Quelqu'un n'est pas venu

Translated title of the contribution: Someone did not come

Pierre Larrivée

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article

Abstract

Received wisdom has it that positive polarity items such as someone are incompatible with negation (?*Someone didn't come). Yet negative contexts are attested with such items not only in their specific indefinite reading (e.g. There's someone who didn't come), but also in their non-specific reading (It isn't the case that someone came). It is the non-specific reading of indefinite quelqu'un as subject of a negative verb phrase which is analysed by the present paper. On the basis of a corpus of attested cases, it demonstrates that polemic contrast is the crucial condition of the considered interpretation. As quelqu'un is included within a presupposed proposition that is rejected as a whole by negation, negative contexts can accommodate an item which does not normally yield the interpretations negation does. Interpretation is thus presented as process of mutual adjustment between contextual readings allowed for by items, readings which can be modalised by discursive values.
Original languageFrench
Pages (from-to)279-296
Number of pages18
JournalJournal of French Language Studies
Volume15
Issue number3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2005

Fingerprint

interpretation
wisdom
Negation
Values
Contextual
Verb Phrase
Wisdom
Positive Polarity Items
Discursive
Negative Verb

Bibliographical note

Copyright of Cambridge University Press

Keywords

  • received wisdom
  • negative contexts
  • non-specific reading
  • negative verb phrase
  • polemic contrast
  • interpretation

Cite this

Larrivée, Pierre. / Quelqu'un n'est pas venu. In: Journal of French Language Studies. 2005 ; Vol. 15, No. 3. pp. 279-296.
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Larrivée, P 2005, 'Quelqu'un n'est pas venu', Journal of French Language Studies, vol. 15, no. 3, pp. 279-296. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0959269505002164

Quelqu'un n'est pas venu. / Larrivée, Pierre.

In: Journal of French Language Studies, Vol. 15, No. 3, 2005, p. 279-296.

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article

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AB - Received wisdom has it that positive polarity items such as someone are incompatible with negation (?*Someone didn't come). Yet negative contexts are attested with such items not only in their specific indefinite reading (e.g. There's someone who didn't come), but also in their non-specific reading (It isn't the case that someone came). It is the non-specific reading of indefinite quelqu'un as subject of a negative verb phrase which is analysed by the present paper. On the basis of a corpus of attested cases, it demonstrates that polemic contrast is the crucial condition of the considered interpretation. As quelqu'un is included within a presupposed proposition that is rejected as a whole by negation, negative contexts can accommodate an item which does not normally yield the interpretations negation does. Interpretation is thus presented as process of mutual adjustment between contextual readings allowed for by items, readings which can be modalised by discursive values.

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Larrivée P. Quelqu'un n'est pas venu. Journal of French Language Studies. 2005;15(3):279-296. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0959269505002164

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