Babanki negation patterns

Pius W. Akumbu (1)

1 LLACAN - Langage, LAngues et Cultures d'Afrique

There are languages in the world in which the normal negation (NEG) construction includes a discontinuous morpheme or a double negative. In many of such languages with SVO structure, the first NEG morpheme precedes the verb while the second follows it, preferably occupying the end of the clause. Dryer's (2009) survey reports a number of such languages in Central Africa with different characteristics. One of the languages, Hausa, employs double NEG only some of the time. Babanki, a central Ring Grassfields Bantu language of Northwest Cameroon presents a case close to Hausa but different in that the second part of the standard negation construction is optional and can always occur except in negative questions where the question particle occupies the end of the clause preventing it from occurring. In central Ring, Babanki shows a unique pattern using the same discontinuous morpheme kóˋ…bwen for standard negation in all tenses/aspects.

Mots clés: Babanki; Grassfields; negation; patterns

Domaines: Sciences de l'Homme et Société

Pius W. Akumbu. Babanki negation patterns. SKY Journal of Linguistics, 2016, 29. ⟨hal-03691861⟩