A Grammar of Italian Sign Language (LIS)

Irregular negatives are a small group of predicates that incorporate negation in an opaque way. They have no obvious morphological relation to their positive counterpart and no distinct negative element can be identified (MORPHOLOGY 3.5.2). In this case, we talk about negative supplition.

         Examples of irregular negatives in LIS are like.not (a) and want.not (b).

 

 

 

                                neg

         a.            like.not

         ‘(To) dislike’

 

 

 

                                  neg

         b.            want.not

         ‘(To) not want’

 

It should be noticed that the irregular negative want.not is a variant of the regular negative form want^not.

 

 

 

         want^Not

         ‘Do not want’

 

We show below the use of like.not (a), want.not (b), and in context.

 

 

 

                                                     neg

         a.            music rap ix₁ like.not

         ‘I don’t like rap music.’

 

 

 

                                                                                  neg

         b.            person₃ ix_{1 1}communicate₃ ix₁ want.not

         ‘I don’t want to communicate with that person.’

 

Other irregular verbs express impossibility. One is the sign that can be glossed as impossible_pa_pa, for the oral articulation that takes place when the sign is performed.

 

 

 

                                   neg

         impossible_pa_pa

         ‘(To) not be able to’

 

It refers to a situation when, after several attempts, the desired result cannot be achieved, like in the example below.

 

 

 

                                                                                                                       neg

         outside wind strong ix₁ cigarette light_ cigarette ++ impossible_pa_pa

         ‘Outside there was a strong wind, so I tried in vain to light a cigarette.’

 

Another sign has a similar meaning but even stronger and it can be glossed as impossible_no_way.

 

 

 

                                  neg

         impossible_no_way

         ‘(To) be absolutely unlikely to happen’

 

It indicates that there is no possibility at all to carry out an action or that a situation has no way out, as it can be seen in the example below.

 

 

 

                                                                                                                neg

         today work CL(5): ‘finish_work’ limittoday ix₁ impossible_no_way

         ‘There is no chance that I will finish my work by today.’

 

There is one more irregular negative predicate, that is the negative counterpart of the verb exist, expressing existence and possession. The verb exist.not can be seen below.

 

 

 

                   neg

         exist.not

         ‘(To) not have’

         ‘There is not’

 

It is used to indicate the non-existence or the non-possession of something, like in the example below.

 

         davide dog exist.not

         ‘Davide does not have a dog.’

 

It is important to note that regular negative predicates such as know^not and can^not differ from the irregular forms presented in this section, in that they show a morphological relation to their positive counterpart (i.e. know and can): in these cases, a negative morpheme is added to the lexical base of the verb (MORPHOLOGY 3.5.1).