A cover analysis of the plural classifier in Hmong

Abstract

This paper applies a cover analysis of the plural classifier cov in White Hmong. A cover analysis best captures the behavior of cov when we compare the semantics of this classifier in definite and indefinite contexts. While other approaches to plurality in semantics could also work for this data, I show here that the cover analysis makes the most sense due to its interactions with the indefinite article ib, which primarily acts as a choice functional indefinite rather than an existential quantifier.