AN OVERVIEW OF NEGATIVE MARKERS IN ENGLISH AND ALBANIAN

Negative sentences are the opposite of positive ones; they negate the action expressed in positive clauses by using negative markers and/or negative words. English and Albanian are two languages in which negation is structured and expressed in different ways, although the negative markers are more or less the same. However, even though they may seem similar and corresponding to each other in both languages, they are used in different structures and have different scope. This paper gives a description and comparison of negative markers in English and Albanian. Their use and structure is illustrated by various examples to support the description. Based on this overview, it can be concluded that both English and Albanian have negative particles functioning as negative markers, as well as negative words. However, these negative markers and negative words do not express negation in the same way in these two languages. The simplest difference is that English has only one negative marker of verbal negation – not; while Albanian has several negative markers: nuk/s’ to mark primary as well as secondary verbal negation, mos to mark verbal negation in the indicative, subjunctive, conditional and imperative mood; jo is used to mark both sentential and constituent negation; as- as a negative particle marks both sentential and constituent negation and can be accompanied by one of the verbal negative markers nuk /s’. Even though there is a correspondence of not and nuk /s’ to mark verbal negation, there is a misbalance of negative markers and their uses in both languages. A further difference, and a greater one is the use of n-words or negative polarity items (NPIs). English as a single negation language forms negation by using negative verbs with NPI, or by using n-words as absolute negators. For instance, (1) Ben didn’t see anybody vs. (2) Ben saw nobody. In sentence (1) there is a negative verb which cannot be followed or preceded by an n-word, therefore the NPI anybody is used, while in sentence (2) there is a positive verb which allows the use of an n-word such as nobody. On the other hand, in Albanian, n-words such as negative adverbs and negative pronouns are only used accompanied by the verbal marker nuk/s’, thus creating negative concord as in the example: Askush nuk tha asgjë. In this sentence there are three negative words – askush, nuk, asgjë- which contribute to one semantic meaning. As far as conjunctions are concerned, most of them correspond in both languages in both structure and meaning. Similarly, prefixes share similar properties in English and Albanian, they are attached to adjectives, verbs or nouns to express negation, opposition, reversative or removing ideas. English also has a negative suffix –less, while Albanian has no negative suffixes, which could be considered as a slight difference.

Other Romance varieties

Chapter 3 extends the investigation of verb placement to other Romance varieties, in order to expand the macro- and micro-typologies identified in Chapter 2. It starts with a description of the placement of the present indicative verb across a selection of varieties of French, Romanian, Spanish, Catalan, European Portuguese, and Brazilian Portuguese. Following the methodology of Chapter 2, the remainder of the discussion is devoted to the description of cases of microvariation attested across the varieties above, which emerge once a selection of structural and interpretative distinctions are considered, such as lexical and auxiliary verbs, ‘have’ and ‘be’ auxiliaries, finite and non-finite verbs (cf. participle and infinitive), as well as a selection of modally, temporally, and aspectually marked forms (e.g. subjunctive, conditional, past, future, imperfect).

Romance varieties of the Italian peninsula

Chapter 2 investigates the differing patterns of verb placement attested across a selection of varieties of the Italian peninsula. After a description of the placement of the present indicative verb in the northern, central, and southern regional varieties of Italian, as well as in a selection of northern, central, upper southern, extreme southern, and Sardinian dialects, a macro-typology of verb placement in the Italian peninsula is drawn. The rest of the chapter is devoted to the description of the microvariation attested across the above varieties which emerges once different verb typologies are considered, such as lexical and auxiliary verbs, ‘have’ and ‘be’ auxiliaries, finite and non-finite verbs (cf. participle and infinitive), as well as a selection of modally, temporally, and aspectually marked forms (e.g. subjunctive, conditional, past, future, imperfect).

Truthmaking

The notions of “truthmaking” and “truthmakers” are central to many attempts in contemporary metaphysics to come to grips with the connection between truth and reality. The intuitive motivation for theories of truthmaking is the idea that truth depends on reality: that truth is not primitive or fundamental, but rather derivative and dependent. The idea, more precisely stated, is that true propositions (or whatever are the primary truth-bearers, e.g., statements, sentences, or beliefs) are not true in and of themselves but must be made true by reality. Truthmaker theorists think that for a proposition to be made true is for it to be true in virtue of the existence of some entity, which is called its “truthmaker.” While many find the thought that truths are “true in virtue of,” or “grounded in,” or “determined by” reality compelling, not everyone finds the truthmaker theorist’s way of articulating this idea adequate. This article focuses on recent truthmaker theories, their challenges, and alternative approaches to truthmaking. One major point of contention surveyed here is the scope of truthmaking: i.e., whether every truth has a truthmaker, or only some. Another important issue is the nature of truthmakers. Some contend that states of affairs are truthmakers, while others hold that particular property instances (“tropes”) are better qualified to ground truths. Truthmaker theorists also disagree about how to characterize the “truthmaking relation” that holds between truths and their truthmakers. The various principles of truthmaking (principles setting out necessary and sufficient conditions under which an entity is a truthmaker for some proposition) offered in the literature are also surveyed in this entry. Perhaps the most contentious matter in truthmaker theory is how to deal with “problem cases”: i.e., truths for which there are no obvious truthmakers, such as negative existential truths, necessary truths, and subjunctive conditional truths. Some deny that these truths have truthmakers, but others have come up with ingenious and therefore controversial accounts of the truthmakers for these truths. Works on the relation between theories of truth and theories of truthmaking are also surveyed. Because it brings together foundational issues in ontology and truth, the nature of truthmaking and truthmakers has and will continue to be a source of interest and excitement for philosophers.

Intrinsicality and the Conditional

In [3] I argued for a particular kind of semantics for subjunctive conditionals. The arguments were based upon some linguistic considerations of the general character of what we mean when we say such and such. I urged that a semantics for subjunctive conditionals ought to provide a distinct representation of the subjunctive mood of a sentence, and should take seriously the fact that subjunctive conditionals admit distinctions of tense. The envisaged semantics took the subjunctive conditional to be about occasions, and the central problem discussed was, accordingly, how to represent what must count as the same occasion in spite of whatever changes were required to make the antecedent of the conditional true.