La négation en berbère tasahlit : à propos des éléments de négation verbale d’étymons arabes

Tasahlit is a Northern Berber language spoken in the Babor Mountains, off the northeast coast of Algeria. It is spoken close to the linguistic area of Jijel Arabic: a Maghrebi Arabic variety considered to be “pre-Hilalian”, that is to say originated from the first wave of Arabization of North Africa (7th-9th century). Both of these languages belong to the Afro-Asian phylum (formerly Hamito-Semitic).This Berber-Arabic contact situation at the heart of Eastern Kabylia is the source of deep convergence in the two systems, at different linguistic levels. The morphosyntax of negation is one of the areas that are most affected by this contact in Tasahlit. The developments that we noted, more or less appropriable to convergence, by no means simplified the whole but rather caused a multiplication of forms and rules. Negation is one of the most studied morphosyntactic areas in both Berber languages and Maghrebi Arabic (Galand, 1994; Chaker & Caubet, 1996; Mettouchi, 1996, 2009; Lucas, 2007, 2013; Lafkioui & Brugnatelli, 2017, 2020), and it has often been discussed in relation to Berber-Arabic convergence (Brugnatelli, 2014; Lafkioui & Brugnatelli, 2020; Kahlouche, 2000; Mettouchi, 2012; Kossmann, 2013; Lucas, 2007, 2009, 2013, 2017; Souag, 2018). In this article, convergence is understood as a trans-linguistic change characterized by approximation between structures of different linguistic systems. This convergence is mainly observable in extensive contact situations (Thomason & Kaufman, 1988). The old and intense contact between Maghrebi Arabic and Berber is sometimes part of convergence dynamics, which vary in intensity from one contact area to another (Kossmann, 2013). Observable differences between Arabic-Berber contact situations provide us with valuable data about the diversity of their sociohistorical conditions (Souag, 2009).Negation presents a certain number of characteristics in Tasahlit: this language has the highest diversity of negation markers in Berber. Each of these varieties certifies the use of a series of preverbal and postverbal negators that are sometimes specific to a certain language. Among the latter, multiple borrowings from Arabic continue to be grammaticalized as markers which were added to the plurality of preexisting negation markers of Berber origin. Moreover, the syntax of negation in Berber presents variability in particular developments depending on the Berber language it concerns. Again, the different Tasahlit varieties show origin