It’s for identifying negative intention regardless of time scale. “Done” can take on any tense in the did/do/does/will do/might do/should have done spectrum.
My 6 year old has a favorite ungrammatical phrase:
Mom: Don’t hit your brother!
Aaron: I amn’t!
I have corrected that a million times, but he still says it. Now I think it’s really cute, and I don’t bother any more. I’m guessing I’ll be sad when he stops saying it. Sort of like when my younger son stopped calling his older brother Ah-ee.
I’ve never heard the expression before, and even reading the explanations offered I’m still not sure I understand what it’s intended to convey in half of the examples. What are Leroy and Jerome doing, refusing to do things?
On the other hand, I’ve been known to occasionally say “ayuh” without the requisite disdainful irony.
I speak like this–though not as bad as “I ain’t done it.”
Usually, “I ain’t had the chance” but “I figure I’ll get there” just as soon as I can. Or, “I reckon some dude” had looked at it before I did. “Nawhaaain’t gonna say” whether someone did see it or not, but “Yessir,” “I’ll git 'er done.”
Tripler
Born and raised in New Jersey, but speaks with a Montana/Arizona/North Dakota accent. [sub]Or a Minnesota/Canadian one if I’m “bein’ properlike”.[/sub]
This isn’t ungrammatical, but it sure as hell is confusing.
If you asked someone, “Could you give me a ride home from work today?” and s/he said, “I don’t care to give you a ride,” you’d probably think you should ask someone else.
If you’re from WV, and perhaps other places, “I don’t care to” = “I don’t mind.”
I had this conversation a couple of days ago with a work colleague who happens to be from my WV hometown.
She: “Could you volunteer to cover the lunch hour?”
Legitimate questions and reactions. Please understand that this may apply mostly to young people or to poorly (if at all) educated people young or old and that it may well be a regional thing. I didn’t mean to imply that it’s a frequently heard thing, and the reason I even posted about it at all is that it’s been ringing in my mind from my own childhood and I just wanted to see if I’m alone or nearly so in my memory of the expression.
The examples were meant to place into some contexts the ways I’ve heard it used, but I’d say the primary usage I’m familiar with is more of a substitute for “I didn’t do it” or “I don’t intend to do it.”
Most of the time it’s said with a challenging or disrespectful tone and is said so as to be emphatic that the speaker has no intention of admitting something he or she may have done or else he or she has no desire or intention of doing something proposed or demanded by an authority figure.
This may be a closer to real life scene:
Principal: Kevin, I want you to apologize for taking Samantha’s lunch money from her.
Kevin: I ain’t done it.
What Kevin “ain’t done” likely has nothing to do with whether or not he may have taken the child’s money. It’s more a statement that an apology will not be forthcoming. In effect, it’s a hybrid denial and a refusal to take blame for it even if it’s true.
If the expression is unfamiliar to you, I’m not surprised. But if you have some similar violation of accepted English that’s in the ballpark with this usage, I’d like to know that my childhood experiences aren’t unique with such sayings.
Only example #2 would accommodate the title phrase. It’s a response to a question; not a response to a statement, and the question would have to be one that is asking if the person had actually done something. Even the most grammatically incorrect person can see that. You’d have to be sort of retarded to use it in the other ways suggested.
That could be true, but I have heard the expression used in multiple ways, even though you’re right about #2 fitting the expanded description. I contend that kids of the pre-school and early school grades use (or did use when I was a kid) similar constructions that defy grammatical sense. And they weren’t necessarily retarded in a mentally competent sense, but surely in an educational sense.
The main point to this one expression is that it’s a multi-purpose utterance. It can mean:
Hmm, Zeldar, does the regional accent perhaps make “done” and “doing” sound similar? Otherwise, I find the “future tense” examples of the use of this phrase to be utterly bizarre.
Possibly, but I don’t remember it that way. I suspect the “I ain’t gon do it” version (which is probably more commonly heard) would be preferred over a deliberate future tense abuse. There’s no doubt, however, that a countrified Southern accent (think Sling Blade) would help to put this utterance in context, and have it be spoken by the young Lucas Black character.
I haven’t done it.
I didn’t do it.
I never did it.
It’s not finished yet.
I don’t plan to do it.
These could all be better (and closer to grammatical) versions.
I use “ain’t” quite frequently, but the phrase I ain’t done it to me can only mean “I haven’t done it” or “I didn’t do it.” I have also said “Ain’t gonna” instead of “I’m not going to.”
I don’t have a (ain’t got no?) problem with ain’t. Variations in dialect fascinate me.
Not really. I’ve worked with student writing for several years, gathered from all over the country. As a general rule, the kids from the northeast have excellent grammar, even in the early elementary grades. They can’t spell to save their lives, but you won’t see subject-verb agreement issues in 90%+ of their essays, unlike even high schoolers in some parts of the country. The littlest ones (7-10 years old) have some issues with keeping things all in one tense from paragraph to paragraph, but other than that… We’ve invented new definitions for words, but those are subject to grammar too. Wicked, for example, modifies adjectives and adverbs. Wicked cold, wicked loud, wicked slowly, and wicked big, yes. Wicked + noun, or Wicked + verb, no. People will correct you if you use it wrong
As an interesting aside, I can’t say what state because of non-disclosure, but a Department of Education head from a southern state told some of our people that they were “biased, elitist northerners” for thinking that lack of subject-verb agreement is an issue of grammar rather than a “regional variance.” That wouldn’t have been so hard to swallow if they didn’t insist we give the papers an individual score for grammar rather than just one score overall effect as some other states request! OTOH, kids from that state can spell the word “maybe” which is something that escapes many of our high schoolers. When it comes to teaching English, it’s clear that different battles are pitched in different regions.
