A Typology of Word Categoriesnouns in (190) are called measure or group nouns and they differ from other nouns
in terms of their relationship to their complements. The complements of the nouns in
(191) are arguments of those nouns and as such stand in a thematic relationship to
them. In other words, these nouns are thematic elements which have -grids in their
lexical entries. Measure nouns do not stand in the same relationship to their
complements at all and in fact they appear to have a similar relationship to their
complements as quantifying determiners do to their nominal complements. This is not
a thematic relationship and hence it appears that these nouns are not thematic nouns.
Clearly they are not determiners either and hence they seem to be prime candidates to
be analysed as non-thematic non-functional nouns.
The complements of measure nouns are always prepositional, though specifically
the preposition of is always involved. We are not yet in a position to clearly see the
details of what this implies, so we will not pursue the issue at this point. The following
lexical entries are an approximation of what is necessary to more precisely capture
their true nature:
(192) bottle category: [+N, –V]
subcat: [prepositional]
cup category: [+N, –V]
subcat: [prepositional]
group category: [+N, –V]
subcat: [prepositional]
Next, let us consider possible non-thematic non-functional adjectives. Recall that
post-determiners are elements which seem to have adjectival properties in that they
have comparative and superlative forms and may be modified by adverbs:
(193) a the many/more/most people
b these extremely few advantages
It is clear that these elements are not thematic and hence should not be analysed as
adjectives such as pink, certain or keen, for example. For one thing, they cannot be
used predicatively as adjectives can, making them more like degree adverbs:
(194) a the outcome was certain/irrelevant/stupid/etc.
b the people were more/most/several/etc.
c the idea was so/too/as
However, degree adverbs do not have comparative and superlative forms and so it would
be inaccurate to categorise the post-determiners as functional adjectives (i.e. as [+F, +N,
+V]). Therefore we propose that these elements be categorised as [+N, +V] elements. It
seems that post-determiners always select nominal complements, which is why they
have been confused with determiners and hence they have the following lexical entries:
(195) many category: [+N, +V]
subcat: [nominal]
few category: [+N, +V]
subcat: [nominal]
several category: [+N, +V]
subcat: [nominal]