Fragment answers and double negation in strict negative concord languages

This paper revisits the phenomenon of negative concord (NC) as an instance of polarity sensitivity. We shed light on a new set of data regarding n-words as fragment answers to negative questions and show that we find unexpected double negation (DN) readings for fragment n-words in view of their behavior in non-elliptical constructions. To account for this pattern, we offer an updated version of the hypothesis that n-words are strong NPIs, making use of an alternative and exhaustification approach. We argue that the difference between n-words and other NPIs should be seen as the result of two parameters: (i) whether reconstruction of the polarity item is allowed, and (ii) whether the polarity item has the ability to license a covert negation operator. The result is an explanatory account of NC and DN readings in both non-elliptical and elliptical environments, which allows for an easier integration of n-words in the broader typology of polarity sensitive items.

Download Full-text

Aspectual Properties and Polarity-Sensitivity of Copulas pen1 and khʉʉ1 in Thai

MANUSYA ◽

10.1163/26659077-01501001 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 15 (1) ◽

pp. 1-18

Author(s):

Boonjeera Chiravate

Keyword(s):

Linguistic Variation ◽

Polarity Sensitivity ◽

The Difference ◽

Additional Support ◽

Polarity Sensitive

‘Pen1’ and ‘khʉʉ1’ in Thai have traditionally been regarded as copular verbs comparable to ‘be’ in English. Appearing in a copulative sentence, the two Thai copula verbs, however, differ in polarity-sensitivity. The present study demonstrates that the difference in polarity-sensitivity of the two Thai copulas cannot be accounted for within the theory of polarity-sensitive items previously proposed. Investigating the aspectual properties of the two Thai copulas in comparison with those of English copula, this study suggests that an explanation for the difference in polarity-sensitivity of the two Thai copulas might involve their aspectual properties. Contributing to the study of aspect and polarity-sensitivity, the present study reveals differences between Thai and English copulas and provides additional support for the idea that the macro-category of so-called copular verbs is too vague to describe cross-linguistic variation.

Download Full-text

Bocado: scalar semantics and polarity sensitivity

Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie (ZrP) ◽

10.1515/zrp-2020-0059 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 136 (4) ◽

pp. 1114-1136

Author(s):

Patrícia Amaral

Keyword(s):

Positive Polarity ◽

Q Value ◽

Polarity Item ◽

Lexical Meaning ◽

Negative Polarity Item ◽

History Of ◽

Old Portuguese ◽

Polarity Sensitive ◽

Scalar Reasoning ◽

Shed Light

AbstractThis 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.

Download Full-text

On the tri-ambiguous status of 'any': The view from child language

Semantics and Linguistic Theory ◽

10.3765/salt.v20i0.2568 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 20 ◽

pp. 19 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Lyn Shan Tieu

Keyword(s):

Language Acquisition ◽

Free Choice ◽

Child Language ◽

Negative Polarity ◽

Polarity Item ◽

Negative Polarity Item ◽

Child Language Acquisition ◽

Npi Licensing ◽

Polarity Sensitive ◽

Shed Light

This paper examines the monolingual acquisition of the English polarity-sensitive item 'any', and uses evidence from child language acquisition to shed light on two questions that arise from the theoretical semantics literature. First, evidence from child spontaneous speech production is used to argue that children are grammatically conservative in their acquisition of negative polarity item (NPI) licensing. The same child data are then used to argue the following: (i) there is only one NPI 'any', subject to a disjunctive licensing condition; (ii) NPI 'any' differs in some way from free choice (FC) 'any', resulting in the later emergence of FC 'any'.

Download Full-text

Double Negation Readings

The Oxford Handbook of Negation ◽

10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198830528.013.26 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 478-496

Author(s):

Henriëtte de Swart

Keyword(s):

Language Use ◽

Theoretical Background ◽

Negative Concord ◽

Specific Context ◽

Double Negation ◽

Parallel Corpora ◽

Grammatical Variation ◽

Multilingual Corpus ◽

Shed Light

This chapter is concerned with the linguistic environments in which double negation readings do and do not arise in double negation and negative concord languages. The theoretical background comes from other chapters in the Oxford Handbook of Negation. The chapter briefly surveys the experimental literature on the role of prosody in the comprehension of negative concord and double negation, and continues with a multilingual corpus investigation that focuses on language use. Under the assumption that all languages convey the same message in a specific context, production data in parallel corpora enable us to detect grammatical variation through translation. The examples are extracted from the parallel corpus EuroParl and the languages discussed are English, Dutch, German, Italian, French, and Spanish. Even though the set of languages is relatively small, the spread of grammars should be wide enough to shed light on the phenomenon of double negation in natural language.

Download Full-text

On the tri-ambiguous status of 'any': The view from child language

Semantics and Linguistic Theory ◽

10.3765/salt.v0i20.2568 ◽

2015 ◽

pp. 19

Author(s):

Lyn Shan Tieu

Keyword(s):

Language Acquisition ◽

Free Choice ◽

Child Language ◽

Negative Polarity ◽

Polarity Item ◽

Negative Polarity Item ◽

Child Language Acquisition ◽

Npi Licensing ◽

Polarity Sensitive ◽

Shed Light

Download Full-text

approach to polarity sensitivity and negative concord by lexical underspecification

Proceedings of the International Conference on Head-Driven Phrase Structure Grammar ◽

10.21248/hpsg.2000.17 ◽

2001 ◽

Author(s):

Judith Tonhauser

Keyword(s):

Negative Concord ◽

Semantic Approach ◽

Dynamic Semantic ◽

Polarity Sensitivity ◽

Context Sensitive ◽

Polarity Sensitive ◽

Uniform Treatment

This paper presents a dynamic semantic approach to the licensing of Polarity Sensitive Items (PSIs) and n-words of Negative Concord. We propose that PSIs are unified by the semantic scale property, which is responsible for their sensitivity to the context; we develop a semantic licensing analysis based on Fauconnier's (1975) scales and Ladusaw's (1979) notion of entailment. The first part of the paper concludes with a formalization of semantic licensing in the sense of Ladusaw (1979) within HPSG (see, e.g., Pollard & Sag (1994)) which allows for a uniform treatment of the licensing of PSIs and n-words of Negative Concord and accounts for the disambiguating nature of PSIs in scopally ambiguous sentences. The second part of the paper is concerned with the limitations of semantic licensing, which, we claim, needs to be sensitive to the context. We present the discussions of, e.g., Heim (1984) and Israel (1996) with respect to the importance of the context in particular licensing constellations, and then turn to linearity constraints on licensing. We present data from German which may not be accounted for by linearity constraints and sketch an analysis for this data which supports the necessity of context-sensitive semantic licensing.

Download Full-text

Negative Fragment Answers

The Oxford Handbook of Negation ◽

10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198830528.013.14 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 440-457

Author(s):

Andrew Weir

Keyword(s):

Negative Concord ◽

Double Negation ◽

Fragment Answers

This chapter discusses the interaction of negation with fragment answers. The ability to use negative concord items as fragment answers has been taken as evidence of their having an inherent negative force; this chapter considers positions for and against this view, and what kind of assumptions (for the licensing of NCIs and/or for the interpretation of elliptical structure in fragments) would be required on each view, as well as considering the implications of double-negation readings for NCI fragments, and the availability of NPI fragments. The chapter also investigates the cooccurrence of a negator with a fragment answer (as in Who ate the cake?—Not John, anyway), exploring what ramifications such structures have for the syntax of fragments, and in particular for the choice between sententialist (elliptical) and non-sententialist analyses of fragments.

Download Full-text

0588 Ring Pulse Oximeter for Screening of Moderate to Severe OSA: A Pilot Study

SLEEP ◽

10.1093/sleep/zsaa056.585 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 43 (Supplement_1) ◽

pp. A225-A225

Author(s):

J Xue ◽

R Zhao ◽

J Li ◽

L Zhao ◽

B Zhou ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Pilot Study ◽

Pulse Oximeter ◽

Characteristic Curve ◽

Diagnostic Value ◽

Receiver Operator Characteristic Curve ◽

Oxygen Desaturation ◽

Significant Difference ◽

Acceptance Range ◽

The Difference ◽

Two Parameters

Abstract Introduction To evaluate the utility of the ring pulse oximeter for screening of OSA in adults. Methods 87 adults were monitored by a ring pulse oximeter and PSG simultaneously during a nocturnal in-lab sleep testing. 3% oxygen desaturation index (ODI3); Mean oxygen saturation(MSpO2), Saturation impair time below 90% (SIT90) derived from an automated algorithm of the ring pulse oximeter. Meanwhile, the parameters of PSG were scored manually according to the AASM Manual. Correlation and receiver operator characteristic curve analysis were used to measure the accuracy of ring pulse oximeter and its diagnostic value for moderate to severe OSA (AHI≥15). Results Among the 87 participants, 18 cases were AHI<5, 17 cases were diagnosed with mild OSA (AHI:5-14.9), 25 cases were diagnosed with moderate OSA (AHI:15-29.9) and 27 cases were diagnosed with severe OSA (AHI≥30). There was no significant difference between PSG and ring pulse oximeter in regard to ODI3 (23.4±23.5 vs 24.7 ± 21.7), and SIT90 (1.54%, range 0.14%-8.99% vs. 3.20%, range 0.60%, 12.30%) (P>0.05], Further analysis indicated that two parameters from the oximeter correlated well with that derived from PSG (r=0.889, 0.567, respectively, both p<0.05). Although MSpO2 correlated significantly (r=0.448, P<0.05), the difference was remarkable [95.9%, range 94.0% to 97.0% vs. 94.5%, range 93.3% to 95.7%, p<0.05]. Bland-Altman plots showed that the agreement of these three parameters was within the clinical acceptance range. The ROC curve showed that the sensitivity and specificity of the ring pulse oximeter when the oximeter derived ODI3 ≥12.5 in the diagnosis of moderate to severe OSA were 82.7% and 74.3%, respectively. Conclusion The pilot study indicated that ring pulse oximeter can detect oxygen desaturation events accurately, therefore to be used as a screening tool for moderate to severe OSA. Support The study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 81420108002 and NO. 81570083).

Download Full-text

Double Negation in a Negative Concord language: An experimental investigation

Lingua ◽

10.1016/j.lingua.2015.05.012 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 163 ◽

pp. 75-107 ◽

Cited By ~ 18

Author(s):

Viviane Déprez ◽

Susagna Tubau ◽

Anne Cheylus ◽

M. Teresa Espinal

Keyword(s):

Experimental Investigation ◽

Negative Concord ◽

Double Negation

Download Full-text

On the Subject of Negative Auxiliary Inversion

The Canadian Journal of Linguistics / La revue canadienne de linguistique ◽

10.1017/cnj.2018.22 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 64 (1) ◽

pp. 32-61 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Frances Blanchette ◽

Chris Collins

Keyword(s):

Word Order ◽

Negative Polarity ◽

Subject Position ◽

Left Periphery ◽

Negative Concord ◽

Double Negation ◽

Polarity Items ◽

West Texas ◽

The Subject ◽

Scope Freezing

AbstractThis article presents a novel analysis ofNegative Auxiliary Inversion(NAI) constructions such asdidn't many people eat, in which a negated auxiliary appears in pre-subject position. NAI, found in varieties including Appalachian, African American, and West Texas English, has a word order identical to a yes/no question, but is pronounced and interpreted as a declarative. We propose that NAI subjects are negative DPs, and that the negation raises from the subject DP to adjoin to Fin (a functional head in the left periphery). Three properties of NAI motivate this analysis: (i) scope freezing effects, (ii) the various possible and impossible NAI subject types, and (iii) the incompatibility of NAI constructions with true Double-Negation interpretations. Implications for theories of Negative Concord, Negative Polarity Items, and the representation of negation are discussed.

Download Full-text