NEG Raising

[David Gil]

Chris (and others),

Several colloquial varieties of Indonesian (eg. Riau Indonesian) lack 
NEG raising.  In a paper (which I've only presented orally, and haven't 
written up yet) I argue that this is part of a more general tendency for 
colloquial Indonesian to exhibit greater isomorphism between syntactic 
and semantic structures than many other more familiar languages.

(A complicating factor is that colloquial Indonesian tends to avoid 
embedding in general -- much more than equally colloquial varieties of 
English and other European languages -- and thus, constructions such as 
'I think John is a werewolf' are rarely used.  However, they ARE 
grammatical, and 'I don't think John is a werewolf' cannot mean 'I think 
that John is not a werewolf'.)

I'll be really curious to find out, from your query, how widepsread the 
absence of NEG raising is across the languages of the world.

Best,

David



On 17/05/2013 03:15, Christopher T Collins wrote:
> Dear Typologists,
>
> Could you tell me if there are languages that you know or know of that 
> do not permit NEG Raising.
> On a NEG Raising reading of (a), it is felt to mean the same thing as (b):
>
> a. I don't think John is a werewolf
> b. I think that John is not a werewolf
>
> Also, strict NPIs are licensed:
>
> c. John won't be here until 6:00
> d. I don't think John will be here until 6:00
>
> In these sentences 6:00 is a strict NPI, and it needs a negation.
> (d) contrasts with (f):
>
> e. I regret that John won't be here until 6:00
> f. *I don't regret John will be here until 6:00
>
> Other NEG Raising predicates include: think, believe, imagine, intend, 
> want.
>
> Chris Collins
>

-- 
David Gil

Department of Linguistics
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
Deutscher Platz 6, D-04103 Leipzig, Germany

Telephone: 49-341-3550321 Fax: 49-341-3550119
Email: gil at eva.mpg.de
Webpage:  http://www.eva.mpg.de/~gil/