+160
"I didn't do nothing" is a stupid sentence. amirite?
by Anonymous1 year ago
Negative concord is incorrect in Standard English, yes, although not in all languages.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Or in all dialects of English.
by Anonymous1 year ago
You obviously don't know nothing about dialect.
by Anonymous1 year ago
I ain't give a care
by Anonymous1 year ago
This is akin to when people say "I could care less". Oh, so you DO care. Or do you mean you COULDN'T care less?
by Anonymous1 year ago
I couldn't care less.
by Anonymous1 year ago
I always say could care less on accident lol
by Anonymous1 year ago
That's because you say the original version and not the bastardized version that's been changed through language in slang overtime
by Anonymous1 year ago
Oh that's cool to hear
by Anonymous1 year ago
If you find that cool. I'd suggest looking into etymology some. It's the study of words and languages and how they change over time.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Will I find out where the word "Rizz" came from. I would like to punch the creator
by Anonymous1 year ago
What's the definition and where did you hear it from? I can probably help figure that out.
by Anonymous1 year ago
You don't know that term? It's like a tik tok slang word for the ability to attract woman with out trying. I hate it so much.
by Anonymous1 year ago
So it's a super recent slang/jargon term probably created on or just before TikTok. Sounds to me like a similar use of the word king referring to any man in the past like 3 to 5 years yeah agree it sounds dumb.
Also, women that just make Rizz another word for attractive, because being attractive get you a member of the preferred sex without you having to do anything
by Anonymous1 year ago
Super recent haha, It's pretty cringe (another word I hate but couldn't think of a different word to use)
by Anonymous1 year ago
Couldn't care less is grammatically correct though, could care less implies you still care
by Anonymous1 year ago
I never said, couldn't care less is incorrect. Dot I merely said it is the bastardize version of could care less which is the original phrase. I'm a descriptivist not a prescriptivist
by Anonymous1 year ago
what? Merriam Webster confirms that "could not care less" is the original and correct phrase, but "could care less" has been a common variant for a long time and is acceptable since the meaning is understood.
the only slang is the "couldn't" contraction from "could not"
by Anonymous1 year ago
Alright, guess i miss remember.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Double negatives aren't proper English.
by Anonymous1 year ago
There's nothing to correct. In some regional dialects double negatives are emphatic and in others they're positive. It's not wrong to be speaking in a different regional dialect from you.
by Anonymous1 year ago
No, it's always wrong. Just because the speakers of a certain language are too stupid to figure out what their utterances mean doesn't make it correct.
by Anonymous1 year ago
I like you.
by Anonymous1 year ago
My regional dialect is mispronouncing every word
by Anonymous1 year ago
All my typos, misspellings and grammar mistakes are just an extremely localized dialect.
by Anonymous1 year ago
*tipos, mistspellengs, und gremmer misteaks
by Anonymous1 year ago
You can't say "I did NOT do nothing" means the same thing as "I did nothing". 0≠1 and never will. "I am a dog" will never mean "I am not a dog." If they mean the same thing at your locality, you locality is stupid. If words don't have a shared meaning, then what's the point of having words?
by Anonymous1 year ago
So language is actual not a mathematical system. Words can differ between dialects the same way they differ between languages
by Anonymous1 year ago
Yes, language is not mathematical. But are words not used to express ideas and logic? If words don't have a shared meaning, then they are meaningless. "Is" and "is not" cannot have the same meaning in any language.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Words aren't really used to express logical abstractions like that—at least not in natural speech—and our general understanding of what language is has moved passed what you're describing.
We know know, for example, that outside of writing, words are really a major unit of meaning, phrases are. When listening actively to an utterance, your brain is going to process a whole phrase and only notice individual words through reflection after the fact. That's the reason a phrase, like "couldn't care less" for example, can mean something completely different from its component words.
Another good example is the use of speech actions to manage conversation between speakers. The classic examples are things like "uh" and "um" which do have a deliberate pattern in how they're used by native speakers as places holders for different kinds of things. Because they're used in clearly defined ways, they aren't simply sounds, but they also don't have any semantic meaning. Our understanding of formalized written languages has no way to account for that, but it's still real language happening everyday. Moreover, words like "and" will be used as this kind of speech action even though it does have semantic meaning sometimes in speech and always in writing.
The way of thinking about language as a way of referring to platonic abstractions falls apart pretty quickly when you get to the nitty gritty of applying it to how language is actually used.
by Anonymous1 year ago
This is wrong, but I know what you mean…😁
"I did" will never mean the same as "I did not".
"I could" will never mean the same as "I could not".
by Anonymous1 year ago
They do have a shared meaning. That meaning is just different from *your* dialect.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Words are defined by their use, not a standard dictionary. If everyone except you is using "I am a dog" to mean they are not a dog then you're the stupid one.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Cope. Yeah, "nothing" means nothing in all cases, oh, except in this one phrase where it seems like the speaker couldn't figure out how to express themselves using the previously agreed upon definition of the word. There it means anything.
by Anonymous1 year ago
You know what idiomatic expressions are, right? Yikes.
by Anonymous1 year ago
"It was just an idiom, bro!" Zoinks.
by Anonymous1 year ago
That's how idioms work, they just are. Glad we sorted this out.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Correct. If someone is using "I did not do nothing" to mean "I did nothing" then they are stupid. If someone thinks "nothing" has the same meaning as "something", they are also stupid. Everybody knows the meaning of the word "not". Everybody knows that "nothing" is the opposite of "something". These are defined in the dictionary AND by their use.
by Anonymous1 year ago
They do have a shared meaning for the people who speak that dialect. And yes, people can say that.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Don't ever sign a contract. Your argument of "I know what the words say, but they mean the exact opposite to me" ain't going to work.
by Anonymous1 year ago
In these dialects, "I didn't do nothing" means they didn't do something. If someone accuses a person of doing something, saying "I didn't do nothing" meant they didn't do it.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Yes, that would be a case where "something" is equivalent to "nothing". That is wrong. "Something" is always the opposite of "nothing" in every "dialect".
by Anonymous1 year ago
Not it's not. Saying "I didn't do nothing" in those dialects literally means "I didn't do anything" or "I didn't do something". And considering that there are dialects that say "I didn't do nothing", not it's not wrong. Certain dialects use double negatives. A dialect cannot be "wrong".
by Anonymous1 year ago
Negative concord is a prominent feature of some forms of English, perhaps most notable in African-American Vernacular English.
by Anonymous1 year ago
But you still understand what's being said, which is the core point of language.
by Anonymous1 year ago
It's incorrect, just because I (might) understand what you mean, doesn't make it correct.
Like sarcasm, this is a situation where you have to use context and clues to know that the message is suppose to be the exact opposite of what was said. Most of the time this works, but you're just introducing a greater likelihood of miscommunication.
by Anonymous1 year ago
It doesn't matter if it's incorrect or not if you still understand it, that's my point. And what do you mean with "might" understand it? What else could it mean? If someone wants to say that they DID do something, they would just say "I did it". No one will say "I didn't do nothing" and mean to say that they did in fact do something.
"I didn't do nothing" and phrases with double negatives still only has one meaning and it's easily understood, even though it is technically incorrect.
by Anonymous1 year ago
I said "might", because, like sarcasm, we're guessing, or using other clues and context instead of words to decipher the meaning, or the opposite meaning. This is a formula for miscommunication.
Take the phrase: "I could care less about starving children." Does the person mean "I could NOT care less, because I already give them zero dollars"; or does it mean "I already send them a lot of money, but maybe I could send less."?
"Could" and "could not" will never mean the same thing. "Did" and "did not" will never mean the same thing.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Yeah, right.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Popular. So popular.
by Anonymous1 year ago
This is not an unpopular opinion.
by Anonymous1 year ago
their goal is to let you know they didn't do anything
when they say "i didn't do nothing", you understand what they are trying to communicate
so that is a successul communication, language has done it's job
by Anonymous1 year ago
I hope you stand up for grammar when you're out in public - this has gone on for far too long! Especially in back alleys and shadowy corners, if you hear poorly constructed sentences (which are not immediately self-corrected), it's your duty to go up to the person and let them know it!
by Anonymous1 year ago
Guess I'll be captain grammar from now on
by Anonymous1 year ago
I try to type everything in a grammatically correct way, except some things for emphasis. That being said, I speak in a very grammatically incorrect way with a fairly heavy midwestern accent because that's how people talk where I'm from. What I'm saying is: NO ONE CARES
by Anonymous1 year ago
I just put on a shaggy song and double point when it goes "it wasn't me". No matter the situation. Cop is like when I saw you dancing at the murder double point: it wasn't me.
by Anonymous1 year ago
I would agree with you if somebody was being serious, and/or straightforward when they say that sentence, but that sentence originated as a form of sarcasm or slang, which doesn't have to adhere to traditional meanings of the words.
Though I am a descriptivist and not a prescriptivist, thus some may disagree with this opinion
by Anonymous1 year ago
"He don't know no better"
by Anonymous1 year ago
Can't take anyone seriously who is lazy enough to use double negatives.
by Anonymous1 year ago
Latinos be like (I'm Latinx I can make this joke)
by Anonymous1 year ago
> Latinx
No
by Anonymous1 year ago
Half the people here should never write or sign a contract, because "I know it says that, but they really mean the exact opposite." isn't going to hold up.
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago
by Anonymous 1 year ago