Negation marking in French text messages

Abstract

This study investigates the drop of the first clitic element, ne, of French sentential negation. It is based on 4,628 French text messages taken from the newly established corpus sms4science.ch. It shows that regional or stylistic factors do not play a major role in triggering ne deletion or ne retention, and that the only relevant language-internal factor is subject type, more precisely clitic subjects (also in subject doubling structures) and subject drop, which seem to favour or even trigger categorically ne deletion. Our findings are in keeping with those by R. van Compernolle (2008) on European French in online chats, and thereby indicate partially specific regularities in French computer-mediated communication (CMC). The findings question traditional assumptions on ne drop as a variety marker in French, irrespective of the phonic or graphic nature of the data (cf. P. Koch and W. Oesterreicher 2011). In fact, even in graphically deviant data, ne drop seems to follow the observed robust language-internal regularities. Some data seem to indicate that the graphic nature of SMSes plays a role also in ne-drop (cf. similar conclusions by R. van Compernolle 2008 for chats); this has to be checked by examining a larger number of French text messages.

Negation in Near‐Native French: Variation and Sociolinguistic Competence

“…The results of the logistic regression confirmed that both linguistic and sociostylistic factors continue to influence ne retention in contemporary French. These results differ from Stark (2012), who suggested that ne was no longer influenced by sociolinguistic factors and was conditioned only by linguistic factors. That the present NSs vary their use of ne to mark emphasis, to quote speech from a more formal register, and to signal serious topics suggests that ne still carries sociostylistic value.…”

“…Similar patterns emerge in studies of internet chat and text-messages (Stark, 2012;van Compernolle, 2008, whose sociolinguistic norms closely resemble those of casual speech despite the written medium (van Compernolle, 2008). The type of postverbal negator has also been reported to influence ne retention.…”

“…The clearest finding is that pas triggers the least ne retention (Armstrong & Smith, 2002;Ashby, 1981;Coveney, 2002). Conversely, data from internet chat and text-messages are less clear-cut (Stark, 2012;van Compernolle, 2008), leading van Compernolle (2008 to suggest that the loss of ne has generalized to the point where the choice of postverbal negator no longer influences ne retention.…”

“…Etienne and Sax (2009) detail the conservatism of L2 French textbooks, and R. Mougeon et al (2010) report (spoken) ne-retention rates of 71% among Canadian French immersion teachers, echoing Coveney's (1998) observation that teachers strongly condemn ne deletion. 2 Stark (2012) dissented, arguing that ne no longer possesses sociostylistic value. 3 Regan's study did not include NSs.…”

What’s up, Switzerland? A corpus-based research project in a multilingual country

“…(2013), Thurlow/Poff (2013), Herring/Androutsopoulos 2015, and most recently, Dürscheid/Frick (2016) have analyzed multiple aspects of CMC, with a clear focus on graphematical, interactional and pragmatic aspects. 3 Swiss text messages, the very first popular form of mobile graphic communication, have been intensely investigated, as can be seen in the aforementioned books and also from the articles and monographs written in the context of the Swiss SNSF research project "SMS communication in Switzerland" (project number: CRSII1_136230): see, e. g., Bucher (2016), Cathomas (2015), Cathomas et al (2015), Jucker/Dürscheid (2012), Grünert (2011), Morel et al (2012), Morel (2016), Frick (in print), Stark (2012), Robert-Tissot (2015), Ueberwasser (2013). 4 In contrast to this, and quite surprisingly given the omnipresence of mobile messengers in our daily lives, systematic research on WhatsApp messages is, at the time of writing, quite lacking.…”