HAI PHONG PRIVATE UNIVERSITY
FOREIGN LANGUAGE DEPARTMENT
-------------oOo------------

GRADUATION PAPER

A CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS OF NEGATIVE
QUESTIONS IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE

By:
Pham Thu Ha
Class: NA 1201

Supervisor:
Ms. Nguyen Thi Phuong Thu

Hai Phong – December 2012


BỘ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO
TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC DÂN LẬP HẢI PHÒNG

NHIỆM VỤ TỐT NGHIỆP

Sinh viên: ……………………………………Mã số: ………………………..
Lớp: …………………………………………Ngành: ……………………….
Tên đề tài: …………………………………………………………………....
………………………………………………………………………………...


NHIỆM VỤ ĐỀ TÀI

HIỆU TRƯỞNG

GS.TS.NGƯT. Trần Hữu Nghị


PHẦN NHẬN XÉT TÓM TẮT CỦA CÁN BỘ HƯỚNG DẪN
1. Tình thần thái độ của sinh viên trong quá trình làm đề tài tốt nghiệp:

2. Đánh giá chất lượng Đ.T.T.N (So với nội dung yêu cầu đã đề ta trong
nhiệm vụ Đ.T.T.N trên các mặt lý luận, thực tiễn, tính toán giá trị sử
dụng, chất lượng các bản vẽ)

3. Cho điểm của cán bộ hướng dẫn:
(Điểm chi bằng số và chữ)

Hải Phòng, ngày …..tháng…..năm 2012
Cán bộ hướng dẫn chính
(Họ tên và chữ kí)


NHẬN XÉT ĐÁNH GIÁ CỦA CÁN BỘ CHẤM PHẢN BIỆN
ĐỀ TÀI TỐT NGHIỆP
1. Đánh giá chất lượng đề tài tốt nghiệp về các mặt thu thập và phân tích số
liệu ban đầu, cơ sở lý luận chọn phương án tối ưu, cách tính toán chất
lượng thuyết minh và bản vẽ, giá trị lý luận và thực tiễn đề tài.
………………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………………………………………
………………………………………………………………………………………


December 2012

Student

Phạm Thu Hà


Abbreviations and Symbols
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

E.g. = Example
(1980:439) = (year : page)
Etc = et cet era
V = verb
S = subject


TABLE OF CONTENTS
PART I: INTRODUCTION ........................................................................... 1
1. Rationale .............................................................................................. 1
2. Aims of the study ................................................................................ 2
3. Scope of the study ............................................................................... 2
4. Methods of the study ........................................................................... 3
5. Design of the study .............................................................................. 3
PART II: DEVELOPMENT .......................................................................... 4

4.2. Subclause ....................................................................................... 28
4.2.1 Use of “not” in English negative questions and in Vietnamese
equivalents ......................................................................................... 28
5. Summary............................................................................................ 31
CHAPTER 3: COMMON MISTAKES MADE BY HAIPHONG PRIVATE
UNIVERSITY STUDENTS IN USING ENGLISH NEGATIVE
QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS ...................................... 32
1. Some common mistakes .................................................................... 32
2. Some suggestions to correct the mistakes ......................................... 33
PART 3: CONCLUSION ............................................................................. 36
1. Summary of the study........................................................................ 36
2. Suggestions for further studies and final comment ........................... 37
References ...................................................................................................... 38
Books: .......................................................................................................... 38
Websites: ...................................................................................................... 38
APPENDIX .................................................................................................... 40


PART I: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale
Learning a foreign language is of great significance today. It is the bridge
connecting countries in many fields. The mastery of a foreign language
enables us to communicate with people from other countries, achieve mutual
understandings, and further our trade contacts, economic co- operations, and
cultural and academic exchanges with other countries.
I am interested in learning English so much. English, as mentioned over
and over again, is an international language. In Viet Nam, English, now, is a
compulsory subject for pupils in most primary and secondary schools. It is
also an important subject for students at all universities. Particularly, English
is one of the essential requirements for those who want to find a good job.

their Vietnamese equivalents.
c. Exposing some common mistakes made by Vietnamese students
and presenting some suggested solutions.
d. Heightening learner‟s awareness in learning English and
Vietnamese negative questions.
3. Scope of the study
The study “Negative questions in English and Vietnamese - a contrastive
analysis” focuses on negative questions in English and Vietnamese
equivalents within the frame of structures and using negative words. Four
types of questions will be discussed: Yes-No questions, Tag questions, Whquestions and Alternative questions. However, due to the limited time and
knowledge, only negative questions that use the negator “not” will be
discussed in details, the others will be suggested for further study. The study
also finds out the common mistakes made by students at HPU and some
suggestions to correct these mistakes.

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4. Methods of the study
The study is conducted by carefully collecting materials from various
sources to have full – blown information of English and Vietnamese negative
questions. Moreover, I have consulted with my supervisor, and obtained
suggestions, instructions and encouragement from my teachers. The
contrastive analysis is made intra- and interlingually: English negative
questions with Vietnamese counterparts. The contrastive analysis involves
two stages: the description of the structures and the use of negative words in
both languages.
5. Design of the study
My graduation paper is divided into three parts, in which the second,
naturally, is the most important part.

varies from scholar to scholar, from dictionary to dictionary, we can draw
some main points as follows: “Negation is a part of man‟s cognition activity
and communication process. It is also a basic category of thinking, of formal
logic. It is the opposition of the affirmative category”.
According to Le Quang Thiem, a Vietnamese linguist, “negative sentence
is used to describe the absence of an object, an event or a phenomena” while
in many grammar books; we can see that a negative sentence is used to claim
that something is not true or incorrect.
1.2. Scope of negation
The term “scope of negation” is introduced to refer to the stretch of
language over which the negative has its effect. The relation between negative
words and non-assertive words that they govern will happen in scope of
negation (that is part of language that the negative meaning operates through).
The scope of negation formally extends from the negative words to the end of
the clause or to the beginning of a final adjunct. The subject and any adjuncts
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occur before a final predication often lies outside it. Thus, the operator can be
within or outside the scope. Below are some examples to illustrate:
E.g. I absolutely did not agree with you. (1)
Versus I did not absolutely agree with you. (2)
In (1), the scope of negation stretches from “not” to “you”, subject (I), adjunct
(absolutely), operator (did) are excluded, the predication takes full negative
effect
(1) = It is absolute that I did not agree with you
or = that I did not agree with you is absolute
Sentence (2) I did not absolutely agree with you, subject (I) and operator (did)
are put outside while adjunct is inside, negative meaning extends from
negative word to the end of the clause.

contrast it with something or somebody already mentioned. Contrastive focus
falls on the final item, but not end-focus.
E.g.: She is not waiting for me ≈ (She is waiting for someone, not me).
His father was not out ≈ (He was in).
Operator also gets a contrastive focus which places contrastive emphasis on
tense.
E.g.: She didn‟t study English two years ago (Now, she is learning
English).
Operator is used in elliptical replies to concentrate attention on new
information by avoiding repetition of the given information.
E.g.: Have you phoned your parents? No, I haven‟t. ≈ (I haven‟t
phoned my parents).
Did you go out last night? No, I didn‟t. ≈ (I didn‟t go out last
night).
The participation of end focus and a contrastive focus makes the focus of
negation not as ambiguous as the scope of negations they also have a certain
contribution to finding appropriate account for ambiguity in the scope of
negation.

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The relationship between scope and focus of negation
The scope and focus are interrelated in such as a way that the scope must
include the focus. In an independent clause, the scope of negation covers all
the negative effect the extent of the scope is identified by the position of the
focus.

2. Negative questions in English
2.1 What is a negative question?

E.g.3: (Situation: Kathleen and Jeff have just come from Chicago on
the Greyhouse bus to visit Bob in Ithaca)
Bob: You guys must be starving. You want to get something to eat?
Kathleen: Yeah, isn’t there a vegetarian restaurant around hereMoosewood or something like that
Bob: Gee, you’ve heard of Moosewood all the way out in Chicago, huh?
Ok, let’s go there.
Kathleen uses the negative question “Isn‟t there a vegetarian restaurant
around here?” to ask for confirmation of something she believes to be true.
Compare this to the following case:
E.g.4: (Situation: Bob is visiting Kathleen and Jeff in Chicago while
attending a meeting)
Bob: I’d like to take you guys out to dinner while I’m here, we’d have time
to

go somewhere around here before the evening session tonight, don’t

you think?
Kathleen: I guess, but there’s not really any place to go in Hyde Park.
Bob: Oh, really, isn’t there a vegetarian restaurant around here?
Kathleen: No, about all we can get is hamburgers and souvlaki.
Bob uses the negative question here for a very different reason: he had
previously assumed the truth of the proposition there is a vegetarian
restaurant around here, but has now inferred from what Kathleen says that
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this proposition is actually false, and is using the negative question to
check this new inference.
The ambiguity in (E.g.2) is between „left-wing‟ and „right-wing‟
readings as seen in (E.g.5) and (E.g.6).

Vietnamese in brief, scope of negation, focus of negation, negative
questions in English in details and the semantic and pragmatic
approaches to English negative question. The focus of negation in
English is divided into two types: end focus and contrastive – focus.
The next chapter is a contrastive analysis of the English and
Vietnamese negative questions.

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CHAPTER 2: A CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS OF
ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE NEGATIVE
QUESTIONS
1. Negative forms and non-assertive forms in English
1.1. Negative Forms
In English, besides inserting not, there are other words which have a
negative meaning such as no+phrase; pronoun: no one, nobody, nothing…
E.g.: There‟s no money in my pocket ≈ (There is not any money in my
pocket)
Here, we have no as negative determiner and it is one of the negative items
in English with different function.
No as a pronoun:
E.g.: I saw no one in the room ≈ (I didn‟t see anyone in the room).
No as a determiner: (happens both singular and plural).
Eg1: There are no students in the class ≈ (There are not any students in
the class).
Eg2: There is no money in my pocket ≈ (There isn‟t any money in my
pocket).
We also use none and neither (of) to replace for pronouns and
determiners:

structures containing negative meaning, which distinguish real negation using
negative items “no” and “never”. English negation is diversified by using both
negative items and non-assertive forms because there are consequently two
negative equivalents of each positive sentence.
E.g.: We have some lunch.

a. We have not any lunch.
b. We have no lunch.

As example above, it is noted that there are always two negative sentences
equivalent to affirmative, one employs non-assertive form and the other uses
negative item. Both of them are negative and close paraphrases. The second
sentence looks like an affirmative since it has no “not” or “n‟t” following
operator, but they have a negative element; the determiner “no”. The first
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sentence is obviously a negative sentence, but its effect is less strongly
negative than the second. It seems that an ordinary negative sentence is
weaker than the one in which the negative making is part of another word or
phrase.
2. Negative orientation
As you know, a question may be presented in a form which refers to a
negative orientation in questions. Here I want to refer to the negative
orientation in questions. Negative orientation is found in questions which
contain a negative form of one kind or another:
E.g.: Can‟t you give us any hope of success? ≈ (It is really true that you
can‟t…?)
Negative orientation is complicated, however, by an element of surprise or
disbelief which adds implication of positive meaning. There is a combination

also used to express surprise, disbelief, annoyance or sarcasm.
E.g. Can’t you shut the door behind you?
Also they are used for invitation and exclamation:
E.g. Won’t you come in for a few minutes?

3.2. Negative Tag- questions
A tag question consists of an operator plus a pronoun, with or without a
negative particle; the choice and tense of the operator is determined by the
verb phrase in the subordinate clause:
E.g. They did not work all night, did they?
As the example illustrates, if the subordinate clause is positive, the tag is
negative, and vice versa. Both patterns are used to ask the hearer to agree that
the statement in the main clause is true.
The nuclear tone of the tag occurs on the operator and is either a rise or
fall. Four main types of tag question emerge from the observance of these
rules:
Type 1

Positive + Negative

(Rising tone)

E.g.: You can dance, `Can‟t you?
Type 2

Negative + Positive

(Rising tone)

E.g.: You can‟t dance, `Can you?