Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Amn't

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. (non-admin closure) Ron Ritzman (talk) 02:13, 28 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Amn't[edit]

Article about a word. Nothing more than a dictionary entry. Powers ^T 14:42, 23 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Redirect to Ain't. Same word, really, differences in dialect aside (indeed, when I got a copy of Mogwai's Happy Songs for Happy People and ripped it to my computer, I thought Gracenotes had a typo in the entry for the CD) Sceptre ^(talk) 14:53, 23 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. The usage of amn't is distinctively different from that of ain't (e.g. in the double negative referred to in the article), as is its provenance. It would be lost in the other article. If this is redirected to ain't, then shouldn't ain't in turn be redirected to copula (linguistics)? And, by the same logic, Hiberno-English should be subsumed within English language, etc, etc. This is emphatically not just "a dictionary entry". SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 15:19, 23 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Before I !vote, please could you explain how it's different to a dictionary entry? Surely provenance, usage and etymology of words belong on Wiktionary, not here?—S Marshall ^Talk/_Cont 15:31, 23 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

S Marshall is right - I too would like to see the case for keeping. pablo_hablo. 21:42, 23 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: I agree that the article is a bit thin, and does not at present contain much more than would fit in a dictionary, but I don't like the argument that it is inherently "nothing more than a dictionary entry" because it is an "article about a word" – which seems to be what the nominator is saying. By that logic, there is no justification for the article on ain't either, or for many other articles about words (sic comes to mind). I also reject the "same word, really" fallacy expressed above, and please note that the fact that one editor had not heard the word and thought it was a misprint is completely irrelevant. I thought one of the benefits of WP (as compared to a paper encyclopaedia) was that it had room for this sort of small article on a minor grammatical/vocabulary issue. I think it's a pity to see it swallowed up by a related article on a quite different negative form of the verb to be. But a careful merge, giving due prominence to how amn't is different from ain't, could perhaps persuade me. SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 08:41, 24 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The two sentences in my nomination are separate. Had I intended the first to be an explanation of the second, I would have made that relationship clear. Powers ^T 12:24, 24 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Merge: A redirect is insufficient: although the amn't article is poor, it has information not in the ain't article. Clearly, amn't is not the "same" word as ain't; the former is only ever used for "am not", never for "is not", "are not", "has not", or "have not". A separate article is not justified: expanding amn't beyond a dictdef will make it overlap considerably with ain't. A bold mention in the intro, or a dedicated subsection, might be in order. jnestorius^(talk) 23:37, 23 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - No applicable deletion rationale given, since this is already more than a dictionary definition. It is also sourced. A merge into a section of ain't can be discussed on the talk pages. — LinguistAtLarge • Talk 05:18, 26 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Language-related deletion discussions. -- — LinguistAtLarge • Talk 05:23, 26 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. Well referenced, distinct from Ain't, and more than a dicdef. —An gr 06:29, 26 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Knock me over with a feather. I didn't say it was nothing more than a dictionary definition; I said it was nothing more than a dictionary entry. Two straw-man arguments in a row! Amazing! Powers ^T 12:51, 26 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- Your argument still doesn't hold, since it isn't a dictionary entry either. —Angr 16:29, 26 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  - Again you misinterpret my words. I didn't say it was a dictionary entry, which implies that it's written in correct dictionary style. I said it's nothing more than a dictionary entry, meaning no meaningful content would be lost by converting it into correct dictionary style. Powers ^T 22:47, 26 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.