A Tale of Two taqs: An OT-LFG Account of Plurals and Distributives in K'ichee' Mayan

In this paper, the distributive pluralizer taq in K'ichee' Mayan is described and explained using Optimality Theoretic Lexical-functional Grammar (OT-LFG). As a nominal pluralizer, the non-bound morpheme taq (PL) barely registers in the literature, while the distributive taq (DISTR) is virtually non-existent. The distributive pluralizer taq pluralizes nominals that are semantically ambiguous between collective and distributive readings. I argue that the distributive pluralizer taq is a phrase that (left) adjoins to the adjacent constituent. This contrasts with the distributive taq, which I contend elsewhere is a non-projecting word that head-adjoins to verbal predicates only. Using an OT-LFG analysis, the complex phrasal distribution of the distributive pluralizer taq can be straightforwardly modeled using a modest number of constraints.