Expression and Interpretation of Negation

Abstract

Chapter summaryThis chapter introduces the empirical scope of our study on the expression and interpretation of negation in natural language. We start with some background notions on negation in logic and language, and continue with a discussion of more linguistic issues concerning negation at the syntax-semantics interface. We zoom in on crosslinguistic variation, both in a synchronic perspective (typology) and in a diachronic perspective (language change). Besides expressions of propositional negation, this book analyzes the form and interpretation of indefinites in the scope of negation. This raises the issue of negative polarity and its relation to negative concord. We present the main facts, criteria, and proposals developed in the literature on this topic. The chapter closes with an overview of the book. We use Optimality Theory to account for the syntax and semantics of negation in a cross-linguistic perspective. This theoretical framework is introduced in Chapter 2. Negation in logic and languageThe main aim of this book is to provide an account of the patterns of negation we find in natural language. The expression and interpretation of negation in natural language has long fascinated philosophers, logicians, and linguists. Horn's (1989) Natural history of negation opens with the following statement: "All human systems of communication contain a representation of negation. No animal communication system includes negative utterances, and consequently, none possesses a means for assigning truth value, for lying, for irony, or for coping with false or contradictory statements." A bit further on the first page, Horn states: "Despite the simplicity of the one-place connective of propositional logic (¬p is true if and only if p is not true) and of the laws of inference in which it participate (e.g. the Law of Double Negation: from ¬¬p infer p, and vice versa), the form and function of negative statements in ordinary Chapter 1 2 language are far from simple and transparent. In particular, the absolute symmetry definable between affirmative and negative propositions in logic is not reflected by a comparable symmetry in language structure and language use." The scope of this book is more modest than Horn's seminal study, but we will nevertheless attempt to work out some of the issues highlighted by Horn. In particular, we will be concerned with negation as a universal category of human language, with negation as the marked member of the pair <affirmation, negation>, and with cross-linguistic variation in the marking and interpretation of propositional negation and negative indefinites. Markedness of negationThe fact that all human languages establish a distinction between affirmative and negative statements is the starting point of the investigation in Chapters 3 through 6.The relation with animal communication systems is investigated in Chapter 7, where we draw implications for language genesis from our study of negation in L2 acquisition. Modern studies on animal communication make it possible to assign a ment...

Anticausatives are weak scalar expressions, not reflexive expressions

“…Rather, it is a negative quantifier denoting the empty set (as English no), which, in addition, triggers negative concord in its clause (e.g. Bosque 1980;Penka 2007;de Swart 2010). This assumption can account both for the unacceptability of (24b) as well as for the acceptability of (26b).…”

Negative sensitive items in Turkish: Negative polarity or negative concord?

“…In this group, NCIs are treated either as (i) indefinites (Ladusaw, 1992(Ladusaw, , 1994Acquaviva, 1993;Giannakidou and Quer, 1995;Giannakidou, 1997), as (ii) indefinites that are licensed in syntax though syntactic agreement (Ladusaw, 1992;Zeijlstra, 2004Zeijlstra, , 2008Zeijlstra, , 2013, or as (iii) universal quantifiers (Szabolcsi, 1981;Giannakidou, 1998Giannakidou, , 2000Giannakidou, , 2006. On the other hand, the negative approach includes the negabsorption analysis by Zanuttini (1991), Haegeman and Zanuttini (1991, 1996), De Swart and Sag (2002), and De Swart (2010. Watanabe (2004) also argues for a negative approach whose analysis involves the theory of feature checking as well as feature copying.…”

Multiple n-words in Afrikaans

“…Firstly, n-words are seen as non-negative existential or universal quantifiers (Laka 1990;Ladusaw 1992;Giannakidou 1997Giannakidou , 2000, or as non-negative indefinites (Zeijlstra 2004 Giannakidou 2006). Finally, the negative quantifier approach takes n-words to be inherently negative quantifiers (Zanuttini 1991;Haegeman andZanuttini 1991, 1996;Haegeman 1995;De Swart and Sag 2002;Watanabe 2004;De Swart 2006). This last approach is the one that seems to account best for Standard Afrikaans, where multiple n-word constructions are (prescriptively) not acceptable.…”