Abstract
There is considerable variation in use of the ne particle in oral French that may be attributable to the speaker’s geographic location or to the formality of the interaction. This study involves the investigation of native French speakers’ use of the ne particle to determine how that use varies among (a) the cities of Avignon, Grenoble, Montpellier, and Paris; and, (b) different speech event settings, such as personal conversations, retail transactions, municipal meetings, and academic lectures and discussions. This analysis was accomplished through the use of corpus linguistics and concordancing tools to discern frequency patterns in naturally occurring language, and through the determination of the statistical significance of those findings.
Negation in Oral French
Historically, negative sentences in French have been formed in different ways. Initially, negation was marked with the single, pre-verbal negator, non. By the twelfth century, use of the phonetically weaker variant, ne, by itself, had come to be the norm (Walter, 1988). This form can sometimes still be found in literary language, certain frozen forms, and highly formal oral exchanges (Laffay, 1981). In Modern French, four basic structures are used in the formation of negative statements. These structures involve the use of a verb and the two negators, ne and pas.
Since the beginning of the seventeenth century, variants of the pas particle, such as grain (grain), goutte (drop), point (dot), brin (a blade of grass), and pas (step), have been associated with the ne particle to reinforce its representation of not with an indicator of smallness or nothingness (Christensen, 2003; Walter, 1988). Take, for example, the phrase, “il ne marche pas” (Walter, 1988, p. 101). The literal translation of this statement is “he doesn’t even take a step.” As double negation evolved, the second negator or pas particle lost its literal definition of step, which had reinforced the smallness of his movement, in this example, and came to be nothing more than a standard marker of negation.
Ne and pas variants are generally combined with the sentence or utterance’s verb in one of the four ways shown in Table 1, thus creating double negation of the verb:
Table 1
Common French Negation Structures
subject + ne + inflected verb + pas
(simple structure)
Il ne pleut pas.
[It’s not raining.]
subject + ne + auxiliary + pas + past participle
(compound structure)
On n’a pas vu le chien.
[We didn’t see the dog.]
ne + verb + pas
(imperative)
Ne crève pas mon ballon !
[Don’t pop my ball!]
ne pas + infinitive verb
(imperative)
Ne pas crier !
[Don’t shout!]
(H. Pensec, personal conversation, October 30, 2004; adapted in part from Descotes-Genon, Morsel, & Richou, 1997, p. 112).
Background and Rationale for the Study
Accepted ne particle variants include: ne, n’, ni, and non; whereas, pas particle variants include: pas, point, plus, jamais, guère, nulle part, rien and aucun(e). In this paper, I have focused upon those instances of negation in oral French that involve the pas particle variants: aucun(e) (none), jamais (never), pas (not), and rien (nothing). Where a ne particle is used in a negation token, I have considered the ne particle variants: ne (no/not), ni (no/not), and n’ (no/not).
Even within the limitations imposed by strict adherence to these traditional forms of negation, the mere existence of different possibilities for the creation of negative utterances implies that language use may vary, if nothing else, in terms of the complexity or form of the statement, or the intentions of the speaker. For example, a person could say either “La vie ce n'est jamais tout bon, ni tout mauvais,” or “La vie c’est jamais tout bon ou tout mauvais,” (Life is never all good, nor all bad); either “Il faut vraiment pas s’attendre à ce qu’elle vienne,” or “Il faut vraiment pas s’attendre à ce qu’elle vienne,” (You really shouldn’t expect her to come); or even either Je ne veux pas manger, or je veux rien manger (I don’t want to eat, vs. I don’t want anything to eat). In each of these cases, the utterance carries essentially the same meaning. Variation in those utterances lies in the simple availability of different negation participle variants. The opportunity to vary one’s negation-forming approach is afforded to both native and non-native speakers of a given language who are not restricted to the rote memorization of a single form. Different options for creating a negative sentence or utterance allow people to adjust their negation-forming choices according to the circumstances in which they are producing the language, the message they intend to convey, or the tone of that message.
Besides variation possibilities engendered simply by the number of potential structural combinations, language use may vary according to the context or time of the speech event, as well as according to individual personality differences of the speakers (Mesthrie, Swann, Deumert & Leap, 2000). For example, a participant in a municipal conference may say “Ce n'est pas forcément aux travailleurs sociaux de faire toutes ces taches administratives,” whereas that same person may recount the discussion to his or her family by saying “C’est pas forcément aux travailleurs sociaux de faire toutes ces taches administratives,” (Social workers should not necessarily do all of the administrative tasks). I believe that, if French teaching is to meet the needs of its students in academic or professional, as well as personal and day-today interactions, then it is important to study variation and determine how the language is actually used by its native speakers.
Investigating linguistic variation and evaluating the reasons why language varies are interesting endeavors that can inform the language-teaching community by raising awareness of how the target language is really used by native speakers and what factors may be influential in predicting how speakers will vary their language. This kind of insight could be useful for both pedagogical and practical purposes. The information gleaned from such an investigation can inform language education professionals in materials development, needs assessment, and helping determine what is most salient in language use and what structures or forms to focus upon in the language classroom. In addition, this sort of information can be analyzed to determine methodological relevance and to gain a better understanding of “real life” language use in different situations and settings.
Variation in Ne Particle Use in Oral French
Research has shown that people tend to drop the prescriptive double negation in French in favor of single negation, by omitting the negative particle, ne, particularly in oral language (Ashby, 1976, 1981, 1982, 1991, 2001; Armstrong, 2001; Coveney, 2002; Martineau & Mougeon, 2003; Sankoff & Vincent, 1980; Walter, 1988). Such instances of non-use of the ne particle represent what is often referred to as ne particle deletion. I do not know that speakers “decide” to omit or include the ne particle. Further, I believe that consideration of both deletion and inclusion of the particle is interesting and relevant. So, I discuss use of the ne particle, that is, both ne particle deletion and ne particle inclusion, instead of only its omission.
There are many theories about the meaning and implications of use vs. non-use of the ne particle in speech. Pohl (1975) asserts that non-use of the ne particle is one of the key features that distinguish oral French of the twentieth century from that of the nineteenth century. Rehner and Mougeon (1999) found that learners tend to use the ne more frequently than not, but that even their usage varies. Ashby (2001) found evidence that ne deletion is more common than not in modern spoken French, and he contends that this phenomenon may be indicative of language change in progress (1981, 1982, 1991). This opinion is seconded by Walter (1988), who explains that, the pas particle carries the weight of negation, while the ne particle has come to play the role of occasional reinforcer.
However, variation in ne particle use, as evidenced by its deletion, has existed, to some extent, for centuries. For example, Ayres-Bennett (1994) pointed out that the pas particles, pas and point, have been used alone, that is, without an associated ne particle to indicate negation, since at least the 17th century. Walter (1988) observed that even the highly educated, social elite of the late nineteenth century frequently dropped the ne, despite that omission’s having been considered so informal as to be deemed relaxed conversation.
Speech Situation
The way that people use language varies in many ways. A woman may well speak to her child in one way, to her spouse in another, to her mother in another, and to her friends in yet another. Finegan (1999) explained that registers are the variations in language that depend upon the situations in which it is used. A speaker’s shift in register can be triggered by different features of these situations of use, “including the setting and purpose of the communication, the person being addressed, the social relations between the interlocutors, and the topic” (Finegan, 1999, p. 332). So, setting of a speech event could well have a significant influence on the ways in which language is used in that particular context. Register in spoken interaction can vary in different ways, such as, in the speaker’s choice of vocabulary, grammar, semantics, pragmatics, and formality. Mesthrie, Swann, Deumert, and Leap (2000), explain that, “different situations call for adjustments to the type of language used” (p. 72), which implies that people will adjust the register used, and, thereby, the level of formality, to fit the interaction.
Related to ne particle use, Sankoff and Vincent (1980) found that, the more formal the speech event, the more likely the interlocutors will include the ne particle in the conversations, whereas in less formal speech events they tend to omit the ne. Pohl (1975) determined that such characteristics as whether the speaker is from an urban or a rural area and his or her socio-economic background may influence that person’s use of the ne particle. He continued to explain that even factors such as the speaker’s profession might contribute to how the person uses the ne particle in his or her speech. But not necessarily in the ways we might expect. Interestingly enough, Pohl (1975) found that female farmers were more likely to use the ne in their everyday speech than their academic counterparts. Walter (1988), however, believes that today’s pas particle has almost deposed the ne particle from negation in oral discourse. I found all of these hypotheses intriguing and so I have tried to determine whether speech event typology seems to influence the interlocutors’ use of ne.
Geographic Location
At the time of the French Revolution in 1789, it was decided that a singular and indivisible republic could survive only if local languages were abolished. Since that time, grammarians, teachers, and l’Académie française have sought to establish a fixed and definitive national language (B. J. Kerr, personal communication, fall semester, 2001; Walter, 1988). This tendency has been especially de rigueur, since the early nineteenth century, when schools began teaching French. At that time, approximately 80% of people in France spoke a local language for most of their daily lives. In 1832, elementary education began, and, by 1886, free, mandatory, public schools were established throughout the country. The language of instruction in those schools was French, although students still spoke their regional languages outside of class (Walter, 1988).
At the beginning of World War I, soldiers were brought together from all over France to serve in the French Army. Soldiers from different regions of the country spoke regional languages or patois. This was not problematic as long as regiments remained in their local areas. But, as the war continued, soldiers were mobilized throughout France, and regiments from different areas were combined and required to work together. If they wanted to interact with soldiers from other regions, or even to understand orders, they were obligated to use French as the lingua franca (B. J. Kerr, personal communication, fall semester, 2001). The soldiers who were deployed away from their home regions became accustomed to using French in their day-to-day lives. Those who returned home after the war, continued using French. Despite legislation, the influence of war, and other trends toward intra- and international interaction, local and regional languages are still common in provincial France, and still influence how French language use varies from one region to another (B. J. Kerr, personal communication, fall semester, 2001; Walter, 1988; Leclerc, 2001, 2004).
As a language teaching professional, it is important to have an idea of how the language is used in real-world situations. Language textbooks do not necessarily represent actual language use. This can lead to language students making mistakes in how they use the language, thereby appearing awkward, old-fashioned, or even rude. I believe that it is important to teach both the traditional, proscriptive forms of language, and the way that it is actually used by native speakers. I think that we do our students a disservice if we ignore the way language is used in day to day life, preferring only to teach that which the textbooks require. Because of this position, I have chosen to evaluate variation in ne particle use so that I know how the French actually use negation in their speech patterns. If I then teach both the formal, or more literary forms, and everyday usage patterns, then I cannot help but better meet the needs of my students. Teaching both what students will encounter in literature and formal occasions and what they will hear in oral discourse, will help me shape a group of people who can understand and express themselves in professional and personal interactions, and who can understand what is said to them and what is taking place around them in the French-speaking world.
Research Questions
The following research questions guided my study:
1. What is the relative frequency of use/non-use of the ne particle in conversations in the cities of: (a) Avignon, (b) Grenoble, (c) Montpellier and (d) Paris? Is any apparent difference in frequency statistically significant?
2. What frequency patterns exist in ne particle use in different types of speech event, specifically (a) personal conversations,(b) retail transactions, (c) municipal meetings, and (d) academic lectures and discussions? Is there a statistically significant difference in the patterns of ne particle use in negations uttered in speech events of varying levels of formality?
Research Hypotheses
The corresponding research hypotheses are:
1. There is no statistically significant difference in ne particle use between the four cities mentioned in research question 1; and,
2. There is no statistically significant difference in ne particle use in the different levels of formality listed in research question 2.
Method
Corpus
A language corpus is “a large and principled collection of natural texts” (Biber, Conrad, & Reppen, 1998, p. 12), that is “maximally representative of the [language] variety under examination, that is, which provides us with as accurate a picture as possible of the tendencies of that variety, including their proportions” (McEnery & Wilson, 1996, p. 22). The data for this study consist of a corpus of 51 hours of oral French discourse recorded in the cities of Avignon, Grenoble, Montpellier and Paris, and published online from Cornell University as the Modern Languages French Corpus (MLF Corpus, or “the corpus”) (Lawson, 2003). The interactions involved in the MLF Corpus are represented in 659 pages of transcribed discourse, comprising 174,685 words. The MLFC involves speech recorded and transcribed from 27 different speech events that took place in the aforementioned cities, and that vary from interactions such as personal conversations, to municipal meetings and academic lectures and discussions.
In order to explore ne variation in both the social and geographic environments, I investigated a corpus of oral language in the cities of Avignon, Grenoble, Montpellier and Paris in an attempt at partially determining the extent to which use of the ne particle varies among those cities.
Avignon.
The city of Avignon is found in south central France, in the Provence region. This region has been vulnerable to invaders from the south throughout its history. The early Occitanian language, Langue d’oc, was spoken in this area after the fall of the Roman Empire. The linguistic influence of the Langue d’oc is still prevalent in language use in many parts of France (Walter, 1988), and may have some influence on how negation varies in that region of the country as opposed to others.
Grenoble.
The city of Grenoble, situated in middle of the Rhône-Alps region of southeastern France, is considered the heart of the French Alps. Grenoble is a large, important city, possessing French, German and Italian sociocultural and historical characteristics. Like Avignon, Grenoble has been vulnerable to the linguistic influences of the Langue d’oc, but was also vulnerable to both Latin and Germanic invaders who brought the influence of languages such as those of the Francs or the Visigoths (B. J. Kerr, personal communication, fall semester, 2001). This could present a partial explanation of variation in ne particle use in Grenoble that differs from that in the other cities represented in the study.
Montpellier.
Montpellier, a major Mediterranean port city, is the largest city in the Languedoc-Rousillon region of south central France. The language in southern France has been the most influenced throughout history by everyone from ancient Roman invaders to modern day sailors and tradesmen from other countries. Because of its situation as a major Mediterranean port and the close proximity of North African and Middle Eastern countries, as well as Italy and Spain, how people use language and the extent to which language use varies in Montpellier could be what I will call highly permeable; that is, it is plausible that the French spoken in Montpellier differs from that spoken in areas such as Avignon or Grenoble because it has more exposure to outside linguistic influences.
Paris.
Paris is the capital of France and is geographically situated in the middle of the country. Most of France’s important economic, political, and cultural activity takes place in Paris, as has been the case since Hughes Capet was elected king of France in 987 (Walter, 1988). Historically, primarily the Germanic Francs, and Langue d’oil influenced Parisian language. Paris is generally considered to be where the most normative, linguistically acceptable, and standard forms of the French language are used, and we could therefore expect to see the most use of the ne particle in Paris. However, Paris’ unique combination of geographic, political, and socioeconomic centeredness may also affect its citizens’ language use. For instance, Parisians may be so accustomed to hearing speakers of languages such as English or Spanish, which use only single negation, that they have incorporated similar patterns into their own speech.
The possible linguistic differences among these four cities led to the first main research question in my study: Does use of the ne particle vary among the cities of Avignon, Grenoble, Montpellier and Paris? Is any observed difference in usage frequency statistically significant?
Figure 1. Map of France showing regional language areas (adapted from Lexilogos, 2004).
Procedures
A concordancing program allows researchers to search for, count, and evaluate specific words and word sequences in a body of text, or corpus. This makes large bodies of text much more susceptible to detailed analysis, as size of the corpora no longer inhibits such investigation. The number of instances a word or phrase appears in a text, and the contexts in which the word or words of interest are presented in the form of a concordance. A concordance is “a list of the words in the text with a short section of the context that precedes and follows each word” (Summer Institute of Linguistics, 2003). MonoConc Pro generates an index, listing the number of occurrences of the target word or phrase in the text, and lists the contexts in which it occurred, this indexed list is known as KWIK, or key word in context.
Figure 2. KWIC concordance of pas showing search results in the bottom window and context with highlighted key word in the top window.
With respect to my investigation, I first searched the corpus for all occurrences of the pas variants, aucun(e) (none), jamais (never), pas (not), and rien (nothing), using the commercially available concordancing software program, MonoConc Pro. Then, I counted the number of times a ne particle appeared in negation in the concordance and the number of times it did not so as to get an impression of variation in ne particle use throughout the corpus.
The next step of my investigatory process involved my dividing the whole corpus into four separate corpora representing the four cities of Avignon, Grenoble, Montpellier, and Paris. I loaded each of these corpora into the concordancing program, and searched for the same ne particles as in my investigation of the MLF Corpus as a whole. For each of the resultant concordances, I counted the instances of ne particle inclusion and ne particle omission to measure the extent of variation from one city to the next.
After reading the corpus and reflecting upon the nature of the conversation involved in each speech event in terms of the apparent purpose for the interaction, the relationships of the speakers, and the context of the exchange, I sorted the 27 speech events into four categories: personal conversations (P), retail transactions (R), municipal meetings (M), and academic discussions and lectures (A).
Personal conversations.
The personal conversations included such events as a family breakfast, friends chatting, and teen conversations.
Retail transactions.
The retail transactions involved the interaction between people shopping in cheese stores and pharmacies and the employees in those establishments.
Municipal meetings.
The municipal meetings consisted of a housing planning meeting and a social welfare conference.
Academic discussions and lectures.
The academic discussions and lectures category contained general literature classes, Francophone literature lecture and discussion sections, and art history classes. All of the academic interactions were relatively formal (in comparison to those in US colleges and universities), highly structured, teacher-fronted events.
I saved the data from these categorizations as four different corpora, and searched them for the pas variants included in my analysis. As in the previous steps in this process, I counted all of the times the ne particle appeared in a negation in the resultant concordances, and all of the times it didn’t.
Chi-square and discourse data.
After generating the concordances and counting the occurrences of the ne particle, I evaluated the differences in frequency patterns among the concordances via chi-square analyses to determine whether those differences were statistically significant.
Chi-square is usually used in instances involving independent samples of frequency data where each observation falls into “one and only one category” (Shavelson, 1996, p. 558). Using chi-square analysis with discourse data is tricky because the samples do not necessarily meet the assumption that the tokens are independent of each other. Independence of the observations cannot really be assumed when you are dealing with conversational data. Conversations are co-created by the participants. Conversations also build upon themselves, which makes the data samples dependent upon each other. However, the large sample size of the MLF Corpus, where each speech event is created by different speakers, in different cities helps assure some level of independence in the data, as the “comparisons here are between cells” (Hatch & Lazaraton, 1991, p. 394). Further, chi-square is the standard statistic used in research on discourse usage frequencies (L. Goldstein, personal conversation, May, 2004; J. Turner, personal conversation, December, 2004), and so I felt comfortable and justified in my use of chi-square to try and discern whether or not the observed variation in ne particle use is significantly different from what would happen were the variation due to chance.
Results and Discussion
Pilot Studies
I conducted two preliminary investigations of ne particle use in the MLF Corpus (Pensec, 2003; Pensec, 2004). In the first, I considered 40 instances of negation in oral conversation. Of those 40 tokens, the negative particle, ne, was used in 24 (60%) of those cases, and was not used the other 16 times (40%) (Pensec, 2003). In the second study, I considered 1,824 occurrences of negation and found that the ne particle was used 720 times (39.47%), and was not used in 1,104 of the instances (60.53%) (Pensec, 2004). The latter results appeared to uphold Ashby’s (2001) hypothesis that ne particle deletion is more prominent than its inclusion in negative utterances. The contradictory findings between my two preliminary studies illustrate the importance of both sample size and representativeness of the body of the corpus being studied in discourse analysis, and had considerable influence in my choosing to investigate this phenomenon further in the present study.
Phonological Ambiguity
In my investigation of ne particle use in this corpus, I have found approximately 23 occurrences of what Sankoff and Vincent (1980) described as “a phonologically ambiguous environment: occurrences of [n] preceded by the subject on (. . .) and followed by a vowel” (p. 297). For example, On n’en a jamais mangé (We have never eaten any) would be pronounced the same as On en a jamais mangé (We have never eaten any). Although both of these utterances carry the same meaning, in the former, the ne particle is used, while in the latter, it is not. In these instances, especially given that the transcriptions are of oral language, it is impossible to determine whether or not the [n] sound represented consists of a liaison of the final [n] in on with the vowel that follows it, or if that sound indicates the inclusion of the ne particle. For these reasons, I have excluded these occurrences of negation from my analysis.
Frozen Forms
I omitted all instances (17 in all) of frozen forms such as n’importe quoi (whatever) and n’est-ce pas (isn’t it), since the ne particle will always be used with such forms. Similarly, I did not count any instance of frozen forms such as pas evident (literally translated as “not evident”) and pas triste (literally, not sad). These forms have come to mean something entirely different than the literal definition of the words, particularly in the case of oral discourse. Pas evident means difficult, and pas triste is a criticism of chaos or disorganization. Fixed forms of this type will never involve the ne particle; as such, they were not counted in my analysis.
Ne Particle Use Frequencies
My investigation of the MLF Corpus yielded the following frequencies of use of the ne particle in oral French:
Table 3
Overall Variant Frequencies in the MLF Corpus
+ ne: 720 (39.47%)
- ne: 1,104 (60.53%)
N=1,824 instances of negation in the corpus
This frequency chart seems to indicate that the ne particle is far more likely to be omitted than to be used in oral discourse. Overall, use of the ne particle throughout the corpus seems to fit the hypotheses put forth by prior research, that people tend to favor single negation in their speech (Ashby, 1976, 1981, 1982, 1991, 2001; Armstrong, 2001; Coveney, 2002; Martineau & Mougeon, 2003; Sankoff & Vincent, 1980; Walter, 1988).
Variation by Location
With respect to variation in ne particle use in the cities of Avignon, Grenoble, Montpellier, and Paris, I found the following usage patterns:
Table 4
Variation in ne Particle Use by Location
Used ne:
Avignon: 10 (71.43%)
Grenoble: 86 (56.57%)
Montpellier: 360 (39.60%)
Paris: 264 (35.25%)
Did not use ne:
Avignon: 4 (28.57%)
Grenoble: 66 (43.43%)
Montpellier: 549 (60.40%)
Paris: 485 (64.75%)
Since such a minimal number of instances of negation took place in Avignon (14/1824, or only 0.77% of the total instances of negation), I did not include that data in my analysis. Instead, I focused upon the instances from Grenoble, Montpellier and Paris.
Considering these simple frequency counts and percentages, it appears that only the speakers in Montpellier and Paris are more likely to omit the ne particle than they are to use it. Contrary to the trend seen in the corpus as a whole, where the ne particle was only used 39.47% of the time (Pensec, 2003), the data from speakers in Grenoble indicate that those interlocutors are more likely to use the ne particle than they are to drop it.
I calculated the chi-square for the results from Grenoble, Montpellier and Paris to determine whether the observed variation among those cities represents a statistically significant deviation from what would be expected were that observed variation due to chance. Because this research is exploratory, and I sought only to describe frequency patterns, I set alpha equal to 0.05. Degrees of freedom equals 2. The chi-square observed value is 53.57. This amount is greater than the critical value of 9.210, so I am able to reject my null hypothesis and state that there does appear to be a relationship between a speaker’s geographic location and his or her use of the ne particle for the cities of Grenoble, Montpellier and Paris.
It seems that how people use the ne particle in negations in oral discourse is related to which of these three cities they are in, although I cannot say for certain that geographic location is the cause of those patterns.
Variation by Type of Speech Event
With respect to the observed variation in ne particle use between different kinds of speech event, I found the following usage frequencies in personal conversations (P), retail transactions (R), municipal meetings (M), and academic lectures or discussions (A):
Table 5
Variant Frequency Patterns by Speech Event
Used ne:
P: 486 (38.91%)
R: 63 (31.98%)
M: 45 (83.33%)
A: 126 (38.89%)
Did not use ne:
P: 763 (61.08%)
R: 134 (68.02%)
M: 9 (16.67%)
A: 198 (61.11%)
In order to determine whether or not this observed variation may be due to the type of speech event that establishes the context for the interaction, I calculated the chi-square statistic for the findings detailed in Table 5. The degrees of freedom in this case = 3. Because this research is exploratory, and since I am seeking only to describe frequency patterns, I have set alpha equal to 0.05. The chi-square value in this case is 63.51. This amount is greater than the critical value of 11.345, so I am able to reject my null hypothesis of no relationship and state that the observed variation in use in speech events of different levels of formality does appear to be due to more than chance.
Of the four possible speech event settings, people seemed most likely to omit the ne in the case of the retail conversations. The ne particle use frequencies were similar in the case of personal conversations and academic lectures and discussions. It is only in the case of municipal meetings that the speakers were more likely to use the ne than to omit it. This could be due to the apparently more formal nature of that kind of interaction, as compared to that of the retail, personal, and academic settings.
Conclusion
Prior research on the topic of ne particle use in oral French has shown that speakers tend to drop variants of the negative particle, ne, and rely solely upon the single negating particle, pas, or its variants (Ashby, 1976, 1981, 1982, 1991, 2001; Armstrong, 2001; Coveney, 2002; Martineau & Mougeon, 2003; Sankoff & Vincent, 1980; Walter, 1988). My findings support this hypothesis in as much as overall usage frequency patterns are concerned. However, based upon my divergent results with respect to the city of Grenoble and the case of municipal meetings, in particular, I feel that further investigation into the particularities of variation in negation in oral French in different locations, and in terms of the typology and setting of speech event is necessary to discern what specific usage patterns exist.
In the case of variation by geographical location, I believe that it will be important to consider potentially influencing factors such as whether the location is urban or rural in nature, its linguistic history, and the type of socio-political and economic activities are common in that area. Including variables like these may help pinpoint the nature of variation in negation patterns in different geographic locations.
Further investigation of this variation is also necessary to better determine what sorts of factors may be influencing this divergence from the overall trend observed throughout the corpus. For instance, the significant discrepancy in use of the ne particle in the city of Grenoble, in contrast to that of speakers in Montpellier and Paris might indicate a need for further investigation of the relationship between geographic location and ne particle use. I would like to elucidate what negation usage patterns exist with respect to the regions’ proximity to international borders and/or their status as major cultural, social, or industrial centers. It would also be important to assess variation in ne particle use in urban vs. rural areas. In the present study, only large cities were taken into consideration, and it is conceivable that more variation may be observed outside of the country’s metropolitan centers.
In the particular case of speech events, variation in language use is often at least partially dependent upon matters such as the interlocutors and the relationship between them, the subject of discussion, and the setting in which the interaction is taking place (Fishman, 1972). Halliday (1978) held that there are three primary constituents of speech events, the type of interaction (the field), the relationships between speakers (the tenor) and the inherent organization of the exchange (its mode). Biber (1991) takes these categorizations a step further and explains that there are “eight components of the speech situation, several of them having sub-components: (1) participant roles and characteristics, (2) relations among the participants, (3) setting, (4) topic, (5) purpose, (6) social evaluation, (7) relations of participants to the text, and (8) channel” (p. 29). In the case of the present study, I have only described variation in ne particle use in terms of the setting of the speech event. In future research into patterns in ne particle use, it will be important to consider these other possible influences on language use in context.
With respect to variation of ne particle use among speech events, I think it is important to go beyond a superficial description of the setting of the speech event in order to consider the possible influence and co-influence of factors such as the interlocutors’ roles, their relationship, the setting of the interaction, the topic of the matter being discussed, and the purpose for the discussion (Biber, 1991). It is also possible that, in the case of the municipal meetings, in particular, since more of them took place in Grenoble than in the other cities, the observed variation is due to more than the type of speech event. It could also be a factor of the city in which the speech events took place, an interaction between the city and speech event variables, or other possible influences.
In addition, I believe it would be very important to consider matters such as age and gender when describing variation in the use of negation in oral language. In the case of my study, that information was not available. I am interested in developing a new corpus of oral French, and would make note of the speakers’ demographic information so that it could be used in future studies.
I am now even more curious to investigate ne particle use in oral French further. It could very well be that, when considering stylistic context, more personal factors such as the individual’s need to feel that he or she belongs to the discourse community in question, may come into play. I would like to investigate ne particle use in other contexts, in different parts of the country, different francophone countries, and across time. I think that is the only way to determine the extent to which ne particle deletion is truly prevalent, and the direction in which ne particle use in negation is evolving.
Developing an awareness of how negation varies, and, more importantly, of how language varies in general, is very important to me. I believe that the best way to serve my students is to teach them both what is expected of them academically speaking and how the French language is actually used in the real world, so that they can understand different varieties and produce context-appropriate language in their interactions.
References
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