| The contracted form n 't is not unusual in the English language, so this paper attempts to focus on the - 't form from the following aspects besides the literature reviews followed by research aim and scope. (1) the origins and varieties of negation in the English language: No-negation and Not-negation; the difference of ne and not in syntax; (2) the derivation of -n 't: main focus is on the irregularities of morphological and phonological realizations and on the proof of its being more like inflection than cliticization; (3) syntactic analysis of -n't: regarding that -n't occupies the head position of NEGP with its counterpart not occupying [NEG, Spec] ; the verification of modaln't is a lexical entry instead of being a composition of modal plus -n 't , which is attached to the preceding modal like won't being made up of wo+ plus -n 't , proposed by Radford; -n 't does not demonstrate agreement features; the application of the syntactic theory to some vernacular dialects; (4) semantic analysis: this part is concentrated on the negative scope caused by sentential negation and constituent negation. Heavy stress can be on the adverb not, but not applicable to —n 't because -n 't can only mean constituent negation; solution to ambiguity depends on the assumption of satisfying GB condition; (5) pragmatic analysis: this part first introduces the -n 't in daily conversation, with people preferring the contracted form instead of the full form, especially in interrogative sentences, reaching as high as 93%; then lay emphasis on the ain 't form, which represents more, such as wasn 't, didn't, don't, oughtn't, won't and even hadn't, besides the originally suggested am/is/are/have/has+n't; another aspect which arouses our interest is the word wont , which is now popular with some people and which tends to replace ain't concerning the past tense of copular ben't; that the reason of why *amn 't is unacceptable and that the -n't form is always combined with NPIs are also concluded in this part.
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