タグ · 意味領域
否定
何かが成り立たないと述べること、およびそれを標示する要素。
このタグの項目
How do languages say “I don’t have X”?
To express absence of possession, languages either negate a HAVE-verb, add a negative determiner to the object, or reframe the situation as one of non-existence or absence — with the possessor as topic, location, or dative.
How do languages build the paradigm of someone, anyone, no one, and everyone?
Most often these words share one interrogative base (who?) plus a small particle — “also”, “every”, “some”, “any” — that sets the reading. A few languages, English among them, lexicalise the series instead.
How does negation rebuild itself over time?
A preverbal negator weakens and is reinforced by an extra element, often a minimizer like “step” or “thing”. The reinforcer is reanalysed as the negator itself, then weakens in turn, and the cycle starts again.
How does a word for “there is no” turn into plain “not”?
A dedicated negative existential (“there is no X”) arises beside the ordinary negator, then spreads from existential sentences into verbal negation until it becomes the standard negator itself. Croft distinguishes six synchronic types — A, A~B, B, B~C, C, C~A — and the languages below sit at different points along the drift.