THE LEFT PERIPHERY OF JAPANESEEXCLAMATIVES*

Naoyuki Yamato

Abstract. In this paper, I intend to shed light on the fact that Japaneseexclamatives, unlike their English counterparts, may not be embedded underfactive verbs but instead may be embedded under a set of assertive predicates suchas say and think (first observed in Ono 2006). I argue that this contrast isattributed to the interrogative and declarative syntax that English and Japaneseexclamatives have, respectively. In order to account for the selection of predicatesthat may embed Japanese exclamatives, I further argue for a cartographicapproach based on Rizzi�s (1997) and Haegeman�s (2006) left periphery structuresand following Ono (2006), namely that Japanese exclamatives always containMoodP, which allows only a subset of assertive matrix predicates to embedexclamatives given its position above TopicP and FocusP in the hierarchy.Another observation made in the paper is that the subject DP in Japaneseexclamatives is obligatorily either aboutness topicalized or exhaustive listingfocalized.

1. Introduction

Since Rizzi (1997) and Cinque (1999), there have been a number ofso-called cartographic approaches to various phenomena in the CPdomain (e.g., subsequent works by Rizzi himself, Haegeman 2006 andEndo 2007, a study of the left periphery in Japanese, among others). Thecartography, which assumes fixed functional positions for elements in theleft periphery, has been used as a tool to account for the distribution andthe order of such elements. The present paper is a study of the leftperiphery of exclamative clauses in Japanese that behave differently fromtheir English counterparts. Firstly, Japanese exclamatives may not beembedded under factive predicates (1 vs. 2a) but they may be embeddedunder a set of assertive predicates (1 vs. 2b):1

(1) Mary knows/*thinks/*wonders how very cute he is.(Zanuttini & Portner�s 2003:48 12)

* I would like to thank the editors of this volume and the anonymous reviewers for theirvery helpful comments and suggestions; especially special thanks goes to Klaus Abels forreading previous versions of the paper and providing me with numerous comments andsuggestions. I am also indebted to all of my informants for their grammaticality judgmentson the examples that appear in the present paper.

1 Abbreviations used in the examples in this paper: acc = accusative; c(omp) = com-plementizer; cop = copular; dat =dative; dem =demonstrative; fin =finite; fn = formalnoun (following Ono 2006); foc(.polite) = focus (polite); gen = genitive; loc = locative;n = nominalizer; neg = negation; nom = nominative; p = postposition; past =past tense;pres = present tense; prog = progressive; stat = stative; top = topic

Studia Linguistica 64(1) 2010, pp. 55–80. � The author 2010. Journal compilation� The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 2010. Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd.,9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK, and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA

(2) a. *John-wa [Mary-ga nante takusan-no gakusee-ni okottaJ-top M-nom nante

2 many-gen student-dat angrynoda-roo]-koto-o/to sitteiru.foc-mood-fn-acc/c know

�John knows how very many students Mary got angry at.�(Ono�s 2006:51 6)

b. John-wa [Mary-ga nante takusan-no hon-o yondaJ-top M-nom nante many-gen book-acc readnoda-roo-ka]-to omotteiru.foc-mood-q-c think-be

�John thinks, how very many books Mary read.�(Ono�s 2006:51 10)

In this paper I argue that the above-observed cross-linguistic discrepancyon the embedded distribution of exclamatives is attributed to theinterrogative and declarative syntax that English and Japanese exclama-tives have, respectively. Further, I claim that the restriction on theembedded distribution of Japanese exclamatives is straightforwardlyexplained by assuming the left periphery structure in line with Ono�s(2006) proposal. He argues that the clause-final particles in Japaneseexclamative clauses, namely no da roo, are realizations of the heads of thefunctional projections in the left periphery: FiniteP, FocusP and MoodP,respectively.

(3) Syntactic structure of Japanese exclamatives proposed in Ono (2006)

MoodP

FocusP Mood roo

FiniteP Focus da

IP Finite no

John what a big car bought

2 The morpheme nante in Japanese exclamatives is glossed in Ono and generally as awh-element, but throughout in this paper it is glossed simply as nante for a reason discussedlater in the paper: I argue that exclamatives in Japanese have declarative syntax.

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Another property of Japanese exclamatives I illustrate in this paper isthat the subject DP in exclamatives, when it does not bear the morphemenante, is obligatorily marked as an aboutness topic or an exhaustivelisting focus:3

(4) a. John-wa nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no da (roo)!John-top nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc mood

�What a big car John bought!�b. John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no da (roo)!

John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc mood

�What a big car John *(and only John) bought!�

The structure of the paper is as follows. In Section 2, I use the tests forexclamativity from Portner & Zanuttini (2000) and Zanuttini & Portner(2000, 2003) to show that what Ono (2006) and I refer to asexclamatives in Japanese are indeed exclamatives in Zanuttini &Portner�s sense, i.e., they pattern with the English exclamatives thatthey discuss. The above-mentioned cross-linguistic discrepancy on theembedded distribution of exclamatives is discussed in Section 3.In Section 4 I argue for a cartographic analysis of the embeddeddistribution of Japanese exclamatives using a left periphery structurebased on Rizzi�s (1997) and Haegeman�s (2006) approaches as wellas Ono�s proposal. Section 5 presents the obligatory aboutnesstopic/exhaustive listing focus reading on the subject DP in exclamatives.Section 6 summarizes the discussions.

2. Exclamativity of exclamatives in Japanese

In Japanese, the ingredients of the exclamative construction are themorpheme nante and a sequence of clause-final morphemes, no da (roo):

(5) John-wa nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no da (roo)!John-top nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc mood

�What a big car John bought!�

(6) John-wa nante kuruma-o kat-ta no da (roo)!John-top nante car-acc buy-past fin foc mood

�What a car John bought!�

3 I call X-ga as an exhaustive listing –ga-marked argument when X is the only argumentthat satisfies the predicate of the clause: the notion is more extensively discussed in theliterature, e.g., Kuno (1973) and Kuroda (2005).

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(7) John-wa nante chooshin na no da (roo)!John-top nante tall cop fin foc mood

�How tall John is!�

(8) John-wa nante hayaku gakkoo-ni ki-ta no da (roo)!John-top nante early school-loc come-past fin foc mood

�How early John came to the school!�

In Portner & Zanuttini (2000) and Zanuttini & Portner (2000, 2003), onecan find three criteria for exclamatives: the scalar implicature test, thequestion/answer test and the factivity test. I show in this section thatJapanese exclamatives pattern with their English counterparts when thefirst two tests are applied. In the next section, I show that this is not thecase for the factivity test.

2.1. Scalar implicature test

Since ‘‘[e]xclamatives introduce a conventional scalar implicature to theeffect that the proposition they denote lies at the extreme end of somecontextually given scale’’ (Zanuttini & Portner 2003:47), an expression ofscalar implicature is used as a criterion for exclamatives. It was firstnoticed by Elliott (1974) that exclamatives are not compatible withnegated scalar implicature expressions (9a) while they are compatiblewith positive scalar implicature expressions (9b) (Zanuttini & Portner�s2003:47 15):

(9) a. *It isn�t amazing how very cute he is!b. It is amazing how very cute he is!

As one can see from the examples below, Japanese exclamatives patternwith their English counterparts in this respect:

(10) a. *Mary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta noMary-top John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin

da (roo) to] odoroka-nakat-ta.foc mood comp be.amazed-neg-past

�Mary was not amazed at what a big car John bought.�b. Mary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no

Mary-top John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin

da (roo) to] odoroi-ta.foc mood comp be.amazed-past

�Mary was amazed at what a big car John bought.�

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2.2. Question/answer test

In order to distinguish exclamatives from interrogatives, which may alsocontain wh-elements, Zanuttini & Portner introduce the question/answertest: interrogatives may be responded to with an answer (11) but notexclamatives (12) (Zanuttini & Portner�s 2003:47 17–18):

(11) A: How tall is he?B: Seven feet.

(12) A: How very tall he is!B: *Seven feet.

The same contrast is observed between interrogatives (13) and exclama-tives (14) in Japanese:

(13) A: John-wa dore-dake ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no?John-top which-much big car-acc buy-past fin

�How big car did John buy?�B: 4-ton torakku.

4-ton truck

(14) A: John-wa nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no da (roo)!John-top nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc mood

�What a big car John bought!�B: *4-ton torakku.

4-ton truck

Zanuttini & Portner also show that in English, the exclamativeconstruction cannot be used as an answer to a question (15) (Zanuttini& Portner�s 2003:48 21). This holds for Japanese as well (16).

(15) A: How tall is Tony�s child?B: *How very tall he is!

(16) A: John-wa dore-dake ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no?John-top which-much big car-acc buy-past fin

�How big a car did John buy?�B: *Kare-wa nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no da (roo)!

he-top nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc mood

�What a big car he bought!�

3. Cross-linguistic discrepancy on the embedded distribution of

exclamatives

The factivity of exclamatives was first noticed by Elliott (1974), and it isZanuttini & Portner�s (2003) third criterion for exclamatives: exclama-

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tives may be embedded under factive predicates, but not under non-factive ones (Zanuttini & Portner�s 2003:48 12):

(17) Mary knows/*thinks/*wonders how very cute he is.

In Japanese, however, exclamatives may not be embedded under a factivepredicate such as shiru �know� (18a) while they may be embedded under anon-factive predicate such as omou �think� and iu �say� (18b–c) – exactlythe opposite pattern to what is observed in English.

(18) a. *John-wa [Mary-ga nante takusan-no gakusee-ni okottaJ-top M-nom nante many-gen student-dat angry

noda-roo]-koto-o/to sitteiru.foc-mood-fn-acc/c know

�John knows how very many students Mary got angry at.�(Ono�s 2006:51 6)

b. John-wa [Mary-ga nante takusan-no gakusee-niJohn-top Mary-nom nante many-gen student-dat

okot-ta no da roo to] omot-teiru.get.angry-past fin foc mood comp think-stat

�John thinks how very many students Mary got angry at.�c. John-wa [Mary-ga nante takusan-no gakusee-ni

John-top Mary-nom nante many-gen student-dat

okot-ta no da roo to] it-ta.get.angry-past fin foc mood comp say-past

�John said how very many students Mary got angry at.�

One might wonder whether the instances of exclamatives in (18b–c) are infact cases of embedding because verbs such as iu �say� and omou �think� inthe language may occur with a direct quotation:

(19) a. Maryi-wa [watashii-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-ta to]Mary-top I-nom big car-acc buy-past comp

it-ta.say-past

�Mary said: I bought a big car.�b. Maryi-wa [watashii-ga ichiban kashikoi to] omot-teiru.

Mary-top I-nom most intelligent comp think-stat

�Mary thinks: I am the most intelligent.�

In order to test whether the embedded exclamatives are embedded clausesor main clauses, I use pronoun binding as a test: whether a third personpronoun can be bound by the matrix quantifier subject or not. The result

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of the test indicates that Japanese exclamatives may in fact be embeddedunder verbs such as iu and omou:4

(20) Daremoi-ga [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o karei/j-noeveryone-nom John-nom nante big car-acc he-gen

gareeji-ni tome-ta no da (roo) to] omot-teiru.garage-loc park-past fin foc mood comp think-stat

�Everyone thinks what a big car John parked in his garage.�

Returning to the cross-linguistic contrast on the embedded distribution ofexclamatives observed in (17–18), there are essentially two logicallypossible approaches to the contrast, namely (i) attributing it tocomplement taking properties of the matrix predicates in the twolanguages and (ii) attributing it to the nature of exclamatives in thelanguages. The former approach, however, seems unlikely to workbecause English know and Japanese shiru behave in the same way in termsof complement taking elsewhere, and so do English think and Japaneseomou. The point is illustrated below with declaratives (21–22),wh-interrogatives (23–24) and yes/no-interrogatives (25–26):

(21) a. Mary knows that John ate the cake.b. Mary-wa [John-ga keeki-o tabe-ta to] shit-teiru.

Mary-top John-nom cake-acc eat-past comp know-stat

4 At first, it seems that what looks like embedded exclamatives are instances of directquotations:

(i) Daremoi-ga [kare??i/j-ga nante ookina kuruma-o mi-ta no da (roo)everyone-nom he-nom nante big car-acc see-past fin foc mood

to] omot-teiru.comp think-stat

�Everyone thinks what a big car he saw.�As one can see in (i), the third person pronoun, kare �he�, cannot be bound by the matrixquantifier subject, daremo �everyone�, which suggests that the exclamative part in theexample is not an instance of embedding. A closer look, however, shows that this is aninstance of what is known as the Montalbetti effect. Montalbetti (1984) observes that inpro-drop languages such as Spanish and Japanese, an overt pronoun cannot be A¢-bound ifan empty pronoun is possible in that position (Montalbetti 1984:183 2):

(ii) a. Daremoi-ga [kare*i/j-ga atama-ga ii to] omotte iru.everyone-nom he-nom be-smart comp think�Everyone thinks that he is smart.�

b. Daremoi-ga [[ei/j] atama-ga ii to] omotte iru.

On the other hand, it turns out that genitive pronouns are harder to be empty, and, asMontalbetti would predict, possible to be A�-bound:

(iii) a. Daremoi-ga [John-ga karei/j-no gareeji-ni kuruma-o tome-ta to]everyone-nom John-nom he-gen garage-loc car-acc park-past comp

omot-teiru.think-stat

�Everyone thinks that John parked a car in his garage.�b. Daremo-ga [John-ga (??[e]) gareeji-ni kuruma-o tome-ta to] omot-teiru.

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(22) a. Mary thinks that John ate the cake.b. Mary-wa [John-ga keeki-o tabe-ta to] omot-teiru.

Mary-top John-nom cake-acc eat-past comp think-stat

(23) a. Mary knows what John ate.b. Mary-wa [John-ga nani-o tabe-ta ka] shit-teiru.

Mary-top John-nom what-acc eat-past q know-stat

(24) a. *Mary thinks what John ate.b. *Mary-wa [John-ga nani-o tabe-ta ka] omot-teiru.

Mary-top John-nom what-acc eat-past q think-stat

(25) a. Mary knows whether John ate the cake.b. Mary-wa [John-ga keeki-o tabe-ta kadooka] shit-teiru.

Mary-top John-nom cake-acc eat-past whether know-stat

(26) a. *Mary thinks whether John ate the cake.b. *Mary-wa [John-ga keeki-o tabe-ta kadooka] omot-teiru.

Mary-top John-nom cake-acc eat-past whether think-stat

Another approach, namely attributing the above-observed cross-linguis-tic contrast regarding the embedded distribution of exclamatives to thenature of exclamatives, seems to fare better although the property inquestion cannot be factivity because Japanese exclamatives do occurunder some factive verbs:

(27) Mary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no daMary-top John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc

(roo) to] odoroi-ta.mood comp be.amazed-past

�Mary was amazed at what a big car John bought.�

A number of authors have argued that exclamative clauses essentiallyhave a syntax/semantics of wh-interrogatives (see for example d�Avis2002, Zanuttini & Portner 2000, 2003 and Sæbø this volume). In the restof this section, I argue that the above-observed contrast between Englishexclamatives and their Japanese counterparts is an indication that, unlikein English, Japanese exclamatives have a declarative syntax. First observein (28) below that Norwegian has two constructions to express adjectivalexclamatives, with hvor �how� and with sa �so�, and when they areembedded, they both pattern with English exclamatives in the sense thatthey can be embedded under factive predicates (29a) but not under, say,assertive verbs (29b):

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(28) a. Hvor veldig vakker han er.how very beautiful he is

b. Sa veldig vakker han er.so very beautiful he is

(29) a. Det er utrolig hvor/sa veldig vakker han er.it is incredible how/so very beautiful he is

b. *Marit sier hvor/sa veldig vakker han er.Marit says how/so very beautiful he is

However, Øystein Vangsnes (personal communication) provides me witha case where the predicate a vite �to know� may embed hvor-exclamativesbut not sa-exclamatives:

(30) Marit vet hvor/*sa veldig vakker han er.Marit knows how/so very beautiful he is

This seems to be an indication that the hvor-exclamatives pattern withEnglish exclamatives, and that the sa-exclamatives pattern with Japaneseexclamatives. This further indicates that the former may be a type ofembedded interrogatives and thus embedded under (a subset of) thepredicates that embed interrogatives whereas the latter are ‘‘declarativeexclamatives’’ in the sense that they are embedded under a subsetof predicates that embed declarative clauses, such as say and think(cf. Grimshaw 1979). The fact that the former type of exclamativescontains an overt wh-element whereas it is not the case with the lattersupports this view. Japanese exclamatives at first do seem to contain awh-phrase, nante, but unlike in languages like English and Norwegian,where the wh-element used in exclamatives, how and hvor, are widely usedin interrogatives (31a–b), the use of nante in interrogatives is quiterestricted: it only has a quotative use (32a–b).

(31) a. How tall is John?b. Hvor vakker er han?

how beautiful is he

(32) a. John-wa dore-dake/*nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no?John-top which-much/nante big car-acc buy-past fin

�How big a car did John buy?�b. John-wa nante it-ta no?

John-top nante say-past fin

�What did John say?�

Assuming nante is not a wh-phrase in the same sense as how is in Englishand hvor is in Norwegian, the generalization seems to hold thatwh-exclamatives, i.e., English exclamatives and hvor-exclamatives inNorwegian, may only be embedded under a subset of question-embeddingpredicates whereas non-wh-exclamativs, i.e., sa-exclamatives inNorwegian

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and Japanese exclamatives, may only be embedded under declarative-embedding predicates (cf. behaviours of English know and think andJapanese shiru �know� and omou �think� in terms of complement taking in21–26).5,6

4. A cartographic approach to a correlation among the embedded

distributions of exclamatives, aboutness topics and exhaustive listing

foci in Japanese

In the last section I have shown that the embedded distribution ofJapanese exclamatives can be explained by analyzing them as embeddeddeclaratives, as opposed to the standard analysis of exclamatives asinterrogatives (e.g., Zanuttini & Portner 2003). In this section I will firstreview Ono�s (2006) account of the embedded distribution of Japaneseexclamatives in Subsection 4.1. In Subsection 4.2, I will present acorrelation between the embedded distribution of exclamatives and thatof aboutness topics and exhaustive listing foci in the language, andI argue that the observed distributional correlation can be best explainedby a cartographic account that Ono calls a ‘‘size’’ account.

4.1. Ono�s (2006) accounts of the embedded distribution of Japaneseexclamatives

Ono�s (2006) study of Japanese exclamatives reveals not only that ‘‘verbsthat require an interrogative clause complement (i.e., tazuneru �ask� andkiku �ask�) cannot take an exclamative clause as a complement’’ (Ono2006:49) but also that ‘‘verbs that only take a proposition as theircomplement are unable to embed exclamatives (sinziru �believe,� syutyoo-

5 The selection of predicates that embed English exclamatives and hvor-exclamatives inNorwegian among the question-embedding predicates is however outside the scope of thepresent paper. For example, lure �wonder� may embed interrogatives (ia) but not hvor-exclamatives (ib) (see also 17 for English):

(i) a. Marit lurer hvor vakker han er.Marit wonders how beautiful he is

b. *Marit lurer hvor veldigvakker han er.Marit wonders how very beautiful he is

6 Rett (2009) also provides an account where wh-exclamatives are not analyzed asinterrogatives. Namely, she claims, given that the content of wh-exclamatives is a degreeproperty, that wh-exclamatives are free relatives. She further argues that multiple wh-ex-clamatives such as (i) below is ungrammatical ‘‘because the illocutionary force operatorassociated with wh-exclamatives binds a free degree argument – and because each utterancecan presumably be expressed with only one ilocutionary force operator (Rett 2009:610):’’

(i) *How very fat how very many people are! (Rett�s 2009:610 18b)

Japanese, however, allows for multiple exclamatives as observed by Ono (2006:71 75a):

(ii) [Nante osanai kodomo]-ga [nante muzukasii mondai]-o toita no da roo!nante young child-nom nante difficult problem-acc solved exc

It is, therefore, not clear to me how Japanese exclamatives could be analyzed as freerelatives.

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suru �claim�)’’ (Ono 2006:49); see a summary of the embedded distributionof Japanese exclamatives in (34) below:

(33) a. *John-wa [Mary-ga nante takusan-no gakusee-ni okottaJ-top M-nom nante many-gen student-dat angrynoda-roo-ka]-(to) tazuneta.foc-mood-c asked

�John asked how very many students Mary got angry at.�(Ono�s 2006:49 1a)

b. *John-wa [Mary-ga nante takusan-no hon-o yondaJ-top M-nom nante many-gen book-acc readnoda-roo]-to sinziteiru.foc-mood-c believe

�John believes how very many books Mary read.�(Ono�s 2006:49 3a)

(34) Summary of the embedded distribution of Japanese exclamatives(Ono�s 2006:52 12)

koto-comp to-comp

A. tazuneru �ask�kiku �ask�

No Yesexc = No

B. sinziru �believe�syutyoosuru �claim�

Yes Yesexc = No

C. sitteiru �know�oboeteiru �remember�

Yes Yes??exc = No

D. kitaisuru �hope�nozomu �wish�

Yes Yes??exc = No

E. omou �think�iu �say�

No Yesexc = Yes

F. odoroku �be surprised�akireru �be amazed�

Yes Yesexc = Yes

As summarized in the table above, Ono observes an interesting conditionfor embedding exclamatives, namely that exclamatives are embeddedonly under the simplex complementizer to but not under what Ono calls anominal complementizer (to-iu-)koto, which is best illustrated by thecontrast in (35) below:

(35) a. Mary-wa [John-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-taMary-top John-nom big car-acc buy-past

to](-iu-koto-ni) odoroi-ta.comp-say-thing-dat be.amazed-past

�Mary was amazed that John bought a big car.�

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b. Mary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta noMary-top John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin

da (roo) to](*-iu-koto-ni) odoroi-ta.foc mood comp-say-thing-dat be.amazed-past

�Mary was amazed at what a big car John bought.�

In order to account for the above-observed embedded distribution ofexclamatives in Japanese, Ono considers two approaches that he calls a‘‘size’’ account and an adnominal form account.The size account is a cartographic approach based on the functional

hierarchy in the left periphery (cf. Rizzi 1997). Namely, the argumentpresented in Ono (2006) is that Japanese exclamatives contain thefunctional projections of FiniteP, FocusP and MoodP in the leftperiphery, and assuming that the noun complement structure is at mostthe size of FiniteP, exclamatives are ‘‘too big’’ to be embedded under thenominal complementizer (to-iu-)koto:

(36) Syntactic structure for Japanese exclamatives proposed in Ono (2006)

John what a big car bought

MoodP

FocusP Mood roo

FiniteP Focus da

IP Finite no

As one can see in the structure above, Ono analyzes the clause-finalmorphemes in the exclamative construction, no, da and roo to berealizations of the heads of FiniteP, FocusP and MoodP, respectively, inthe left periphery of the clause (see his arguments in Chapter 2 of Ono2006 together with Hiraiwa & Ishihara 2002 on which Ono builds hisarguments on no-da), and thus the surface order of these morphemes isattributed to the hierarchical order of the functional projections thatrealize the morphemes as the head. This account makes a strongprediction that not only exclamatives but any construction that containsFiniteP, FocusP and MoodP in the left periphery, i.e., the morphemes no,da and roo clause-finally on the surface, would not be allowed under the

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nominal complementizer (to-iu-)koto. This prediction is indeed borne out.As Ono (2006) points out, following Johnson (2003), the moodmorpheme roo ‘‘indicates the judgment of the speaker toward theproposition to which the morpheme attaches’’ (Ono 2006:24). This isobviously not a property exclusive to exclamatives (Ono�s 2006:26 74):

(37) John-wa osoraku hon-o kau-n(o)da-roo.J-top probably book-acc buy-noda-mood

�Probably, John would buy a book.�

It turns out that the embedded distribution of such constructions isidentical to that of exclamatives. Namely, it may be embedded under thepredicates that take the simplex complementizer to, such as omou �think�,but not under those that take the nominal complementizer to-iu-koto,such as shiru �know�:

(38) a. Mary-wa [John-wa osoraku hon-o kau-no-da-rooMary-top John-top probably book-acc buy-fin-foc-mood

to] omot-teiru.comp think-stat

�Mary thinks John would probably buy a book.�b. ??Mary-wa [John-wa osoraku hon-o kau-no-da-roo

Mary-top John-top probably book-acc buy-fin-foc-mood

to]-iu-koto-o shit-teiru.comp-say-thing-acc know-stat

�Mary knows John would probably buy a book.�

Ono, however, further observes that a construction with the morphemeroo can be embedded under the nominal complementizer (to-iu-)kotowhen the morpheme no is dropped (note that no-de-ar-oo is merely a morecomplex/formal version of no-da-roo; cf. Ono�s 2006 Chapter 2):

(39) a. *[John-ga kaetta-no-de-ar-oo]-koto-wa yooini soozoo-dekiruJ-nom left-n-p-exist-mood-fn-top easily imagine-can�It is very easy to imagine that John left.� (Ono�s 2006:28 82)

b. [John-ga kaetta-de-ar-oo]-koto-wa yooini soozoo-dekiruJ-nom left-p-exist-mood-fn-top easily imagine-can�It is very easy to imagine that John left.� (Ono�s 2006:28 84)

This piece of evidence leads Ono to reject the size account and,alternatively, propose an approach he calls an adnominal form account,where he argues that what is embedded under the nominal complemen-tizer (to-iu-)koto is an adnominal form licensed by a syntactic C-T-v-Vhead amalgamation (see Hiraiwa 2001, 2002). Under Hiraiwa�s accountof head amalgamation, the complementizer has to be affixal in orderto attract the verb to raise, pied-piping the functional projections, to forma morphological unit. According to this adnominal form account,therefore, the unavailability of a construction with no-da-roo is because

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‘‘the particles no-da/no-dearu are quite different from the copula, and arein fact a realization of the complementizer’’ (Ono 2006:23), and since it isthen not affixal, licensing of a legitimate adnominal form fails, yieldingungrammaticality, whereas this is not the case when the morpheme no isdropped.In the remainder of this section, I will present a piece of data that

shows a correlation between the embedded distribution of aboutnesstopics and exhaustive listing foci and that of exclamatives in Japanese,and I will argue that the observed correlation is best accounted for by acartographic account in terms of the size of the left periphery.

4.2. Parallel embedded distributions of aboutness topics, exhaustive listingfoci and exclamatives in Japanese – a cartographic approach

Based on the classification of predicates in Hooper & Thompson (1973),Yamato (2007) shows that in Japanese, (strongly- and weakly-)assertivepredicates (Class A and B predicates in Hooper & Thompson�staxonomy) may embed exhaustive listing focus (or aboutness topic)constructions (40–41). Non-assertive predicates (Class C) (42) and factiveverbs (Class D) (43) may not:

(40) Class A: strongly-assertive predicatesMary-wa [John-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-ta to] it-ta.Mary-top John-nom big car-acc buy-past comp say-past

�Mary said John (and only John) bought a big car.�

(41) Class B: weakly-assertive predicatesMary-wa [John-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-ta to] omot-teiru.Mary-top John-nom big car-acc buy-past comp think-stat

�Mary thinks John (and only John) bought a big car.�

(42) Class C: non-assertive predicatesMary-wa [John-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-taMary-top John-nom big car-acc buy-past

to]-iu-koto-o utagat-teiru.comp-say-thing-acc doubt-stat

�Mary doubts that John (*and only John) bought a big car.�

(43) Class D: factive predicatesMary-wa [John-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-taMary-top John-nom big car-acc buy-past

to]-iu-koto-o shit-teiru.comp-say-thing-acc know-stat

�Mary knows that John (*and only John) bought a big car.�

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Based on Rizzi�s (1997) and Haegeman�s (2006) left periphery structures,Yamato (2007) argues that in Japanese, aboutness topicalized / exhaus-tive listing focalized argument DP�s occupy positions in the left peripheralfunctional projections, namely SpecTopicP and SpecFocusP, respec-tively. Non-aboutness topicalized and non-exhaustive listing argumentsare within the IP domain. The paper further contends that this is whyaboutness topicalized / exhaustive listing focalized argument DP�s do notappear in the complements of non-assertive predicates and factivepredicates while they do appear in the complements of assertivepredicates. The former do not have ForceP and thus may not projectTopicP and FocusP, while the latter do have ForceP and thus mayproject TopicP and FocusP above it:

(44) Syntactic positions for –wa/–ga-marked elements proposed inYamato (2007)

TopicP

X-waTOP

FocusP

Y-gaexh

IP

Z-ganon-exh

ForceP

Let us now return to exclamatives. It turns out that the embeddeddistribution of exclamatives parallels that of aboutness topics andexhaustive listing foci in the sense that assertive predicates embedexclamatives (45–46) whereas non-assertive and factive predicates do not(47–48).

(45) Class A: strongly-assertive predicatesMary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no daMary-top John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc

(roo) to] it-ta.mood comp say-past

�Mary said what a big car John bought.�

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(46) Class B: weakly-assertive predicatesMary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no daMary-top John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc

(roo) to] omot-teiru.mood comp think-stat

�Mary thinks what a big car John bought.�

(47) Class C: non-assertive predicates*Mary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no daMary-top John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc

(roo) to]-iu-koto-o utagat-teiru.mood comp-say-thing-acc doubt-stat

�Mary doubts what a big car John bought.�

(48) Class D: factive predicates*Mary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no daMary-top John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc

(roo) to]-iu-koto-o shit-teiru.mood comp-say-thing-acc know-stat

�Mary knows what a big car John bought.�

A closer look, however, reveals that the distribution of exclamatives ismore restricted than that of aboutness topics and exhaustive listing foci.Assertive predicates such as shinjiru �believe� and shuchoo suru �claim� mayembed aboutness topics and exhaustive listing foci (49a) but notexclamatives (49b):

(49) a. Mary-wa [John-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-ta to]Mary-top John-nom big car-acc buy-past comp

shinji-teiru.believe-stat

�Mary believes that John (and only John) bought a big car.�b. *Mary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no

Mary-top John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin

da (roo) to] shinji-teiru.foc mood comp believe-stat

�Mary believes what a big car John bought.�

We have observed above that the embedded distribution of Japaneseexclamatives is not identical to that of aboutness topics and exhaustivelisting foci; the former is more restricted than the latter. We now need ananalysis that (i) accounts for the embedded distribution of exclamativesindependently of that of aboutness topics and exhaustive listing foci yetstill (ii) links the two phenomena since the predicates that may embedexclamatives seem to be a subset of those that embed topics andexhaustive listing foci. Ono�s (2006) adnominal form account, aspresented in the last subsection, accounts for the independent embedded

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distribution of exclamatives but does not account for the above-observedcorrelation. The cartographic approach, on the other hand, neatly takescare of the both problems. As seen in works such as Haegeman (2006),cartography provides a tool for explaining embedded distribution ofvarious phenomena related to the CP domain. The richer the functionalprojections in the left periphery a construction requires, the morerestricted the embedded distribution of the construction is. For example,Haegeman shows that in English, the availability of argument fronting inperipheral adverbial clauses (50a) and its unavailability in centraladverbial clauses (50b) are due to the presence/absence of ForceP, whichaccommodates the assertion of the clause and makes available higherfunctional projections such as TopicP and FocusP which host the frontedarguments (51):

(50) a. If these problems we cannot solve, there are many othersthat we can tackle immediately. (Haegeman�s 2006:33 14f)

b. *If these exams you don�t pass you won�t get the degree.(Haegeman�s 2006:33 12a)

(51) The left periphery structure (Haegeman�s 2006:36 18b–d)a. Central adverbial clause: Sub Mod* Finb. Peripheral adverbial

clause:Sub Top Focus Force Mod* Fin

c. Root clause: Top Focus Force Mod* Fin

Ono�s size account of the embedded distribution of Japanese exclamativesworks in much the same way as Haegeman�s (2006) analysis of Englishargument fronting in adverbial clauses. The claim is that the restrictionon the embedded distribution of Japanese exclamatives is due to thepresence of MoodP in the left periphery, which hosts the notion of thepresumptive mood (Johnson 2003) of the clause. Implementing Ono�s sizeaccount and extending Yamato�s (2007) proposal that the restrictedembedded distribution of aboutness topics and exhaustive listing foci isdue to the presence/absence of ForceP, I argue that the restriction on theembedded distribution of Japanese exclamatives is attributed to thepresence/absence of MoodP:

(52) a. Embedding under non-assertive V:

Sub Fin

b. Embedding underbelieve-V:

Sub Top Focus Force Fin

c. Embedding under say/think-V:

Sub Mood Top Focus Force Fin

d. Root clauses Mood Top Focus Force Fin

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Yamato (2007) argues that aboutness topics and exhaustive listing focimay be embedded under assertive predicates but not under non-assertiveand factive ones. This is because the former may embed a clause with afunctional projection, namely ForceP, which allows for higher projec-tions in the left periphery such as TopicP and FocusP. These, in turn,host aboutness topics and exhaustive listing foci. In the present paper Iextend the argument that the embedded distribution of exclamatives ismore restricted than that of aboutness topics and exhaustive listing focibecause exclamatives contain a functional projection, namely MoodP,which is projected higher than TopicP and FocusP. The evidence for thisassertion comes from the morphological order of the clause-finalparticles, as well as from the fact that only a limited set of assertivepredicates (which includes iu �say� and omou �think� but excludes shinjiru�believe�) may embed a clause with MoodP. The analysis is furtherstrengthened when one notes that the observed restriction on embeddingoccurs not only with exclamatives but also with other types of clauseswith the mood morpheme. The following example demonstrates that anyclause with the clause-final morpheme roo cannot be embedded undershinjiru �believe� (compare also 18 a–b and 38):

(53) ??Mary-wa [John-wa osoraku hon-o kau-no-da-roo to]Mary-top John-top probably book-acc buy-fin-foc-mood comp

shinji-teiru.believe-stat

�Mary believes John would probably buy a book.�

This piece of evidence provides further support for the present claim thatthe restriction on the embedded distribution of Japanese exclamatives isattributed to the presence of the functional projection MoodP in the leftperiphery.I have argued above that presence of MoodP, of which the morpheme

roo is the morphological realization, is responsible for the restriction onthe embedded distribution of Japanese exclamatives. Given the argu-ment, it is predicted that as soon as the morpheme roo is dropped, therestriction will be weakened. The data presented in this paper, however,points to the opposite. As one can see from the examples presented, themood morpheme roo seems to be optional in Japanese exclamatives. Yetit is observed that the embedded distribution of exclamatives is restrictedin the same way no matter if they contain the morpheme roo or not. Inorder to account for this observation, I follow Ono�s (2006) claim that themorpheme roo in Japanese exclamatives must be covertly present when it

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is not pronounced. A piece of evidence for his claim is that in the politeform of exclamatives, the morpheme yoo, the counterpart of roo, isobligatory:

(54) a. *John-wa nante kasiko-i-no-desu!J-top nante intelligent-pres-fin-foc.polite

b. John-wa nante kasiko-i-no-des-yoo!J-top nante intelligent-pres-fin-foc.polite-mood

�How very intelligent John is!� (Ono�s 2006:6 4)

I argue, therefore, that MoodP is always projected in exclamatives andblocks embedding under the believe-type of predicates.Before concluding the section, I illustrate yet another correlation

between embedded exclamatives and embedded aboutness topics/exhaustive listing foci, with respect to complementizer selection. Recallthat the grammaticality of embedded exclamatives depends on theselection of the complementizer. Exclamatives are allowed under thesimplex complementizer to whereas they are not allowed underthe complex to-iu-koto. It is demonstrated in (35), which is repeatedbelow:

(55) a. Mary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta noMary-top John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin

da (roo) to] odoroi-ta.foc mood comp be.amazed-past

�Mary was amazed at what a big car John bought.�b. *Mary-wa [John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o

Mary-top John-nom nante big car-acc

kat-ta no da (roo) to]-iu-koto-ni odoroi-ta.buy-past fin foc mood comp-say-thing-dat be.amazed-past

�Mary was amazed at what a big car John bought.�

As demonstrated in (40–43) and (45–48), this seems to hold for theembedded distributions of both aboutness topics / exhaustive listingfoci and exclamatives under predicates of all classes. Ono�s (2006)adnominal form approach assumes that the inability of exclamatives tobe embedded under the nominal complementizer (to-iu-)koto isattributed to the fact that exclamatives resist the syntactic amalgam-ation to form a legitimate adnominal form, and he illustrates thispoint by showing that Japanese exclamatives in general resist nomi-

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nalization (56b) as opposed to for example interrogatives (56a) (Ono�s2006:53 14a and 15a):

(56) a. John-wa [Mary-ga doko-e itta]-ka(-o) tazuneta.J-top M-nom where-to went-q-acc asked�John asked where Mary went.�

b. *John-wa [Mary-ga nante mazusii]-no-da-roo(-o) nageita.J-top M-nom nante poor-fin-foc-mood-acc lamented�John lamented how very poor Mary is.�

Under Ono�s adnominal form account, aboutness topics and exhaustivefoci are not predicted to resist nominalization as long as they do notcontain the non-affixal complementizer no-da. However, this prediction isnot borne out:

(57) a. *John-wa keeki-o tabe-ta to-iu jijitsuJohn-top cake-acc eat-past comp-say fact�the fact that John ate the cake�

b. John-ga keeki-o tabe-ta to-iu jijitsuJohn-nom cake-acc eat-past comp-say fact�the fact that John (*and only John) ate the cake�

A plausible explanation for why this is so would be to attribute theabsence of aboutness topics and exhaustive foci (and hence exclama-tives) under the to-iu-koto complementizer and in nominalization tolack of illocutionary force in such constructions, i.e., the lack of ForcePfailing at licensing TopicP and FocusP and thus also failing ataccommodating necessary ingredients for the left periphery compositionof exclamatives.In this subsection I have sketched out a cartographic approach that

accounts for both (i) the embedded distributional parallelism amongaboutness topics, exhaustive listing foci and exclamatives in Japanese and(ii) a more restricted distribution of embedded exclamatives compared tothat of aboutness topics and exhaustive listing foci. I have shown thatboth observations are straightforwardly accounted for by assuming thefunctional projection MoodP in the left periphery of the exclamativeconstruction in Japanese. Namely, that MoodP is projected aboveFocusP (and presumably TopicP), which receives evidence from thesurface order of the clause-final morphemes, provides an explanation forthe restriction on the embedded distribution of the exclamatives that isstricter than that on the embedded distribution of aboutness topics andexhaustive listing foci:

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(58) Embedded distribution of aboutness topics, (non-)exhaustive listing fociand exclamatives

Subset of assertive verbs (e.g., say/think) MoodP

Assertive verbs (e.g., say/think, believe)

TopicP

X-waTOP

FocusP

Y-gaexh

ForceP

(Non-)assertive verbs(e.g., say/think, believe, doubt, know)

IP

Z-ganon-exh

5. Obligatory aboutness topic or exhaustive listing focus reading

on the subject DP of Japanese exclamatives

In Japanese, the subject DP may be marked with either the nominativecase marker, –ga (59a), or the aboutness topic marker, –wa (59b). Whenit is –ga-marked, as seen in (59a), and similarly, when an object DP isaccusative –o-marked, the reading is ambiguous between an exhaustivelisting reading and a non-exhaustive listing reading:

(59) a. John-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-ta.John-nom big car-acc buy-past

�John (and only John) bought a big car (and only a big car).�b. John-wa ookina kuruma-o kat-ta.

John-top big car-acc buy-past

�As for John, he bought a big car (and only a big car).�

One may have noticed that the subject DP�s of all the matrix exclamativesin this paper (and in fact most of the exclamative examples in theliterature) are topic –wa-marked. The question is, then, whether they areobligatorily –wa-marked, or whether there are cases where the subjectis simply nominative case-marked in the exclamative construction. The

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answer is that there are indeed cases where the exclamative subjectis –ga-marked, but in such a case, it gets a special interpretation: it isobligatorily interpreted with an exhaustive listing reading unlike innormal declarative construction (compare 60 with 59a).7

(60) John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no da (roo)!John-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin foc mood

�What a big car (and only what a big car) John *(and only John)bought!�

This is exemplified by the fact that the example is infelicitous under acontext that requires the subject argument to bear a non-exhaustivelisting reading such as the following:

(61) Context: A bunch of people including John bought a surprisinglybig car.#John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no da (roo)!

Notice, however, that the obligatory exhaustive listing reading is notimposed on the object DP, kuruma �car�, in (60). The interpretation of theobject DP in exclamatives is still ambiguous between an exhaustive listingreading and a non-exhaustive listing reading as in normal declarativeconstructions (see 59). Another example of this subject-object asymmetryis found in the example below:

(62) John-ga keeki-o nante hayaku tabe-ta no da (roo)!John-nom cake-acc nante quickly eat-past fin foc mood

�How very quickly John *(and only John) ate the cakes(and only the cakes)!�

In the literature, there are a number of tests for exhaustivity. In thissection, I apply (i) the coordination and entailment test taken fromSzabolcsi (1981) and (ii) the compatibility test with oozeino hito �manypeople� taken from Kuno (1973), to show that the subject DP inexclamatives does have an obligatory exhaustive listing reading.The first test I apply is the coordination and entailment test (Szabolcsi

1981). A sentence with coordination, with an exhaustive listing reading,does not entail the same sentence without one of the coordinates.A sentence with non-exhaustive listing coordination, however, does entailthe same example with one of the coordinates dropped. When given acontext which forces a non-exhaustive listing reading, therefore, a normal

7 It is noteworthy that the subject DP of simplex stative predicates is also obligatorilytopicalized or exhaustive listing focalized (observed in the literature, e.g., Kuno 1973):

(i) John-ga gakusee da.John-nom student cop

�John *(and only John) is a student.�(ii) John-wa gakusee da.

John-top student cop

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declarative sentence with coordination will entail the same sentencewithout one of the coordinates:

(63) Context: (A bunch of people, including) Taroo and Mary, eachbought a big car.a. Taroo to Mary-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-ta.

Taroo and Mary-nom big car-acc buy-past

�Taroo and Mary bought a big car.�b. ) Taroo-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-ta.

�Taroo bought a big car.�

When the test is applied to an exclamative construction, however, adifferent result is obtained. When the nominative-marked subject of anexclamative clause is coordinated, the sentence does not entail the sameexample with one of the coordinated subjects dropped:

(64) Context: John and Mary each bought a surprisingly big car.a. John to Mary-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no

John and Mary-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin

da (roo)!foc mood

�What a big car John and Mary bought!�b. ; John-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta no da (roo)!

�What a big car John bought!�

This test therefore shows that the subject DP of exclamatives cannot beinterpreted without an exhaustive listing reading.The second test deals with compatibility of exhaustivity with the DP

oozeino hito �many people�. It is first observed in Kuno (1973) that thisDP, oozeino hito, never gets an exhaustive listing reading (65a). Similarly,the English counterpart is also ungrammatical (65b):

(65) a. oozeino hito-ga ookina kuruma-o kat-ta.many person-nom big car-acc buy-past

�Many people bought a big car.�b. *Many people and only many people came to the party.

If the nominative-marked subject DP in exclamatives always has anexhaustive listing reading, we would predict that oozeino hito may not bein the subject position of the exclamative construction with thenominative marker. This prediction is borne out:

(66) *oozeino hito-ga nante ookina kuruma-o kat-ta nomany person-nom nante big car-acc buy-past fin

da (roo)!foc mood

�What a big car many people bought!�

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Assuming the left periphery structure argued for in this paper, I willattempt a tentative approach to the above-observed obligatory readingon the subject of exclamatives. Notice (i) that the relevant projections,namely TopicP and FocusP, are hierarchically lower than the othercrucial ingredient of exclamatives, MoodP, in the left periphery, and(ii) that the hierarchical order between FocusP and MoodP is determinedby the morphological order of the head morphemes of these projections.Since it was shown that MoodP is always present in Japanese exclama-tives, I would like to suggest that FocusP (and presumably also TopicP) isalso always present in the exclamative construction. Assuming a sortof EPP feature in the specifier of such projections, the obligatorytopic/exhaustive listing focus interpretation on the subject of exclama-tives obtains.This solution, however, suffers from a number of problems. Firstly, the

proposed suggestion does not account for the fact that only the subjectDP but not the object undergoes movement to receive an obligatoryaboutness topic or exhaustive listing focus reading (see 60/62). Moreover,there exists a case in which the subject DP in an exclamative clause doesnot seem to have an exhaustive listing reading. It is when nante isattached to the subject DP:

(67) nante oozeino hito-ga sono kuruma-o kat-ta no danante many person-nom dem car-acc buy-past fin foc

(roo)!mood

�How very many people bought the car (and only the car)!�

As one can see in comparing (66) and (67), oozeino hito, which isincompatible with an exhaustive listing reading, can be the subject ofexclamatives only if the nante is attached to it. Secondly, the system doesnot account for the fact that it is enough to ‘‘activate’’ either one ofTopicP or FocusP to further project the higher projection MoodP, i.e.,the subject only gets either an aboutness topic reading or an exhaustivelisting focus reading but not both.Since I do not have a proposal that accounts for these problems, I leave

the issues for future research.

6. Conclusion

In this paper, I have proposed an account of the embedded distributionof Japanese exclamative clauses. Unlike in English, Japanese exclama-tives may not be embedded under factive (or question-taking) predicatesbut may be embedded under some declarative-embedding predicates.With the observation that Norwegian wh-exclamatives pattern withEnglish exclamatives whereas Norwegian non-wh-exclamatives patternwith Japanese exclamatives in terms of their embedded distribution,

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I have argued that this cross-linguistic discrepancy is attributed to theinterrogative and declarative syntax that English and Japanese exclama-tives have, respectively. I have further presented data that shows acorrelation between the embedded distribution of aboutness topics andexhaustive listing foci and that of exclamatives. Given the observation,I have argued that the restriction on the embedding distribution ofJapanese exclamatives is best explained by a cartographic approach Ono(2006) calls a size account. I have also presented a piece of data thatshows that the subject DP�s of Japanese exclamatives are obligatorilyinterpreted with either an aboutness topic or an exhaustive listing focus.I have left unsolved, however, some of the problems such the subject-object asymmetry, which are therefore left for future research.

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Naoyuki YamatoUniversity of Tromsø/CASTL

Fakultet for humaniora, samfunnsvitenskap og lærerutdanningUniversitetet i Tromsø

N-9037 TromsøNorway

naoyuki.yamato@uit.no

80 Naoyuki Yamato

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