Question, question or two...

[conuly]

Okay, because I'm a broken record. Two things seem to be a common (and pollable) theme in the recent angsty discussion.

1. "If language changes, eventually we'll have lots of incomprehensible languages instead of just one"
2. "Double negatives are confusing, because two negatives can make a positive".

Now, the first one is pretty much true. Look what happened to Latin, or to Chinese (now Mandarin, Cantonese, etc.) However, the question isn't "is this true" but "do we care?". After all, in other places people *expect* to be multi-lingual, to know five or six languages. And we could always go the IAL route, have one auxlang that's not anybody's native language and let the rest of it all go its way.

The second one, I just don't believe. I don't think *anybody* has ever actually gotten confused when hearing a double negative. I know for a fact that it used to be an accepted part of the English language (which, yes, means that the educated classes said it) and that it's a required part of many other languages now. Edit: That's not true. I can certainly believe that *some* people have. However, I don't believe that any native speaker with normal language development has, and I'm fairly certain that most non-native speakers haven't, unless they had a well-meaning (but ill-informed) language instructer tell them that "In English two negatives are a positive", when the reality is "In English, two negatives are a negative, but this usage is considered to be uneducated".

So, poll!

[Poll #409457]

You all know my view by now, so it was hard for me to keep my bias out of this poll. My apologies.

Edit: Wow. I'm honestly surprised. I didn't expect *anybody* would pick "yes, recently, native speaker". Okay, I'm not too surprised with Moggy, because she's not typical I think, but the other (can't spell name gah)? I wasn't expecting that. I still think that my case still stands, most people are never gonna get confused by this usage after childhood. Keep voting, of course. I'm just chattering.

Comments

[eofs.livejournal.com]

I find double negatives confusing because I don't know if people are using them 'correctly' to mean a positive, or 'incorrectly' to mean a negative. Obviously this problem is increased these days by my extensive exposure to non-native speakers (heck, even US-English speakers) but it was a problem even before then. As for whether or not I'm normally developing with regards language... well you tell me. I didn't speak until I was nearly 3 (having communicated in my own language before then) but launched straight into sentences ("Mummy usually gives me marzipan and icing" being my first words.) My vocabulary was extensive for my age (I think) as evidenced when 3 months later (just shy of 3 years old) I told my mother I was desperate (I was asking for biscuits whilst shopping.) I was reading before I was 4, but then was untaught how to read in school. The next I can recall about reading is having a reading age of 15 from when I was 10 (and since the tests didn't go any higher, I kept testing to RA15 for the next 5-6 years.) So, erm, take my answer as you will.

I can remember having an argument with a Dutch friend over the use of double negatives in English. He finished school top of his year in English, an generally it's impeccable (heck, he's corrected me in the past) but I don't think anyone had ever taught him what governs double negative use in English. Which I think is risky, because whilst there are certain stock phrases where a negative is intended ("I didn't do nothing") in other cases he could construct a double negative which we would take as a positive (right?)

I must admit, the thing I find most confusing isn't strictly a double negative, it's the question "do you mind?" Or more precisely, it's the answer. Because obviously the 'correct' answer is "no, I don't mind" or "yes, I do mind" but people usually just answer no/yes. Which would be fine, if they didn't often answer yes when they mean no. I suppose because it's hard to get your head around no being the positive. But as a result it's often difficult for me to deduce what they mean, and it's not unheard of for me to follow up their answer with "so you mean I can('t) do it?"

But then, this is the girl who had a huge argument with her mother in Estonia (which she says wasn't an argument, it was just me being unreasonably pedantic as always *sighs*) over the fact that the *grass* wasn't yellow. It was covered in yellow leaves. But the grass itself was green. Had she said "the ground is/looks yellow" I'd have been fine, because that was quite true, but she said that the grass was yellow, so I looked expecting that to be the case and it wasn't and I was confused, grr.

Bilingualism seems a popular choice :0)