by Sentenceworks
Negatives
Negatives are words which make a sentence negative; not, no, never,etc.Double Negatives
Two negative words in one clause (i.e. a negative verb followed by another negative word) are called “double negatives”. Two negatives make a positive, and will change the intended meaning of your sentence. Having more than two negatives in the same clause is also considered incorrect.
Incorrect: I haven’t got no money to give you.
Both “haven’t” and “no” are negatives, which changes the meaning of the sentence to “I have money to give you”. The sentence should be written as, “I haven’t any money to give you.”
Incorrect: My teacher said to never put no semicolon in front of a conjunction.
The words “never” and “no” are both negative. The sentence now means, “My teacher said to put semicolons in front of conjunctions”. The sentence should be, “My teacher said to never put a semicolon in front of a conjunction.”
Incorrect: No one never gave me nothing.
Triple negatives are also considered incorrect. The sentence should be, “No one ever gave me anything.”
Double Negatives Involving Adverbs
Certain adverbs which infer “little”, “few” or “not often” should not be used in the same clause as a negative word, as this also creates a double negative. Such adverbs include: scarcely, hardly, barely, rarely, and seldom.
Incorrect: The employees never scarcely had personal time, as the project deadline loomed.
The word “scarcely” implies “not often”, and should not be used with “never”. The clause should be written: The employees scarcely had personal time...
Incorrect: My professor doesn’t rarely look at the work we hand in, but he doesn’t send it to his assistant.
The word “rarely” infers “not often”, and should not be used in the same clause as “don’t”; “doesn’t” is grammatically correct, as it is in a different clause.
Correct: The vocalist barely achieved the proper note.
There are no negative words in this sentence; the adverb, “barely”, implies the near-negative.
Incorrect Placement of Negatives
When using more than one verb in a string (e.g. “should have done something” or “must remember something”), any negative words should be placed after the first verb. Negative words include “not” and “never”.
Incorrect: I might have not bought the house if I had known about the mouse problem.
“Not” should be placed after the modal verb “might”: I might not have bought the house....
Incorrect: Alice never would have known how to finish the math puzzle until Matt showed her.
The negative “never” should be moved between “would” and “have”: Alice would never have known....