Contenu du sommaire : Polarité, négation et scalarité, sous la direction de Silvia Palma

In this paper, two series of French indefinite pronouns and determiners have been examined and compared. One series, the que ce soit type, covers all the distribution of negative polarity items far better than negative indefinite pronouns, but also the free-choice distribution, as any does in English. The other series, the n'importe type, is said to have only free-choice uses. We have compared the two sets of distributions and shown that negative polarity cannot be clearly distinguished from free choice: in both collocations, cases of universal and existential uses can be found. We have also established that the n'importe type is indeed possible in multiple polarity sensitive contexts, when not directly under the dependence of a negation. We conclude that the affinities between free-choice and negative polarity result from an extension of argumental selection on the complete set of reference in both cases, including virtual values. The key for both collocations is the absence of specification of individual items. The ability to employ the series n'importe in some real contexts is linked with a dissociation between the mental space of the selection and the mental space of a future (sometimes present) specification, dissociation which is not available with que ce soit (but is indeed available with any).

The purpose of this paper is to show that asymmetric ou (in French) is systematically followed by a negative context. This assertion is illustrated by the use of adjectives with ambiguous interpretations (e.g. the adjective relatif) as well as adjectives with no negative connotations (e.g. important and moyen). With the first kind of adjectives, it is shown that the word after the asymmetric ou will systematically select the negative sense of relatif. With the second kind of adjectives, it is shown that the term following the asymmetric ou needs to be qualified by a negative term so that a grammatically acceptable sentence can be built.

Inequality comparative constructions are found amongst the so-called “negative polarity” contexts. Actually, it has often been suggested that comparison operations contain an underlying negation; in addition, comparative clauses form part of structures allowing for the presence of an expletive negation in some languages, like French or Spanish. In this paper, we intend to examine the comparisons which can present that supposed negative mark in French – ne – from a semantic perspective on the basis of certain assumptions from O. Ducrot's polyphonic theory and from J.-C. Anscombre's stereotypical theory. Specifically, the internal polyphonic structure of those sequences are analysed here as a conglomeration of points of view conveying argumentative instructions and a hypothesis is presented which accounts for the internal “negativity” of comparisons.

A study of negative polarity idioms –NPI– (e.g. not lift a finger, not say a word) within the theoretical framework of stereotypical theory (Kleiber, Anscombre) is proposed in our paper. From our point of view, generic phrases underlying sentences with NPIs play a crucial role in the presence of a negation. As a matter of fact, a sentence like Peter didn't lift a finger for his sister doesn't actually deny *Peter lifted a finger for his sister but rather a sort of general rule related to stereotypical contents: “people help their close relations”. Negation in NPIs is then a trace, a sign of this opposition between a general belief and a particular case which seems to be a counter-example. This perspective shows several common points between phrases including NPIs and phrases including positive polarity items.

The connection between negation and polarity has been studied from many points of view, the resulting work comprising a whole array of metaphors on the actual object of study: quantity. In this paper I provide some arguments supporting the relation between the concepts of quantity, negation, and polarity, which should actually be construed as a single concept if a scale based on quantification is established. This scale will necessarily be polar and negation will be a constitutive part of it. Quantity is the element that justifies the connections between scalar implicature and negative polarity. Starting with the logical traditional square, and having in mind Jespersen's ideas on this question, a triangular scheme (an escherian scale) is presented describing the basic values of the system of quantification in Spanish (its basic quantifiers and the peripheral ones) and the relation between the most frequent lexical items for the logical modalities. The main consequence proposed is that polar values should be considered, at least in these cases, as the semantic contents of the corresponding lexical entries.

This paper is focused on the effect of negative polarity on presuppositions and scalar implicatures, negative quantifiers and negative events. The main thesis is that the semantics of negation, depending on its scope, does not cover all the properties and relations of sentence meaning. When ordinary negation is used, the presupposition is not affected, whereas when negation is metalinguistic, it either asserts or negates the proposition, and either asserts or negates its implication. When negation is used with a negative particular (down-bounded quantifier), it preserves its negative scalar up-bounded implicature. Finally, when used with an event, negation preserves the relational domain of the semantics of event, i.e. its temporal (directional) inference. These properties of negation contrast with the complement function of logical negation.

A comparison is proposed between the peculiar behaviour of statements containing negative polarity items and the minimal logic (nontraditional logic) negation operator. Under this approach, the habitual filiation of statement validation (where the negative statement “comes after” a positive one by applying a negation operator to the positive statement) becomes inverted and turns into an uncommon filiation, where the negative statement comes first and the positive statement (i.e. the opposite version of the negative statement) comes later, including no logical operator. Statements containing negative polarity items can't be validated compositionally (i.e. as the positive version is not available, it can't be used to calculate the value of the negative statement). They need to be validated directly through their linguistic sense, their status of “figures” being thus capital to perform this step. In our perspective, far from being peculiar elements of utterances statements containing negative polarity items are in fact necessary formulations of natural languages appearing in highly varied forms. They are an essential part to achieve a rational approach to negative statements as a whole.