This paper deals with the Japanese adjectival conjugational ending drop construction (abbreviated as “ACED”), exemplified by utterances such as Dasaʔ! (“Uncool!”) and Kimochiwaruʔ! (“Disgusting!”). (The symbol “ʔ” represents a glottal stop in the examples.) Providing a thorough description of the syntax and semantics of the ACED construction, I argue that the construction contains certain systematic form-meaning correspondences. The ACED construction is peculiar both syntactically and semantically. Syntactically, it lacks the basic clausal functional categories C, T, and Neg and consists solely of an optional subject NP and an adjectival base followed by a glottal stop. It is therefore characterized as a “root small clause” in the sense of Progovac (2006). On the functional side, the ACED construction “expresses” (as opposed to “communicates”) the speaker’s immediate reaction to a given situation in which he/she is involved at the time of utterance and is used exclusively to perform what Hirose (1995, 1997) calls a “private (as opposed to ‘public’) expression act,” one that does not have any communicative intention on the part of the speaker. These observations are related naturally from a syntax-semantics interface standpoint in terms of motivation, iconicity, and markedness.

Recognizing an important semantic difference between izyoo(-ni) and gurai comparatives and the standard yori comparative in Japanese regarding implications to the positive standard, Hayashishita (2007) proposes an analysis that essentially treats izyoo(-ni) and gurai comparatives as instances of comparison of deviation. This analysis predicts that the standard-oriented positive implications for the matrix degree and the comparative degree should have the same status with respect to their (non-)presuppositionality. I provide novel data that counterexemplify this prediction, and sketch an alternative that treats these constructions as standard comparative and equative constructions with one extra presupposition for the comparative degree. The proposed alternative is shown to capture the relevant facts better than Hayashishita’s (2007) analysis, casting doubt on the validity of Hayashishita’s (2007) key analytic idea wherein izyoo(-ni) and gurai comparatives are identified as instances of comparison of deviation.

The present paper compares the following two sentences and analyzes asymmetrical characteristics observed between them: (i) “John walked over the bridge”, and (ii) “John walked under the bridge”. Though (i) and (ii) constitute a minimal pair of sentences, they are interpreted quite differently. Sentence (i) describes the event of John crossing the length of the bridge, while sentence (ii) describes the event of John walking without a specific direction under the region of the bridge. Here, five asymmetrical characteristics are observed between the two sentences: (a) the presence or absence of contact between the trajector and the landmark, (b) the role of the landmark, (c) the role of the ground, (d) the semantic characteristics of the prepositional phrases, and (e) the grammatical characteristics of the prepositional phrases.

  The present paper argues that these five asymmetrical characteristics are motivated by encyclopedic knowledge and embodied conceptual structure, both of which speakers acquire through experience. Over and under are generally regarded as antonyms in that they show opposite location and movement along the vertical axis. However, the vertical axis in the conceived world is structured asymmetrically, and therefore, humans conceive it asymmetrically. This asymmetrical construal of the vertical axis motivates the divergent characteristics of the two sentences. In conclusion, the present paper suggests that linguistic embodiment and encyclopedic knowledge motivate not only the semantic but also the grammatical characteristics of linguistic structures.