Avoid These Common Double Negatives

Posted: December 31, 2013

The use of double negatives can not only make some people cringe, but it's also grammatically incorrect – most of the time. There are very few exceptions to the rule of avoiding double negatives. Learn which should never be used, and the very few that you might get away with.

The use of double negatives can not only make some people cringe, but it's also grammatically incorrect – most of the time. There are very few exceptions to the rule of avoiding double negatives. Learn which should never be used, and the very few that you might get away with.

Maeve Maddox, Editor at Daily Writing Tips, shares double negatives that should be avoided.

Double Negatives to Avoid

A French speaker who says “Je ne sais rien” raises no eyebrows among the educated, but an English speaker who says “I don’t know nothing” is immediately marked as semi-literate. (French ne corresponds to English not and rien to nothing.)

Some languages, like French and Spanish, have what is called “negative concord,” usage that allows two negatives to express a single negation without being considered incorrect. Double negatives in English came to be seen as ungrammatical after the Middle Ages.

Considering the wide use of double negatives in nonstandard English dialects of English, one might wonder why the double negative is disdained in the standard dialects.

Read the entire article Double Negatives to Avoid on Daily Writing Tips.