Semantic Properties of Tumori-da in Japanese

Abstract

The attitude predicate tumori-da has been considered to correspond approximately to ‘intend’ in English. In actuality, it is used to convey volition, conviction and hypothesis. The majority of previous studies have assumed that tumori-da denotes a meaning equivalent to omou (‘think’). They so claim that the above three different usages derive from this core meaning according to morphological (i.e., tense and aspect) and semantic (i.e., volitional or non-volitional) properties of embedded predicates. In this paper, I re-examine the semantic properties of the tumori-da construction and show that it does not fall under simple epistemic predicates the way which omou does. First, by investigating the syntactic and semantic properties of the embedded clause in tumorida constructions conveying volition and conviction in detail, I demonstrate that the two usages are differentiated depending on the temporal and volitional properties of the state of affairs (P), denoted by the embedded clause, rather than solely on the morpho-semantic properties of embedded predicates as in previous studies. Second, I provide novel data showing that P needs to be brought about by the attitude holder's (x) volitional action. This is shown to also be well captured by the semantic notion of RESP-relation (Farkas 1988). Third, I also re-examine the hypothetical tumori-da construction, which is mainly realized as a subordinate clause, and demonstrate that it requires the main clause to be x's volitional action. Based on these observations I propose the following: (i) tumori-da asserts x's thought about P but at the same time presupposes some volitional action by x; (ii) the tumori-da construction shows two different semantic properties depending on the relationship between x's volitional action and P.