Negación enfática y gramaticalización en asturiano: estructuras con "ná"

Abstract

The reduced form of the negative quantifier nada, na, generates in Asturian the pattern of emphatic negation nun_V_na, in which the particle loses its quantitative content and, as a consequence of a grammaticalization process, it behaves as an intensifier of the sentential negation. This phenomenon of syntactic microvariation has been recorded in South Central Asturias, where ambiguous structures in which na can express quantity or negation coexist with others in which this item can only be interpreted as a postverbal negative marker with emphatic value (interpolation in verbal periphrasis and compatibility with negative DOs).