Grammar Crammer: Double Negatives
It ain’t no good to confuse someone!
Wondering what I want to convey here? Well your confusion is as valid as my sentence construction is incorrect.
If you haven’t picked out the mistake just yet, I will help you with it.
In the above sentence, I have used a double negative. “Ain’t and no” are both negative words and cannot be used together in a single sentence.
It is commonly known that in mathematics two negatives make a positive. This holds true in English grammar as well. But English grammar is not as accepting as mathematics. Though some experts say that, we can use two negative words in a single sentence, as long as the message is clearly conveyed. It is a largely accepted fact that this practice majorly creates confusion. And so it is advisable that we do not use more than one negative word in a single sentence.
Some commonly made mistakes are:
Incorrect: I don’t want nothing.
Correct: I don’t want anything.
Incorrect: She does not have no money.
Correct: She does not have any money.
Note: Stay tuned on every Wednesday for upcoming posts.
