REFERENCE BASE
AIN’T

O.T. FORD

‘Ain’t’ is a contraction of ‘am not’. As such, it was originally completely grammatical when used with the first-person singular: ‘I am not’ → ‘I ain’t’. For the same reason, it was originally ungrammatical for any other person or number (for example, ‘you ain’t’, ‘it ain’t’). In time, of course, it was adopted in some dialects for other persons and numbers, or even all persons and numbers. In those dialects, it has been and is grammatical.

At the same time, the standard dialects avoided this expansion of ‘ain’t’, and prescriptive grammarians rejected ‘ain’t’ so fully that they pushed ‘ain’t’ out of usage even for the first-person singular. ‘I ain’t’ is no longer used in standard English.

The formula pronoun + ‘be’ + ‘not’ can be contracted in two ways: the form of ‘be’ can be contracted with the pronoun, or it can be contracted with ‘not’: ‘you are not’ → ‘you’re not’ or ‘you aren’t’. The second is no longer available in standard English for the first-person singular, but the first is (‘I’m not’), so the prescriptive ‘ain’t’-avoidance is not an issue in declarative sentences. In questions, though, the subject and verb are inverted, and the only available form of contraction is ‘be’ with ‘not’: ‘Isn’t it?’, ‘Aren’t you?’. Given the prevalence of contractions in normal speech, the non-existence of a contracted form of the inverted first-person singular (‘Ain’t I?’) is rather unnatural. The result of extreme ‘ain’t’-avoidance has been to produce an alternative: ‘Aren’t I?’. No other use of ‘are’ with ‘I’ is grammatical in standard English (or any other dialect, for that matter). It seems clear that ‘aren’t I’ exists entirely to avoid ‘ain’t’, and was developed by those who believed ‘ain’t’ was so universally wrong that it would be better to use an otherwise-wrong form of ‘be’.

© O.T. FORD