[Lingtyp] Expletive derivational negation
Jeremy Bradley
jeremy.moss.bradley at univie.ac.at
Mon Aug 19 14:02:44 UTC 2024
Mari (Uralic) has an interesting pair of adjectives using the fully
productive privative derivational suffix /-dəme/ '-less' here:
/mučas-dəme/
end-PRIV
'endless'
/ńi-mučas-dəme/
NEG-end-PRIV
'endless'
... with /ńi/- being a prefix most likely borrowed from Russian used to
create negative indefinites (/molan /'why' > /ńimonal /'for no reason')
and otherwise only attaching to pronominal stems.
Best,
Jeremy
On 18/08/2024 22:11, Hartmut Haberland via Lingtyp wrote:
>
> I do not know if anybody has remarked on German /Untiefe/ which
> actually has two opposite meanings:
>
> 1. a shallow part of a river or the sea, where the water is /not/
> deep, hence a danger for ships that might get stuck
>
> 2. an unfathomably deep part of a river (rarely) or the sea
>
> This is what the dictionaries say. For me, /Untiefe/ has mostly the
> first meaning, although some people might claim it is old-fashioned or
> even obsolete.
>
> Hartmut Haberland
>
> *Fra:*Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> *På vegne af
> *Volker Gast via Lingtyp
> *Sendt:* 18. august 2024 21:25
> *Til:* lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
> *Emne:* Re: [Lingtyp] Expletive derivational negation
>
> There are some further interesting examples of the German un-prefix on
> nouns:
>
> Un-mensch 'inhuman person'
>
> Un-person 'persona non grata'
>
> Un-ding 'something unheard of'
>
> Un-zahl 'huge number' (cf. Un-menge)
>
> I had a look at Grimm's Wörterbuch, where I found some further
> examples that I was unaware of, e.g. Un-haufe 'un-heap', Un-masse
> 'un-mass'. Some of these words seem to be relatively old (16th cent.),
> others quite recent (and Unperson may have been influenced by G.
> Orwell's English coinage? It seems to have emerged in the middle of
> the 20th century in German, according to the DWDS).
>
> There's clearly an emotive component to all of these, and I think they
> all have a negative connotation. Some of the nouns seem to be formed
> on the model of the pattern
>
> 'Some x that you cannot V (measure, count)' (cf. Stephane's comment)
>
> "Un-mensch" is perhaps the example that's closest to literal negation,
> 'someone who is not a human being'. Unding is mostly used for abstract
> entities, in my German, and more or less means 'scandal'.
>
> I think I would see these examples as instances of subjectification
> and specialization, as others have written or implied. The core
> meaning of 'un-' still survives in the negative evaluation (cf.
> Bastian). Btw I think that 'Un-menge' also has a negative evaluation.
> It's not just a large quantity -- it's a quantity that's TOO large,
> according to some standard.
>
> Best,
> Volker
>
> Am 16.08.2024 um 14:18 schrieb ROBERT Stephane via Lingtyp:
>
> I fully agree with Bastian which perhaps expresses more clearly
> what I meant by “high degree”: subjective evaluation pointing to
> an extreme degree (indescribable, inexpressible), positive or
> negative depending on the notion involved.
>
> To take on this meaning, lexical negation must be combined with a
> gradable (or scalar) notion. In the case of nouns, this typically
> involves mass nouns, such as Menge (crowd), Tiefe (depth) vs.
> Freiheit (freedom).
>
> Stéphane
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *De :*Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> <mailto:lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> de la part de
> Zingler, Tim via Lingtyp <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> <mailto:lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> *Envoyé :* vendredi 16 août 2024 14:15
> *À :* Bastian Persohn
> *Cc :* lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
> *Objet :* Re: [Lingtyp] Expletive derivational negation
>
> Well, the point is that these words contain what synchronically
> looks like a negator affix even though that affix does not negate
> the stem. So, they seem to qualify for the phenomenon the original
> post was about.
>
> But I like the idea that the function has shifted as part of
> a subjectification (?) process. Does that happen with negators
> cross-linguistically?
>
>
> Best,
>
> Tim
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Von:*Bastian Persohn <persohn.linguistics at gmail.com>
> <mailto:persohn.linguistics at gmail.com>
> *Gesendet:* Freitag, 16. August 2024 13:55
> *An:* Zingler, Tim
> *Cc:* lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
> *Betreff:* Re: [Lingtyp] Expletive derivational negation
>
> I’m not sure that /Untiefe/ is synonymous with /Tiefe/, or
> /Unmenge/ with /Menge/. In my intuition /Un-menge/ has an
> evaluative ring to it (‚an undesirably large or over-the-top
> amount‘), and DWDS translates it as ’sehr große, übergroße Menge’
> [very big, unnecessary big amount]’. Similarly, /Un-tiefe/ usually
> refers to an extreme depth (cf. DWDS: ‚abgrundartige, sehr große
> Tiefe in einem Gewässer [abysm-like, very large depth in a body of
> water]‘.
>
> Their closest relatives are probably found in instances like
> /Un-fall/ ‚accident‘ < /Fall/ ‚case‘, i.e. ‚the undesirable case‘
> or /Un-tier/ ‚monster‘, lit ‚un-animal‘. What all these have in
> common is a negative element, albeit in the subjective rather than
> the material domain.
>
> Best,
>
> Bastian
>
>
>
> Am 16.08.2024 um 13:10 schrieb Zingler, Tim via Lingtyp
> <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> <mailto:lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>:
>
> German has /Un-tiefe/, which essentially means the same
> as/Tiefe/ 'depth'. Or/Un-menge/, largely synonymous
> with/Menge/ 'mass, crowd, great amount.' These seem perfectly
> analogous to/valuable-invaluable/.
>
> I'm sure there's more, but I don't know if that prefix is
> cognate with the negator found in, for
> instance,/Un-freiheit/ 'unfreedom.' So, there are probably
> complications involved if one were to analyze that more seriously.
>
>
> Best,
>
> Tim
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Von:*Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> <mailto:lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> im Auftrag
> von ROBERT Stephane via Lingtyp
> <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> <mailto:lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> *Gesendet:*Freitag, 16. August 2024 11:48
> *An:*lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
> *Betreff:*Re: [Lingtyp] Expletive derivational negation
>
> Dear Joe,
>
> Personally, I do not regard these uses of lexical negation as
> expletive but rather as contributing a construction with a
> high-degree value that can be paraphrased as follows: 'this
> object is (valuable) to a degree that I (speaker) cannot
> (even) express', or '*no*matter how hard I try to estimate how
> much X is P, I***can't*express it'(P for predicate).
>
>
> Note that in the examples I can analyse (Germanic, English and
> also French '/in-estim-able/'), this lexical negation is
> combined with a suffix (cf. Germ. -/bar/, Eng. < Fr. -/able/)
> which contributes to the meaning of the construction because
> it expresses evaluation about capacity ‘which can be P’ .
>
> Best
>
> Stéphane ROBERT
>
> https://llacan.cnrs.fr
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *De :*Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> <mailto:lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> de la part
> de Hannu Tommola via Lingtyp
> <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> <mailto:lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> *Envoyé :*vendredi 16 août 2024 11:03
> *À :*<LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG>
> <mailto:LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG>; Pun Ho Lui
> *Objet :*Re: [Lingtyp] Expletive derivational negation
>
> Hi,
>
> there seems to be a tendency to lexicalize 'invaluable' in an
> intensifying non-negative meaning (cf.
> Russian/bes-cennyj/ 'invaluable, priceless', which has an
> obsolete meaning 'valueless' =/ne-cennyj/). This tendency goes
> back to the verb 'value' that has, in various languages, both
> the meanings 1) 'estimate', 2) 'regard/estimate highly'. Cf.
> also German/un-schätzbar/ 'invaluable' </schätzen/ 1. 'to
> regard highly, respect', 2. 'value, estimate'; the same
> applies to Swedish/o-skattbar/ </(upp)skatta/.
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Hannu Tommola
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Lähettäjä:*Lingtyp
> <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> <mailto:lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> käyttäjän
> Pun Ho Lui via Lingtyp <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> <mailto:lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org> puolesta
> *Lähetetty:*perjantai 16. elokuuta 2024 3.22
> *Vastaanottaja:*<LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG>
> <mailto:LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG>
> <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> <mailto:lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
> *Aihe:*[Lingtyp] Expletive derivational negation
>
> Dear linguists,
>
> I am recently interested in lexical items that consist of a
> derivational negative affix which may not contribute a
> negative meaning (i.e. being expletive).
>
> For instance,/in-valuable/~/valuable/. Other possible examples
> would be 無價‘invaluable [lit. NEG value’ in Mandarin,
> and/sewashi-nai/‘restless’ ~/sewashii/‘busy’ in Japanese.
>
> I have looked into a number of (decent) grammar descriptions
> but have no luck.
>
> I am wondering if you know of any language with similar items.
>
> Thank you.
>
> Warmest,
>
> Pun Ho Lui Joe
>
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--
Jeremy Bradley, Ph.D.
University of Vienna
http://www.mari-language.com
jeremy.moss.bradley at univie.ac.at
Office address:
Institut EVSL
Abteilung Finno-Ugristik
Universität Wien
Campus AAKH, Hof 7-2
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1090 Wien
AUSTRIA
Mobile: +43-664-99-31-788
Skype: jeremy.moss.bradley
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