Mandarin verbal reduplication and the one-delimitation principle

Abstract

It has long been observed that an eventuality may be associated with at most one delimitation. This paper argues that the incompatibility between Mandarin verbal reduplications and several post-verbal result-denoting elements is one of the cases to which the one-delimitation principle applies. The discussion of Mandarin verbal reduplication contributes to our understanding of the one-delimitation principle by showing that (i) the one-delimitation principle not only applies to resultatives but also other result-denoting elements; (ii) vP is the domain for the one-delimitation principle.