<3.0.6.32.19990706094703.007af20-@...> wrote:
original article:http://www.egroups.com/group/conlang/?start=27600
> Hello everybody,
>
> I was wondering about negation in con- and natlangs. What I'd
like to know
> is if there are con- or natlangs without a formal negation (that's to
say a
> word or bunch of words used to negate any assertions).
>
> Well, I'm not very clear I think. So I'm going to explain it
better:
> - In English, verbs (assertions) are all negated by 'not' with an
auxiliary,
Not quite. We also have "fail to" and "avoid" and other such creatures
-- positive assertions which have the effect of introducing a negation
into the discourse. Even "stop" introduces a negation as well as an
assertion, sequenced in time!
"not" is just a very all-purpose way of doing it but the specialized
ways also exist.
> - In French, we use 'ne', with 'pas', 'plus', etc...
> - In Spanish, there is 'no',
> - In Japanese, you use -nai or -masen (and compounds of them),
> - etc...
>
> What I would like to know is whether there are languages that
don't have
> such negations, I mean a language that has to use a different
affirmative
> (at least in structure) assertion to negate another one.
>
> I would like to know that because I use such structures in
Notya, and I
> feel Tj'a-ts'a~n works that way too. In Notya, I can remind at least
four
> words used for negation. They are 'wa': to refuse to, refusal, 'tyo':
> contrary, 'phjukyo' /Bu'kjo/: stop, to stop to and 'itjo' /ido/:
after,
> behind, to follow. They are used in positive ways, that's to say 'wa'
means
> 'refuse to...', 'tyo' is more like 'do the contrary of...'. As for
> 'phjukyo', it can be translated as 'not... anymore, no more', and
'itjo' by
> 'still not'. Using 'wa' or 'tyo' depends on context, meaning,
politeness,
> etc... 'phjukyo' and 'itjo' are more meaningful, so depend less on
context
> and politeness.
>
> As those words are used unstressed when meaning negation,
they tend to
> become a "formal negation" as I tried to explain it. What I want to
do in
> Tj'a-ts'a~n is to negate assertions with affirmative assertions
constructed
> differently (with other modals or adverbial complements, etc...). For
> example, I think the negation of 'it must' (probability) could be 'it
> would' (hypothesis) (that's just an idea).
>
> So, do you know languages that have to use affirmative
assertions to
> negate other affirmative assertions like I described? Tell me if I
wasn't
> clear enough. I feel hard to explain what I want.