Quantification and polarity
-
Philip J. Jaggar
Abstract
Hausa has a typologically interesting but poorly understood set of quantifying time and degree adverbs – equivalent to English 'never ever', 'not at all', etc. – which behave as negative polarity items and enhance the pragmatic impact of a negative utterance (both verbal and non-verbal). The functional distribution of these adverbial intensifiers is unusual, however, in that some are "bipolar", i.e., they can express opposite (minimal/maximal) values according to whether they occur in negative or positive syntactic environments, with the minimal intensifiers operating at the negative pole. An intensifier such as dà1ai, for example, can mean either 'never' (negative) or 'always' (positive), and other modifiers, e.g., atàbau, can express these same temporal meanings in addition to 'absolutely'. This paper provides a unified account of this natural functional class of adverbs, and is seen as a contribution to cross-linguistic research into polarity items and their licensing contexts
Abstract
Hausa has a typologically interesting but poorly understood set of quantifying time and degree adverbs – equivalent to English 'never ever', 'not at all', etc. – which behave as negative polarity items and enhance the pragmatic impact of a negative utterance (both verbal and non-verbal). The functional distribution of these adverbial intensifiers is unusual, however, in that some are "bipolar", i.e., they can express opposite (minimal/maximal) values according to whether they occur in negative or positive syntactic environments, with the minimal intensifiers operating at the negative pole. An intensifier such as dà1ai, for example, can mean either 'never' (negative) or 'always' (positive), and other modifiers, e.g., atàbau, can express these same temporal meanings in addition to 'absolutely'. This paper provides a unified account of this natural functional class of adverbs, and is seen as a contribution to cross-linguistic research into polarity items and their licensing contexts
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction 1
- Negation of non-indicative mood in Hausa, Fulfulde and Kanuri 7
- The impact of clause types and focus control, aspect, modality, and referentiality on negation in Lamang and Hdi (Central Chadic) 21
- Quantification and polarity 57
- Negation patterns in Kanuri 71
- Songhay verbal negation in its dialectal and areal context 93
- Negation in Jukun 107
- Negation marking in Igbo 121
- Aspects of discontinuous negation in Santome 139
- Negation in Gur 167
- Double negation-marking 205
- Negation in South Mande 223
- From double negation to portmanteau 261
- The system of negation in Berber 287
- Verb-object-negative order in central Africa 307
- Language index 363
- Name index 365
- Subject index 367
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction 1
- Negation of non-indicative mood in Hausa, Fulfulde and Kanuri 7
- The impact of clause types and focus control, aspect, modality, and referentiality on negation in Lamang and Hdi (Central Chadic) 21
- Quantification and polarity 57
- Negation patterns in Kanuri 71
- Songhay verbal negation in its dialectal and areal context 93
- Negation in Jukun 107
- Negation marking in Igbo 121
- Aspects of discontinuous negation in Santome 139
- Negation in Gur 167
- Double negation-marking 205
- Negation in South Mande 223
- From double negation to portmanteau 261
- The system of negation in Berber 287
- Verb-object-negative order in central Africa 307
- Language index 363
- Name index 365
- Subject index 367
