Introduction

Most languages have numeral noun phrases resulting from combining nouns directly with numerals. In some languages, however, usual translations of such phrases have special expressions accompanying the numerals or intervening between nouns and numerals. Japanese Semantics and the Mass/Count Distinction, Takashi Iida argues that Japanese indeed has countable predicates and that they can be recognized by the kinds of numeral suffixes which can modify them. After rejecting the traditional binary view that is and vice versa, he proposes that one type can be more countable or less countable than another type: that is, there are many different types in between the countable type and the non-countable type. Chungmin Lee states that in a dialogic question-and-answer discourse situation between interlocutors, a fixed article-like demonstrative is employed for dynamic anaphoric definite use, which is independent of proper deictic use of demonstratives in article-less languages, particularly in Korean, Japanese, and Chinese.