Bad Negation (Word Usage)

Bad Negation

Making a statement negative in English is a relatively straightforward affair, especially compared to other languages, like German, which have more than a dozen different ways to make a statement negative. Native English speakers have no problem placing "not" or "no" in the right place to make a sentence say the opposite of what it would without these little words, but there are some more complex cases that are the cause of some very common errors.

The first and most obvious misuse of the negative is a favorite of many teachers and professors alike, and it is known as the double negative. An example which will make your instructor jump onto your desk and strike you in a blind fury reads as follows: "I ain't got no money." First, the term "ain't" meaning "is not" or in this case, "haven't," is universally recognized as poor English. Next, since this term already expresses the negative, no further negations are needed and so "no" is unnecessary. In fact, some scholars argue, when you have two negatives in a single clause, they cancel each other out, resulting in your actually saying the opposite of what you mean. In the above example, you are saying that you do not have no money, which means that you actually do have some money.

Taking a quick historical digression, we can see that the above rules were not always standard English. "Ain't" is a form of "isn't" which dates back hundreds of years, and is still predominant in certain dialects, even though it is officially considered improper. The idea of the double negative, as well, is certainly not a natural native English idea, because Old English (or Anglo-Saxon), the parent language of Modern English, allowed a speaker to pile up negatives, and each one only served to stress how strongly negative the statement was! 17th century scholars undertook a concerted effort to standardize the English language, and so many of the rules we have today which seem somehow unnatural are attributable to this movement, which often attempted to apply Latin forms to English grammar. However, knowing the history of these developments will not get you good grades on your next paper, and although it might make for an interesting class discussion, protesting that your double-negatives have a proud history in English will not save you from the dreaded red pen.

Another very common error in negation comes from the misuse of limiting terms such as "but," which we can see in the following example: "I couldn't help but notice her earrings were made of chocolate." In this use, "but" is a near synonym of "only," and it should always be interchangeable with it as it is in this sentence: "I had but (only) three dollars to my name." As you can see, "but" cannot truly negate a statement; its power is in limiting a number or amount. So, in the sentence ""I couldn't help but notice her earrings were made of chocolate," the "but" makes no sense, and the sentence should be written ""I couldn't help noticing her earrings were made of chocolate." The negation is completed by the "not" found contracted in the word "couldn't," and nothing more is needed.

Another popularly misused limiting term is "hardly," as in the title of the movie Can't Hardly Wait. Although the writers and producers of this film knew quite well that they were making a mistake when they wrote this, it is such a typical teenage misuse that we can see why they used it as the title of a teen movie. In this case, "Can't Wait" or "Can Hardly Wait" is what is intended, the difference being that the first suggests that any waiting is impossible, while the second suggests that waiting will be difficult, but that some small amount of waiting will be possible.