Creoles with sentence final negation
A comparative study
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/sols.v1i2.297Keywords:
creole languages, Palenquero, Fa d’ambô, Santomense, negationAbstract
This article synthetically presents the main properties of the negation system of three creoles that share the typologically marked feature of postsentence negation: Palenquero, Fa d´ambô and Santomense. Remarkable coincidences are noted, not only at a syntactic structure level, but also coincidences of semantic implications that the distribution of the negative elements has for the scope of negation and for the production of pragmatic effects that go beyond negation. To account for these similarities, a semantic-pragmatic explanation is proposed: the negative patterns of these creoles follow a general tendency, recorded in all languages (creoles and non creoles) with postsentence negation, to avoid ambiguity in the interpretation by clearly marking the scope of negation with an additional element.
References
Dahl, Ö. (1979) Typology of sentence negation. Linguistics 17: 79–106.
Dieck, M. (2000) La negación en palenquero: análisis sincrónico, estudio comparativo y consecuencias teóricas. Frankfurt am Main: Vervuert; Madrid: Iberoamericana.
Dieck, M. (2002) Distribución y alcance de la negación en palenquero. En Y. Moñino y A. Schwegler (eds) Palenque, Cartagena y Afro-caribe: historia y lengua 149–67. Tübingen: Niemeyer.
Dryer, M. S. (to appear 2006) Verb-Object-Negative Order in Central Africa. En N. Cyffer, E. Ebermann y G. Ziegelmeyer (eds) Negation Patterns in West Africa. Consultado el 10 de noviembre de 2006 en: http://linguistics.buffalo.edu/people/faculty/dryer/dryer/DryerVONeg.pdf
Dryer, M. S. (1988) Universals of negative position. En M. Hammond, E. Moravcsik y Jessica Wirth (eds) Studies in Syntactic Typology 93–124. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: J. Benjamins.
Ferraz, L. (1983) The origin and development of four creoles in the Gulf of Guinea. En E. Woolford y W. Washabaugh (eds) The Social Context of Creolization 120–25. USA: Karoma.
Hagemeijer, T. (2003) A negaçao nos crioulos do Golfo da Guiné: aspectos sincrónicos e diacrónicos. RILI II(2): 161–88.
Kouwenberg, S. (1994) Berbice Dutch. En P. Kahrel y R. van den Berg (eds) Typological Studies in Negation 237–66. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Portner, P. y Zanuttini, R. (2000) The force of negation in wh exclamatives and interrogatives. En L. Horn y Y. Kato (eds) Negation and Polarity 193–231. New York: Oxford University Press.
Post, M. (1997) Negation in Fa d´Ambô. En R. Degenhardt, T. Stolz y H. Ulferts (eds) Afrolusitanistik- eine vergessene Disziplin in Deutschland? 292–316. Bremen: Universität Bremen.
Schwegler, A. (1991) Negation in Palenquero: Synchrony. Journal of Pidgin and Creole Languages 6: 165–214.
Welmers, W. E. (1973) African Language Structures. Berkeley: University of California Press.
