Negation and the History of African American English.

Howe, Darin M.

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Peer reviewed

ERIC Number: EJ552242

Record Type: Journal

Publication Date: 1997

Pages: N/A

Abstractor: N/A

ISBN: N/A

ISSN: ISSN-0954-3945

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Negation and the History of African American English.

Howe, Darin M.

Language Variation and Change, v9 n2 p267-94 1997

Describes the use of negation in three corpora representative of early to mid-19th-century African American English. The study examines the negative form "ain't," negative concord to indefinites and verbs, negative inversion and negative postposing. Findings reveal that the negation system of early African American English derived directly from colonial English. (89 references) (Author/CK)

Descriptors: Black Dialects, Diachronic Linguistics, Dialect Studies, Negative Forms (Language), North American English, Pronouns, Slavery, Verbs

Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive

Education Level: N/A

Audience: N/A

Language: English

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Authoring Institution: N/A

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Author Affiliations: N/A