North Germanic Negation - Munin

INTRODUCTION
NEG parameter (Ouhalla 1990) has the same value across North Germanic. The reason for choosing
one rigid position for NegP is first and foremost methodological. The perspective in this dissertation
is microcomparative, and thus it is reasonable to keep the variables at a minimum in order to detect
and reveal the locus or loci for variation across North Germanic.
1.3.2 The clausal structure and the locus of NegP
I assume the basic clausal structure given in (4). NegP is located between the subject positions AgrSP
and TP. This field may also contain sentential adverbs like heldigvis (‘fortunately’). It is not important
for the purpose of the dissertation whether adverbs are analysed as adjuncts (cf. e.g. Ernst 2002) or
as specifiers of specific functional categories (cf. Cinque 1999). I will not go into a detailed study of
positions, categorial status, or different types of adverbs. When necessary, I assume the
decomposition of the CP domain into ForceP > TopP > FocP > FinP (Rizzi 1997), and potential other
CP projections, as well. Whereas TopP and FocP are optional positions for topicalised and focalised
constituents, ForceP is related to the illocutionarly force of the clause, and FinP to finiteness.
Spec,FinP is recognised as the canonical subject position in (certain) varieties of North Germanic (cf.
Holmberg and Platzack 2005; Christensen 2005).
(4) CP
ty
(subject)
AgrSP
ty
ikke
NegP
ty
(subject)
< (high) sentential adverbs, e.g. heldigvis (‘fortunately’)
TP
ty
vP
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In (4) the subject is merged within vP, and raises to at least Spec,TP (depending on language). NegP
is merged on top of TP, which means that the relative order of negation and the subject hinges on
which projection the subject targets. A structure like the one in (4) is relatively standard in analyses
of North Germanic (cf. Åfarli et al. 2003).
The structure in (4) suffices in many cases for my purposes, which is to account for, and model
the observed word order variation. It should be noted that there is little attention to semantic issues
in the thesis. When needed I will use a more elaborate structure than the one in (4), and be more
specific about the technicalities. For an introduction to the Minimalist version of Generative
Linguistics I refer to Radford (2004).
1.3.3 Negative heads and negative clitics (from a Norwegian perspective)
The Norwegian negative marker ikke has been analysed as a head by some scholars (e.g.
Johannessen 1998; Lindstad 2007; van Gelderen 2008). Judging from the literature it seems in some
respects difficult to determine whether or not ikke and the other negative markers in North
Germanic are heads or XPs. Their status depends not least on which criteria are used. Several of the
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