The asymmetric behavior of English negative quantifiers in negative sentences
Tubau Muntaña, Susagna (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament de Filologia Anglesa i de Germanística)

Date:	2020
Description:	32 pàg.
Abstract:	In this paper, the unexpected behavior of object negative quantifiers in some diagnostic tests of sentential negation is accounted for within a Minimalist framework assuming that: (i) negative quantifiers decompose into negation and an existential quantifier; (ii) negative quantifiers are multidominant phrase markers, as Parallel Merge allows the verb to c-select their existential part but not their negative part, thus giving negation remerge flexibility; (iii) tag questions involve or-coordination of TPs, and neither/so clauses involve and-coordination of TPs; (iv) two positions for sentential negation are available in English, one below TP (PolP2), and one above TP (PolP1). Activation of either PolP1 or PolP2 in the absence of other scope-taking operators corresponds to two distinct grammars. If PolP1 is active, the negative part of an object negative quantifier remerges in its Specifier valuing the [upol:[ feature of Pol1 as negative ([upol:neg]) while skipping the TP-domain. As no negative formal feature is present in the TP, a negative question tag is required, as well as so-coordination, too-licensing and Yes, I guess so 'expression of agreement'. Conversely, if PolP2 is active, the negative part of the object negative quantifier remerges in the TP-domain (in Spec, PolP2), thus requiring a positive question tag, neither-coordination, either-licensing, and No, I guess not.
Grants:	Agència de Gestió d'Ajuts Universitaris i de Recerca 2017-SGR-634 Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad FFI2017-82547-P, FFI2016-81750-REDT
Rights:	Aquest document està subjecte a una llicència d'ús Creative Commons. Es permet la reproducció total o parcial i la comunicació pública de l'obra, sempre que no sigui amb finalitats comercials, i sempre que es reconegui l'autoria de l'obra original. No es permet la creació d'obres derivades.
Language:	Anglès
Document:	Article ; recerca ; Versió acceptada per publicar
Subject:	Decompositionality ; English ; Grammatical variation ; Multidominance ; Negative quantifiers ; Sentential negation
Published in:	Journal of Linguistics, Vol. 56 Núm. 4 (2020) , p. 775-806, ISSN 1469-7742

DOI: 10.1017/s0022226719000495

Post-print 57 p, 461.4 KB

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