[2] The NEG-element was first introduced by Edward Klima, but the term neg raising has been accredited to the early transformational analysis as an instance of movement.
[3] Charles J. Fillmore was the first to propose a syntactic approach called neg transportation but is now known solely as negative raising.
This syntactic approach was supported in the early beginnings by evidence provided by Robin Lakoff, who used, in part, strong/strict polarity items as proof.
Chris Collins and Paul Postal have also written in more recent times in defense of the classical argumentation to negative raising.
[6][1] These early accounts attributed negative raising to be derived syntactically, as they thought that the NEG element was c-commanding onto two verbs.
[2] However, it is suggested by Chris Collins, Paul Postal, and Laurence R. Horn that the divide between these approaches is not necessary.
[7][8] An approach combining the two is argued for by Chris Collins and Paul Postal, who claim that using an exclusionist method is not viable.
It is important to note that some CNRPs such as reckon and guess, exhibit more dialectal variation in their acceptability to speakers.
[8][13] Take, for example, the following clause where the NPI is highlighted: I don't think that ever before have the media played such a major role in a kidnapping.
While the standard view of fronted NPIs is that they are indefinites or existentials, this raises an issue for the existence of Horn clauses, as negative Inversion is prevented.
Because the resulting negatives would not give a meaning similar to that of the above sentence, an additional covert NEG is added to the complement clause.
[14] Strict NPIs, like breathe a word, require a clause internal licenser as they are subject to syntactic locality constraints.
However, negative raising is known to license strict NPIs, as seen in the following example, where the negation is in the main clause rather than the embedded clause:[13] Stanley doesn't believe that Carolyn will breathe a word about it[13] Phrase structure showing NEG- raising licensing a strict NPI
Once this happens, negation can no longer participate in cyclic movement by stopping in spec CP before moving to the host NM in the main clause.
Thus, despite the movement of the negative "ne...pas" to the matrix clause, the meaning of ii) is seen as a paraphrase of iii).
It is suggested that one of the main differences between Japanese and English is that the extent of negative scope is based on whether there is or is not any neg-head raising to a higher position.
[18][19] This is different from English in that the negative scope in Japanese extends over the tense phrase (TP) because of neg-head raising.
Only the upper copy of the word is pronounced, so there is no possibility of an incorrect double negation analysis of the meaning.