Auxiliary Reduction The Clitics Forms
possible second form, which is the negative contraction, is it isn’t. However, the cliticization tends to occur in the auxiliary it’s not rather than the negative it
isn’t . The researcher certainly believes that it is because the auxiliary occurs first
before the negative according to the example sentence. So the auxiliary reduction is chosen better than the negative contraction. Take a look at another example for
this case:
3-HE92FS2426 The name of Mama Goose is rather
unique for a restaurant that doesn’t have goose on the menu.
From 3-HE92FS2426, it can be seen that there is only one possible cliticization. That is the negative contraction, doesn’t. By observing the sentence,
the researcher is convinced that the negative contraction occurs because it is unlikely to apply auxiliary reduction in the sentence. It is because there is no
contraction that occurred in the auxiliary verb, does. However, there is another example in order to get the certain information of this phenomenon. It can be seen
briefly as follows: 3-HE120HMM6782
Several crusades and four centuries later, the palace hasn’t been heard.
According to 3-HE120HMM6782, there are also two possible cliticizations that occurred. However, the negative contraction is chosen even
though the auxiliary verb, has, can be contracted. By looking and comparing the previous patterns, the researcher suggests that the auxiliary reduction cannot be
occurred because the head of the cliticization is not a pronoun. As a result, the negative contraction is chosen to cliticize those words.
Therefore, in this subchapter there is a theory that is applied. It is the theory of contracted forms in negative contraction by Zwicky and Pullum 1983.
HighEnd magazine has 24 contracted not with percentage 24. On the other hand, HighEnd Teen magazine has 57 negative contractions with percentage
22. In order to get the exact details of the cliticization, a table will be used to show the precise features. It can be seen as follows:
NO. CONTRACTED
NEGATIVE OCCURENCES
PERCENTAGE
1. Don’t
9 9
2. Aren’t
4 4
3. Doesn’t
3 3
4. Wasn’t
2 2
5. Can’t
2 2
6. Isn’t
1 1
7. Won’t
1 1
8. Hasn’t
1 1
TOTAL 24
24 Table 6. Negative contraction in HighEnd magazine
From the table beyond, the negative contraction which occurred the most in HighEnd is don’t with nine occurrences and percentage 9. Then, aren’t
becomes the second with four occurrences. Doesn’t comes next with total three occurrences. After that, there are two contracted negative with two occurrences.
They are wasn’t and can’t. The rest of negative contractions are isn’t, won’t, and hasn’t
with the same one occurrence. On the other hand, the identical table of negative contraction in HighEnd
Teen magazine can be seen as the comparison:
NO. CONTRACTED
NEGATIVE OCCURENCES
PERCENTAGE
1. Don’t
30 12
2. Didn’t
5 2
3. Doesn’t
4 1
4. Couldn’t
3 1
5. Haven’t
3 1
6. Aren’t
3 1
7. Can’t
3 1
8. Won’t
2 1
9. Wasn’t
2 1
10. Wouldn’t
1 1
11. Isn’t
1 1
TOTAL 57
23 Table 7. Negative contraction in HighEnd Teen magazine
According to the table, don’t becomes the most negative contraction which occurred in the magazine same as the previous one. It has 31 occurrences from 57
in total with percentage 12. The second most contracted negative goes to didn’t with only five occurrences. Therefore, the gap between the first and the second is
pretty large. Then, there is doesn’t with four occurrences following by couldn’t, haven’t
, aren’t, and can’t with three occurrences respectively. After that, there are also two negative contractions which have the same amount of occurrences. They
are won’t and wasn’t with two occurrences correspondingly. The rest are wouldn’t, and isn’t with the same single occurrence.