FW: some negative primary verbs

[Colin P Masica]

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From: Colin P Masica <dacotah at mwt.net>
Date: Tue, 04 Feb 2003 16:42:58 -0600
To: <LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGLIST.ORG>
Subject: some negative primary verbs

Dear other LINGUISTLIST Members, and Richard Valovics,

Richard Valovics' communication concerning Hungarian and Russian prompts me
to weigh in on behalf of Dravidian, lest it be overlooked in this
discussion. Not only are there unique negative existential verbs (in Tamil,
illai,'there is not' vs. positive uNDu 'there is') but also a negative
copula in the narrow sense (Tamil alla 'X is not Y' vs. 'X = Y' with zero
copula, or an alternative construction). Examples from Arden 1942: itu |
niiyaayam 'this (is) justice' vs. itu niyaayam alla 'this is not justice';
atu en naay alla 'this is not my dog' [pure copula] vs. en viiTTilee naay
illai 'there is no dog in my house' (p. 280).

In Telugu (a language of the Central Dravidian subgroup -- Tamil is South
Dravidian -- with around 70,000,000 speakers, mainly in the SE Indian State
of Andhra Pradesh) the situation is even more interesting. Not only do these
two types of negative verbs (existential and pure copula) exist, but both
may be inflected. Examples from Krishnamurti & Gwynn 1985: adi pustakam
'that is a book' vs. adi pustakam kaa-du 'that is not a book'; manam telugu
waaLLam 'we are Telugus' vs. manam telugu waaLLam kaa-mu 'we are not
Telugus' (pp. 309, 313); waaDiki buddhi lee-du 'he has no sense < to him
there is no sense' (vs. positive waaDiki buddhi undi); dukaaNaalloo biyyam
lee-wu 'there is no rice [pl.] in the shops' (vs. positive dukaaNaalloo
biyyam unnaayi 'there IS rice in the shops') (pp.141ff). [NB: those who are
interested in 'count' vs. 'mass' nouns: words for 'rice', 'water', 'milk',
etc. are PLURAL in Telugu.]

Also interesting is the fact that the simplest (shortest) form of all other
verbs -- i.e. the stem + the suffix /a/ + the personal endings --
constitutes the so-called Negative Form of the verb, with
General-Present/Future reference: neenu kawitwam raay-a-nu 'I do not/will
not write poetry'; meemu reepu uuriki weLL-a-mu 'We will not go to the
village tomorrow'; miiru naa-maaTa win-a-ru 'You do not/will not listen to
my word' (K&G, p.159-160). (Cf. miiru naa-maaTa wiN-Taa-ru 'You listen to my
word' and miiru naa-maaTa wiN-T-unn-aa-ru 'You are listening to my word'.

In Tamil, there is also such a "Negative Form" -- with the personal endings
added directly to the stem -- but it is for the most part obsolete. In
Malayalam such a form is not possible because there are no personal endings.

All for now,

Colin P. Masica

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