Plus in the French negative system
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Pascal Amsili
Abstract
This contribution focuses on the place of plus (“no more”) in the system of negation in French. Is it merely the presuppositional counterpart of pas (“not”), or does it belong to the class of n-words, such as personne (“nobody”) and rien (“nothing”), which can combine with each other and give rise to negative concord readings? We show that when plus co-occurs with an n-word, it brings different semantic contributions depending on the place it occupies. This leads us to assume that two instances of plus have to be distinguished: one that incorporates a sentential negation and the other which has only a presuppositional contribution. These two instances differ in assertive content, but convey the same presuppositional content. The chapter shows how to derive the observed interpretations in each kind of configuration.
Abstract
This contribution focuses on the place of plus (“no more”) in the system of negation in French. Is it merely the presuppositional counterpart of pas (“not”), or does it belong to the class of n-words, such as personne (“nobody”) and rien (“nothing”), which can combine with each other and give rise to negative concord readings? We show that when plus co-occurs with an n-word, it brings different semantic contributions depending on the place it occupies. This leads us to assume that two instances of plus have to be distinguished: one that incorporates a sentential negation and the other which has only a presuppositional contribution. These two instances differ in assertive content, but convey the same presuppositional content. The chapter shows how to derive the observed interpretations in each kind of configuration.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction 1
- The acquisition of verbal passives by Portuguese-speaking children 9
- Plus in the French negative system 29
- An experimental approach to parallelism in ellipsis 49
- On focal and wh -projections, indirect wh -questions, and quantificational chains 73
- Is there a dative alternation in Romanian? 91
- The interpretation of null subjects in Romanian 111
- Verum focus and Romanian polar questions 135
- The downward grammaticalisation of irrealis subordinators in Romanian, Salentino and southern Calabrese 157
- Differential object marking 171
- The effects of language ecology on syntactic structure 193
- The syntactic distribution of raddoppiamento fonosinttatico in Cosentino 205
- The causative-inchoative alternation (as we know it) might fall short 239
- On wh -extraction in de + que constructions in Spanish 263
- On another apparent violation of the subject-island constraint in French 277
- Moving towards an event 297
- Cyclicity without containment in Romanian perfects 311
- Dative clitics in Romanian ditransitives 335
- Syntactic vs pragmatic passive 357
- Index 373
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction 1
- The acquisition of verbal passives by Portuguese-speaking children 9
- Plus in the French negative system 29
- An experimental approach to parallelism in ellipsis 49
- On focal and wh -projections, indirect wh -questions, and quantificational chains 73
- Is there a dative alternation in Romanian? 91
- The interpretation of null subjects in Romanian 111
- Verum focus and Romanian polar questions 135
- The downward grammaticalisation of irrealis subordinators in Romanian, Salentino and southern Calabrese 157
- Differential object marking 171
- The effects of language ecology on syntactic structure 193
- The syntactic distribution of raddoppiamento fonosinttatico in Cosentino 205
- The causative-inchoative alternation (as we know it) might fall short 239
- On wh -extraction in de + que constructions in Spanish 263
- On another apparent violation of the subject-island constraint in French 277
- Moving towards an event 297
- Cyclicity without containment in Romanian perfects 311
- Dative clitics in Romanian ditransitives 335
- Syntactic vs pragmatic passive 357
- Index 373
