LINGUIST List 10.1438

Sat Oct 2 1999

Qs: Negative Concord, Internet Jargon

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Directory

  • Sue Brown, Negative concord/negation
  • Michal Lisecki, internet jargon in European languages

    Message 1: Negative concord/negation

     Date: Tue, 28 Sep 1999 15:01:51 -0400
    From: Sue Brown <sbrownfas.harvard.edu>
    Subject: Negative concord/negation


    I am continuing my research on negative concord in Russian and would like to expand my horizons a little bit. I am interested in data, references, etc..., regarding patterns of negative concord in other languages, especially less documented languages.

    In Russian, all negative words (ni-words) require the negative proclitic 'ne' on the verb, where *() indicates ungrammaticality in the absence of 'ne':

    (i) Ja nikogo *(ne) vizhu. I no one not see 'I don't see anyone.'

    (ii) Ja nikogda ni s kem *(ne) tancuju. I never not w/whom not dance 'I never dance with anyone.'

    In other words, Russian exhibits negative concord, where multiple negative constituents express a single instance of negation. The neutral word order for the negative words in Russian is preverbal, but they may occur postverbally as well (usually with emphasis). The reading is still one of negative concord:

    (iii) Ja ne vizhu NIKOGO. I not see no one 'I don't see ANYONE.'

    I am interested in discovering patterns of negative concord in other languages, in particular:

    a) whether negative words in any position (e.g., preverbal or postverbal) require a negative marker on the verb (e.g., as in Catalan, Old Russian preverbal negative constituents do not require 'ne' (it is optional), while postverbal ones do; as in Italian, in my dialect of Southern American English, preverbal negative constituents cannot cooccur with the negative marker on the verb, while postverbal ones require it, for example, the declaratives "Didn't nobody do see the film" or "Ain't nobody seen the film" vs. "Nobody saw/seen the film."/*"Nobody didn't see the film" *=ungrammaticality);

    b) whether movement of the negative words (e.g. fronting to a preverbal position) is required, disallowed, or optional (as in Russian);

    c) whether non-movement affects the negative force of the clause (e.g. West Flemish, according to Haegeman 1995, requires an overt Spec-head relation for a negative concord reading to obtain; otherwise the reading is one of double negation, and the negatives cancel each other out);

    d) whether movement or non-movement of the negative word(s) is more neutral (if movement is optional), i.e., whether one or the other results in focus/emphasis on the negative word (as non-movement does for (iii) above);

    e) whether the option of movement is somehow affected by the number of negative constituents (for example, in Russian, native speakers tend to resist sentences like (ii) if both negative words remain postverbal, preferring either a sentence where at least one of the negative constituents raises to a preverbal position or the sentence in (ii), where both move.); and if at least one must move, whether there is a restriction on which one moves (e.g., argument, adjunct, indirect object, direct object, etc...).

    I am also curious as to who originated the term 'negative concord', if anybody knows.

    Thanks in advance for your help. Please respond to sbrownfas.harvard.edu. I will post a summary, if I get enough responses.

    Best, Sue Brown

    Message 2: internet jargon in European languages

     Date: Tue, 28 Sep 1999 22:45:57 +0100
    From: Michal Lisecki <maguraares.fils.us.edu.pl>
    Subject: internet jargon in European languages


    Dear all,

    I need help with getting the chart which showed up in "Romanistik im Internet: Eine praktische Einfuhrung", Bonn: Romanistichser Verlag, 1999. It is a four-page chart comparing internet jargon in German, French, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish. There's just no way I can get the book here in Poland so I would be thankful if somebody could either scan/xero it and forward it to me. I would also be interested, if possible, in getting the TOC of the book (the respective contributors/authors). My scope of interest includes multicultural aspect of CMC from the perspective of linguistic phenomena which occur in it. Although my interest is mainly in synchronous modes (IRC, MUD) I am currently preparing for a conference presentation on the 'pragmatics of email communication.' Should you be interested

    Thanks 4 any help tafn mike _______________________________________________________________ Michal Lisecki, Ph.D candidate <maguraares.fils.us.edu.pl> Institute of Slavonic Studies, University of Silesia (Poland) http://www.cz.top.pl/~magura <maguracz.top.pl> finger 4 my PGP