Alternative questions through focus alternatives in Mandarin Chinese
Michael Yoshitaka Erlewine
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

1 Introduction
In this paper I discuss the syntax/semantics of alternative questions in Mandarin
Chinese. Alternative questions are similar to wh-questions in that they present possible answers which cannot simply be represented as yes or no, but the variation
between different answers is introduced through a disjunction rather than through a
wh-word. Alternative questions in Mandarin use the disjunction háishi.

(1) Mandarin háishi alternative question:nı̌ xiǎng hēkāfē i háishi hóngchá (ne)?1
you want drink coffee HAISHI tea
Q
Alternative question: ‘Do you want to drink coffee or tea?’2
Possible answers: ✓ (I want) coffee; ✓ (I want) tea; #Yes; #No
I argue that Mandarin alternative questions are computed through the pointwise
computation of Rooth-Hamblin focus alternatives, as has been argued by Beck &Kim (2006) for alternative questions in other languages. The disjunction háishi in(1), for example, is a local disjunction of ‘coffee’ and ‘tea,’ and this disjunction stays
in-situ for interpretation. I motivate this proposal through a careful look at háishi’s
island sensitivity, focus intervention effects, and cooccurrence with the focus marker
shì.
Mandarin Chinese is one of a number of languages which distinguishes the disjunctions used in alternative questions from those which can be used as boolean
disjunction in declaratives. Alternative questions use háishi which I will call interrogative disjunction following Haspelmath (2000). The other (logical) disjunction
is huòzhe.3
I propose that háishi projects only a focus-semantic value, as has been argued
previously for in-situ wh-words by Kratzer & Shimoyama (2002) and Beck (2006).
The logical disjunction huòzhe projects both an ordinary boolean disjunction meaning and a focus-semantic value, as is proposed by Alonso-Ovalle (2006) for English
or. A prediction of this approach which I show to be correct is that in environments
where only the focus-values of a disjunction are used for interpretation, the contrast
between the two disjunctions will disappear. To my knowledge, this is the first concrete proposal made for how to model the difference between these two types of
disjunctions, which is also attested in other languages.
1

Here I assume that the sentence-final ne in alternative questions is the Q complementizer, witha phonologically null variant. See Constant (2011) for a recent, more detailed look at ne.
2
In English “Do you want to drink coffee or tea?” can be an alternative question or a polar(yes/no) question, depending on the prosody. (1) is unambiguously an alternative question.
3
The logical disjunction can also be pronounced huòshı̀ or simply huò.

2 Proposal
Following the work of Hamblin (1973) and Karttunen (1977), we take the denotation of a question to be a set of (intensional) propositions corresponding to possible
answers to the question. For the alternative question in (1) repeated below, we mustyield the denotation in (2).
(1) nı̌ xiǎng hēkāfē i háishi hóngchá (ne)?
you want drink coffee HAISHI tea
Q
Alternative question: ‘Do you want to drink coffee or tea?’(2) J(1)K = {you want to drink coffee, you want to drink tea}
I argue following Beck & Kim (2006) that alternative questions in Mandarin
are computed using a pointwise computation of Rooth-Hamblin focus alternatives,
which are also used by focus-sensitive operators (Rooth 1985; 1992).
I will illustrate my analysis with the derivation of example (1). The disjunctionin (1) is a local disjunction of ‘coffee’ and ‘tea,’ and this disjunction stays in situ
throughout the derivation. The focus semantic value of the disjunctive projection,“coffee HAISHI tea,” is the set of ordinary semantic values of its disjuncts, ‘coffee’and ‘tea.’ Its ordinary semantic value is undefined.4(3) Jcoffee HAISHI teaKf = {coffee, tea}; Jcoffee HAISHI teaKo undefinedAs subsequent material is merged into the structure, the new material will becomposed with each of the existing focus alternatives. Thus the initial focus alternative ‘coffee’ will lead to the generation of the alternative ‘you want to drink coffee’
and the initial focus alternative ‘tea’ will lead to the generation of the alternative‘you want to drink tea.’ Below is a simplified tree structure with focus-semantic
denotations for each nonterminal node:(4) Computation of focus-semantic values in (1):Q

TP{you want to drink coffee,
you want to drink tea}you {λx.x want to drink coffee,
λx.x want to drink tea}want

{λx.x drink coffee,
λx.x drink tea}drink{coffee, tea}coffee HAISHI tea

4
Here I use J·Kf to indicate the focus-semantic value and J·Ko to indicate the ordinary semantic
value (Rooth 1985; 1992). Semantic values are represented here as extensional and stand in for
intensional equivalents.

Because the ordinary semantic value of the háishi disjunction was undefined, theordinary semantic values of subsequent projections will also all be undefined. We
thus yield the following denotations for the clause at TP:(5) JTPKf = {you want to drink coffee, you want to drink tea};
JTPKo undefined
At TP, the focus semantic value represents the two propositions corresponding
to possible answers to the question, but the ordinary semantic value is undefined. I
assume that the interpretation of a complete structure is the ordinary semantic valueof its root node. Therefore I take the task of the question-type complementizer Q
to be to lift the focus semantic value of its complement into an ordinary (question)
semantic value (6) (Beck & Kim 2006). This yields the desired question interpretation, repeated below as (7).
(6) J[Q TP]Ko = JTPKf(7) J(1)Ko = {you want to drink coffee, you want to drink tea}
The analysis proposed here uses focus alternatives to interpret the háishi disjunction in situ without movement, and thus predicts that háishi alternative questions are
not subject to syntactic islands. It does, however, predict that they are sensitive toso-called focus intervention effects (Beck 2006; Beck & Kim 2006), where intervening focus-operators can disrupt the proper interpretation of the question. In section
4 I show that both of these predictions in fact hold of háishi alternative questions.
In contrast to the alternative-question-triggering háishi which has a focus semantic value but no ordinary semantic value, I propose that the logical disjunction
huòzhe has the ordinary semantic denotation of boolean disjunction while also projecting its disjuncts as focus alternatives. This is the meaning proposed by AlonsoOvalle (2006) and Beck & Kim (2006) for disjunction in other languages which do
not distinguish between logical disjunction and interrogative disjunction.
(8) Denotations of Mandarin disjunctions
a. Interrogative disjunction:
JA HAISHI BK f = JAK f ∪ JBK f ; JA HAISHI BKo undefinedb. Logical disjunction:5
JA HUOZHE BK f = JAK f ∪ JBK f ; JA HUOZHE BKo = JAKo ∨ JBKo
Because the interrogative disjunction háishi produces only a focus semantic
value, an operator such as Q will be required to turn its output into an interpretableordinary semantic value. This is the source of “question force” which is normallytriggered by the use of háishi.
In the next section I will briefly sketch two previous approaches to alternative
questions in Mandarin. In section 4 I will argue for my proposal based on evidence from island insensitivity, focus intervention effects, and the position of theBoolean disjunction ∨ can be defined over non-propositional types as well; see Appendix Cof Alonso-Ovalle (2006). It does, however, require that DP disjuncts such as ‘coffee’ or ‘tea’ beinterpreted as generalized quantifiers and take scope via QR.
5

focus marker shì in alternative questions. I will show that the previous analyses
are unable to account for the facts presented. In section 5 I discuss environments
in which háishi disjunction does not trigger interpretation as an alternative question, and show how they argue for the relationship between háishi and the logicaldisjunction huòzhe proposed in (8). I conclude in section 6.
3 Previous approaches
Two types of analyses have been previously proposed for Mandarin háishi alternative questions: covert movement and Conjunction Reduction.
J. Huang (1982) proposes that the háishi-disjunctive phrase moves covertly toSpec,CP, just as wh-words are argued to do. This movement is necessary to check a[+wh] feature on háishi, which the logical disjunction huòzhe does not have (Huang
et al. 2009:242).

(9) LF movement analysis of (1) (J. Huang 1982):[kāfē i háishi hóngchá]i [nı̌ xiǎng hē
ti ]coffee HAISHI tea
you want drink
R. Huang (2009; 2010) proposes that háishi alternative questions are always casesof clausal disjunction with Conjunction Reduction. In particular, R. Huang (2010)
argues that háishi disjunctions are always underlyingly disjunctions of the minimal
clauses which contain the surface-disjoined material.
(10) Conjunction Reduction analysis of (1) (R. Huang 2009; 2010):[nı̌ xiǎng hēkāfē i] háishi [nı̌ xiǎng hē
hóngchá]
you want drink coffee HAISHI you want drink tea
It is unclear what principles govern this Conjunction Reduction operation. Han& Romero (2004) advocate for the Conjunction Reduction approach for alternative
questions in other languages and adopt Schwarz’s (1999) analysis of Conjunction
Reduction as gapping, presenting parallels between the syntax of alternative questions and gapping in Hindi and Korean. Note, however, that Mandarin Chinese
famously lacks gapping constructions (Tang 2001; a.o.).
4 Evidence
My proposal for Mandarin alternative questions lets us interpret the háishi disjunction in situ through focus alternative computation. The háishi disjunction does not
move. In this section I will present a number of properties of háishi alternative
questions which are predicted by this approach and cannot be explained under theprevious analyses. I will show that háishi alternative questions are not sensitive tosyntactic islands in section 4.1 and show the existence of focus intervention effects
in section 4.2. In section 4.3 I give Mandarin-specific evidence for the interpretationof háishi through focus values, through its cooccurrence with the focus marker shì.

4.1 Island-(in)sensitivity
The first piece of evidence for the focus-alternative-based proposal comes fromháishi’s pattern of island sensitivity. Rooth (1985) argues that association with focus
between a focus-operator and a focus-marked constituent does not obey syntactic islands. Below is an example from Rooth (1985) to show the island-insensitivity offocus association with only:(11)

They only investigated [the question of whether you know the woman who
chaired [the ZONING BOARD]F ].
(Rooth 1985)

This is a property of the way focus-semantic values are computed: denotations propogate compositionally through the entire structure without regard for intervening
islands, just as do ordinary semantic values.
If, on the other hand, the disjunction had to move to the complementizer in orderto take scope and be interpreted (J. Huang 1982; Larson 1985; Han & Romero 2004),
we would expect questions to become ungrammatical if a syntactic island intervenes
between the háishi disjunction and the associated complementizer.
As noted by J. Huang (1991), háishi alternative questions are not sensitive tosentential subject and relative clause islands. This is in contrast to the Mandarin“A-not-A” polar question form, for which J. Huang (1991) argues that null operator
movement is involved. (J. Huang left off the optional final ne in these examples; its
addition does not affect judgments.)(12) Sentential subjects (J. Huang 1991:313–314):
a. háishi alternative question:[island wǒ qù [měiguó] háishi [yı̄ngguó]] bı̌ jiàohǎoI go America HAISHI England comparatively good
Matrix alternative question: ‘Is it better for me to go to America or
to England?’b. A-not-A question:* [island wǒ qù bu qù měiguó] bı̌ jiàohǎoI go NEG go America comparatively goodIntended: matrix alternative question: ‘Is it better for me to go to
America or not?’(13) Relative clauses (J. Huang 1991:314):
a. háishi alternative question:nı̌ xı̌ huān [island rènshı̀ nı̌ háishi bu rènshı̀ nı̌ ] de rén
you likeknow you HAISHI NEG know you DE person
Matrix alternative question: ‘Do you like people who know you or
people who don’t know you?’b. A-not-A question:* nı̌ xı̌ huān [island rènshı̀ bu rènshı̀ nı̌ ] de rénknow NEG know you DE person
you like
Intended: matrix alternative question: ‘Do you like people who know
you or people who don’t know you?’However, háishi alternative questions are not without island sensitivity: háishi
alternative questions are subject to wh-islands. The baseline in (14) shows thatháishi can be embedded under the declarative-embedding verb juéde ‘think.’ In(15), the embedded clause is turned into a subject wh-question under the the questionembedding verb xiǎng zhı̄dào ‘wonder.’ The result is ungrammatical, despite thefact that the intended matrix alternative question interpretation is natural.
(14)

(15)

Baseline: háishi disjunction in embedded clause✓nı̌ juéde [Zhāng Sān xı̌ huān Lı̌ Sı̀ háishi Wáng Wǔ] (ne)?
you think Zhang San like Li Si HAISHI Wang Wu Q
Matrix alternative question: ‘Do you think Zhang San likes Li Si or Wang
Wu?’
Háishi is wh-island-sensitive:* nı̌ xiǎng zhı̄dào [wh-island shéi xı̌ huān Lı̌ Sı̀ háishi Wáng Wǔ] (ne)?
you wonder
who like Li Si HAISHI Wang Wu Q
Intended: matrix alternative question: ‘Is it Li Si or Wang Wu that you
wonder who likes ?’The focus alternatives approach to háishi questions predicts this pattern of islandsensitivity, in the same way that Japanese wh-nominals yield wh-island effects according to Shimoyama (2006). Question-embedding verbs such as xiǎng zhı̄dào‘wonder’ require that their complement be headed by Q, which will convert CP2 ’s
focus semantic value into an ordinary semantic value. The complement of Q1 will nolonger contain multiple focus alternatives so CP1 cannot be interpreted as a question.
(15’) [CP1 Q1 you wonder [CP2 Q2 who like [ Li Si HAISHI Wang Wu ] ] ]The previous analyses do not predict this pattern of islandhood. For J. Huang’s(1982) covert movement approach, the lack of island effects may be expected forháishi disjunction of arguments: assuming covert movement can violate Subjacency/CED, háishi argument disjunctions would be island-insensitive just as wharguments are. As noted by R. Huang (2010), however, J. Huang’s (1982) analysis predicts that embedded háishi disjunction of non-arguments would be islandsensitive, due to the ECP. Embedded háishi disjunctions of adjuncts can, however,be interpreted as matrix alternative questions, as seen in example (17).6(16)

6Adjunct wh-in-situ is sensitive to RC islands (R. Huang 2010:124):* nı̌ xı̌ huān [island Xiǎodi wèishénme xiě] de shū?
you like
Xiaodi why
write DE book
Intended: ‘What is the reason x such that you like books which Xiaodi
wrote for reason x?’

R. Huang (2010:125) shows that the copula shì and conjunctive ér in (17) are independently
required in this sentence and not due to the háishi disjunction.

(17) Adjunct háishi is not sensitive to CNP islands (R. Huang 2010:125):nı̌ xiāngxı̀n [island Xiǎodi shı̀ [yı̄ nwèi qiàn zhài] háishi [yı̄ nwèi shı̄ liàn]
you believe
Xiaodi be because owe debt HAISHI because lose romanceér zı̀shā] de shuōfǎ ne?
so suicide DE story Q
Alternative question: ‘Do you believe the story that Xiaodi committed suicide because of owing debt or because of falling out of love?’
4.2 Intervention effects
Beck (2006) argues that intervention effects occur when a focus-sensitive operator(intervener) intervenes between a wh-item and its corresponding complementizer.
Beck (2006); Beck & Kim (2006) show that such intervention effects also occur
with alternative questions. In (19b), the intervener (in bold) is negation.

(18) Beck’s (2006) schema for focus intervention effects:* [ Qi ... [ Focus-Op [ ... whi ... ] ] ](19) Intervention effects in alternative questions (Beck & Kim 2006:172):a. ✓ Did Sue read [‘Pluralities’] or [‘Barriers’]?
b. * Didn’t Sue read [‘Pluralities’] or [‘Barriers’]?
Below we see that the focus-sensitive negation bu yields intervention effects in
Mandarin háishi alternative questions:
(20)

(21)

Baseline:✓nı̌ xiǎng [sǎo dı̀] háishi [xı̌ wǎn] (ne)?
you want sweep floor HAISHI wash dishes Q
Alternative question: ‘Do you want to sweep the floor or wash dishes?’
Negation above the disjunction is ungrammatical:* nı̌ bu xiǎng [sǎo dı̀] háishi [xı̌ wǎn] (ne)?
you NEG want sweep floor HAISHI wash dishes Q
Intended: alternative question: ‘Do you not want to sweep the floor or
not want to wash dishes?’

The addition of the negation bu above the disjunction of ‘sweep the floor’ and‘wash dishes’ leads to ungrammaticality. Note that the intended alternative question is not infelicitous. The problem can be avoided by choosing to introduce thedisjunction higher than the intervener, as in (22). (22) grammatically expresses theintended meaning of (21), by producing the negation and control verb ‘want’ in bothdisjuncts.
(22)

No intervention with disjuncts which include the negation:✓wǎn] (ne)?
nı̌ [bu xiǎng sǎo dı̀] háishi [bu xiǎng xı̌
you NEG want sweep floor HAISHI NEG want wash dishes Q
Alternative question: ‘Do you not want to sweep the floor or not want towash dishes?’

My proposal accounts for this contrast, as the focus-sensitive negation intervenes
between Q and the háishi disjunction in (21) but not in (22).
Similarly, subject focus constructions which have been shown to produce intervention effects in Chinese wh-questions (Yang 2006) and alternative questionsin other languages (Beck & Kim 2006) also trigger intervention effects in háishi
alternative questions.7(23) Subject focus triggers intervention effects (Beck & Kim 2006):* Did only [John]F drink coffee or tea?
(24) a. * shi [Zhāng Sān]F chı̄ le [pı́ngguǒ] háishi [júzi] (ne)?
SHI Zhang San
eat LE apple
HAISHI orange Q
Intended: alternative question: ‘Was it an apple or an orange that it
was Zhang San who ate ?’b. * zhı̌yǒu [Zhāng Sān]F chı̄ le [pı́ngguǒ] háishi [júzi] (ne)?
only Zhang San
eat LE apple
HAISHI orange Q
Intended: alternative question: ‘Was it an apple or an orange that
only Zhang San ate ?’The existence of focus intervention effects in háishi alternative questions is unpredicted by previous approaches. Under the covert movement approach (J. Huang
1982), no intervention effects are predicted as the disjunction will always move toSpec,CP at LF, above the interveners. Focus intervention effects do not occur whenthe question-triggering element (here, the háishi disjunction) moves above the intervener, regardless of whether this movement is covert or overt (Beck 2006).
The Conjunction Reduction approach (R. Huang 2009; 2010) also cannot explain these intervention effects. For example, under the Conjunction Reduction approach, the same underlying structure is posited for the ungrammatical (21) andgrammatical (22), repeated below as (25a,b), with differing extents of Conjunction
Reduction. No theory is given as to how this surface deletion process would be
restricted by focus interveners.
(25) Patterns of intervention unexplained under Conjunction Reduction:a. * [nı̌ bu xiǎng sǎo dı̀] háishi [nı̌ bu xiǎng xı̌
wǎn] (ne)?
you NEG want sweep floor HAISHI you NEG want wash dishes Q
Intended: alternative question: ‘Do you not want to sweep the floor
or not want to wash dishes?’
(=21)
✓
b.
[nı̌ bu xiǎng sǎo dı̀] háishi [nı̌ bu xiǎng xı̌
wǎn] (ne)?
you NEG want sweep floor HAISHI you NEG want wash dishes Q
Alternative question: ‘Do you not want to sweep the floor or not want
to wash dishes?’(=22)
7

The sentence-initial shì in (24) has a cleft-like semantics and must associate with the subject(Paul & Whitman 2008). Shì will be discussed in more detail in section 4.3.

4.3 The position of the focus marker shì
In this section I discuss the morpheme shì which optionally occurs to the left of aháishi disjunction, exemplified below in (26).
(26) shì marking the left edge of a háishi disjunctionkāfē i] háishi [xiǎng hē
hóngchá] (ne)?
nı̌ shı̀ [xiǎng hē
you SHI want drink coffee HAISHI want drink tea
Q
Alternative question: ‘Do you want to drink coffee or tea?’
The same morpheme shì also occurs in Mandarin focus constructions, such as subject clefts and narrow focus constructions, and thus has been described as a focus
marker in previous literature (Paul & Whitman 2008; Erlewine 2010; a.o.).8 In
this section I argue that the shì which occurs optionally in háishi questions is thefocus marker shì. The unified distribution of shì in both háishi questions and focus constructions can be straightforwardly captured if the interpretation of háishi
disjunction produces focus values, as proposed here.
Paul & Whitman (2008) describe the distribution of the focus marker shì and, in
so doing, identify three different uses of the focus marker shì. Shì can occur either
sentence-medially (pre-VP) or sentence-initially (pre-subject). Sentence-medial shì
indicates narrow focus on a constituent within VP. Sentence-initial shì indicates focus on either the subject or the entire proposition. These patterns are summarizedin table 1.
position
focused constituent
sentence-medial constituent within VP
sentence-initial subject (cleft)sentence-initial entire sentence
Table 1: Positions and associated foci of the focus marker shì (Paul & Whitman 2008)

I will show that for each position in the clause where focus alternatives may
be produced—either through focus-marking or háishi disjunction—the distributionof the focus marker shì is identical between the focus constructions and alternative
questions. I begin with cases where focus alternatives originate within the VP.
(27) Focus within VP ⇒ sentence-medial shì(*shı̀) wǒ (shı̀) xiǎng (*shı̀) [SǍO DÌ]FSHII SHI want sweep ground‘I want to [SWEEP THE FLOOR]F ’ (...not wash dishes)(28) Disjunction within VP ⇒ sentence-medial shìháishi [xı̌ wǎn] (ne)?
(*shı̀) nı̌ (shı̀) xiǎng (*shı̀) [sǎo dı̀]you SHI want SHI sweep ground HAISHI wash dishes Q
SHI
Alternative question: ‘Do you want to sweep the floor or wash dishes?’
In both the narrow focus construction and alternative question above, shì canonly occur in one position: in sentence-medial position, to the left of the main verb.98
Shì is also homophonous and homographous with the copula. I assume that this use as a lexicalverb is, at least synchronically, a separate lexical item.
9
I will not explain the inability of shì to occur within the control verb xiǎng ‘want’ here.

Focus on the subject can be indicated by a sentence-initial shì, yielding exclusive, cleft-like semantics (Paul & Whitman 2008). When háishi disjunction is insubject position, shì can optionally occur in sentence-initial position.
(29) Focus on subject ⇒ sentence-initial shìshı̀ [MĀO]F (*shı̀) tōu le yú.
SHI cat
SHI
steal LE fish
‘It’s [the CAT]F that stole the fish.’ (...not the dog)(30) Disjunction in subject ⇒ sentence-initial shì(shı̀) [māo] háishi [gǒu] (*shı̀) tōu le yú (ne)?
SHI cat
HAISHI dog SHI
steal LE fish Q
Alternative question: ‘Did the cat or the dog steal the fish?’Finally, in cases where the entire clause is emphasized in contrast to other propositions, sentence-initial shì is used. Similarly, in háishi disjunctions of entire clauses,shì can occur sentence-initially.
(31) Focus on entire clause ⇒ sentence-initial shìContext: “The computer’s broken. Did you break the computer?”(shı̀) [diànnǎo zı̀jı̌ dāngjı̄ le]FSHI computer ZIJI crash LE‘(It’s that) the computer crashed by itself.’(32) Disjunction over distinct clauses ⇒ sentence-initial shì(shı̀) [nı̌ (*shı̀) nòng cuò le] háishi [diànnǎo zı̀jı̌ dāngjı̄ le] (ne)?
SHI you SHI
make wrong LE HAISHI computer ZIJI crash LE Q
Alternative question: ‘Did you make a mistake or did the computer crashby itself?’
As can be seen from the pairs above, the position of the focus marker shì in focus
constructions and the position of the optional shì in háishi alternative questions are
identical. I argue that the shì which optionally marks háishi alternative questions is
the standard Mandarin focus marker shì. Under the proposal made here, we are able
to unify the shì in these different environments with a simple generalization:(33) Descriptive generalization of shì position:10
The focus marker shì optionally occurs immediately above VP or TP when
its complement has a non-trivial focus semantic value.11 Shì should be on
the lowest position possible.
Other analyses involving covert movement or Conjunction Reduction would
have to stipulate the availability of shì in alternative questions, with coincidentallythe same distribution as the focus marker shì.
10

See also Erlewine (2010) which argues that the focus marker shì marks the position where focus
alternatives are computed.
11
Recall that constituents which contain no focus-alternative-generating constituents, such as
focus-marking or háishi disjunctions, have a focus value which is the singleton set of its ordinary semantic value. A non-trivial focus semantic value means having a non-singleton set of focus
alternatives.

5 Non-question uses of háishi
In most cases—and in all cases discussed thus far—the interrogative disjunction
háishi clearly contrasts with the “logical” disjunction huòzhe, in that the use ofháishi forces an alternative question interpretation. This contrast is observed inminimal pairs such as (34).

(34) Normally háishi and huòzhe require differing interpretations:a. Zhāng Sān xiǎng hēkāfē i háishi hóngchá (ne)?
Zhang San want drink coffee HAISHI tea
Q✓
Alternative question: ‘Does Zhang San want to drink coffee or tea?’* Declarative: Zhang San wants to drink coffee or tea.
b. Zhāng Sān xiǎng hēkāfē i huòzhe hóngchá
Zhang San want drink coffee ortea* Alternative question: ‘Does Zhang San want to drink coffee or tea?’✓
Declarative: Zhang San wants to drink coffee or tea.
However, there are environments in which háishi and huòzhe are interchangeable. Note in particular that in these environments, háishi does not trigger an alternative question interpretation.
(35) The antecedent of a conditional (based on R. Huang 2010:128):yàoshı̀ Akiu [cı́zhı́] {háishi/huòzhe} [tuı̀xiū] dehuà, qı̌ ng gàosù wǒ
if
Akiu resign HAISHI/or
retire the.case please tell me‘If Akiu resigns or retires, please tell me.’(36) Under a modal (based on R. Huang 2010:130):tā kěnéng xı̌ huān [Zhāng Sān] {háishi/huòzhe} [Lı̌ Sı̀]s/he might like Zhang San HAISHI/or
Li Si‘S/he might like Zhang San or Li Si.’I argue that the environments where the interrogative disjunction háishi and logical disjunction huòzhe are interchangeable are precisely those environments whichinterpret disjunction through their focus semantic values only. As háishi lacks an
ordinary semantic value, it requires an operator such as Q in order to be interpreted,
unless another operator has already constructed an ordinary focus value out of the
focus semantic value of háishi. Thus these environments block the alternative question “force” of háishi.
Alonso-Ovalle (2006) has shown that, for independent semantic reasons, disjunction in certain environments must be interpreted by accessing the individual
disjuncts and cannot be computed through a standard boolean disjunction semantics.
He argues that the individual disjuncts are projected through focus alternatives, as
proposed independently by Beck & Kim (2006). In these environments, only these
focus alternatives are used in the interpretation of the disjunction.
The environments that Alonso-Ovalle (2006) identify as interpreting disjunction
through focus alternatives include counterfactual conditionals and modals. The interpretation of disjunction in non-counterfactual conditionals is also amenable to an
analysis which uses focus semantic values only. This describes the environments
identified in the examples (35–36) above.

Consider Alonso-Ovalle’s (2006) example of disjunction within the scope of amodal:(37) Sandy may have ice cream or cake.

(Alonso-Ovalle 2006)

A salient deontic reading of (37) asserts that Sandy may have ice cream and that
Sandy may have cake. In particular, this reading of (37) is judged as false if Sandy
is only allowed to have ice cream or only allowed to have cake. If the or in (37)were the standard boolean disjunction, the sentence would instead be predicted to
be true in such cases. In order to compute the correct assertion, he argues, or must
project its individual disjuncts in its focus semantic value. In addition, the ordinary
semantic value projects the standard boolean disjunction meaning.
(38) Jice cream OR cakeKf = {ice cream, cake},
Jice cream OR cakeKo = ice cream ∨ cake
Alonso-Ovalle (2006) shows how the individual disjuncts projected through thefocus value of or interact with the semantics of counterfactual conditionals andmodals to yield the correct interpretations. In such environments, the ordinary semantic value of boolean disjunction is not used. Instead, only the focus semantic
values projected by the disjunction are considered.
I analyze the Mandarin disjunctions háishi and huòzhe to be the same in bothprojecting their disjuncts as focus values, but differing in whether ordinary semantic
values are defined. Thus, in environments where disjunctions are interpreted solely
through their focus semantic values, it is predicted that they will be interchangeable.
My analysis predicts that (a) háishi and huòzhe are interchangeable and (b)háishi loses its alternative question “force,” precisely in the scope of those operators which must use the focus alternatives of disjunction instead of boolean disjunction for their proper interpretation.12 Following the work of Alonso-Ovalle (2006),
these effects within the antecedent of conditionals (35) and modals (36) is explained
through the semantics of these environments.
Previous analyses of Mandarin alternative questions do not attempt to explainthese environments in which the disjunctions are interchangeable. For example,
Huang et al. (2009) suggests that háishi has a [+wh] feature but the logical disjunction huòzhe does not. This feature-based approach incorrectly predicts that theháishi variants of (35–36) will necessarily be interpreted as alternative questions,
unless conditionals and modals somehow have the ability to check a [+wh] feature.
12

However, this predicts that huòzhe disjunction can also be interpreted as an alternative question,
given Q. It is possible that transderivational competition makes such a reading marked.

6 Conclusion
I presented a new approach to Mandarin alternative questions which uses the RoothHamblin computation of focus alternatives. The proposal explains háishi alternative questions’ insensitivity to strong syntactic islands, sensitivity to wh-islands,
and their intervention effects. I showed that the shì which optionally occurs to theleft of háishi disjunctions is in fact the general Mandarin focus marker shì (Paul& Whitman 2008; Erlewine 2010). I proposed that háishi projects only a focussemantic value while the logical disjunction huòzhe also produces an ordinary semantic value, explaining the difference between háishi and huòzhe, as well as theirneutralization in environments which interpret disjunction through focus alternatives only (Alonso-Ovalle 2006).
Different lexical items for logical and interrogative disjunctions are also attested
in a number of other languages.13 The proposal here provides an approach to theformal semantics of these disjunctions, and makes concrete predictions about theirdistributions. I note that previous approaches involving covert movement (J. Huang
1982) and Conjunction Reduction (R. Huang 2009; 2010) do not adequately accountfor these facts.
Acknowledgements
For helpful discussion and comments, I thank Noah Constant, Paul Hagstrom, Irene
Heim, Jim Huang, Hadas Kotek, Waltraud Paul, David Pesetsky, Norvin Richards,
Dylan Tsai and the audiences at the European Association of Chinese Linguistics 7
and CLS 48. For judgments and discussion of the data, I thank TC Chen, Louis Liu,
Pamela Pan, Edwin Tsai, and Yimei Xiang. All errors are my own.

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Michael Yoshitaka Erlewine
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
77 Massachusetts Avenue 32-D808
Cambridge, MA 02139 USA
mitcho@mitcho.com