Etymological Opacity, Hybridization, and the Afrikaans Brace Negation

Abstract

One of the enduring cruxes in Afrikaans historical linguistics has been the origin of the so-called “double” or more properly “brace” negation, specifically with respect to the negative particle nie in sentence-final position. Though bipartite negation is well represented in the Germanic languages, the Afrikaans pattern stands alone. The brace negation is an innovation that came about through the reanalysis of a discourse-dependent (pragmatically conditioned) structure in metropolitan Dutch. The agents of the change were Khoikhoi and enslaved peoples at the Cape in the context of wholesale language shift and basilectalization under the pressure of a socioeconomic order based on caste. Given the intensive mixing between mesolectal and basilectal varieties as part of a shared repertoire, the innovation was accepted by rural, lower-class Europeans living in closest proximity to indigenes and slaves, with stylistic and social variation.

'Nie sommer nie': Sociohistorical and formal comparative considerations in the rise and maintenance of the modern Afrikaans negation system

“…Secondly, the Afrikaans negation system has been shown to differ quite substantially from what is found in Dutch varieties or, more generally, in the European languages with which Afrikaans was in contact during its formative period (cf. again Ponelis, Roberge, Deumert andvan der Wouden, op.cit, andalso, particularly, den Besten 1986 andRoberge 2000).…”

“…In terms of Roberge's (2000) proposal that nie 2 originated as a resumptive tag-element that speakers employed to reinforce the negative nature of the proposition expressed, or the prohibitive nature of the speech act intended…”

“…The article is structured as follows: Section 2 focuses on the peculiarity of nie 2 , which is attributed to its origins as a discourse tag (Roberge 2000), and the formal consequences of this, in Western European terms, unusual source. Particularly important here is the fact that the negative developments that we observe in Afrikaans do not appear to be of the familiar Jespersenian type.…”

Multiple n-words in Afrikaans

“…More recent contributions to this field include (Robbers 1992), (Oosthuizen 1998), (Molnárfi 2002(Molnárfi , 2004, (Bell 2004) and (Biberauer 2007). See also (Den Besten 1986) and (Roberge 2000) for discussions of the origin of negative concord in Afrikaans.…”

Foreword

“…The paper attempts to demonstrate just how peculiar the modern Afrikaans negation system is, and what a central role clause-final nie has played in creating the conditions for the rise of this strangeness. Following Roberge (2000), I argue that final nie has its origins as an emphatic spoken-language resumptive discourse particle (Dit kannie waar wees, nee! -literally: it cannot true be, no, i.e.…”