{"title":"Yorùbá Sentential Negative Markers","authors":"Taofeeq Adebayo","doi":"10.32473/sal.v50i1.120778","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"The main claim of this paper is that Yoruba has only four sentential negative markers, kìí, kò, kọ́ and má, contrary to a traditional assumption that there are six of them (Fabunmi 2013). It is argued that these markers can be subcategorized into two morphemes: the k-morpheme and the má-morpheme. The k- and má-morphemes are distinguished based on mood. The k-morpheme is used in realis mood while the má-morpheme is used in irrealis mood. Kìí, kò, and kọ́, which are taken to be allomorphs of the k-morpheme, are distinguished based on aspect and focus. It is shown that when the SN markers occur in a different modal-aspectual environment, this generally gives rise to the kind of form-interpretation mismatches described for functional items in Carlson (2006).","PeriodicalId":35170,"journal":{"name":"Studies in African Linguistics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2021-04-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Studies in African Linguistics","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.32473/sal.v50i1.120778","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"Arts and Humanities","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The main claim of this paper is that Yoruba has only four sentential negative markers, kìí, kò, kọ́ and má, contrary to a traditional assumption that there are six of them (Fabunmi 2013). It is argued that these markers can be subcategorized into two morphemes: the k-morpheme and the má-morpheme. The k- and má-morphemes are distinguished based on mood. The k-morpheme is used in realis mood while the má-morpheme is used in irrealis mood. Kìí, kò, and kọ́, which are taken to be allomorphs of the k-morpheme, are distinguished based on aspect and focus. It is shown that when the SN markers occur in a different modal-aspectual environment, this generally gives rise to the kind of form-interpretation mismatches described for functional items in Carlson (2006).