Strategies of Quantification

Quantification has been at the heart of research in the syntax and semantics of natural language since Aristotle. The last few decades have seen an explosion of detailed studies of the syntax and semantics of quantification and its relation to the rest of the theory of grammar, resulting in a highly sophisticated understanding of the mechanisms of quantification. This book considers the ways natural languages vary with respect to their realisation of quantificational notions. Drawing on data from English, German, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Hausa and others, the authors also link the variation in the expression of quantification to the notions of polarity sensitivity, free-choice and indefiniteness.

Kook-Hee Gil is a Lecturer in the Department of English Language and Linguistics, University of Sheffield.


Steve Harlow was senior lecturer in linguistics at the University of York until he retired in 2008. He was principal investigator on the AHRB-funded research project "Strategies of Quantification". His other research interests lie in the syntax of the Celtic languages.


George Tsoulas is a senior lecturer in linguistics at the University of York. After an undergraduate degree in linguistics and literature at the University of Strasbourg he went on to study for a PhD at the University of Paris VIII. His research to date has focused on the syntax/semantics and syntax/pragmatics interfaces, and more specifically on issues of quantification, tense and modality, number and the count/mass distinction, topic/focus articulation, particles, and the nature of pronominal reference.