‘Not’ in focus:

This paper investigates the interaction of focus and negation in the Bantu language Zulu (Nguni; S42). I discuss four strategies that are used to negate transitive sentences in Zulu. The default strategy, in which an object marker is added to the negated verb, expresses polarity focus by dislocating the object-marked object from the VP-focus domain. In the second strategy, no object marker occurs, and focus falls on the object or the VP. I show that in this strategy, negation typically associates with the focus and is not part of the presupposition, and I argue that this is responsible for a (hitherto unexplained) additional contrastive inference that speakers report with this negation strategy. The third strategy, a cleft, is used to remove the focused object from the scope of negation; as a result, negation can associate with the presupposition. In the fourth strategy, the object noun loses its augment and is interpreted as a negative polarity item (NPI). Based on a proposal by Lahiri (1998), I argue that in negated sentences with NPI-objects, focus is placed on an implicit cardinality predicate which is associated with the semantic representation of the indefinite NPI-object.

GRAMMATICALIZATION OF NOUNS IN JORDANIAN ARABIC: EVIDENCE FROM ʃIKIL AND OMIR

The current study aims at exploring the grammaticalization of the nouns ʃikil 'shape' and omir 'age' in Jordanian Arabic. The data were collected from Jordanian T.V. series and interviews with native speakers of Jordanian Arabic. The sample of the study consisted of 300 tokens of ʃikil and 200 tokens of omir. The researcher collected the data, then he analysed the functions of these two words. The study found out that ʃikil was used 100 times as a noun meaning 'shape', and 200 times as an evidential particle. Besides, omir was also used as a noun 60 times and 140 times as a negative polarity item. The findings of the study showed that ʃikil has one lexical meaning 'shape', and it evolved by the process of grammaticalization into an evidential particle. ʃikil underwent the process of semantic bleaching, since it lost its content meaning and developed to serve a grammatical function of evidentially. Bedsides, it was decategorized as it lost the grammatical features of nouns, i.e. it cannot be pluralized and cannot accept definite articles. Also ʃikil lost its stress as part of phonetic reduction. Similarly, omir has one lexical meaning 'age' and developed into a negative polarity item. Omir was affected by the process of semantic bleaching and decategorization as it was developed from its original meaning as a noun meaning 'age' into a negative polarity item. Additionally, omir underwent the process of phonetic reduction as it lost stress. The study found out that ʃikil and omir underwent three stages of grammaticalization: semantic bleaching, decategorization, and phonetic reduction.

Bocado: scalar semantics and polarity sensitivity

This paper traces the developments of the noun bocado as it participates in two polarity-sensitive constructions in the history of Portuguese: the minimizer bocado ‘[not even] a bit’, a negative polarity item in Old Portuguese, and the degree adverbial um bocado ‘a bit’, which emerges in the 1700 s and is a positive polarity item. I adopt Israel’s (2011) grammar of polarity based on two lexical features, a quantitative value (q-value) and an informative value (i-value), in order to analyze the properties of these constructions as they reveal the interaction between lexical meaning and the logic of scalar reasoning. By applying this model in diachrony, I show how the logic of pragmatic scales underlies the patterns observed: a low q-value (lexical meaning) constrains the possible contexts of use of the expression in terms of the informativity of the propositions conveyed. Diachronic studies can thus shed light on the types of meaning associated with scalar terms as well as on types of scalar items.

Syntax of the Palestinian Arabic negation-associated exclusive construction

This paper presents an analysis of a Palestinian Arabic negation-associated exclusive construction featuring the contrastive focus marker illa ‘but’, with theoretical implications for the syntax of negation, negative polarity item licensing, and the categorical status of the root in sentential syntax. It analyzes illa-phrases as constituents licensed by a c-commanding sentential negation (Neg), and illa as a grammatical device encoding contrastiveness. A crucial source for the exclusive semantics of the construction comes from a silent bass ‘only’ immediately following illa that constitutes a syntactic ‘shield’ against Neg scope. Rather than taking an in-situ focus-interpretation approach (cf. Rooth 1985, 1992), we argue for two covert movements at the syntax-semantics interface: quantifier raising of illa-phrases to the designated specifier of polarity Phrase followed by Polarity-to-Focus-raising of Neg. This creates the right syntactic configuration for the truth conditional import of both operators and captures the ‘classical’ thought that focus-sensitive exclusive operators like only quantify over propositional alternatives.

Is There a Negative Polarity Item ‮דבר‬‎ in DSS Hebrew?

A negative polarity item (NPI) is a word or expression that occurs grammatically in negative clauses and a variety of other types of clauses such as interrogatives and conditionals, but not in ordinary affirmative sentences. Examples from classical Biblical Hebrew include the pronoun ‮מאומה‬‎ “anything” and the semantically-bleached noun ‮דבר‬‎ “a thing,” which has been produced from the ordinary noun ‮דבר‬‎ “word, matter, action” by the process of grammaticalization. This paper examines the noun ‮דבר‬‎ in the non-biblical DSS with the purpose of determining whether it is used as there as an NPI, as in Biblical Hebrew, or as an ordinary semantically-bleached noun, as in Rabbinic Hebrew. The results show that the diachronic development of ‮דבר‬‎ in the DSS appears to be at an earlier stage than classical Biblical Hebrew, despite the later dating of the scrolls. This finding is explained as a special kind of pseudo-classicism.

Polarity, expression of degree and negation: the vernacular form caraças

This paper presents the vernacular form caraças which, in European Portuguese (EP) is associated to multiple contexts, differents from its use as a feminine common noun. The data I will present shows that caraças behaves as a polarity item, without referential interpretation. On the one hand, caraçasbehaves as a minimizer, a subtype of Negative Polarity Item (NPI), being associated to the lowest point of a scale of value. On the other hand, it also behaves as a Positive Polarity Item (PPI), expressing maximal degrees, therefore being a maximizer. The fact that caraças occurs simultaneously as a NPI and a PPI could indicate we are in the presence of a bipolar element, as described by van der Wouden (1997). Nevertheless, data suggests that there are two distinct items caraças, one of them being a NPI and the other a PPI.The form caraças is also associated to other contexts of use, namely as a metalinguistic negation marker and in evaluative constructions such as N-of-an-N constructions. We also find it functioning as an interjection in exclamative sentences.Although the feminine common noun caraça (augmentative of cara ‘face’) remains in the lexicon as synonym of mask, the polarity item caraças does not result from a process of grammaticalization of the common noun, as documented for other polarity items. In this paper I will put forth the idea that caraças, in its masculine singular form, appeared as an euphemistic variant of caralho ‘dick’, a highly offensive taboo term, used to designate the masculine sexual organ.

The Neurology of Negation

This chapter provides an overview of psycho- and neurolinguistic studies on negation with healthy adult speakers, as well as studies on patients with focal brain damage. Semantically, negation inverts the truth value and the direction of entailment, and it is associated with a more complex syntactic structure. Behavioral evidence shows that negative sentences are associated with increased complexity and processing load. In the ERP data, an unlicensed negative polarity item (NPI) elicits an N400, due to semantic integration cost, whereas a positive one (PPI) elicits a P600, due to structural reanalysis or pragmatic discourse processing. Neuroimaging studies with fMRI have shown that while positive polarity engages the temporo-parietal region, the syntactic complexity of negation increases activation in promoter cortex (BA 6), not in Broca’s area—which converges with the evidence showing that negation is relatively spared in Broca’s aphasia.