To wish or not to wish: Modality and (metalinguistic) negation

The Oxford Handbook of Negation, ed. by V. Déprez & M.T. Espinal , 2020

PRE-PRINT DRAFT https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198830528.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780198830528-e-4 This chapter is dedicated to the morpho-syntactic properties of markers of sentential negation, and to the relation between such properties and other aspects of the syntax of negation. It reviews the results of cross-linguistic research and describes the different forms of negative markers (affixes, particles, auxiliary verbs, complementizers). It also discusses a number of correlations between the form of the sentential negative marker and more general structural aspects (doubling, pre- vs. postverbal negation, presence of Negative Concord).

Language, 1985

2017

This very rich and comprehensive monograph presents a study of the expression of negation in a large array of languages, mostly but not exclusively from the Indo-European family. Henriëtte de Swart's aim is to provide an analysis of the cross-linguistic variation found with respect to negation, using a model based on Optimality Theory (OT). The choice of this model is motivated by its applicability to the syntax-semantics interface, that is, it is said to offer a unified perspective on both the syntactic and semantic contributions of negation, or the speaker (production) and hearer (interpretation) contributions in negative forms/meanings. As such, the book embarks on a clearly innovative enterprise, which encourages the reader to view the strikingly diverse phenomena involved in negation from a different perspective. Wide-scope OT accounts are-to my knowledge-extremely scarce ; and although recent contributions to the study of negation, both from a syntactic and from a semantic point of view, have added to our understanding of the phenomenon, few researchers have attempted to tackle the complex issue of the syntax-semantics interface of negation, especially when working within a large-scale typological investigation. De Swart's book is divided into six chapters and a conclusion. The first two chapters provide the empirical and formal background. Chapter 1, ' Negation in a cross-linguistic perspective ', presents an overview of the central issues of negation. It provides an in-depth discussion of typological and diachronic variation in sentential negation. It also introduces the muchdebated question of the nature of negative expressions. In the existing literature, negative expressions have been assigned various interpretations, having been analysed as negative quantifiers, indefinites in the scope of negation, or even as ambiguous between the two readings (see the references in the book). De Swart argues that 'n-words ' (Laka 1990

This thesis investigates the multifaceted nature of negation on a theoretical account and discusses its representation in non-standard and standard varieties of English and German. In natural languages, negation is understood as being marked by the presence of certain morpho-syntactic elements, qua negation markers. In simple terms, logical negation can be treated as merely symbolizing a two-valued operator indicating the truth category of an utterance, which strictly surfaces as being either true or false. From a theoretical viewpoint, negation is regarded as more complex when its interaction with various principles of logical form, syntax, compositional semantics and processes of language acquisition are considered. This thesis attempts an integrated analysis of negative expressions across a fragment of English and German varieties. The empirical part of this thesis is mainly engaged with the phenomenon of multiple negation and distinct approaches that deal with clusters of negative markers. The nuances of negativity in this respect can range from preserving the complete falsity of an utterance to elevating it to the exact opposite, namely positive semantics. While affirmatives can be distinguished from negative utterances by the occurrence of n-words, the semantical and logical analysis of multiple negation encompasses a wider spectrum of multifunctional meanings, and thus has triggered an ongoing debate in the field. To contribute to this discussion, a study of native speakers of an Austrian variety of German has been conducted in order to explore form, function and acquisition of multiply-marked negation in this lesser examined non-standard variety of German.

Whereas existential deontic modals (may, can) always scope under negation, universal deontic modals may vary w.r.t. whether they scope over or under negation. Modals like "must" and "should" take wide scope w.r.t. negation, modals like "have to" and "need to" take narrow scope. Similar patterns have been attested in other languages. In this article we argue that the scopal properties of modals w.r.t. negation can be understood if (i) modals that outscope negation are Positive Polarity Items (PPIs); (ii) all modals originate in a position lower than I°; and (iii) modals undergo reconstruction unless reconstruction leads to a PPI licensing violation. Finally, in this article the question is addressed as to why certain modals are PPIs and others not.

Functional Heads, 2012

In this article we focus our attention on sentential negations, both clitic and adverbial. These are associated with the functional category Neg by Pollock (1989) and further articulated in several Neg positions as part of the adverbial hierarchy by Zanuttini (1997), Cinque (1999). Based on data from Romance varieties, we argue that while the interpretive component of grammar includes a sentential operator negation (with the properties of the logical negation), neither clitic nor adverbial negations instantiate it. Rather both clitic and adverbial negations are negative polarity arguments, implying the negative operator in whose scope they are licenced. In turn, negative polarity properties are not encoded by a specialized functional category, but have exactly the same status as other properties represented in lexical entries as pertaining to their interpretation at the LF interface, including those imputed to lexical categories: animacy, numerability, etc. 'He didn't want to abandon his sword' Northern Italian dialects provide evidence in favor of a non purely etymological connection between negation and partitive assignment to the internal argument of the verb. Thus in (3) the negation triggers the partitive even in the presence of a definite interpretation. This type of data recalls the phenomenon described by Pesetsky (1982) for Russian, whereby the accusative object in nonnegative contexts can alternate with a partitive object in negative ones. (3) (a mmarju) tSamum-ru/na mija Trecate (Piedmont) the Mario we.call-him/of.him not

Journal of Pragmatics, 2003

Metalinguistic negation (MN) is a specialized use of the negative operator where it functions as a device for registering an objection to a preceding utterance on any grounds other than its truth-conditional content. In this paper, I describe how MN is used in Egyptian Arabic, where it can be expressed differently from descriptive negation. Moreover, I discuss its language specific properties such as the use of an overt complementizer in a matrix clause, and propose two diagnostics for MN in this language: (a) it licenses double negation, an otherwise ungrammatical structure, and (b) it cannot be used emphatically. Negation in Egyptian Arabic is ambiguous only if the speaker suppresses the formal properties of MN to strengthen the double processing effect, so as to achieve certain communicative goals such as humor, surprise, and irony. Although there are two ways of expressing negation in Egyptian Arabic, I argue that there is only one negative operator, and that the different ways of expressing negation are a result of the grammaticalization of pragmatic functions. The facts about negation in Egyptian Arabic strongly support Horn's account of MN as non truth-functional, as the negated clause can be conjoined to its rectification without triggering a truth-functional, therefore contradictory, interpretation.

This paper revisits the definition of metalinguistic negation (MLN) illustrated by e.g. They don't have kids, they have children. A new definition is proposed that rests on two properties. The first is that MLN is a corrective speech-act. The second is that the sentence used to perform the speech-act has a paradoxical Information Structure: it is discourse-old material, along with the corrected a segment that is however treated as discourse-new by virtue of being focused and contrasted to the correcting segment. These properties are used to explain established features of MLN. MLN's speech-act status accounts for the distinctive behaviour of relevant connectives. The paradoxical Information Structure distinguishes MLN from other uses of negation, relates it to other corrective constructions and metalinguistic phenomena (e.g. in conditionals and questions) and accounts for the alleged marked status of metalinguistic configurations. How MLN can be mapped by a cartographic approach is speculated upon.

2013

The distribution with respect to negation of verbs and auxiliaries in English needs a new analysis. Using data from the behaviour of modals, we argue for three negation positions: Echoic, Polarity, and Adverbial. The main claim we make is that Polarity Negation and Echoic Negation (and their Positive counterparts) have a categorial feature [V]. This fact explains why a verb cannot, but an auxiliary may, occur higher than Pol[NEG]. Soft constraints on the distribution of the Infl with which each [V] head must be associated determine the PF positions of the inflected heads.

Every natural language has some lexical element at its disposal to reverse the truth-conditional content of a sentence. Sometimes, sentences are rendered negative by means of a negative marker, sometimes by means of a negative indefinite, and sometimes even by a combination of both of them. It turns out that the syntactic and semantic behaviour of these negative markers and indefinites is much more complex than may be initially thought. In this chapter, I discuss the general syntactic and semantic properties of both negative markers and negative indefinites and I focus on three particular phenomena that shed more light on their intricate syntactic and semantic properties: negative concord, split-scope readings, and the co-occurrence of multiple negative markers in a single clause.