In this paper, I examine some properties of higher and lower adverbs to suggest that the focusing só ‘only’ belongs to the first group. I argue that the behavior of exclusive só in Brazilian Portuguese is better explained on syntactic grounds, i.e. in terms of its position in the universal hierarchy. The key to arrive at this conclusion comes from the distribution of the focusing exclusivamente ‘exclusively’ which is also an exclusive adverb but behaves differently from só with respect to some syntactic properties which discriminate between lower and higher adverbs. I will show that Bever and Clark’s (2008) predictions that Semantics would be responsible for the asymmetries between quantificational adverbs and the exclusive só is not accurate inasmuch as exclusive exclusivamente ‘exclusively’, in Brazilian Portuguese, goes together with quantificational adverbs as far as some syntactic properties are examined.
Focusing adverbs; Exclusive adverbs; Quantificational adverbs; Functional hierarchy; Cartography; Generative Syntax
