Negation in Non-Standard Varieties Page 1 of 18 PRINTED FROM OXFORD HANDBOOKS ONLINE (www.oxfordhandbooks.com). © Oxford University Press, 2018. All Rights Reserved. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a PDF of a single chapter of a title in Oxford Handbooks Online for personal use (for details see Privacy Policy and Legal Notice). Subscriber: OUP-Reference Gratis Access; date: 07 May 2020 Print Publication Date: Mar 2020 Subject: Linguistics, Morphology and Syntax Online Publication Date: May 2020 DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198830528.013.29 Negation in Non-Standard Varieties Christina Tortora and Frances Blanchette The Oxford Handbook of Negation Edited by Viviane Déprez and M. Teresa Espinal Abstract and Keywords This chapter discusses the relevance of data from non-standard varieties to our under standing of natural language negation, and in particular, to theories which seek to model and explain natural language properties. The chapter focuses specifically on the different types of Negative Concord exhibited in non-standard Englishes, in West Flemish, and in Romance varieties, showing that in relation to Standard English, Standard Dutch, and Standard French, these non-standard languages exhibit much more intricate points of syntactic variation. The theoretical relevance of subject/non-subject asymmetries, the lex ical nature of postverbal negative constituents, and intra-speaker variability in the ex pression of negation are discussed. The syntactic structures examined reveal that when non-standard languages serve as the main reference point in linguistic theory, this ex tends the hypothesis space in crucial ways, and more fruitful and revealing cross-linguis tic comparisons can be made. Keywords: bilectalism, multiple grammars, negation, negative polarity items, non-standard varieties, negative con cord, standard varieties, standardization, variants, variability 29.1. Introduction THE aim of this chapter is to demonstrate the relevance of data from non-standard vari eties to our understanding of natural language negation, and in particular, to theories which seek to model and explain natural language properties. The idea that negation in non-standard varieties is different enough from that of standard varieties to warrant treat ment in an independent chapter calls for some initial clarification. Specifically, we first need to be clear on what we mean by “non-standard” versus “standard,” and on the fun damental differences between the two. We clarify these points here in the Introduction, drawing from relevant work in variationist sociolinguistics, before turning to a more in- depth discussion of negation in sections 29.2 and 29.3. In those sections, we develop the argument that negation in non-standard varieties should play a privileged role relative to negation in standard varieties in informing theories of natural language.