Reciprocating same

Abstract

same can appear with a complement (the external construction) or associating with a plural element in the sentence (the internal construction). This type of alternation is observed with other relational modifiers as well (e.g. enemy, neighbor). However, same is unique in also being able to associate with the singular distributive quantifier every in the internal construction (e.g. every child read the same book). Here, I propose to derive this unique behavior from two independently evidenced phenomena: plural properties of every (Kratzer, 2000) and same’s scope-taking (Barker, 2007). Together, these two facts explain same’s behavior: by taking scope, same is able to enter levels of hierarchies where every behaves like a plural. The merit of this analysis is to provide a principled type-driven difference between same and other relational modifiers, which, I argue, is missed in other analyses.