Negation in South Mande

Southern Mande languages, spoken in Côte-d’Ivoire, Liberia and Guinea, display different strategies in the expression of negation. The most frequent one consists in the use of special “negative” series of personal subject pronouns (all Dan languages, Mano, Tura, Guro, Yaure, Mwan, Beng). In some languages the negative pronouns are completed by auxiliaries, most often following the subject pronouns. Two languages (Guro and Yaure) have developed a frame negative marking: the first element of the negation follows the subject group (and optionally fuses with the subject pronoun), the second follows the verbal group.