I was intrigued to read people's posts about French negation historically being more oriented towards the "ne" than the "pas", and even quite surprised to see how many people still lean towards the "ne" as being the important part. In most colloquial French usage, I tend to see the exact opposite: people saying "Je sais pas" (or even "J'ai pas") and the like. I don't think I have ever heard a native French speaker say "Je ne sais" without a "pas" (except in constructions such as "ne...rien", "ne...que", "ne...jamais" etc., obviously) – although expressions such as "Je ne sais ce que je veux" do somehow sound like "elegant French" to me, if somewhat less common. (My opinion is to be taken with a grain of salt, because my level of French is not very advanced.)
Here are a few excerpts from the thread, for those who don't wish to read the whole thing:
newg wrote:Peut-être me trompe-je mais le "pas" n'est pas spécialement obligatoire bien qu'il soit rarement voire (jamais) dans un français oral, mais à l'écrit, personnellement, ça ne me choque pas.
"Je ne peux vous en parler pour le moment, veuillez m'en excuser..." < Ne me choque pas.
"Je ne sais quel tailleur choisir" < Ne me choque pas
itka wrote:Loomis, you don't know this way of speaking, but as the others said, it's perfectly correct.
"Je ne sais" is much more high-level than "je ne sais pas" and if you read some literature in french, you'll find it very often as well on this part of the pound as on the other part. It's simply french, you know (sorry for your friend if he doesn't know it. Maybe, he just has to learn a bit more french ?)
I'd be interested to hear people's thoughts on this. What linguistic register, in your opinion, is the best fit for the usage of "ne" without a corresponding "pas"? Should it appear in literature only? Or perhaps in academic speech, e.g. a talk given at a conference? In a casual conversation between two highly educated people? In a more average daily conversation?
And more specifically: what about using "Je ne sais" as a complete sentence?