Trisha Shetty (Editor)

Negative verb

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A negative verb or negation verb is a type of auxiliary that is used to form the negative of a main verb. The main verb itself has no personal endings, while the negative verb takes the inflection. The English auxiliary don't/doesn't performs a similar function by acting as a negative verb that indicates whether one or multiple individuals are involved while the verb referring to the negated activity remains uninflected, e.g. "he cares"/"we care" versus "he doesn't care"/"we don't care".

Contents

English

In English, ordinary verbs take the auxiliary do when negated by not.

Uralic languages

The negative verb is typical of the Uralic languages. Uralic languages inflect by person, thus one word, the negative verb corresponds to e.g. "I don't" (Finnish en) or "doesn't" (ei).

Finnish

The negative verb is conjugated in moods and personal forms in Finnish. In the present tense, the form of the main verb is just the stem of the present form without a personal ending, e.g. lähdenen lähde ("I leave" – "I do not leave"), menisitet menisi ("you would go" – "you would not go"), syöneeei syöne ("he/she may eat" – "he/she may not eat"), ottakaammeälkäämme ottako ("let's take" – "let's not take"). In the imperfect tense, the form of the main verb is the past participle, e.g. otinen ottanut ("I took" – "I did not take"), otimmeemme ottaneet ("we took" – "we did not take").

Indicative, conditional, and potential

Imperative

Estonian

In Estonian, the negative verb is evident only in the imperative mood.

Indicative, conditional, and oblique

Imperative

Inari Sami

The negative verb is conjugated in moods and personal forms in Inari Sami:

Indicative, conditional, and potential mood

Imperative

Northern Sami

The negative verb is conjugated in moods and personal forms in Northern Sami.

Indicative, conditional, and potential mood

Imperative

Lule Sami

The negative verb is conjugated in moods and personal forms in Lule Sami.

Indicative, conditional, and potential mood

Hungarian

Hungarian has lost most evidence of a negative verb, but the negation particle nem becomes ne before verbs in the jussive/imperative (also sometimes called the conditional mood, or J-mood).

Furthermore, the 3rd person present indicative of the copular verb (lenni) has unique negative forms nincs(en) and nincsenek as opposed to nem van and nem vannak, but only when the particle and verb would occur adjacently. In all other instances the copular verb acts regularly. These forms are also unique in that they have an existential role "there is (not)" and "there are (not)". In the present indicative 3rd person, copular verbs are not used; rather the absence of a verb (with or without a negation particle) implies the copula.

Korean

Korean verbs can be negated by the negative verbs 않다 anta and 못하다 mothada or by the negative adverbs 안 an and 못 mot. The copula 이다 ida has a corresponding negative copula 아니다 anida. (anida is an independent word like anta and mothada, unlike ida which cannot stand on its own and must be attached to a noun.)

References

Negative verb Wikipedia