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Adjunction Sites for Negation in Norwegian: Modals and Negation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 December 2008

Kristin M. Eide
Kristin M. Eide
Affiliation:
Department of Computer and Information Science, NTNU, NO-7491 Trondheim, Norway. E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

This paper investigates a surprising interpretational asymmetry in modal-negation sequences in Norwegian: When the negation word follows the subject, the sentence is ambiguous with respect to the relative scopes of the negation and the modal. When negation precedes the subject, however, the negation unambiguously takes scope over the modal. I argue that this asymmetry can be accounted for by assuming that verb raising has semantic implications; contrary to Chomsky (2001a). Modal-negation sequences in subordinate clauses do not display the same asymmetry, which supports the hypothesis that verb raising causes the observed patterns. Moreover, many speakers reject the sequence negation-subject in subordinate clauses. I propose that, for these speakers, main clauses employ two adjunction sites for negation, whereas subordinate clauses employ only one.

Type
Articles
Information
Nordic Journal of Linguistics , Volume 25 , Issue 2 , December 2002 , pp. 225 - 252
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2002

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