Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
A double negative is a construction occurring when two forms of grammatical negation are used in the same sentence. This is typically used to convey a different shade of meaning from a strictly positive sentence ("You're not unattractive" vs "You're attractive").
Negative concord, also called "double negation", as in I didn't go nowhere; if the sentence is negative, all negatable forms are negated. This contrasts with standard written English convention, which interprets a double negative to mean a positive (although this was not always so; see double negative). [89]
Some style guides use the term double negative to refer exclusively to the nonstandard use of reinforcing negations (negative concord), e.g., using "I don't know nothing" to mean "I know nothing". But the term "double negative" can sometimes refer to the standard English constructions called litotes or nested negatives, e.g., using "He is not ...
In Appalachian English, the form 'liketa' functions as an adverb and occurs before the past form of a verb. 'Liketa' carries a meaning similar to "on the verge of" or "came so close that I really thought x would", where x is the subject of the verb. It comes from a compression of the phrase "likely to". [47]
Cicero uses the word to mean simplicity (or frugality) of life. The meaning and the function of the word changed from 'simple' to the idea of understatement that involves double negatives, a way to state things simply. Old Norse had several types of litotes. These points are denied negatives ("She's not a terrible wife" meaning "she's a good ...
Tina Knowles is getting a hilarious wake-up call after learning the NSFW meaning behind daughter Beyoncé’s hit “Ego,” 16 years after the song was released.
Even so, contemporary speakers of both continue to share these unique grammatical features: "existential it", the word y'all, double negatives, was to mean were, deletion of had and have, them to mean those, the term fixin' to, stressing the first syllable of words like hotel or guitar, and many others. [98]
Thirty years after its short but memorable run on ABC, it is widely regarded as a miraculous one-season wonder that captures the era's competing strains of irony and earnestness.