Double negative, the joke
Posted by Bob on July 27, 2004
In Reply to: Double negative posted by ESC on July 27, 2004
: : : Do you like Elvis' songs? What about the lyrics?
: : : 1.Mean Woman Blues
: : : "I got a woman as mean as she can be." I've heard this phrase "as adj. as one can be" a lot. What does that mean?
: : : 2.King Creole
: : : "Well, he sings a song about a crowded hole
: : : He sings a song about a jelly roll
: : : He sings a song about meat and greens
: : : He wails some blues about new orleans"
: : : Could you tell me what're a crowded hole and "meat and greens"?
: : : 3.Trouble
: : : "My daddy was a green-eyed mountain jack"
: : : Who could be a "mountain jack"?
: : : "I don't take no orders From no kind of man"
: : : What does this "not-no-no" sentence want to say?
: : : Thanks!
: : Not, no. This is a double negative - each no just adds emphasis to the not. "I don't take orders from anyone." English is not the same as arithmetic where two minuses make a plus!
: Here's two.
: Jelly roll = sex.
: Jack = man. (Merriam-Webster online: JACK 1 a : MAN -- usually used as an intensive in such phrases as every man jack b often capitalized : SAILOR c : SERVANT, LABORER : LUMBERJACK
The professor said, "In Russian, and in many other languages, a double negative intensifies the denial, just as it does in ungrammatical English. But curiously, nowhere, in no language, does a double positive make a negative."
To which, a voice from the back of the lecture hall said, "yeah, sure."
- *** thanks, but still... sphinx 28/July/04
- *** thanks, but still... Bob 28/July/04
- *** thanks, but still... Kate Millsaps 17/August/04
- :) *** thanks, but still... sphinx 28/July/04
- :) *** thanks, but still... sphinx 28/July/04
- *** thanks, but still... Bob 28/July/04