Plurality and Its Effect on Genericity and Definiteness in Korean

한국어의 복수성과 총칭성/한정성

We examine semantic properties of Korean plural expressions and how they are related to genericity and definiteness. First of all, Korean plural expressions provide a strong evidence for the plurality theory which discerns between the two sorts of plural individuals such as sum and group. Sum and group are clearly distinguished by morphological markers in Korean i.e., 'tul-plurals and ${\phi}$-plurals correspond to sum and group interpretations respectively. Second, the treatment of Korean bare singulars(=${\phi}$-plurals) as group accounts for why Korean generic NPs prefer bare singulars to bare plurals. Generic NPs refer to kind, and kind is a special group derived from supremum, therefore both generic NPs and bare singulars refer to group, and generic NPs are realized as bare singulars rather than bare plurals in Korean. Finally, in Korean, plurality and definiteness have little effect on each other although some connection between them has often been reported in the literature.