wasn't
See also: wasnt
English
Alternative forms
- wadn't, warn't, wudn't, wunt (pronunciation spellings)
- wa'n't, wan't (pronunciation spellings, colloquial, dated)
- wasnt (informal, nonstandard)
- wazn't, wuzzent (eye dialect)
Etymology
Contraction of was not. By surface analysis, was + -n't.
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ˈwɒz.ənt/, [ˈwɒz.n̩(ʔ)], (colloquial, Yorkshire) IPA(key): [ˈwɒn.(ʔ)]
Audio (Southern England): (file) - (General American) IPA(key): /ˈwʌz.ənt/, [ˈwʌz.n̩(t)] (colloquial, dialectal) IPA(key): [ˈwʌd.n̩(t)]
Audio (General American): (file) - Hyphenation: was‧n't
- Rhymes: (RP) -ɒzənt
- Rhymes: (GA) -ʌzənt
Verb
wasn't
- (chiefly in the negative, auxiliary) Contraction of was not.[1]
- 1899, Hughes Mearns, Antigonish:
- Yesterday, upon the stair / I met a man who wasn’t there / He wasn’t there again today / I wish, I wish he’d go away …
Derived terms
See also
References
- ^ Zwicky, Arnold M[elchior].; Pullum, Geoffrey K[eith]. (1983), “Cliticization vs. Inflection: English n’t”, in Language[1], volume 59, number 3, archived from the original on 21 October 2020, pages 502–513