Learn English – What does “not” modify

grammarnegationsyntactic-analysis

The word "not" is an adverb. I am trying to clarify what it modifies.

1: Consider the sentence: "The person is not smart".

Is "not" modifying "is" or "smart"? How can I tell?

According to the Stanford Parser, the parse tree is:

(ROOT
  (S
    (NP (DT That) (NN person))
    (VP (VBZ is) (RB not)
      (ADJP (JJ smart)))
    (. .)))

2: Consider a second sentence: "That figure is not a person".

Is "not" modifying "a person"? If so, then "not" would be an adjective, yes?

(ROOT
  (S
    (NP (DT That) (NN figure))
    (VP (VBZ is) (RB not)
      (NP (DT a) (NN person)))
    (. .)))

In both cases, it looks like "not" is only modifying the verb.

Best Answer

I cannot (offhand) think of a case where an adverb directly modifies a noun, but rather modifies an adject that modifies a noun. You cannot say "the not man", but you can say "the not strong man".

Also in regards to not being an auxilary verb, it can't happen in a well-formed sentence. It easier to visualize the "is not" construction as a copular joined by the negation-adverb, which is a lot like saying "≠" (not equal to); however, since adverbs can attach to verbs or adjectives (or other adverbs) the construction "the man is not smart" could be, and probably should be connected to the predicate nominative forming [the man] [not smart], where other single adjectives like "dumb" or "uneducated" can replace the negated phrase "not smart".

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