QUANTIFYING NUMBER IN THE NOUN PHRASE: A COMPARATIVE STUDY BETWEEN ENGLISH AND MACEDONIAN

: This paper discusses some of the theoretical insights for English gained by means of a contrastive analysis with Macedonian on the issue of grammatical/semantic number in the NP, with a particular focus on the features of partitivity, collectivity and distributivity reflected through marked external (grammatical) means. Quantifying the NP provides information on the fragmentation of the whole, togetherness of the whole (with non-determinedness of entities), or the individuality of each element of the whole. The quantitative characteristics are visible in the NP structure, while the syntactic relationships formally realize the connection between the quantity in the NP and semanticity. Through excerpted examples from authentic source materials (in English and Macedonian) and translations, it will be concluded that both languages have more commonalities than differences in the morphology and semantics of these features, although precision of language means is necessary to avoid miscommunication.


Introduction
Language makes a distinction between individual entities and the plurality of those entities, which can be expressed through lexical quantifiers or through the morphosyntactic characteristics of the nouns (Acquaviva, 2008;Chierchia, 1998;Corbett, 2000;Corbett, 2001;Cruse, 1994;Link, 1998)."The category of number represents grammaticalization of the intensional definition of a set; it grammaticalizes specific properties of a referent, a certain semantic meaning of quantity" (Петроска, 2008, 19).Petroska uses the term 'intensional' as these sets are characterized by sharing common traits and properties, with sufficient conditions having been fulfilled (Allwood et al., 1977).The grammatical form for the category of number in nouns most commonly coincides with semantic countability in both Macedonian and English, are those on verbs, with some rare instances on quantifiers.This proves that for children it is the syntactic relationship between the NP and the verb that is more perceptible than agreement in the NP.
Concerning grammatical number and semanticity, the different modifiers in these languages can play a partitive role (few, a few, little, a little, several, some), a collective role (all, every) or a distributive role (both, each, every, either, neither), and while in English they have an unchangeable form, in Macedonian the forms are changeable depending on the category of number and in some instances, gender.Quantifiers give precision of focus in the NP.
This paper explores some of the theoretical insights for English gained by means of a contrastive analysis with Macedonian on the issue of number in the NP, with a particular focus on partitivity, collectivity, and distributivity.Both languages are Indo-European, with the former having branched out into a West Germanic language, while the latter is a South Slavic language.The examples in the paper have been excerpted from online newspapers/journals as well as works of literature, written in English and Macedonian, all of which are stated at the end of this paper (see Sources).The results of this contrastive study will have applicative potential in translation studies.

Partitivity
Partitivity denotes a feature of nouns that marks a part or a given amount (quantity) of the contents of the noun, i.e. one or more than one part of a whole, which can consist of discrete or non-discrete elements, and as such has formal markers, e.g. a slice of bread (парче леб).In fact, what is distinct about partitivity is the inclusion of non-discrete elements, which are uncountable.Partitivity in the broadest sense of the word refers to all that the entity represents as a fragment of the whole, however, this fragment of the whole is not marked externally on the (head) noun so as to be clear that partitivity is in question.Every NP characterized by number can be turned partitive, thus providing information on the fragment of the whole (Falco and Zamparelli, 2019;Pelletier, 1974;Минова-Ѓуркова, 2000, 118;Петроска, 2008, 39-48;Тополињска, 1974, 58).
In English, the following examples -dust, glass, grass, sand -represent mass nouns, for which there are no equivalent plural forms, hence the singular forms with preceding indefinite articles or numerals are lacking -*one dust, *one glass, *one grass, *a sand.If speakers do want to stress their separate constituent parts or quantify them by counting, then the NP could be expanded into -a particle of dust, a shard of glass, a blade of grass, a grain of sand -with the mass nouns being head nouns, while the information on countability is in the modifiers preceding the head noun (Huddleston and Pullum, 2002, 328).In Macedonian, however, the uncountability of the above nouns -прашина, стакло, трева -has created quite interesting singular nominal forms (singulatives) of a diminutive nature -прашинка, стакленце, тревка -as equivalents to the above NP expansions in English.Such singulative derivation is limited, yet other examples in Macedonian are: клас / клавче, јаглен / јагленче, семе / семка, снег / снегулка (Конески К., 2003, 63; Марков, 1973; Петроска, 2008, 51).Translated into English, respectively, these are row of cob, coal, seed, snow -the lexical gap in English being the lack of appropriate nominal forms of a diminutive nature.

The quantifier some
In English, there are two interpretations of the partitive quantifier/determiner some (unchangeable for grammatical number): (i) the strong or stressed form (in a sentence), whose equivalent in Macedonian would be некој (changeable form for number and gender), and which can be used with singular or plural countable nouns, as well as mass nouns (only those with the meaning of 'a type of'), such as examples ( 1) and ( 2); (ii) the weak or unstressed form (in a sentence), equivalent to малку / мал дел / малкумина in Macedonian, which is used exclusively with countable plural nouns or mass nouns (in an ordinary context), such as examples ( 3) and ( 4): (1) Some man came in who wore a golden crown upon his head.(BG,65) (2) Some wine on the table is worse than the one from the village.(BG,407) (3) Only some birds can fly and reach them, no man can.(BG, 46) (4) "I will rest awhile, I need some sleep."(BG,577) In (1) the quantifier can be replaced with the indefinite article a (еден/некој човек), and in (2) some wine implies a type of wine that is made from somewhere else than the village.In (3) we focus on a section (a small part) of all existing birds, while in (4) this could be paraphrased as a little sleep.In fact, (3) is interpreted as proportional some, but only then when contrasted to all (Barwise, 1979;Huddleston and Pullum, 2002, 364).In addition, however, Higginbotham (1994) thinks that there should not exist a difference in the meaning of some for countable vs. mass nouns.He further suggests a general division of the quantifiers into homogeneous, distributive, and cumulative.

Measure nouns
According to Topolińska (Тополињска, 1974, 52-53), measure nouns represent determiners in the NP which when joined with the head noun contribute to the countability of the NP.Petroska (Петроска, 2008) uses the terms 'particulizators' and 'fragmentizers' for phrases that show partitive information.In such a case, the countable and mass nouns in the NP undergo quantification in the NP, i.e. for mass nouns the feature of discreteness of the matter is introduced (through its ability to be measured).A countable plural noun or a mass noun in its singular form stands after the unit of measure in singular and plural form.In English, the preposition of can be placed between the unit of measure and the head noun, but it is not a mandatory element (especially in conversational style), yet in Macedonian, there is no occurrence of a preposition in the NP.The semantic dimension apparent here is that the universal units of measure refer to the homogeneous nature of the partitive parameters of the head noun, without which these units cannot function independently because it is unclear what head noun they specifically refer to.
Nouns with the suffix -ful (spoonful, bucketful) place the grammatical plural morpheme after the suffix and not after the root noun referring to the unit of measure (Jespersen, 1924, 157-158).This is in fact additionally confirmed by the English corpus findings: there is a noticeably low number of occurrences of the hyphenated mouths-ful (total: 2) vs. the non-hyphenated mouthfuls (total: 9.261).Macedonian takes another approach: the suffix -ful is interpreted as the determiner full (полна), so mouthfuls would be translated as полни усти.

Containers
There is yet another group of determiners in the NP -containers or receptacles -which serve the purpose of measuring partitive 'portions' and as such appear in their secondary function, while their primary role is as a head noun, not attached to another noun.These determiners, in singular and plural form, stand in front of countable plural nouns or mass nouns in their singular form, such being (with the Macedonian equivalent in brackets): bag/sack (вреќа), basket (кошница), bin (канта), bottle (шише), box/packet (кутија), can (лименка), flask (термос), glass/cup (чаша/шолјичка), jar (тегла), jug/pitcher (бокал), mug (шолја/кригла), pot (лонец), tube (епрувета).These determiners give mass nouns the feature of countability, while partitivity is seen through the fact that these containers narrow down the whole quantity of the head noun.They provide information on the measurability of the countable noun or the form which the mass noun takes (a liquid state), thus implying the discrete elements, e.g. ( 7) in Macedonian and its translation equivalent in English ( 8): (7) Се бара министерот да се напие чаша вода од езерото.(FO) (8) The Minister is asked to drink a glass of water from the lake.
Structuring the NP paradigm as in (7) opens the possibility for dual semantic interpretation of the NP in Macedonian: (i) the quantity of the water is one glass; (ii) the glass is filled with water to the brim.Contextualization of ( 7) is required to figure out the precise meaning of the NP, and in this specific example further on in the newspaper article it was clarified to have been (i), so (8) would be a much more appropriate equivalent for (ii).However, if the indefinite article in the NP in (8) were to be replaced with the numeral one, then the focus shifts to numeric quantification rather than quantity of water in the glass.

Unit nouns
Partitivity of the head noun in the NP can also be expressed through unit nouns, which provide the head noun with formal boundaries (strict or with an undetermined shape) (Biber et al., 1999, 250-252), such as (with the Macedonian equivalent in brackets) -ball (топка/топче), chunk (поголемо парче), fragment (фрагмент), grain (зрно), heap (купче), item (парче), loaf (векна), lump (грутка), mound (брдо/куп/купишта), piece (парче), pile (купче), ream (топ), roll (ролна), slice (парче), stack (купче), wad (купче) -in the following order in the English and Macedonian NP, with Macedonian omitting the preposition of: unit noun + of + countable plural noun or uncountable noun A particularity of nouns of this type, just like those in 2.2 and 2.3, is that they form collocations and are semantically more diverse in English than in Macedonian, i.e. each unit noun in the former conveys a distinct semantic feature, whereas a unit noun in the latter might have more than one English equivalent.For example, the Macedonian unit noun купче translates into the English unit nouns -heap ('a collection of things thrown one on another'), pile ('to heap in abundance'), stack ('an orderly pile or heap'), or wad ('a small mass, bundle') -but does not take account of each noun's distinctiveness.
Their semantic value can also be transferred to abstract head nouns so as to achieve vividness of expression as well as partitive precision in the quantitative description of the head noun, e.g.stacks of time (куп време), a load of rubbish/nonsense (куп глупости), a slice of happiness (парче среќа).

Personal nouns
It is natural that personal nouns demonstrate singularity in meaning and have a singular form because they each refer to a specific and unique entity, but this is not always the case in English and Macedonian.In both languages in certain and rarer cases, the plural form does take shape, though not with the meaning of plurality of those entities.The numeral marker for partitivity in front of and the plural morpheme attached to the personal noun are acceptable when they refer to 'more than one entity with the same name', partitively denoting 'a fragment of all entities with the same name'.This in fact represents a transfer of personal nouns to the group of countable nouns, with the former taking on formal plural features (Ibid, 247).The Macedonian translation equivalent in (10) to the English (9) contains a partitive determiner with the suffixмина, inherently specifying the head noun being a person: (9) How hard is it to find fifty Donalds in the USA? (TIME) (10) Колку е тешко да се најдат педесетмина Доналдовци во САД?
Inserting the indefinite article a / an or the zero article in the English NP plays no role in the correlation singularity: plurality, but rather it helps to determine the degree of familiarity with the person in question.The partitive value here for both implies 'one entity as a fragment from all the entities with the same name'.This difference in semantic value is also expressed in Macedonian, with slightly varying linguistic means: On the one hand, the indefinite article in the English NP in (11) corresponds to the numeral една in the Macedonian equivalent (12), the translation of which is one in English.This instance further exemplifies that English indefinite articles equate to the Macedonian numeral еден (changeable form for number and gender) when expressing partitivity for personal nouns, i.e. an entity that the speaker is not familiar with.On the other hand, the zero article in the English NP in (13) corresponds to the lack of numeral in the Macedonian NP in (14), however, there is a need for the gendered (feminine) short pronoun form -ja -in the initial sentence position when expressing partitivity for personal nouns, i.e. an entity that the speaker is familiar with.If the entity is of masculine gender, the short pronoun form in Macedonian is го.

Collectivity
Collectivity denotes a semantic feature of the noun as the collective whole represents a unit (a collection) on its own, comprising discrete elements whose number is unlimited and undefined, i.e. a countable non-determinedness of entities, e.g.all the trees (сите дрвја) (Landman, 1989;Levin, 2001;Mathieu, 2014;Syrett and Musolino, 2013;Минова-Ѓуркова, 1986;Петроска, 2006;Петроска, 2008, 74-90).Such collective quantification is a characteristic of discrete elements (those that can be counted).In English, collective nouns are linked with certain entities, thus entering larger NPs or collocations, following the order: collective noun + of + head noun in plural form In Macedonian, however, the collective noun and the plural head noun are not normally split by a preposition.The collective noun in both languages gives information not only about collectivity as a semantic characteristic, but also up to a point about the orderliness and inherent organization of the entities it consists of.According to Biber et al. (1999, 248), the most productive collective nouns in English have proved to be (with the Macedonian equivalent in brackets): bunch of (куп), group of (група) and set of (сет).In this context, there is a particular instance of collectivity turning into partitivity that needs to be further analysed (Петроска, 2001; Петроска, 2008, 41): (15) A group of sparrows was hard hit by high temperatures.(NG) (16) Група врапчиња беше тешко погодена од високите температури.
The collective nouns in ( 15) and ( 16) are interpreted as 'sparrows that are united in a group', thus collectivity.The only way for partitivity here to be expressed in both languages is if the head noun were to be marked for determinedness with the definite article in (15) and the preposition од after the collective noun as well as the definite article as a suffix on the head noun in ( 16): (15a) A group of the sparrows was hard hit by high temperatures.
In more recent times, speakers have contributed to the language wealth of English with innovative collocations of a collective noun + head noun, in which animals are personified and alliteration (consonantal repetition) as a literary device has been exploited for such combinations: cackle of hyenas, cauldron of bats, gaggle of geese, kindle of kittens, leap of leopards, parade of elephants, parliament of owls, prickle of porcupines, pride of lions, scurry of squirrels, tower of giraffes.English far outnumbers Macedonian in such creative and often alliterative combinations, so this area could provide food for thought for English-Macedonian translators or students of translation studies, who could offer their suggestions.Some appropriate Macedonian equivalents for the above English examples could be: хеклачи хиени, котел лилјаци, групиранка гуски, шепа мачиња, летало лепарди, парада слонови, парламент бувови, боцкало ежови, тајфа лавови, вјасач верверици, висококатница жирафи.Furthermore, the translator interestingly decided to translate the Macedonian NP in ( 17) as ( 18), while option (19) has also been noticed in the online world: Aside from the internal NP structure, the feature of collectivity in Macedonian can also be morphologically expressed through a plural suffix (only for certain mass nouns), which represents a distinctive characteristic of this South Slavic language: -је.This suffix expresses morphological plurality, but semantic singularity, i.e. collectivity, which is why amongst speakers it most commonly takes a singular determiner.Therefore, Macedonian speakers would rather be semantically accurate than morphologically accurate as nouns with this suffix should in fact take a plural determiner in the NP (Минова-Ѓуркова, 2000, 197).Additionally, Petroska (Петроска, 2008, 74-90) explains that the nouns ending in -је are qualified as a collective singularity because they provide information about the whole, emphasizing the undivided nature of its constituent elements.There is no specific English translation equivalent for this Macedonian suffix, so трева and тревје would both be translated as grass in English.
In Macedonian certain singular forms of nouns can replace the plurals, which further develops the mental representation of a collective whole.In fact, just as mass nouns can narrow down their sense in the NP ('a type of', 'a kind of'), in the same way, Macedonian countable nouns can develop a slightly different meaning, thus losing their discrete nature.In (20), the phrase 'една од нив', translated as 'one of them' in ( 21), gives away the plurality of the noun fish, which is considered to be an uncountable noun: (20) ...рибарот седеше загледан во својата риба кога една од нив... (DM2) (21) ...the fisherman was watching his fish when one of them... (DM2) It is also common for the singular form of the noun in Macedonian to refer to an object consisting of parts, and in this case, if the noun co-occurs with a preposition, a close syntagmatic unit (expressing collectivity) between the preposition and the singular noun can be formed, as in ( 22).In English, the noun remains plural, as in ( 23), because the unit in question is a prepositional phrase, not an equivalent syntagmatic unit.Collectivity is more perceptible in (22) than in ( 23 In the literature on collectivity, the modifier together (заедно), placed at the end of an NP, is also mentioned because linguists regard it as possessing semantic collectivity.Moltmann (2004), though, makes a critical re-evaluation of this function and concludes that together actually contribute towards expressing cumulative numeric collectivity in sentences with verbs such as weigh, earn or pay (not the case with other verbs): (24) Giselle and Tom Brady together earned $72 million last year.(TIME) (25) Жизел и Том Брејди заедно заработија 72 милиони долари минатата година.

The quantifier all
Partitivity stands against markedness for collectivity with its lexical exponents.With the use of the collective quantifier all in English, speakers visualize a collection of entities whose distributivity is not at the forefront, so they form this NP construction, which is the same in Macedonian: all + (of the) countable plural noun All can occur just as commonly with countable nouns as with uncountable nouns in both languages, implying that the given relationship connects the entity as a whole, without excluding any part of it (Nickel, 2012;Radden and Dirven, 2007, 121-125;Winter and Scha, 2014).In Macedonian, all can be translated as: (i) сите if followed by a countable plural noun -compare ( 26) and ( 27); (ii) collective quantifiers changeable by number and gender цел / цела / цело / цели or сето / сета / сиот if followed by an uncountable noun -see ( 28) translated in English as ( 29 The problem that is apparent in (28) is the emphasis on the collectivity of the precise amount of 281 tons, i.e. a wholeness of tons that amount to a total number of 281, as the agreement in the NP should follow the rule of a quantifier put in singular form because the head noun is singular.However, the quantifier цели is in plural form due to the fact that if it were singular, then it would totally deflate the information about the precise amount.This inaccurate use of цели derives from semantic reasons as it is not possible to simultaneously express collectivity and distributivity at an NP level (Петроска, 2008, 58-59).In fact, the most suitable option would be вкупно (a total of) due to its unchangeable form: (28a) Производството на пченица изнесувало вкупно 281 тон.

Distributivity
Distributivity denotes the focus of individuality on each element separately in a whole.The distributive wholeness consists of discrete entities in space and time, emphasizing the commonality of each entity which comprises the wholeness e.g. both thumbs (обата палци) (Mathieu, 2014;Schwarzschild, 2011;Syrett and Musolino, 2013;Петроска, 2006;Петроска, 2008, 17, 62-73).It is characterized by separateness, unboundedness and countability, while each element is connected to one another in the same relation.Only those entities characterized by countability can be distributively quantified.The basic type of quantification is the numeric, realized morphologically through the category of number, in addition to both and every / each.
The NP structure formed with a numeral + noun expresses a defined separated (distributive) wholeness with concretization on quantity (Петроска, 2006; Петроска, 2008, 58).Numerals function as determiners in the NP, being selective according to the grammatical category of number, and all but 'one' occur with countable nouns in plural form.The exception in Macedonian refers to numerals that end in 'one', which takes a singular countable noun, as this is an agreement by proximity, while in English the numeral takes a plural noun.

The determiner both
The English marker for distributivity -both (of the) -which is unchangeable in form for number and gender, is equivalent to the Macedonian обајцата (a form referring to a person) and the derivatives обата (masc.)/ обете (fem.and neuter) -compare ( 30) and ( 31).In both languages the marker for distributivity expresses an inherent duality of the head noun, being in plural form.Aside from these three forms in Macedonian, there is also what Petroska calls 'the determiner of strengthened assertion' (Петроска, 2006, 2008, 63, 134-136) -и -which is sometimes followed by двaјцата / двата / двете.When the NP contains two nouns, this determiner is placed in front of the first noun.Both in ( 32) is translated as the equivalent determiner of assertion in ( 33 In both sentences, the NP consists of a numeral + plural noun, which as a structure expresses a defined wholeness with concretization on the quantity.The difference lies in the fact that on the one hand, the NP in (34) clearly expresses distributivity in the real sense of the term, i.e. each child separately was crying, while the NP in (35) expresses non-distributivity or a wholeness of the people involved in the activity of filming a movie, i.e. seven celebrities together.If both NPs are expanded in a construction with the distributive quantifier each + of + the + number + plural countable noun, then the NP in (34) will become (34a), translated into Macedonian as (34b), and the NP in (35) will become (35a), translated into Macedonian as (35b).So, in these cases, distributivity becomes a feature of both NPs, with each entity observed separately.In Macedonian, the equivalent distributive quantifiers are секој / секоја / секое / секои (changeable forms for number and gender).
(34a) When Gene Rosen found each of the six children crying on his lawn...Each and every as quantifiers denotes a separate entity which together with other separate entities comprises a defined whole, and they are the only determiners of distributivity with inherent semantic plurality, yet singular agreement in the NP, i.e. each / every + singular countable noun.The subtlety of the difference between both comes down to the following explanation: every connects the individual entities with each other for totality, whereas each focuses of the individual entity in the totality (Barwise, 1979;Radden and Dirven, 2007, 125-127;Schein, 2006;Winter and Scha, 2014).An NP with every refers to at least three entities, while an NP with each implies at least two entities.Linguists consider the distributive meaning to be stronger with each than with every (Huddleston & Pullum, 2002, 378-379).The overlap in the semanticity of both quantifiers can be seen in the expression each and every, which in fact combines the collective and distributive aspects.Chierchia (1998) and Crnič (2010) demonstrate that NPs with countable quantifiers can be interpreted as having collective or distributive meaning: (36) Mary and Jane gave birth to four babies.
According to the collective viewpoint, Mary and Jane gave birth to a total of four babies, so how many babies each one bore is not significant, while the distributive viewpoint regards Mary and Jane as separate entities having given birth to four babies each, i.e. a total of eight babies, thus sentences (36a) and (36b) use the distributive quantifier to specify.In fact, the distributive character of each can be brought to the surface when it is actually placed after the countable plural noun, as in (36b) (Grimm, 2012;Link, 1998;Sauerland, 1994).The equivalent for English each is Macedonian по, as in (37).By inserting по in the Macedonian NP in the initial position, distributivity in the plural NP is specified, yet without по the plurality has a collective interpretation (Петроска, 2008, 66-69): (36a) Mary and Jane each gave birth to four babies.
(36b) Mary and Jane gave birth to four babies each.
In addition, Koneski B. (Конески Б., 1999) explains that one of the meanings of the Macedonian по is to denote a measure in reference to more entities, which in fact is what distributivity represents.

Conclusion
This paper, contrastively analysing the issue of number in the NP -with a particular focus on partitivity, collectivity, and distributivity, in English compared to Macedonian -explains and exemplifies the commonalities that abound in both languages.Both English and Macedonian use linguistic means to specify the size and quantity of the NP, thus enriching the head noun with quantifiers.On the phrase level, the possibilities for formally signalizing the presence of a semantic category are much richer than on the word level.Both Macedonian and English use modifiers (embedded in the broader framework of the NP), with the help of which scope is specified and the contents of the head noun are enriched.The differences that exist between both languages could provide a springboard for linguists to delve even deeper into this topic, or for experienced translators and students of translation studies to search for translation equivalents where they are lacking or not specific enough.Конески, Б. (1999).Граматика на македонскиот јазик (второ изд.).Скопје: Детска радост.Конески, К. (2003).Зборообразувањето во современиот македонски јазик (второ изд.).Скопје: Филолошки факултет "Блаже Конески".Марков, Б. (1973).Nomina singulativa и collectiva во современиот македонски јазик.

b. Macedonian
Јужнословенски филолог, XXX. 391-402. Минова-Ѓуркова, Л. (2000).Синтакса на македонскиот стандарден јазик.Скопје: Магор.Минова-Ѓуркова, Л. (1986) Creative Commons licensing terms Author(s) will retain the copyright of their published articles agreeing that a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0) terms will be applied to their work.Under the terms of this license, no permission is required from the author(s) or publisher for members of the community to copy, distribute, transmit or adapt the article content, providing a proper, prominent and unambiguous attribution to the authors in a manner that makes clear that the materials are being reused under permission of a Creative Commons License.Views, opinions and conclusions expressed in this research article are views, opinions and conclusions of the author(s).and European Journal of Literature, Language and Linguistics Studies shall not be responsible or answerable for any loss, damage or liability caused in relation to/arising out of conflicts of interest, copyright violations and inappropriate or inaccurate use of any kind content related or integrated into the research work.
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