Paratactic negation revisited
The case of the Finnish verb epäillä
This paper examines the phenomenon of paratactic negation (PN) by analyzing the usage of the Finnish verb
epäillä (‘doubt’, ‘suspect’, ‘suppose’), which is associated with both inherent negation and negative evaluation. Paratactic negation refers to
an overt negation in a complement clause of an inherently negative verb that results in a single negative reading. This analysis
draws on previous research going back to
Jespersen (1917), in observing that the PN
complement clause verbalizes the content of the activity that is expressed by the matrix verb. In this case, the verb of inherent
negation does not have scope over the complement despite its negative semantics. This paper addresses the question of where and
why content complements actually occur. The answer to this question is given by accounting for the differences of the content
complements from more clearly subordinate target complements. It is shown that this distinction is related to verb semantics and
conventionalized syntagmatic patterns. This is demonstrated by accounting for the differences of the content complements from more
clearly subordinate target complements. On the basis of these results, the paper offers a refined definition of paratactic
negation. This definition has two major implications: First, it suggests that a semantically non-vacuous PN may be a
conventionalized pattern. Second, it leads us to reconsider the limits of PN and the definition of inherent negation.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 1.1Data and methods
- 1.2Aim and organization of this paper
- 2.Paratactic negation in previous literature: Terms and definitions
- 3.Paratactic negation as a content reading of the complement
- 3.1Two functional roles of the complement: Target and content
- 3.2Support for the present analysis of PN
- 3.2.1Clausal complements “in between” direct quotes and nominal objects
- 3.2.2Paratactic negation with other verbs in Finnish
- 4.Paratactic negation with epäillä
- 4.1The polar polysemy of epäillä in a nutshell
- 4.2Paratactic versus compositional analysis of epäillä että ei ‘doubt/suspect that neg’
- 4.3Paratactic negation with the negated matrix verb
- 5.Evaluative negation: Difference with paratactic negation
- 5.1Negation proper and negative evaluation in the interpretation of epäillä
- 5.2Evaluative negation reflects underlying wishes
- 6.Conclusions
- Acknowledgements
- Notes
-
Glossary
-
References
References (55)
References
Allwood, Jens, Lars-Gunnar Andersson & Östen Dahl. 1977. Logic in linguistics. Cambridge: CUP. 

Bloomfield, Leonard. 1933. Language. New York, NY: Henry Holt & Company.
Bybee, Joan. 2010. Language, usage, and cognition. Cambridge: CUP. 

Croft, William. 2000. Explaining language change. An evolutionary approach. London: Longman.
Croft, William & D. Alan Cruse. 2004. Cognitive linguistics. Cambridge: CUP. 

Cruse, D. Alan. 1977. Antonyms and gradable complementaries. In Dieter Kastovsky (ed.), Perspektiven der lexikalischen Semantik. Beiträge zum Wuppertaler Semantikkolloquium vom 2–3 Dezember 1977, 14–25. Bonn: Bouvier.
Cuypere, Ludovic de, Johan van der Auwera & Klaas Willems. 2007. Double negation and iconicity. In Elżbieta Tabakowsa, Christina Ljungberg & Olga Fisher (eds.), Insistent Images, 301–320. Amsterdam: Benjamins. 

Denison, David. 1999. Syntax. In Suzanne Romaine (ed.), The Cambridge history of the English language IV 1776–1997, 92–329. Cambridge: CUP.
Espinal, Maria Teresa. 2000. Expletive negation, negative concord and feature checking. Catalan Working Papers in Linguistics 81. 47–69.
Givón, Talmy. 1978. Negation in language: Pragmatics, function, ontology. In Peter Cole (ed.), Syntax and semantics. Vol. 9: Pragmatics, 69–112. New York, NY: Academic Press.
Givón, Talmy. 2001. Syntax: An introduction. Vol. 21. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Hakulinen, Auli & Fred Karlsson. 1979. Nykysuomen lauseoppia. [Syntax of Modern Finnish.] Helsinki: SKS.
Hakulinen, Auli, Maria Vilkuna, Riitta Korhonen, Vesa Koivisto, Tarja-Riitta Heinonen & Irja Alho. 2004. Iso suomen kielioppi [A comprehensive Finnish grammar]. Helsinki: SKS.
Haiman, John & Sandra A. Thompson. 1988. Introduction. In John Haiman & Sandra A. Thompson (eds.), Clause combining in grammar and discourse (Typological Studies in Language 18), ix–xiii. Amsterdam: Benjamins. 

Herlin, Ilona, Jyrki Kalliokoski & Laura Visapää. 2014. Introduction. In Laura Visapää, Jyrki Kalliokoski & Helena Sorva (eds.), Contexts of subordination, 1–16. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Horn, Laurence R. 1978. Some aspects of negation. In Joseph Greenberg, Charles Ferguson & Edith Moravcsik (eds.), Universals of human language, 127–210. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Horn, Laurence R. 1989. A natural history of negation. Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press.
Horn, Laurence R. 2010a. Multiple negation in English and other languages. In Laurence R. Horn (ed.), The expression of negation, 111–148. Berlin: Mouton. 

Horn, Laurence R. 2010b. Introduction. In Laurence R. Horn (ed.), The expression of negation, 1–7. Berlin: Mouton. 

Huddleston, Rodney & Geoffrey K. Pullum. 2002. The Cambridge grammar of the English language. Cambridge: CUP. 

Jespersen, Otto. 1917. Negation in English and other languages. Historisk-filologiske meddelelser / Det Kongelige Danske videnskaberners selskab; 1, 51. København: Andr. Fred. Høst & søn.
Jespersen, Otto. 1924. The philosophy of grammar. London: Allen & Unwin.
KS = Kielitoimiston sanakirja. [The new dictionary of Modern Finnish.] Available online at [URL].
Langacker, Ronald W. 2008. Cognitive grammar. A basic introduction. Oxford: OUP. 

Larjavaara, Matti. 1992. Etteikö kelpaa? [As if it won’t (etteikö) do?] Virittäjä 961. 119–122.
Larjavaara, Matti. 2007. Pragmasemantiikka. [Pragma-sematics.] Helsinki: SKS.
Laury, Ritva. 2006. On subordination, Finnish-Style: Questioning the category of finite clausal complements in spoken Finnish. In Mickael Suominen, Antti Arppe, Anu Airola, Orvokki Heinämäki, Matti Miestamo, Urho Määttä, Jussi Niemi, Kari K. Pitkänen & Kaius Sinnemäki (eds.), A man of measure: Festschrift in honour of Fred Karlsson on his 60th birthday. SKY Journal of Linguistics. Special Supplement 191. 310–321.
Leino, Jaakko. 1999. Selvää on se, että [‘It is clear that’]. Kielikello 31/1999. 20–25.
Meibauer, Jörg. 1990. Sentence mood, lexical category filling, and non-propositional nicht in German. Linguistische Berichte 1301. 441–463.
Miestamo, Matti. 2005. Standard negation: The negation of declarative verbal main clauses in a typological perspective. Berlin: Mouton.
Miestamo, Matti. 2011. A typological perspective on negation in Finnish dialects. Nordic Journal of Linguistics 34(2). 83–104. 

Pajunen, Anneli. 2001. Argumenttirakenne. Asiaintilojen luokitus ja verbien käyttäytyminen suomen kielessä. [Argument structure. The classification of state of affairs, and the behavior of verbs in Finnish.] Helsinki: SKS.
Salminen, Jutta. 2015. From doubt to supposition: The construction-specific meaning change of the Finnish verb epäillä
. In Juhani Rudanko, Jukka Havu, Mikko Höglund & Paul Rickman (eds.), Perspectives on complementation. Structure, variation, and boundaries, 157–176. London: Palgrave.
Saury, Jean-Michel. 2004. The phenomenology of negation and its expression in natural language. Gothenburg Monographs in Linguistics 27. Department of Linguistics. Göteborg University.
Saury, Jean-Michel. 2008. The phenomenology of negation. Phenom Cogn Sci (2009) 81. 245–260. 

Smyth, Herbert Weir. 1956 [1920]. Greek grammar. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Schneider, Stefan, Julie Glikman & Mathieu Avanzi. 2015. Introduction. In Stefan Schneider, Julie Glikman & Mathieu Avanzi (eds.), Parenthetical verbs, 1–12. Berlin: Mouton.
SSA = Suomen sanojen alkuperä: etymologinen sanakirja 1: A–K. [The origin of Finnish words: etymological dictionary]. 1992. Helsinki: SKS.
Tommola, Hannu. 2015. Conversation ‘fear + neg’ in LingTyp mailing list on 20 March 2015: [URL]
Tottie, Gunnel. 1991. Negation in English speech and writing: A study in variation. (Quantitative analyses of linguistic structure 4). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.
Tovena, Lucia M. 1996. An expletive negation which is not so redundant. In Karen Zagona (ed.), Grammatical theory and Romance languages: Selected papers from the 25th linguistic symposium on Romance languages (LSRL XXV), 263–274. Amsterdam: Benjamins. 

Tuppurainen, Hanna. 1991. Kieltojen merkitys ja käyttö keskustelussa. [The meaning and use of negations in conversation.] Helsinki: University of Helsinki.
Verhagen, Arie. 2005. Constructions of intersubjectivity: Discourse, syntax, and cognition. Oxford: OUP.
Vilkuna, Maria. 2015. Negation in Finnish. In Matti Miestamo, Anne Tamm & Beata Wagner-Nagy (eds.), Negation in Uralic languages (Typological Studies in Language 108), 457–486. Amsterdam: Benjamins. 

Wouden, Ton van der. 1997. Negative contexts: Collocation, polarity and multiple negation. London: Routledge.
Wurff, Wim van der. 1998. On expletive negation with adversative predicates in the history of English. In Ingrid Tieken-Boon van Ostade, Gunnel Tottie & Wim van der Wurff (eds.), Negation in the history of English, 295–328. Berlin: Mouton.
Yoon, Suwon. 2011. ‘Not’ in the mood: The syntax, semantics, and pragmatics of evaluative negation. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago PhD thesis.
Yoon, Suwon. 2013. Parametric variation in subordinate evaluative negation: Korean/Japanese versus others. Journal of East Asian Linguistics 221. 133–166. 

Cited by (2)
Cited by two other publications
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 4 january 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
Any errors therein should be reported to them.