New paper: Bonfim and Lima (2020)

Anari Bonfim (Museu Nacional/Federal University of Rio de Janeiro) and Suzi Lima (faculty) have a paper out in Linguistic Variation, 20(2): "Count and mass nouns in Patxohã."

This paper describes the count/mass distinction in Patxohã, a revitalized language spoken in Bahia and Minas Gerais, Brazil. We observe that only count nouns can be directly combined with numerals and that only count nouns can co-occur with plural determiners. Furthermore, only count nouns can be combined with size adjectives. As for quantifiers, we observe that at least one quantifier in the language (nitxi) can be combined with count and mass nouns, but trigger different interpretations depending on the noun it is combined with. We also discuss the use of container phrases in counting and measuring contexts.