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Bookmark or Share- No, not, and non - English Language & Usage Stack ExchangeNot is the general negator for verb phrases, including predicate adjectives and nouns. In a verb phrase, not occurs immediately after the first auxiliary verb. If there is no auxiliary verb in the verb phrase, Do-Support supplies a form of do. Not is contracted whenever possible, with auxiliaries or subjects (especially pronouns):
- "It isn't" vs. "it's not" - English Language & Usage Stack ExchangeIt*is*n't vs Its*not. This obviously matters a whole lot for rhythm and rhyme. Sometimes (though rarely) it is worth avoiding the harsh 's' sound from it's not due to microphones' tendency to accentuate the sssss. But in terms of meaning there is no significant difference.
- negation - Order of "not" with infinitive - English Language & Usage ...The normal form of a negative infinitive is "not to X", in all contexts. The form "to not X" is grammatical (notwithstanding the generations of people who have moaned about "splitting the infinitive"), but unusual, and would only be used in order to convey a special meaning.
- meaning - Subjunctive mood: "Be not" vs. "not be" - English Language ...The negative subjunctive is formed by putting not before the verb, at least nowadays, as indicated in e.g. this Q&A on our sister site English Language & Usage: What's the correct form of the negative subjunctive?. (That seems to imply it used to be the other way around.)
- "no" vs "not any" - English Language Learners Stack ExchangeWe found no differences between their reports. We did not find any differences between their reports. Example 2: I received no email. I did not receive any email. OBS: I am aware that similar questions have been asked before (e.g. here and here), but I didn't find any (or, I found no) satisfactory answer.
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