LL-L "Grammar" 2004.09.25 (08) [E]

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From: Ingmar Roerdinkholder <ingmar.roerdinkholder at worldonline.nl>
Subject: LL-L "Grammar" 2004.09.25 (06) [E]

I ain't a native speaker of English, but ain't it possible that  "aren't I"
is a civilizated form of "ain't I" ?
And as "I ain't" would be derived from "I am not", "ain't I" would come from
"am n't I".
"... ain't" can be the negative of  ... am, ... are and ... is > ... am not,
... aren't, ... isn't,
so "ain't ..." can be the interrogatibe negative of   am ... not, are ...
not, is ... not.

But when people wanted to speak more civilized and replaced ain't by
isn't/aren't, they also must have
replaced hypercorrectly their "ain't I?" by "aren't I?"

Ingmar

> Tom wrote re "aren't I?":
> "I know that this form is taught in many  ESL classes, probably throughout
> the world, .."
>
> Well, what else could be taught? We recently discussed the widespread but
> incorrect use of "isn't it?" in this situation.  "Am I not?" is possible
but
> not something most people habitually say.
>
> John Duckworth wrote:
>
> "I think our use of _aren't I_ in English is just a sign that the verbal
> system was on its way to further simplification when printing and
> standardization more or less froze it as we know it today. We might have
> been using forms such as *_I are_ and *_she are_ if things had not slowed
> down."
>
> But in that case why does "are" appear only in this single negative
> construction? We say "I'm not" and never (in the standard language) "amn't
> I?". Language development doesn't stop just because printing fixes certain
> forms pro tem. The loss of the preterite plural form in Swedish is a very
> clear example.
>
> John also wrote:
> "In some dialects of English ... the subjunctive forms of the verb seem to
> have taken over; hence, _I be from England_. "
>
> This isn't a subjunctive, just a version of "beo", the 1st person sing
> indicative of the verb "beon".
>
> John Feather CS johnfeather at sceptic1.freeserve.co.uk

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From: Tom <jmaguire at pie.xtec.es>
Subject: LL-L "Grammar" 2004.09.25 (06) [E]

From: john feather <johnfeather at sceptic1.freeserve.co.uk>

>Subject: Grammar
>
>Tom wrote re "aren't I?":
>"I know that this form is taught in many  ESL classes, probably throughout
>the world, .."
>
>Well, what else could be taught?
>
"Amn't I?" could be taught. It is the grammatically correct form. It's
certainly the one I teach.

>We recently discussed the widespread but
>incorrect use of "isn't it?" in this situation.  "Am I not?" is possible
but
>not something most people habitually say.
>
I agree that it is not habitually said and that is because it is an
emphatic form. Example:
"Why should she get preference? I am just as good at the job as she is,
am I not?"

Regards,

Tom [Maguire]

--
Carpe Diem.
-Visit Nlp in Education  http://www.xtec.es/~jmaguire
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