B05: Negative Polarity Items in Non-Negative Contexts
Project B05 focuses on understanding how negation functions in different linguistic contexts. By investigating negative polarity items in non-negative contexts, we aim to contribute significant insights into the broader field of linguistic negation.
This project seeks to reconcile traditional assumptions about the licensing of Negative Polarity Items (NPIs) with observed exceptions, focusing specifically on English, German, and Romanian. We hypothesize that weak NPIs require at least a weak licenser in the at-issue meaning, while strong NPIs demand a strong licenser, which can appear in either the at-issue or non-at-issue content. Our empirical approach integrates both quantitative and qualitative data analyses, including acceptability judgments. Ultimately, the project aims to develop an empirically grounded theory of NPI licensing within a constraint-based grammar framework.
Project description on the official CRC page:
Project B05: Negative Polarity Items in Non-Negative Contexts
The complete project proposal:

Meet the Team

Manfred Sailer

Frank Richter

Dirk Buschbom
Research Associate

Nicolas Lamoure
Cooperation Partners
- Mihaela Cristescu (Bucharest)
- Gianina Iordăchioaia (Graz)
- E. David Martínez García (Nikosia)
- Monica-Mihaela Rizea (Bucharest)
Events
Upcoming Events
February 14, 2025: Manfred Sailer: Welchen Teil von ,,Nein'' verstehen wir (noch) nicht? Aktuelles aus der linguistischen Negationsforschung. (in German) Part of the science communication series Gomadinger Gespräche 2024/25, Gomadingen.
Past Events
December 17 & 18, 2024: Nicolas Lamoure, E. David Martínez García, Frank Richter, Monica-Mihaela Rizea, Manfred Sailer: "Einen Scheiß muss ich!" - Implicit and expressive negators in German, Romanian, and Spanish. Presentation at the CRC Workshop
December 13, 2024: 2nd cooperation meeting with Gianina Iordăchioaia (Graz)
November 29, 2024: Manfred Sailer: Co-occurrence with negation and types of NPI-hood. Online presentation, Nicosia, Cyprus.
August 6, 2024: Cooperation meeting with Gianina Iordăchioaia (Graz)
July 9-10, 2024: Manfred Sailer: Horn clauses and strict NPIs under negated matrix clause. Paper at the 31st International Conference on Head-Driven Phrase Structure Grammar (HPSG 2024), Olomouc.
July-September, 2024: Research visit of Jong-Bok Kim (Seoul) as a fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.
July 1-3, 2024: Research visit of E. David García Martínez (Nicosia).
June 24-26, 2024: Research visit of Jack Hoeksema (Groningen).
June 20-21, 2024: Manfred Sailer: Negation-transparent matrix predicates: Licensing of embedded NPIs. Poster at the MECORE Closing Workshop, Konstanz.
Download: slides
May-June, 2024: Research visit of Gerald Penn (Toronto).
May 13, 2024: Frank Niu (Toronto): Dissecting Language Models: From Black Boxes to Interpretable AI. Guest lecture.
Time: 10.15-11.45am (UTC+2)
Room: IG 1.418
Download: abstract
April 19, 2024: Nicolas Lamoure, Frank Richter & Manfred Sailer. Negative polarity items with coffee stain distribution. Presentation at the NegLab kick-off workshop.
February 2024: The project is hiring a doctoral student!
Find our job ad on LinguistList and on the English Linguistics blog.
Publications
A list of publications related to the project will be available here.