Chapter published in:
Negation and Negative Concord: The view from Creoles
Edited by Viviane Déprez and Fabiola Henri
[Contact Language Library 55] 2018
► pp. 257–288

Negation in Palenquero

Syntax, pragmatics, and change in progress

| University of California, Irvine
This study offers an up-to-date (synchronic) overview of Palenquero predicate negation, and seeks to explain how and why it has recently begun to undergo change, especially among the younger generations. Earlier descriptions (e.g., Dieck 2000, 2002, Schwegler 1991a, 1996a) revealed that Palenquero features a complex variable system in which the negative marker nu ‘not’ can be placed either before or after the verb, or both (embracing negation), as in: (1) nu + VERB, (2) nu + VERB + nu, and (3) VERB + nu. Scholars have been in general agreement that all three strategies express the same propositional content, but there has been dispute as to underlying causes for the variable selection between these strategies. Sections 1 and 2 of this article provide a fresh look at the issue, and defend the hypothesis (pace Schwegler 1991a but contra Dieck 2000, 2002) that subtle contextually-derived conditions rather than morphosyntactic considerations best explain the selection and felicity of a given negation strategy. This discussion in turn will help explain certain aspects of negative concord, including the behavior of Spanish-derived negative polarity items like Pal. nunka ‘never’, tampoko ‘(n)either’, and so forth.
Keywords: language attitudes, language change, Jespersen cycle, negation, negative concord, Palenque, Palenquero, polarity, pragmatics, presuppositions
Published online: 12 December 2018
https://doi.org/10.1075/coll.55.12sch
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