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Negation to a negative sentence | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Gosiak Triglot Senior Member Poland Joined 5128 days ago 241 posts - 361 votes  Speaks: Polish*, English, German Studies: Norwegian, Welsh | Message 9 of 33 01 October 2012 at 4:49pm | IP Logged |
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Polish works like this:
Didn't you have breakfast? - No,I didn't. Nie jadłeś śniadania? - Nie,nie jadłem. (No, I didn't eat) or Tak, nie jadłem. (Yes, I didn't eat - less used but perfectly undersandable) Didn't you have breakfast? - Yes, I did. Nie jadłeś śniadania? - Nie,jadłem (No, I did eat) "Yes" or "no" answer is not enough in Polish unless one uses special tone or intonation to make the answer clearer. The key is the verb with or without particle "nie". Edited by Gosiak on 01 October 2012 at 4:51pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| vermillon Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4680 days ago 602 posts - 1042 votes Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, German | Message 10 of 33 01 October 2012 at 4:59pm | IP Logged |
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French (and surely others, German?) has 3 words: "oui", "non" and "si". To negate a negative question (and therefore make a positive assertion), you use "si". Therefore there is no possible confusion.
"Tu n'as pas mangé? -non. OR -si" (i.e. "didn't eat / did eat") And answering "oui" would simply be incorrect and mean nothing. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6599 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 11 of 33 01 October 2012 at 5:44pm | IP Logged |
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Reminds me on how in English you can say "But I did" a bit emphatically. (at least I was taught so...)
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| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7158 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 12 of 33 01 October 2012 at 6:04pm | IP Logged |
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There's nothing highly exotic about Hungarian negation if you're used to English. I don't recall it being used or acceptable to answer a negated Hungarian question with just "yes (i.e. my not eating breakfast as implied in your question is true)" (Hungarian: igen) as in the Korean example.
Didn't you have breakfast? - No (, I didn't). Nem reggeliztél? - Nem. Didn't you have breakfast? - But I did! Nem reggeliztél? - De igen! (literally: "But yes!") 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4846 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 13 of 33 01 October 2012 at 6:06pm | IP Logged |
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This is interesting, because I also used to believe Russian worked the Korean way. There is even a paragraph about this in the German Wikipedia article on Russian grammar.
Yes, German has three words, just like French: "Ja", "nein", and "doch". Swedish and Icelandic have three words as well: "Ja", "nej", and "jo" (Swedish) respectively "já", "nei", and "jú" (Icelandic). 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6599 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 14 of 33 01 October 2012 at 6:16pm | IP Logged |
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Wiktionary has a nice collection here :)
One example which is not there is the Romanian ba da. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Марк Senior Member Russian Federation Joined 5058 days ago 2096 posts - 2972 votes Speaks: Russian* | Message 15 of 33 01 October 2012 at 6:24pm | IP Logged |
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Russian has да нет. (I know that's off-topic).
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| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4846 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 16 of 33 01 October 2012 at 6:45pm | IP Logged |
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German can top this: "Ja, nicht doch!" (Да нет же!)
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