MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

TRỊNH THỊ HỒNG NGỌC

THE SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF NEGATIVE
QUESTIONS IN ENGLISH WITH REFERENCE TO VIETNAMESE
BASED ON THE SELECTION OF BILINGUAL PLAYS “AN IDEAL
HUSBAND” AND “LADY WINDERMERE‟S FAN”
(NHỮNG ĐẶC ĐIỂM VỀ CÚ PHÁP VÀ NGỮ NGHĨA CỦA CÂU HỎI
PHỦ ĐỊNH TRONG TIẾNG ANH LIÊN HỆ VỚI TIẾNG VIỆT DỰA TRÊN
TUYỂN TẬP KỊCH “MỘT NGƢỜI CHỒNG LÝ TƢỞNG” VÀ
“CÁI QUẠT CỦA PHU NHÂN UYNĐƠMIA”)
M.A THESIS

Field: English Language
Code: 8220201

Hanoi, 2018


MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

TRỊNH THỊ HỒNG NGỌC

THE SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF NEGATIVE
QUESTIONS IN ENGLISH WITH REFERENCE TO VIETNAMESE
BASED ON THE SELECTION OF BILINGUAL PLAYS “AN IDEAL
HUSBAND” AND “LADY WINDERMERE‟S FAN”
(NHỮNG ĐẶC ĐIỂM VỀ CÚ PHÁP VÀ NGỮ NGHĨA CỦA CÂU HỎI

Date:……………………


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to give my deepest thanks to my supervisor, Assoc.Prof.
Dr.Nguyễn Đăng Sửu from Ha Noi University of Business and Technology for his
extremely helpful advice, enthusiastic supports and comments when I carry out my
study.
I also give my sincere thanks to the leading board of Faculty of Graduate
Study- Ha Noi Open University for their help and right directions and the whole
staff of the Faculty of Graduate Study- Hanoi Open University for their support and
advice.
Finally, I want to send my thanks to my father, my mother, my husband and
my family for their long time support and encouragement during the completion of
my study.
Hanoi, March, 2018


TABLE OF CONTENT
ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................1
CHAPTER1: INTRODUCTION ................................................................................2
1.1. Rationale of the study .......................................................................................2
1.2. Aims and Objectives of the study .....................................................................3
1.2.1. Aims of the research ...................................................................................3
1.2.2. Objectives of the research ..........................................................................3
1.3. Scope of the research ........................................................................................3
1.4. Research question .............................................................................................3
1.5. Significance of the study ..................................................................................3
1.6. The organization of the study ...........................................................................4
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ....................................................................5

4.1.2.2.Contracted form ..................................................................................27
4.1.2.3. Negative declarative Yes/No questions .............................................28
4.1.2.4..Negative Yes/No questions in the selection of plays .........................28
4.1.3. The syntactic features of Negative Tag Questions ..................................29
4.1.3.1. The syntactic features of negative tag-questions ...............................29
4.1.3.2. Negative tag- questions in the selected plays ....................................30
4.1.4. The Syntactic features of Negative Wh- questions ..................................31
4.1.4.1.The syntactic features of negative WH- questions .............................31
4.1.4.2.Negative WH- questions in the selected plays....................................31
4.1.5. The Syntactic features of Negative alternative questions ........................32
4.1.5.1. The syntactic features of negative alternative questions ...................32
4.2. Semantic features of negative questions in English .......................................33
4.2.1. negative question used to express disappointment ...................................33
4.2.2. Negative questions used to confirm the truth: ..........................................33
4.2.3. Negative questions used to express suggestions: .....................................33
4.2.4. Negative questions used to express advice: .............................................33
4.2.5. Negative questions used to express offer: ................................................34
4.2.6. Negative questions used to invite the negative response from the hearer: ........34
4.3. Negative questions in Vietnamese ..................................................................34


4.3.1. Negative Yes/No questions ......................................................................34
4.3.2. Negative WH–questions..........................................................................35
4.3.3.Negative alternative questions ..................................................................36
4.4. Similarities and differences of negative questions between English and Vietnamese ....37
4.4.1. Similarities of English and Vietnamese negative questions. ...................37
4.4.1.1. Yes/No questions ...............................................................................37
4.4.1.2. Negative Wh- questions .....................................................................40
4.4.1.3. Negative alternative questions ...........................................................41
4.4.2. Differences of English and Vietnamese negative questions ....................41

In English, especially English grammar, every student also hear about the
questions in English, the main purpose of giving question is to get needed
information, besides, question also functions to express the emotion, attitude or
command of interviewer. Based on the context, question is given in a suitable
structure for a certain purpose. In many kinds of questions, negative questions seem
more popular in daily conversation and in the literature. User can use negative
questions with variety of aims, for example:when someone has a negative question,
they can reply “No” in response to the agreeing answer, but “yes” to negative
answer. Hence, negative question is difficult to use and understand in both their
meaning and structure. As the result, in the hope of helping both teachers and
students to use negative question effectively, this study is concerned about the new
aspect of negative question: the syntactic and semantic features. The full title is: the
syntactic and semantic features of negative question in English with reference to
Vietnamese based on the selection of plays “An Ideal Husband”and “Lady
Windermere‟s Fan”. In this study, English user can know more deeply about the
meaning and structure of negative question, besides, researcher also points out some
mistakes made by learners, especially, by students in the Faculty of English at
Hanoi Open University and some solutions to the problems.
Many teachers and students have confessed that they have made confusion in
different situations when they use negative questions. Sometimes, they do not know
what their partners talk about, the partners agree or disagree even they can‟t understand
their partners‟ emotion. That‟s why, they always ask for further information and in
some cases, they require the answer again and again but with unclear and equivocal
questions. The problem is: “how to understand clearly when to use and give negative
question? How to make a negative question in the proper situation? For all the abovementioned reasons, the researcher would like to introduce to English users the new
respect of negative question: “the syntactic and semantic features of English negative
questions with reference to Vietnamese(based on the selection of bilingual plays “An
Ideal Husband” and “Lady Windermere‟sfan”. Although, this aspect has beenstudied in
different areas,this study deals with syntactic and semantic features of negative
questions based on the selection of bilingual play,which helps learners make correct

English and Vietnamese?
- What are the use of negative questions in the selection of plays “An Ideal
Husband” and “ Lady Windermere‟s fan”?
1.5. Significanceof the study
- In term of theories: this study provide foundation theories for semantic and
syntactic features of negative question, and also provide information to help
students and teachers of English.
- In term of realities: the study will help both teachers and students use negative
questions correctly in their communication, teaching and learning of English.

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1.6. The organization of the study
The study consists of five chapters:
- Chapter 1: Introduction: this part shows the general view of the study, the
aims and objectives of study.
- Chapter 2: Literature review: in this part, author want to mention some
previous study, theoretical background and theoretical framework. From that
point,it makes the readers know the foundation sources of the topic: the syntactic
and semantic features of negative questions in English with reference to Vietnamese
(based on the selection of bilingual plays “An Ideal Husband” and “Lady
Windermere‟s fan”). In addition, it would be the foundation for the finding and
discussion.
- Chapter 3: Methodology: This part is to provide the data which author collected
and explains the ways and the reasons why author is able to collect the data
- Chapter 4: Finding and discussion: this is the most important part of the
study. It illustrates the results of study including: some general knowledge of
negative questions, the syntactic and semantic features of negative questions in
English with reference to Vietnamese equivalents.

attitude (surprise, anger,…).Many grammarians have described negative questions
like L.G.Alexander (1990), Betty Scrapper Azar (2002), Anne Seaton( 2007),
&Randolph Quirk (1973) and so on. They have their own way to describe
thenegative questions. Fundamentally, they concentrate their attention on the
definition, formation, functions of the negative questions, types of negative
questions and their uses. Moreover, negative questions in Vietnamese are also
described by such authors as Diep Quang Ban (2002), Nguyen Tai Can (1999),
Cao Xuan Hao (2003), Nguyen Kim Than (1997) and Nguyen Phu Phong (2002).
L.G. Alexander (1990) in Longman English Grammar constantly concernswith

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basic different uses between some questions. He focuses on Yes/ No questions,
Negative statements, Yes/ No answers. He only doesn‟t deal with the formation of
making Yes/ No questions. He also introduces theforms of negative alternative
questions. In negative question, he describes the full form and the short form.
Furthermore, he describes how to use stress and intonation in negative questions.
Betty Schrampfer Azar (2002) in Understanding and Using English
Grammar refers to the background knowledge of negative questions. He
givesspecific details for each negative question. He introduces more about the
forms of yes/ no and information questions, negative Wh- questions, negative tagquestions. He specifies forms of avoiding double negatives.
In the book Basic English Grammar book 1, Anne Seaton (2007) only
focuses his attention on two kinds of questions. They are yes/ no questions and
Wh-questions. He gives some more simple uses, functions and positions of the
questions. In addition, he pays much attention to the usages of some negative
questions such as yes/ no negative questions and wh- negative questions.
Randolph Quirk (1973) in the book A University Grammar of English gives
some features of negative questions or specific details of relationship between
subjects, predication with negative questions. In his opinion, assertion and nonassertion are some major types of sentence.

(Eastwood,2002,p.27).According to Vietnamese linguist Le Quang Thiêm,questions
are sentences whose main purpose is to find out more about something we have not
known or have not understood yet.
Examples: Do you speak French? How can I do that?
As you can see,the two above definitions share the same idea with each other .
However, as Le Quang Thiêm states,in reality,sometimes we ask questions so as
not to seek for extra information but for other purposes .For instance,Vietnamese
can use questions in order to greet each other.
Forexamples: Nam,đang xem phim hả?
Cháu đang đi đâu thế?
It is also true in English .We ask questions such as:“Hi there,what are you
doing?”,“Hello,how are you ? ”which do not really need a particular reply. When
doing research about questions,we may also come across some ideas defining
question as a sentence that needs a reply.This definition is not accurate because I
have mentioned,there are some kinds of questions which do not need answers.
Among the mare rhetorical questions and paradoxical questions.Sometimes we ask
questions as a means of expressing the way we feel or as away of showing our
frustration, anxiety, agreement, anger etc.Wec all the serhetorical questions.
Forexamples: What the hell are you talking about?
There is also another type of question that cannot be answered because there is
no answer to it.We call this type of question aparadox.The most famous paradoxical
question is:“What came first :the chicken or the egg?”

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In conclusion, we can see that there are many different ways to define a
question, largely based on their purpose of usage. Most of them are not
contradictory to each other, they are complementary to each other.The most
accurate and concise definition I think is the one in “Oxford guide to English



„Yes/no‟ questions are formed by changing the order of the subject and the
verb group. If the verb group consists of more than one word, you put the first word
at the beginning of the sentence, in front of the subject and put the rest of the verb
group after the subject. For example:Will you have finished by lunchtime? ; Has he
been working? If you are using a simple tense, you use an appropriate form of the
main verb after the subject. For example:Do you meet Jane in London? Does Anne
do this sort of thing often? However, if the main verb is „be‟ you put the form of
„be‟ at the beginning of the clause, followed by the subject and „do‟ must not be
used. For example: Are you Okay? Was it lonely without us?
You can use a structure such as „Have you got…?‟ Or a structure such as „Do
you have…?‟ in yes-no questions. People no longer say „Have you…?‟ when using
„have‟ as the main verb. If you want to ask a „yes/no‟ question, you do not usually
use the normal word order of a statement. However, you can use the normal word
order of a statement to ask a „yes/no‟ question if you want to express surprise, or to
check that something is true. For example:
You‟ve flown this machine before?
You‟ve got two thousand already?
Wh-questions: Wh-questions are used to ask about the identity of the people
or things involved in an action, or about the circumstances of an action. Whquestions begin with a „wh‟word. The „wh‟-words are:
- the adverbs „how‟, „when‟, „where‟, and „why‟;
- the pronouns „who‟, „whom‟, „what‟, „which‟, and „whose‟;
- the determiners „what‟, „which‟, and „whose‟.
When a „wh‟-word is the subject of a question, the „wh‟-word comes first,
followed by the verb group. The word order of the clause is the same as that of an
ordinary statement. For example:
- What happened?
- Who could have done it?
The form of a question is similar when the „wh‟-word is part of the subject.

Answers
i Have you seen it?
I have seen it.
I haven‟t seen it.
ii Who broke it?
I broke it.
Jane broke it?
The waiter broke it.
One of my sons broke it
Instead of saying I have seen it to the question Have you seen it?we might say
“Yes” or “I have.” Or “Yes, I have” or „Yes, I have seen it.” And so on. Although
these are different in form they are equivalent, and we will regard them as the same
answer. Similarly for the negatives: “I have not seen it; I have not; I haven‟t; No;
No, I haven‟t”.These all count as the same answer. It is in this sense of the term that
we can say that question “Have you seen it” defines a closed set of just two possible
answers. Questions like “Who broke it?”, on the other hand define in principle an
open set of answers: there are definitely many others besides those given as “I
broke it; Jane broke it;The waiter broke it; One of my sons broke it.”

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At the pragmatic level, the pragmatic concept of question is an illocutionary
category. Prototypically, a question in this sense is an inquiry. To make a genuine
inquiry is to ask a question to which one doesnot know the answer with the aim of
obtainingthe answer from the addressee. An inquiry can be thought ofas effective a
kind of a directive - a directive (usually a request) to the addresseeto supply the
answer. The directive forceis indirect, however, since the propositional content of
the implied directive is not the same as that which is actually expressed. As with the
indirect directive, the request force can be signaled explicitly in the nonpropositional component by the marker please,as in “What is the time, please?

b. Alternative questions
Alternative questions have as answers a set of alternatives given in the
question itself. For example, the answers to the question “Is it good or bad?” are
“It‟s good” and “It‟s bad”, which are derivable directly from the question. This
example contains two alternatives, but there may be more: e.g. three in“Would you
like to come in the morning, the afternoon or the evening?” The propositional
content of an alternative question is equivalent to, a disjunction of propositions,
disjunction being the relation expressed by “or”. Each of these propositions gives
the content of one of the answers. The propositional content of“Is it cool or cold?,
for example, is “It is cool or cold”, which is logically equivalent to “It is cool or it
is cold”.
The essential characteristic of alternative questions is the coordinator “or”
which relates the alternatives. The or-coordination is normally prosodically marked
by a rise on the first coordinate and fall on the final one, as indicated by rising
arrow ↓↓↓↑ which is put after a word or a phrase that is uttered with rising pitch and
by falling arrow ↓ after a word or ↓phrase that is uttered with a falling pitch. For
example:
- Is it a man ↑ or a woman ↓?
- Is it real ↑ or is it false ↓?
- You‟re staying here ↑ or coming with him ↓?
- Tea ↑ or coffee ↓?
With multiple coordination the intermediate coordinates take rising intonation
like the first, for example: Would you like tea ↑ coffee ↑, or orange juice
↓?Alternative questions usually have closed interrogative syntax. In Is it a man ↑ or
a woman ↓? the or-coordination is within the clause, whereas in Is it real ↑ or is it
false ↓? It is between clauses which are two interrogative clauses but a single
question. It is also possiblefor an alternative question to have the form of a
declarative as You‟re staying here ↑ or coming with him ↓?, or of a clause fragment
as Tea ↑ or coffee ↓?. Prosodically marked declaratives, however, are much less
readily used for alternative questions than for polar ones; this is no doubt because

iv. Are you ready or not?
v. Are you, or are you not, ready?
c. Variable questions or Wh- questions
- Variable questions
Variable questions or Wh-questions have a propositional content consisting of
an open proposition (which has a place left open) containing a variable. The
answers express closed propositions (which haven‟t left anything available to be
filled in) derived by substituting a particular value for the variable. We look at the
variable question “What did they give Ann?” The answers may be: “They gave Ann
some books; They gave Ann the key; They gave Ann everything she asked

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for…”“Some books, the key, everything she asked for” are the variables which have
different values. Prototypically, there is no logical limit to the number of different
possible values so that the set of answers will be open-ended. These questions have
the form of an open interrogative clause. They are marked by a phrase containing an
interrogative word-whose role is to express the variable. The question may consist
solely of the interrogative element, forming a clausal fragment: Who?; What about
the others?; and so on.
When the interrogative phrase has a function other than that of subject of the
interrogative clause, it is normally fronted to pre-nuclear position, and in main
clauses this triggers subject-auxiliary inversion. For example: “Where are those
senses located?” “What were the results of that examination?”
Fronting of a non-subject interrogative phrase is not obligatory in main
clauses: it can remain in situ, i.e. in the default position of corresponding noninterrogative phrases, following the verb. For example: “And those senses are
located where?” It is easy for us to see the difference in the following presentation.
Fronted inversion
i.Where are those senses located?

In the book "A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language"
(Randolph Quirk, Sidney Greenbaum, Geoffrey Leech, Jan Svartvik, 1985),
question can be classified into three major kinds according to the types of reply
they expect such as Yes/No question, WH-questions and Alternative questions.
This way of classification, in my opinion, is suitable and logical. That‟s why I
take this classification for the study in my thesis.
Questions that expect answer is affirmation or negation, as in "Have you
finished the book?" are Yes/No questions. Specially, Yes/No question also known
as a polar question.
Polar questions have divergent forms. The most prototypical form is
interrogative clause, as in “Is Jane coming?”
Not all yes/no questions have subject-operator inversion. Another form is
declarative question. The declarative question is type of question which is identical
in form to a declarative, except for the final rising intonation. It rather casual in tone
as in "You think I'm kidding you? You think it's a joke to have to walk home on a
clear night with an umbrella? You think that because I'm quirky I don't
hurt? You've got it backwards. I'm quirky because I hurt."
(Jack Weston as Danny in The Four Seasons, 1981)
A further type of Yes /No question which conveys positive or negative orientation is
Tag question like “a. She's Italian, isn't she? ; b. She doesn't have any
children, does she?”
Huddleston noted that Interrogative clause added as a supplement to the
declarative clause is called the tag. The declarative clause is referred as an anchor
(Huddleston & Pullum, 2002, p. 892). A special rule is that a negative tag is
attached to a positive anchor. This is easily seen in “a. He is a professor in your
university, isn‟t he? And “b. He isn‟t a professor in your university, is he?
Tags questions can be used for imperatives or suggestions. After
imperatives, "won‟t you" often used to invite people to do things, and
"will/would/can/can‟t/could you" to tell or ask people to do things (Swan, 2000,
p.480). For instance:

(Alternative question), câu hỏi dùng ngữ điệu (Declarative questions), câu hỏi có
tiểu từ chuyên dụng (Specialized copulative questions). However, with Le Quang
Thiem, he simply categorizes Vietnamese question just into two types in term of
semantic such as alternative questions and variable questions (Lê, 2004, p. 225).
Vietnamese Alternative questionshave the answers as the alternatives,
usually two alternatives. There are three subtypes: alternative questions marked by
là/hay là, có…không/ phải không/đã…chưa, à/ư/ nhỉ/ nhé.

16


Alternative questions marked by là/ hay là (or) may have the answers given
or negate the information in the question.
a. Mẹ em thích ăn bánh tráng hay bánh xèo?
b. Bánh tráng/ Bánh xèo/ Cả hai (both)/ Chẳng món nào cả (none of them).
Alternative questions marked by có…không, ….phải không, ….đã chưa have
the polar opposites.
a. Cậu có đi học Anh văn tối nay không? - Có/không
b. Bố con về hay chưa? - Dạ chưa/ Dạ rồi.
c. Con đánh vỡ cái lọ này phải không? - Dạ vâng/Dạ không phải.
Alternative questions marked by à, nhỉ, ư, sao, chứ…These words are put at
the end of the sentence.
a. Tối nay không đi chơi à? - Có chứ/ không.
b. Hôm nay là hạn cuối nộp bài ư? - Ừ/không.
Another kind of questions in Vietnamese is variable questions. This kind
uses the interrogative words or phrases to ask for information such as: ai (who),
gì/cái gì/nào(what), đâu/ở đâu (where), khi nào/bao giờ (when), sao (why),…For
example:
a. Khi nào cậu về quê nghỉ tết?- Một tuần nữa
b. Ai đi với cậu hôm qua?- Mẹ tớ.

we cannot say this one is correct and that one is not . They are just different points
of view and might be based on different foundations. Because the purpose of this
paper is making a comparison between English and Vietnamese negative

17


questions, therefore, I will take the classification of Lê Quang Thiêm, which seems
the most logical one related to the two languages, as the foundation for my
analysis.
2.2.3. Negation in English
2.2.3.1. Overview of negation.
The definition of negation abounds with many newsworthy viewpoints. Many
scholars reckon that negation shows dissension, disagreement and a contradictory
opinion or quality of something that is absent. In the Longman Dictionary of
Contemporary English, published in 1994, negation is defined as the act of stating
that something does not exist or is untrue, and the Dictionary of Vietnamese,
published in 1998 by the Centre of dictionary at Da Nang Publishing House says
that negation is the act of rejecting the existence, the necessity of something; is the
opposition to affirmation. The fact has shown thatthere also have been many
definitions of negation made by many scholars so far: Frank, Marcela (undated;
205) states that negation shows disagreement, denial, absence of somebody or
something, or an opposite idea or quality. Forming a negative clause means putting
“not” directly after operator. Semantically speaking, Frank has pointed out the
importance of negation in establishing “a counter–part” of affirmation.
Grammatically speaking, the insertion of “not” in predicate of a sentence is a signal
of negation.
My research mainly bases on English Grammar book “A University Grammar
of English” (R, Quirk.1973). According to him, the negation of a simple sentence is
accomplished by inserting not (abbreviated n‟t) between the operator and the