It seems a bit strange that you have no reactions from your South African members, since in Afrikaans the double negative is absolutely standard. (This first sentence in Afrikaans would become something like "... no reactions from none of your South African members")
In French, there is a problem : "jamais" as an exclamation means "never", but if used in a sentence, it has to be matched by "ne"
But double negative iare colloquially used in many local variants of Dutch as well, and I think in many other languages, too. I do remember hearing things like "nobody told me nothing..."
And listen (and look) to this : YouTube - THE DUBLINERS
(not all YouTube clips have to be about "serious" science)
__________________ "Wonder is no wonder" (Simon Stevin 1549-1620)
It seems a bit strange that you have no reactions from your South African members, since in Afrikaans the double negative is absolutely standard. (This first sentence in Afrikaans would become something like "... no reactions from none of your South African members")
In French, there is a problem : "jamais" as an exclamation means "never", but if used in a sentence, it has to be matched by "ne"
But double negative iare colloquially used in many local variants of Dutch as well, and I think in many other languages, too. I do remember hearing things like "nobody told me nothing..."
And listen (and look) to this : YouTube - THE DUBLINERS
(not all YouTube clips have to be about "serious" science)
Hi Eric,
Some good examples 'never no more', but the 'nobody told me nothing' is another one where 'anything' should probably be substituted for 'nothing'.
Isn't he never on time?
mmm-humph, I've never not seen him walk in late.
__________________ Hypography Science Forums Moderator
--- "There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth. We are all crew." - Marshall McLuhan
"We must not forget that when radium was discovered no one knew that it would prove useful in hospitals. The work was one of pure science. And this is a proof that scientific work must not be considered from the point of view of the direct usefulness of it." - Marie Curie
It is certainly important to distinguish bad grammar from other cases. Now the case of:
"you can NOT expect me NOT to do"
isn't a case of bad grammer, it makes sense and is clearly not equivalent to:
"you can (NOT NOT) expect me to do"
because the first implies "I might" but, unlike the second, doesn't imply "I will". Cases such as "not unremarkable" are called understatements, a form of subtle humour by which the double negation is meant as being enhancive. It is likewise a form of humour when a double positive such as "yeah, sure" is meant as an enhanced negation.
__________________ The velocity of light in vacuo is c, but c isn't just the velocity of light.
Inutil insegnŕ al mus, si piart timp, in plui si infastiděs la bestie.
Everything that ever was is a song that is sung into existence.
orbsycli.
Cases such as "not unremarkable" are called understatements, a form of subtle humour by which the double negation is meant as being enhancive. It is likewise a form of humour when a double positive such as "yeah, sure" is meant as an enhanced negation.
Hi Q, good point,
It seems that a society develops linguistic sophistication as it develops a sense of humour.
But these types of structures can originate within a distinct group in society (like an inside joke) before becoming more widespread. I once wrote a Communications studies paper called 'When does a message become noise? when does noise become a message?', and, to me anyway, these types of things all depend on the context.
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