Czech polarity items

Czech indefinites come in two polarity-sensitive series, typed by PolarityItem. The ni- series (nikdo, nic, nikdy, nikam) and the determiner žádný are negative concord items. In Short's words, "any negative subject or object pronoun or pronoun-adverb is reinforced by ne- in the verb", as in Nikdo to nekoupil 'No one bought it' and Petr nekoupil nic 'Peter didn't buy anything' (p. 511), so the concord holds whether the item precedes the verb or follows it. The ně- series (někdo, the determiner nějaký), built on the prefix ně-, are positive polarity items, which escape the immediate scope of clausemate negation; the two determiners therefore diagnose the position of negation in polar questions. The determiners take their forms from Czech.Determiners.QuantityWord, and the ne- prefix lives in Negation.lean.

References

• [Sho93a]
• [Has97]
• [SS25]
• [Sta26]

The ni- series

def Czech.PolarityItems.nikdo : PolarityItem

nikdo 'nobody', the human concord item.

Equations

• Czech.PolarityItems.nikdo = { form := "nikdo", licensor := some PolarityItem.DEStrength.antiMorphic, licensingContexts := [PolarityItem.LicensingContext.negation] }

def Czech.PolarityItems.nic : PolarityItem

nic 'nothing', the non-human concord item.

Equations

• Czech.PolarityItems.nic = { form := "nic", licensor := some PolarityItem.DEStrength.antiMorphic, licensingContexts := [PolarityItem.LicensingContext.negation] }

def Czech.PolarityItems.nikdy : PolarityItem

nikdy 'never', the temporal concord item.

Equations

• Czech.PolarityItems.nikdy = { form := "nikdy", licensor := some PolarityItem.DEStrength.antiMorphic, licensingContexts := [PolarityItem.LicensingContext.negation] }

def Czech.PolarityItems.nikam : PolarityItem

nikam 'nowhere (to)', the directional concord item.

Equations

• Czech.PolarityItems.nikam = { form := "nikam", licensor := some PolarityItem.DEStrength.antiMorphic, licensingContexts := [PolarityItem.LicensingContext.negation] }

def Czech.PolarityItems.zadny : PolarityItem

žádný 'no', the determiner concord item, licensed by inner negation alone in polar questions ([Sta26]).

Equations

• One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.

def Czech.PolarityItems.niSeries : List PolarityItem

The strict concord items.

Equations

• Czech.PolarityItems.niSeries = [Czech.PolarityItems.nikdo, Czech.PolarityItems.nic, Czech.PolarityItems.nikdy, Czech.PolarityItems.nikam, Czech.PolarityItems.zadny]

The ně- series

def Czech.PolarityItems.nejaky : PolarityItem

nějaký 'some', the determiner positive polarity item, admitted by outer and medial negation in polar questions ([SS25], [Sta26]).

Equations

• Czech.PolarityItems.nejaky = { form := Czech.Determiners.QuantityWord.nejaky.form, antiLicensor := some PolarityItem.DEStrength.antiMorphic }

def Czech.PolarityItems.nekdo : PolarityItem

někdo 'someone', the human positive polarity item, which replaces nikdo under the non-propositional negation of a fear-predicate complement ([SS25]).

Equations

• Czech.PolarityItems.nekdo = { form := "někdo", antiLicensor := some PolarityItem.DEStrength.antiMorphic }

def Czech.PolarityItems.neSeries : List PolarityItem

The positive polarity items.

Equations

• Czech.PolarityItems.neSeries = [Czech.PolarityItems.nejaky, Czech.PolarityItems.nekdo]

Verification

theorem Czech.PolarityItems.niSeries_strict_concord (e : PolarityItem) : e ∈ niSeries → ∀ (c : PolarityItem.LicensingContext), c.licenser.Licenses e ↔ c.licenser.Carries PolarityItem.DEStrength.antiMorphic

A ni- item is licensed exactly by the contexts carrying anti-morphic strength, clausal negation alone among the named contexts: the strict concord of the series.

theorem Czech.PolarityItems.neSeries_antiLicensed (e : PolarityItem) : e ∈ neSeries → PolarityItem.LicensingContext.negation.licenser.AntiLicenses e

Clausemate negation blocks the ně- items.