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The caritive and abessive negation in the changing system of negation in Nganasan This presentation focuses on the Nganasan caritive and abessive. The hypothesis is that these suffixes are markers of a special type of negation. The goal of this contribution is to pin down the exact meanings on the basis of new data, comparing them to the data of the abessive (caritive) in Finnic. Uralic, Altaic and several other typologically divergent languages have a case that is referred to as the caritive or the abessive. The standard descriptions of Nganasan employ both labels; the two suffixes are morphologically and distributionally distinct. Abessive is a mood suffix and a suffix for forming participles, caritive is a case suffix. An example of the caritive (-kaľi, -gaľi, -kaj, -gaj) follows in (1), where the suffix is attached to the noun kümaa ’knife’. (1) Mənə ďesɨmə kümaa-gi͡aľi iču I father-1SG knife-CAR be.3SG ‘My father does not have a knife.’ An example of the abessive mood suffix in Nganasan is illustrated in (2), where the suffix is attached to the verb kona- ’go’. Subjective and objective conjugation suffixes are (S1)+-mətumaɁa, -məδumaɁa, -mətɨmɨɁa, -məδɨmɨɁa, the suffixes for the conjugation of reflexive and multiple objects are (S1)+ -mətumaɁi, -məδumaɁi, -mətɨmɨɁi, -məδɨmaɁi. (2) mənə ŋɨɨtənə kona-mətumɨɁə-m basu-ďa I yet.not-GEN.1SG go-ABES-1SG ‘I have not yet gone hunting.’ hunt-INF An example of the abessive participle suffix in Nganasan is illustrated in (3), where the suffix (-mətumaɁa, -mətɨmɨɁa, -məδumaɁa, -məδɨmɨɁa) is attached to the verb kona’leave, go’. (3) Taa-ču huδurtəkə-mətumaɁa kuəďümu ma-tə čii-Ɂə. reindeer-Pl3SG harness-Abess man tent-Lat enter-AOR.3SG ‘The man who did not harness the reindeers yet went into the tent.’ Estonian has one suffix referred to as abessive. In other Finnic languages, its correlates are also referred to as caritive. The suffix combines with nouns and, diachronically, non-finite verbs, expressing meanings that are comparable those the illustrated in the examples above. In Estonian, it is claimed that certain abessive constructions express presuppositional negation, and the abessive marked non-finite constructions are instances of not yet completely grammaticalized perfect negations (Tamm to appear). Similarly to Finnic, the caritive negation as in (1) is not the only type of negation in the grammatical system. In addition to the negation by means of the negation verb and caritive, the system of negation in Nganasan comprises is a standard negation auxiliary úisɨ 'not-be'. In (4) illustrates a negation in a possessive sentence. (4) Mənə ďesɨ-mə kümaa-δu ďaŋku. I father-1SG knife-3SG is-not ‘My father does not have a knife.’ Generally, in the examples the existence of the referent of the caritive marked NP is presupposed, as in (5), where the existence of a wife is presupposed. (5) Mənə natətə nɨ-gaj kona-Ɂa-ŋ. I from-me wife-CAR go-AOR-2SG ‘You went from me without your wife.’ (You have one.) We can assume that the caritive negation is an earlier development, the meaning of which is 1) either becoming non-transparent or 2) developing into a new meaning, since example (6) (recent data) shows that existential negation is expressed by a combination of the caritive construction and the negation verb. (6) Мənə ďesɨmə kümaa-gi͡aľi ďaŋku. I father-1SG knife-CAR is-not ‘My father does not have a knife.’ The abessive mood as in (2) is an exclusively negative mood. There are no examples of this mood combining with other expressions of negation. The presupposition in sentences that have verbs marked with the abessive is that a certain event will happen. The form expresses that this event has not yet happened. In the sentence ’I have not yet gone hunting’, the subject referent will go hunting once. The sentence with the abessive participle as in (3) denotes an event that has not taken place yet: the man who did not harness the reindeers is described in the sentence as somebody who will once harness the reindeers but has not yet done so. In case of telic events, the participle expresses that the event has either not started or not reached its endpoint, as in (7) or (8), or, in case of atelic events, that the event has not started yet, as in (9). (7) büü-mətumaɁa ‘(the one who has) not yet gone away’ (8) kəntɨ-mətɨmaɁa ‘(that which has) not frozen completely yet’ (9) hoδətə-məδumaɁa ‘(the one who has) not yet started to study’ We can conclude that the Nganasan caritive and abessive are parts of constructions of negation. The meaning of the Nganasan caritive is changing in the context of negation in this language, and we have some but not conclusive evidence for regarding it a presuppositional negation. The abessive mood corresponds to perfect negation, and the participles are negative perfect participles. One of the further questions is whether the relationship between caritives or abessives, on the one hand, and presuppositionality or perfect negations, on the other, 1) is a more general development in languages, 2) is due to the relatedness of languages (Uralic) or 3) is dependent on contact. At this point of research, the data suggest considerable similarity between the developments in the meaning of the Finnic and Nganasan caritive/abessive negation.