Structure
［い］Adjective［く］+ ない
Examples:
おもしろく + ない
新しく + ない
Details
Part of Speech
Adjective
Word Type
Auxiliary Verb
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Standard
About い-Adjectives くない
The negative form of い-Adjectives in Japanese is created by using the conjunctive form of the adjective, followed by ない. conjunctive form just means 'agglutinative', or 'conjunctive' in Japanese. For い-Adjectives, this conjunctive form is created by removing い, and replacing it with く.
The ない used with い-Adjectives is considered to be a different word to the ない used with verbs. When used with い-Adjectives, ない itself is also an い-Adjective. This means that it follows the same rules as regular い-Adjectives. Due to ません (the polite negative form) being an auxiliary verb, it cannot be conjugated with い-Adjectives in the same way as verbs.
As can be seen here, you must first add the verb ある, and then conjugate it into its negative form using the auxiliary verb ません. This is how the polite negative is created.
Caution
As with regular い-Adjectives, you cannot use だ after ない. です is acceptable to create a semi-polite form, but is best used in spoken language only.
Related
Examples
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暑くないです。
It is not hot.
今日は寒くない。
It is not cold today.
これは楽しくないです。
This is not fun.
新しくないコンピューター。
A computer that is not new.
それは安くないです。
That is not cheap.
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い-Adjectives くない – Grammar Discussion
Most Recent Replies (4 in total)
Vaminta
It says “negative, standard” i.e. not polite. I forget to check and make this mistake all the time though
BreadmanNin
Using grammar patterns that are too polite or too casual are the number one thing that Bunpro gives warning messages for instead of marking wrong, so if that is really what the problem is here, that would be all the more reason to add a warning message in this case.
Ruslan_Montana
ゲームは難しくありません。
vs
ゲームは難しくない(です）What is the difference?
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