English Grammar: Fix your double negatives!

Using double negatives in English can make you sound uneducated or unclear. I'm going to teach you how to avoid these common mistakes. Though double negatives are often used by native speakers, they are slang and they are grammatically incorrect. As an English learner it is important to understand slang, but you shouldn't try to use incorrect grammar, especially in cases like this where it can make people think you mean the opposite of what you want to say! I'll show you examples of some of the most common double negatives that English learners and native speakers use. You'll learn how to correct these mistakes so that your English is clear and correct.

TRANSCRIPT

Hello. Welcome to this lesson. I'm going to teach you something called "double negatives". Now, maybe you don't use double negatives, which is cool and good and amazing, and you don't want to use double negatives. So, I'm going to tell you first of all what double negatives are. Double negatives mean you have one sentence with two words that are both negative words. For example: "I don't have nothing." So, "don't" and "nothing" are both negative words. So, this might have something to do with math, which I'm not good at. If you don't have nothing, actually you have something. I'm not too sure how that works out, but you don't want to use double negatives because two negatives make a positive.

So, we hear double negatives all the time. "I can't get no satisfaction..." Can't get no...? Can't... "Can't get no" is a double negative. So, whoever sang this song, Mick Jagger, terrible grammar. What are you...? What are you teaching us, here? Good old lips.

So, one thing I'm going to do is you have to be very, very, very careful about certain words in English, like this word: "ain't". I hate this word. As soon as someone says to me: "I ain't got nothing." I'm not talking to that person probably again. If you use the word "ain't", it just makes you seem very uneducated. People who say these words, they sound stupid. Maybe your favourite rapper uses it a lot. Are they stupid? Hmm. So, it's cool if they do it, but be careful you don't because you don't want to sound stupid. So, I'm going to give you the examples. Now, the ones in black are bad, don't use them. The red pen is the right pen.

So, if we look at the first example: "He ain't no teacher." He ain't no teacher, G, yo. We can't say: "ain't". "Ain't" is not even a word in English. If you look in the dictionary, it's not there. It's really, really, really, really slang, and it's bad. So, "ain't", I want you to take this word out of your head, and I want you to say: "He isn't". You've learned this before, you used the verb "to be", so you're going to say: "He isn't the teacher." He ain't no teacher, yo. Yeah, you ain't no teacher either. I'm the teacher, and you have to say: "He isn't a teacher."

Next one: "She ain't got no class." [Laughs] Which is true. Now, "class" means refinement or the way you were brought up. So, if you ain't got no class, your momma didn't raise you right. This means that you were basically were not educated well. We have to say: "She has no class." Okay? So, the difference is that she... We can't use "ain't", we have to use "has no". When we use "teacher", we have to use an adjective. We have to use "to be". Sorry. When we say "teacher", we have to use the verb "to be", but when we say "got", we have to use "has", because this is a noun. Okay? If it's a job, we use "to be", and if it's a noun, we use "has". If it was "I", we would say "have". So you can check out a lesson that I've done before between "had", "have", and "has".

"I ain't been nowhere." I ain't been nowhere. Hmm. Well, no. You have to say: "I haven't been anywhere." So, it's kind of confusing in English when we use "any". So, I'm going to teach you in this part of the lesson when to use "any". It's easy once you get it. So, you don't want to say: "I ain't been nowhere." You... You have to say: "I haven't been anywhere."

So, "any"... Once you get this, it's going to be easy for you. We use "any" only if your sentence is negative or if you are asking a question. For example: "Do you have any pizza?" Now, I'm not going to say: "I ain't got no pizza." I'm going to say: "I don't have any pizza." Okay? You can also say: "I don't have anything." You can't say: "I don't have nothing." So, we have to change "nothing" to "anything", because "any", we have to use with our negative sentence.

"I don't know no one or nobody." They're the same. You have to say: "I don't know anyone." Because we have "don't", we can... We have to use "anyone". You can say: "I do know someone", but that's a positive and we're good.

[masterchief]

Suspect: I didnt kill nobody
Cop: thanks for the confession

[felipesantos]

Each and every one of you teachers will always have a special place in my heart, but you Ronnie have a really special place....thank you for your commitment and dedication. I've been learning a lot watching your wonderful videos, i have not enough words to thank you!! I really appreciate your support and your geniality!! i wish you all the best of luck!! Best regards..Luis Felipe from Brazil!!

[liliand.]

Ronnie, you are a fantastic teacher! Grammar seems really easy when you explain it. Thank you.

[jacquexo]

You are so good at explaining things !! I WISH U WERE MY ENGLISH TEACHER

[erickjaimes]

Thank you dear teacher Ronnie!
And I'd like to add something here:
In most songs and everyday spoken English, AIN'T is used to replace negative auxiliary verbs such as: am not, aren't, isn't, haven't and hasn't.

[andrescalderon]

So the right way to use NO and ANY is like this:
'HAVE + NO' as in "I have no idea"
While DON'T + ANY as in "I don't have any idea"
Just let me know if this concept is right.

[arsal]

"If you don't have nothing, you have something", thats the moment i instantly liked the video

[ScottGregor]

This video should be mandatory for everyone. I’ve corrected so many but they keep doing the double negative.

[anee]

Thanks for making it clear, Ronnie ! ☺

[GabrielSilva-fbdj]

I learned almost 100% of my pronunciation and speaking with you Ronnie, thank you so much, and congratulations !!! Amazing video

[Iggywiggywoo]

She is a great teacher! I hate double negatives with a passion!

[sophh]

Ronnie! You're literally the best!

[blessingjohnchelliah]

I like the song sung by Professor Higgins in 'My fair Lady' on how English is spoken in different countries.. ....'the Scots and Irish leave you close to tears' 'in America they haven't used it in years'. As the good teacher explains using 'double negatives' makes you sound uneducated and unclear...'aint, gonna, haveta, wanna are not words. But Americans routinely use them.

[خالدعبدالرحمن-لك]

My name is Khaled Adam from Eritrea've watched clip on YouTube two weeks ago, I do not speak English well, but I thank you with all my heart from the first stake and I am amused and I think the easiest for any student to learn from you because he presented to the stake and simplify things in order to understand the student

[queenofegypt]

thanks my lovely teacher
you're the best teacher ever

[Banguitaa]

I love your lessons 😀😀 I'm learning a lot.

[Armando_Lara]

Thanks a lot Ronnie, I had doubts about this.

[samb.]

Good lesson, your explanations are very helpful and easy to understand, keep doing what you do the best helping people.

[liu]

Very helpful lesson, thanks a lot, Ronnie!

[leatherchannel]

Seriously! There are amazing songs with this word. Bare in mind, language is a living thing!