Negation in languages of the Lotuxo sub-group of Eastern Nilotic

Lokoya, Lopit and Otuho (Lotuxo) are Eastern Nilotic languages spoken in the area around Torit in Eastern Equatoria province, South Sudan. The three languages are verb initial (VSO) and have a marked-nominative case system.\par Negation in these languages is normally expressed through a verbal or verb-like construction. The negative morpheme can be regarded as a verb corresponding to 'not be'. Sometimes the negative verb is marked for person, aspect and modality and sometimes it has the same form for first, second and third person. In all three languages, the standard negative construction shows the same constituent order. \par Standard negation involves a negative verb and the lexical verb. The negative verb is clause initial. The lexical verb is marked with the subordinating prefix (except in Otuho) and maintains its person marking. The lexical verb is placed after the subject to give an NEG SVO word order. The subject retains its nominative marking when it is placed before the lexical verb and after the negative verb. It is likely that the negative construction originated as a bi-clausal construction.