Resumen de Grammaticalization from Minimizer to Focus Marker as Upward Reanalysis along the Nominal Spine

Yoshiki Ogawa

• This article demonstrates that Japanese minimizers, which are originally used as Negative Polarity Items in a negative context, can sometimes behave as focus markers when used postnominally. I will review a previous syntactic analysis of English minimizers, and propose a revised syntactic analysis of Japanese minimizers, based on newly discovered synchronic and diachronic facts. I argue that the usage of Japanese minimizers as focus markers was developed through grammaticalization as Upward Reanalysis along the nominal spine.