Negation in Dagaare is marked mainly by pre-verb particles

Abstract

Of the almost two dozen pre-verb particles in Dagaare, only four – ba, kùŋ, ta and tɔ́ɔ́ – are negation markers. The negation particles combine with different aspects of the verb to signal not only negation but also various other semantic relations. By some kind of negative focus however, the subject or any phrasal constituent of the predicate may be “negated” by naanɪ or its clitic variant naa.