Existential negation in Turkish: A functional approach

Abstract

 

Existential negation is the one type of negation present in languages, which its item is called “negative existentialâ€, and it provides to tell the case of “absenceâ€, “lackâ€, “there is notâ€, “poorâ€, “emptyâ€, “dead†etc. Negative existentials are generally used for the common similarity of a structure as morphological, syntactic and semantic typologies. In Turkish, existential negation occurs with the independent morpheme yok, which is defined as “absolute absence/non-existenceâ€. Yok is the main negative existential that is different from the standard negation and it is a separate lexical item with negative content. Since it is a powerful negator with its “absolute absence/non-existence†meaning, it can be used in different positions, such as existential negation, possessive negation, emphatic negation, standard negation, short answer “noâ€, prohibition or double negation. In addition to yok, the bound morpheme -sXz is used with “without/lack†meaning in existential negation by implying the non-existence case. Besides, general rejection item deÄŸil, which means “is notâ€, is used in existential negation, which implies the non-existentiality by rejecting the existence case that is presupposed.