Partitivity and referentiality constraint: Removing incompletive potential with Mandarin -le

Abstract

We present a formal analysis of an understudied postverbal completive marker -le in Mandarin, distinct from the perfective -le. We propose that completive -le forces strict telicity via maximal affectedness of the theme. Building on degree-based approaches, we show that -le interacts with a covert partitive operator to link event progress to both the extent of the theme and an abstract path scale. This analysis explains the marker’s unique referentiality constraints and semantic effects. The findings demonstrate that Mandarin completive markers possess distinct lexical semantics and reinforce the crosslinguistic link between object referentiality and the completion of accomplishments.