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<p>Dear Bastian and all,</p>
<p>Something a bit like this can be observed in the domain of
paralinguistic clicks, specifically, in the case of repeated
dental clicks (often written as "tut tut tut" or "tsk tsk tsk".
In many languages around the world, as in English, repeated dental
clicks are associated with negative affect, expressing feelings
such as regret, commiseration, admonition, and the like. However,
in some languages of western Eurasia (e.g. Russian, Yiddish,
Greek, Turkish, Georgian, Dargwa, Palestinian Arabic), repeated
dental clicks may — for some if not all speakers of these
languages — also be used to express positive affect, the most
commonly-cited context being that of men girl-watching, reacting
to a very beautiful girl walking by. Speakers who have this usage
tend to describe it as ironic, derivative from the basic negative
usage.<br>
<br>
(I should add that in what I have elsewhere defined as the
Mekong-Mamberamo linguistic area, e.g. in languages such as
Cantonese, Kammu, Indonesian, Hatam, Mee and others, repeated
dental clicks are associated not with negative but rather with
positive affect, the core meaning being one of amazement. One
could imagine this usage deriving from the conventionalization of
the ironic positive-affect usage of western Eurasia followed by
the loss of the negative affect usage, but this would be a rather
speculative account.)</p>
<p>David</p>
<p><br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 24/01/2020 19:12, Bastian Persohn
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:CAP4orTFp=m05dCezK8btKp2KLHbXv4nRHFHzPtU+J2zRSKtbJA@mail.gmail.com">
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<p style="margin:6px
0px;font-family:Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-size:14px">Dear
group members,<br>
</p>
<p style="margin:6px
0px;font-family:Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-size:14px">I
am posting the below on behalf of a student of mine. Any
input will be greatly appreciated, be it on similar
conventionalized uses of negation and irony in other
languages of the world, general thoughts, or even specific
remarks regarding isiXhosa (or the larger Nguni branch of
Bantu).<br>
</p>
<p style="margin:6px
0px;font-family:Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-size:14px">Best
regards,</p>
<p style="margin:6px
0px;font-family:Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-size:14px">Bastian<br>
</p>
<p style="margin:6px
0px;font-family:Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-size:14px"><br>
</p>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px
0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<p
style="margin-top:6px;margin-right:0px;margin-bottom:6px;font-family:Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-size:14px">I
would like some help with finding resources/getting more
information on ironic negative constructions, which are a
rather frequent device in isiXhosa (Bantu, South Africa).
I’m not sure if they go by any other name, I found this
term in Oosthuysen’s (2016) Grammar of isiXhosa. He
describes it as “The use of a grammatical negative to
convey a predicate with an emphatic positive connotation”.
So, these constructions read as negative statements but in
actual fact mean the opposite. The prosody is different
which helps in realising that<span
style="display:inline;font-family:inherit"> it’s the
ironic negative. Here are some examples (numbers
indicate noun classes, FV is the default final vowel
morpheme):</span></p>
<div
style="display:inline;font-family:Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-size:14px">
<p style="margin:0px 0px 6px;font-family:inherit"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin:6px 0px;font-family:inherit"><i>A-ka-se-m-hle
lo mntwana</i><br>
NEG-SBJ.NEG.1-still-1-pretty PROX.1 1.child<br>
'This child is so/very beautiful' (lit: 'This child is
no longer beautiful')
</p>
<p style="margin:6px 0px;font-family:inherit"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin:6px 0px;font-family:inherit"><i>A-ni-sa-hlafun-i</i><br>
NEG-SBJ.2PL-still-chew-NEG<br>
'You are chewing so much/so loudly' (lit: 'You are no
longer chewing')<br>
</p>
<p style="margin:6px 0px;font-family:inherit"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin:6px 0px;font-family:inherit"><i>A-ndi-sa-dinw-anga</i><br>
NEG-SBJ.1SG-still-be(come)_tired-NEG.PFV<br>
'I am so/very tired.' (lit: 'I am not tired anymore')<br>
</p>
<br>
<i>Be-ndi-nge-minc-e</i>
<div>REC.PST-SBJ.1SG-NEG-tense_up-PFV<br>
</div>
<div>'I was so very tense' (lit: 'I was not tensed up')<br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><i>A-yi-nints-i imi-buzo ya-m</i></div>
<div>NEG-COP.4-many 4-question 4-POSS.1SG <br>
</div>
<div>'My questions are so many' (lit: 'My questions are
not many')<br>
</div>
<p style="margin:6px 0px;font-family:inherit">Any input in
the form of papers, books, tiny excerpt, noting that it
you’ve encountered a similar thing in another language
etc would be of great help.</p>
<p style="margin:6px 0px;font-family:inherit">Thanks!<br>
</p>
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</blockquote>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
David Gil
Senior Scientist (Associate)
Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution
Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History
Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745 Jena, Germany
Email: <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:gil@shh.mpg.de">gil@shh.mpg.de</a>
Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-556825895
Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-81344082091</pre>
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