Actitudes punitivas hacia el delito

3.1.1

The data: Jespersen

Jespersen (1924) observes a cyclic pattern in the diachronic development of the overt marking of sentential negation. This cyclic pattern is known as the Nega- tive Cycle and is illustrated in Germanic and Romance in (3) and (4) respective- ly, after Jespersen (1924: 335!36). The dates for the respective stages of the development in (3) are from Bennis et al. (1995b, 1997: 1010 (9)).

2. The stage represented here by (3d) was not included in Jespersen’s paradigm. It has been included here to take into account the work of Beukema (1994) and Bennis et al. (1995a, b, 1997). Beukema and his colleagues argue that the pattern in (3d) was rare and essentially served as a bridge between (3c) and (3e).

3. For discussion of the Negative Cycle in French, see Hopper and Traugott (1993: 58), McMahon (1994: 161!66), Price (1984: 252!57), Schwegler (1988: 26, 45!46), and Winters (1987). See also sections 3.1.2 and 3.5.2, as well as section 4.3.2.

4. To the extent that the illustrations in the text show nothing more than how sentential negation is overtly marked, they are likely to be a simplification of the underlying facts. As has been argued earlier in this book (for example, section 1.2.4), and as I demonstrate later, the expression of sentential negation can involve non-overt operators. The importance of these elements, and of their changing nature, is, of course, masked in (3) and (4).

5. For cross-linguistic and typological work on negation, see Croft (1991), Dahl (1979), de Haan (1997), Payne (1985), Ramat et al. (1987), and the contributions to Kahrel and van den Berg (eds.) (1994).

6. The word “first” is in inverted commas since it would be wrong to give the impression that the relevant varieties have no history prior to the stages illustrated by (3a) and (4a). Posner (1985b: 265!

67) suggests that the negative marker non was reanalyzed over time from being a sentence adverb in Latin to being a clitic-like element that forms part of the verbal complex, for example, ne in French in (4). (See also Posner 1996: 302!5.) According to Vennemann (1974: 366!68), this reanalysis was a natural consequence of the typological shift from XV to VX. (See Schwegler 1988: 37 for a useful illustration of how the reanalysis of an adverb in Latin as a functional head in French can be explained by the typological shift from OV to VO order.) Burridge (1993: chapter 5) critically discusses Venne- mann’s typological approach to the syntax of negation in the history of Dutch. See also footnote 71.

(3) English:2

a. he ne secgeþ. (“classical” Old English)

b. he ne seiþ not. (M iddle English)

c. he says not. (late M iddle English 6 late 17th century) d. he not says. (early 15th century 6 second half 18th century) e. he does not say. (15th century 6 present)

f. he doesn’t say. (±1600 6 present)

(4) French:3

a. jeo ne di. (6 1600)

b. je ne dis (pas). (1600 6 1700)

c. je ne dis pas. (Standard written French) d. je (ne) dis pas. (Standard spoken French)

e. je dis pas. (Colloquial French)

‘I don’t say.’

The sequences in (3) and (4) reflect the diachronic development in the respective languages; however, contemporary languages are known to exemplify the vari-4 ous stages in the sequences. In the “first” instance, for example, sentential ne-5 6

gation is marked by a pre-verbal, syntactically dependent, element alone, as in (4a). This is where Italian and Spanish currently stand in the Negative Cycle: (5) a. Gianni non telefona a sua madre. (Italian, Haegeman

G. non telephones to his mother 1995: 195 (43a)) ‘G. doesn’t phone his mother.’

7. A number of researchers, including Schwegler (1988: 26), have pointed out that the post-verbal “reinforcer” is often a nominal element denoting a small amount. See chapter 2, footnote 29.

8. According to Hirschbühler and Labelle (1993: 3), in French “ne can be the sole lexical negative element in a clause, and it is used alone much more than in combination with pas or point” “until at least the end of the sixteenth century”.

9. This phraseology is taken from Posner (1985a: 184). Posner suggests that, prior to the late four- teenth century, French pas had “emphatic import”.

10. In the bipartite system of sentential negation used in some clause types in F]n, the pre-verbal marker, má, is associated with SpecNegP, while the post-verbal marker, a¢, is associated with NegE (da Cruz 1992, reported in DeGraff 1993b: 87). See also Navajo (Speas 1991b: 394!95; and chapter 2, footnote 6).

b. La niña no está hablando por teléfono. (Spanish, Haegeman the girl no is talking by telephone 1995: 227 (81a)) ‘The girl isn’t talking on the phone.’

The next stage in the overt Negative Cycle comes when the pre-verbal ele- ment is “reinforced” by a syntactically independent post-verbal constituent, first7 only optionally, “with emphatic import”, as in (4b), then obligatorily, as in8 9 (4c). Once the post-verbal element becomes compulsory, I assume it is inher- ently negative. It would seem that the position in the Negative Cycle occupied by some dialects of Berber is the same as that occupied by French in (4b). In the (null-subject) Taqbaylit dialect, sentential negation is marked by an (obligatory) proclitic marker, ur, with optional emphatic reinforcement by an independent post-verbal negative marker, ara (Jamal Ouhalla, personal communication). (6) Ur zrigh (ara) Idir. (Taqbaylit dialect of Berber)

ur saw-1SGara I.

‘I didn’t see I.’

Further, the following Burmese data attributed to Denise Bernot by Lazard (1994) suggest that this language is at the same stage in the Negative Cycle as the variety of M odern French exemplified in (4c). In Burmese, sentential nega- tion is marked by both a pre-verbal negative marker, mc, and a post-verbal one,

Phù:10

(7) a. §lo§ ›u mc caN Phù. (Lazard 1994: 26 (3)) work him mc organize Phù

‘He doesn’t organize his work.’

b. §c4co Ko mc cá Phù. (Lazard 1994: 26 (2)) profit RELmc happen Phù

‘There is no profit.’

c. mìN ùN mc›a Phù là. (Bernot 1980: 98, cited by you stomach mc be-happy PhùQ Lazard 1994: 115 (86)) ‘Aren’t you satisfied?’

In the next stage of the Negative Cycle, the independent post-verbal negative marker suffices to mark sentential negation on its own, and the clitic marker be-

11. See also section 3.5.1 for discussion of West Flemish, which also seems to be at this stage in the Negative Cycle.

comes first optional, as in (4d), then disappears altogether, as in (4e). The data in (8) suggest that spoken Breton is at the same stage in the Negative Cycle as the variety of M odern French exemplified in (4d). In spoken Breton, sentential negation is marked by obligatory post-verbal ket and, optionally, by pre-verbal

ne:11

(8) a. Ne ziskenn ket ar vugale betek an hent. (Standard Breton,

ne go-down ket the children to the road Stephens 1993: 397) ‘The children are not going down to the road.’

b. ‘ziskenn ket ar vugale betek an hent. (Spoken Breton, Stephens

(= (8a)) 1993: 398)

In the “final” stage, the independent post-verbal negative marker weakens and is susceptible to reanalysis, or grammaticalization, in the sense of H opper and Traugott (1993). The Negative Cycle is discussed further in section 3.1.2, where I suggest a structural template with which to view the developments.

3.1.2