The Semantics of Negation
Karen De Clercq, Guido Vanden Wyngaerd
November 2024 

We classify negative elements in natural language into five broad categories: standard negators, negative correlative conjunctions, negative indefinites, other types of negative elements, and squatitive negators. We discuss a number of criteria by which to diagnose negation, such as the universally negative reading of 'or' in the presence of negation (based on De Morgan's Law), the licensing of Negative Polarity Items (NPIs), the interaction with modality, and the syntactic effects of negation. We conclude that the diagnostics point to the the conclusion that not all semantically negative words come with a syntactic negative feature, while the opposite is always the case.

Format:	[ pdf ]
Reference:	lingbuzz/008557 (please use that when you cite this article)
Published in:	submitted to the Handbook of Linguistic Semantics
keywords:	negation, negative indefinites, squatitive negation, npis, semantics, syntax
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