partitivity

Partitivity is a semantic and syntactic phenomenon in linguistics that concerns how languages encode a portion of a whole rather than the whole itself. It is closely connected to the study of part-whole relations (mereology) and to how quantification interacts with noun class. In partitive constructions, a noun phrase denotes only a subset or a portion of a larger referent.

A typical partitive reading arises with mass nouns or plurals when the speaker intends only a part of the whole. English frequently uses "some of" or "a portion of" (some of the water, a piece of cake, two of the cookies). In other languages, dedicated partitive markers or articles encode this meaning.

In French, the partitive articles du, de la, des mark partial quantities with mass and count nouns (Je voudrais du pain). Italian uses del, della, dei, delle (Vorrei del pane). Spanish may express partitivity with de + definite article or with phrases like un poco de pan. These markers align with container or mass readings rather than enumerating all items.

Theoretical treatments vary; many analyses tie partitivity to the mass-count distinction, container semantics, and distributivity. Some frameworks treat partitive constructions as licensed by a specific determiner or preposition that introduces a subset, while others view them as general quantifier phrases with a special meaning.

Partitivity also interacts with context: the same expression can yield a non-partitive reading when the larger whole is assumed or when the reference is definite. Cross-linguistic variation and diachronic change show that partitivity is a flexible tool for encoding partial quantities in natural language.