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Isn't that why you're here? Let's go. Welcome to another Happy English
podcast, coming to you from New York City. And here's your English teacher,
Michael. All right, thank you John, and thanks everyone. It's
Michael here from Happy English and I help people speak English better. And this
is Happy English Podcast, Episode seven twelve. Negative questions negative questions are questions
that begin with the negative forms of the be verb and other auxiliary verbs.
Like their cousins tag questions, Negative questions are often used to check what we
think is true. Let's look at the construction first. Aren't we going to
take a break for lunch? We start the sentence with the negative form of
the be verb aren't, followed by the subject we Aren't we going to take
a break for lunch? This has the same meaning as we're going to take
a break for lunch, aren't we? Here's another example. Doesn't the boss
want us to attend the meeting? Here? We start the sentence with the
negative form of do, which is doesn't, followed by the subject the boss.
Doesn't the boss want us to attend the meeting? As I said,
we basically use negative questions to check our understanding of the situation, much like
tag questions are used. Imagine you see someone at a cafe who who looks
familiar. Maybe it's someone you met at a party one time. You could
check your idea by asking them like this, aren't you Jack's friend. I
think we met at his birthday party a few months ago. Here's another situation.
You remember that there's a meeting this week, but you didn't put it
in your calendar. You can ask your coworker like this, don't we have
a sales meeting this week? In both of these examples, we expect the
answer to be yes, and we're really just asking to confirm what we think
is true. Of course, in the opposite case, when you think that
something is not true or something didn't happen, you can use a negative question.
Here's an example of that. You see your roommate is still sleeping at
nine o'clock in the morning. It seems like she doesn't feel well. You
can ask her, aren't you going to go to work today? Don't you
feel well? Here's another example Imagine you're at a really boring meeting. You're
hoping the meeting will be over soon, but you're pretty sure that's not gonna
happen now, so you can turn to your colleague and say something like this,
can't we leave yet? Isn't this going to be over soon? In
each of these examples, you basically have a pretty good idea what the answer
is going to be, but you ask the question anyway just to confirm.
In a similar way, we use negative questions when we ask rhetorical questions.
These are questions that you ask as a way of making a statement, so
you don't expect the other person to answer. Oh, wait, a question
you but you don't expect an answer. Oh that's weird man. Yes,
but in English we quite often express our opinions indirectly, and negative questions are
one example of that. You probably know statements beginning with wh question words like
what and how? What a nice day? How beautiful? What a fun
party? Well, we can use negative questions in the same way, like
this, isn't this a nice day? Aren't these flowers beautiful? Don't they
make the best pizza? Here? Questions like these are not really looking for
information, They are just used to express your opinion. Let's compare, if
I'm at a new school on the first day of class, I may ask
someone, is this the right classroom for Michael's English lessons? I ask a
direct question like that because I'm really not sure whether or not this is in
fact the right place or not. Is this the right classroom? Is a
genuine question used to obtain information. But maybe I think this is the right
classroom, but I'm not one hundred percent sure. I may try checking my
idea with a tag question, this is Michael's classroom, isn't it? I
can do the same thing with a negative question, isn't this Michael's classroom?
I can find out about whether or not I'm in the right room with either
question. But when your friend brings you to their favorite pizzeria and during the
meal says, isn't this a great restaurant, they are not trying to find
information. Isn't this a great restaurant? Is a rhetorical question, which is
an indirect way to give an opinion. In the nineteen sixties, the California
pop group The Beach Boys asked us one of the most famous rhetorical questions of
that decade. Wouldn't it be nice if we were older? That's interesting to
me because nowadays the question I always ask is wouldn't it be nice if I
were younger? We also use negative questions when we offer something or invite someone.
Here are some examples of that. Hey, thanks for coming to the
office. Won't you sit down? Won't you sit down? Is a polite
way of inviting your guests to have a seat. Here are some other examples.
Wouldn't you like a cool drink? Why don't you let me help you
move that heavy box? Keep in mind, the best way to remember this
and any other word or phrase in English is to take that word or phrase,
write it in a sentence that's true for you or true in your world,
and then memorize your sentences. By the way, can you imagine getting
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this English point with speaking and writing checked by me. To learn more or
to see some of the example sentences from this lesson, just visit Myhappy English
dot com. That's Myhappy English dot com and choose podcast lesson seven twelve.
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