This book contains eleven carefully selected papers, all discussing negative constructions in English. The aim of this volume is to bring together empirical research into the development of English negation and analyses of syntactic variations in Present-day English negation. The first part "Aspects of Negation in the History of English" includes six contributions, which focus on the usages of the negative adverbs ne and not, the decline of negative concord, and the development of the auxiliary do in negation. Most of the themes discussed here are then linked to the second part "Aspects of Negation in Present-day English". Especially, the issue of negative concord is repeatedly explored by three of the five papers in this part, one related to British English dialects in general, another to Tyneside English, and the other to African American Vernacular English. This book uniquely highlights the importance of continuity from Old English to Present-day English, while, in its introduction, it provides a useful detailed survey of previous studies on English negation.

Table of contents

Acknowledgement vii List of contributors ix List of abbreviations xi

Introduction: Studies on English Negation and the Present Volume Yoko Iyeiri 1–11 I. Aspects of Negation in the History of English

Negative Constructions in Old English: The Question of Cynewulf's Authorship Jun Terasawa 15–25

Variable Features of Negative Elements in Old English Psalter Glosses Michiko Ogura 27–38

On Grammaticalization of Negative Adverbs, with Special Reference to Jespersen's Cycle Recast Ohkado Masayuki 39–58

"I not say" Once Again: A Study of the Early History of the "not + finite verb" Type in English Yoko Iyeiri 59–81

Decline of Multiple Negation Revisited Hideo Nishimura 83–92

A History of the Negative Interrogative do in Seventeenth- to Nineteenth-Century Diaries and Correspondance Fujio Nakamura 93–111

II. Aspects of Negation in Present-day English

Negative Concord in British English Dialects Lieselotte Anderwald 113–137

No, nay, never: Negation in Tyneside English Joan C. Beal and Karen P. Corrigan 139–157

A Corpus-based Study of the haven't NP Pattern in American English Naohiro Takizawa 159–171

Negation in African American Vernacular English Darin Howe 173–203

Subjective Meanings of Except-linkage in Present-day English in Comparison with Including Mitsumi Uchida 205–227 Name Index 229–231 Subject Index 233–239