Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[vsting]

I understand in English when we say "Both windows are not open.", we mean: "Not both of the windows are open. Probably one is open, the other is closed. " Am I right?

If so, how about: "Everybody doesn't like the book." Does that also mean: "Not everybody likes the book. Some do and some don't."?

Is there a grammatical term called partial negation existing in English grammar?
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[stellara]

i thought when you say for example "both windows are not open" it's the same as "both windows are closed" = "no window is open". here's clear that both windows are not open, in the other sentence it means that you don't exactly know if eventually one window may be open, maybe also both are closed but they are definitely not both together open. that's not the same, in my opinion.

same here, if you say "everybody does not like this book" it's the same as "nobody likes this book" but not absolutely the same as "not everybody likes this book" .. �h, now i'm confused..

and sorry, i don't know if there's something like a partial negotiation in engish grammar. for me, every sentence you said for itself is correct, but they don't mean the same.

greets
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[vsting]

thanks, Stellara
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