scholarly journals Sakha 'da(qany)': Negative Polarity, Conjunction, and Focus

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 71
Author(s):  
Ian L. Kirby
Keyword(s):  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
Polarity Sensitivity ◽  
Similar Elements

This paper discusses the quantifier particle da(qany) in the Siberian Turkic language Sakha (also known as "Yakut").  Focusing on its distribution in negative polarity items (NPIs) and doubled coordination constructions, it is shown that it has a distribution which is far more restricted than similar elements in other languages. In order to account for the semantics of this element, it is argued in an exhaustification-based theory of polarity sensitivity, that da(qany)'s main semantic contribution is to mark the alternative of its host as obligatorily active.

Negative Polarity Items

2020 ◽  
pp. 390-406
Author(s):  
Lucia M. Tovena
Keyword(s):  
Special Form ◽  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
Polarity Sensitivity ◽  
Sentential Negation ◽  
Idiomatic Expressions ◽  
Distributional Patterns ◽  
Semantic Notion ◽  
Selection Of

This chapter investigates the phenomenon of negative polarity sensitivity. The term negative polarity items (NPIs) has been introduced in the literature to refer to forms whose distribution was observed to polarize in negative contexts. NPIs can vary from indefinites that take a special form when they occur in the scope of negation, e.g. any in English, to DPs functioning as minimizers, e.g. a drop, verbal idiomatic expressions such as lift a finger, and more. NPIs are often characterized indirectly by analyzing their distribution in terms of licensing contexts. Sentential negation is a typical licensor that is required to c-command an NPI. A weaker but more inclusive semantic notion of negativity shared by many licensing environments is provided by downward monotonicity. Distributional patterns also led to distinguishing between weak NPIs and stronger NPIs, the latter being restricted to a subset of contexts from the broad selection of licensing environments.

scholarly journals Polarity sensitivity of question embedding: experimental evidence

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 ◽  
pp. 217 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thom Van Gessel ◽  
Alexandre Cremers ◽  
Floris Roelofsen
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Evidence ◽  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Judgment Task ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
Polarity Sensitivity ◽  
Universal Quantifiers ◽  
Acceptability Judgment

Attitude predicates can be classified by the kinds of complements they can embed: declaratives, interrogatives or both. However, several authors have claimed that predicates like be certain can only embed interrogatives in specific environments. According to Mayr, these are exactly the environments that license negative polarity items (NPIs). In his analysis, both NPIs and embedded interrogatives are licensed by the same semantic strengthening procedure. If this is right, one would expect a correlation between acceptability of be certain whether and NPIs. The analysis also predicts a contrast between antecedents vs. consequents of conditionals and restrictors vs. scopes of universal quantifiers. This paper tests these predictions experimentally through an acceptability judgment task. We find that judgments for be certain whether do not correlate with judgments on NPIs, which suggests that be certain whether and NPIs are in fact licensed by different mechanisms.

scholarly journals Spotting, collecting and documenting negative polarity items

2010 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 931-952 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan-Philipp Soehn ◽  
Beata Trawiński ◽  
Timm Lichte
Keyword(s):  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
Polarity Items

How Antisymmetric Is Syntax?

2003 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 516-526 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuji Takano
Keyword(s):  
Linear Order ◽  
Phrase Structure ◽  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Other ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
The Right

Since the emergence of Kayne's (1994) stimulating proposal for an antisymmetric theory of phrase structure and linear order, much work has been devoted to arguing for or against his theory as well as discussing its empirical predictions. As a result, for a number of phenomena involving rightward positioning, such as rightward adjuncts, heavy NP shift, extraposition, postverbal subjects, and postverbal constituents in OV languages, there now exist both an approach consistent with Kayne's theory (the antisymmetric approach) and another not consistent with it (the symmetric approach). In such a situation, it is often difficult to show on empirical grounds that one approach is superior to the other (see Rochemont and Culicover 1997). In what follows, I describe this situation with respect to two well-known phenomena in English: rightward positioning of adjuncts and heavy NP shift. For each of these phenomena, the symmetric and antisymmetric approaches have been proposed, and both approaches can correctly account for the data discussed in previous studies. Here, I examine the approaches from a novel point of view, showing that data involving the licensing of negative polarity items allow us to differentiate them and to decide which is the right one for each of the two empirical domains. Interestingly, the relevant facts lead to different conclusions for the two phenomena. The results have important implications for the antisymmetric view of syntax.

scholarly journals The Interpretation of Disjunction in the Scope of Dou in Child Mandarin

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shasha An ◽  
Peng Zhou ◽  
Stephen Crain
Keyword(s):  
Mandarin Chinese ◽  
Free Choice ◽  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Judgment Task ◽  
Recent Theory ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
Value Judgment ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
Downward Entailing ◽  
The Right

A recent theory provides a unified cross-linguistic analysis of the interpretations that are assigned to expressions for disjunction, Negative Polarity Items, Free Choice Items, and the non-interrogative uses of wh-phrases in languages such as Mandarin Chinese. If this approach is on the right track, children should be expected to demonstrate similar patterns in the acquisition of these linguistic expressions. Previous research has found that, by age four, children have acquired the knowledge that both the existential indefinite renhe “any” and wh-words in Mandarin Chinese are interpreted as Negative Polarity Items when they are bound by downward entailing operators, but the same expressions are interpreted as Free Choice Items (with a conjunctive interpretation) when they are bound by deontic modals (Mandarin keyi) or by the Mandarin adverbial quantifier dou “all”. The present study extends this line of research to the Mandarin disjunction word huozhe. A Truth Value Judgment Task was used to investigate the possibility that disjunction phrases that are bound by the adverbial quantifier dou generate a conjunctive interpretation in the grammars of Mandarin-speaking 4-year-old children. The findings confirmed this prediction. We discuss the implications of the findings for linguistic theory and for language learnability.

scholarly journals Bipolar Items

2016 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Sumiyo Nishiguchi
Keyword(s):  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Wide Scope ◽  
Positive Polarity ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
Simple Sentences

Abstract This article asserts that the Japanese wide-scope mo ‘even’ in simple sentences are bipolar items (BPIs) antilicensed or forbidden by negation and licensed in a non-monotonic (NM) environment. BPIs share the features of negative polarity items (NPIs) as well as positive polarity items (PPIs). The Dutch ooit ‘ever’, the Serbo-Croatian i-series ‘and/even’, and the Hungarian is-series ‘and/even’ are antilicensed by clausemate negation and licensed by extraclausal negation (van der Wouden, 1997; Progovac, 1994; Szabolcsi, 2002) or non-monotonic negative (and positive, for Serbo-Croatian) emotive predicates. Adding an NPI rescues BPIs in uncomfortable clausemate negation.

scholarly journals Exploring negation in Awing

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 94-107
Author(s):  
NYOMY Cyrine Cyrine
Keyword(s):  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Negative Concord ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
West Region ◽  
Sentential Negation ◽  
Universal Category ◽  
Negative Marker

Negation is a universal category and languages differ in many respects in the way they express the latter (see Klima 1964). In this regards, some languages express sentential negation (a subcategorization of negation) with one marker (Dutch, German, English, etc.) while others like French uses two markers. Alongside markers used to express sentential negation, other items, among which Negative Polarity Items, mark negation and tight a particular element within its domain. In this paper, I aim at providing a picture of the expression of negation in Awing (a Bantu Grassfield langue of the Ngemba Group spoken in the North West region of Cameroon). Accordingly, sentential negation is expressed with two discontinuous markers kě…pô. One fact important to the presence of this negative marker is the movement of postverbal elements to a preverbal position turning the SVO structure in non-negative clause to an SOV pattern in negative clauses. In addition, the study describes other negative elements and negation subcategories. In last, the study of negative concord reveals that Awing belongs to the group of Strict Negative Concord (SNC) languages in which n-words must co-occur with negative marker to yield negation.

Introduction: Current perspectives on positive polarity

Linguistics ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 56 (2) ◽  
pp. 283-300
Author(s):  
Mingya Liu ◽  
Gianina Iordăchioaia
Keyword(s):  
Internal Structure ◽  
Negative Polarity ◽  
Positive Polarity ◽  
Negative Polarity Items ◽  
Theoretical Concepts ◽  
Polarity Items ◽  
The Past ◽  
Linguistic Research ◽  
Semantics And Pragmatics ◽  
Different Sources

Abstract Polarity sensitivity has been an established key topic of linguistic research for more than half a century. The study of polarity phenomena can be extremely revealing about the internal structure of a language, as they usually involve an interaction at the interface between syntax, semantics and pragmatics. In the past, most attention was paid to negative polarity items. However, recent years have witnessed a growing interest in positive polarity items. As a continuation of this trend, this issue collects four papers dedicated to positive polarity items, which enrich the empirical domain with novel observations from different languages and appeal to diverse theoretical concepts such as scalarity and presupposition in their modeling of positive polarity. The results show that positive polarity is a distributional phenomenon that has different sources and most likely cannot be modeled in a unifying way, although there may be subsets of positive polarity items that allow unifying accounts.

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