ABSTRACT
As discussed in the past two chapters, explanations for polarity have been dominated by the idea of complementarity. Items are either sensitive or non-sensitive; if sensitive, they are either positive or negative; if negative, they are either licensed or non-licensed. Two features are particularly relevant for the discussion which follows. The first one is that the literature offers no direct definition of NPI. As we have seen, the standard procedure is to give a provisional list of items and to characterise them by means of their behaviour. The second one is that it is usually taken for granted that the vast majority of NPIs are lexically ambiguous. To the best of my knowledge, the reasons for such ‘schizophrenic’ behaviour are not explained. The claim for such a split fits the standard approach to negative polarity, which accounts for the variation in meaning of the items in terms of satisfaction or non-satisfaction of licensing conditions, whereas the reverse is not so certain.
