Negative Prefixes in English: UN-, DIS-, NON-, A-, AB-, AN-, ANTI-

Do you know how to turn positive words into negative words? It’s easy when you know your negative prefixes, which is the focus of this lesson. A prefix is one or more letters we add in front of a word to modify its meaning. There are many kinds of prefixes, but today we will talk about the prefixes that turn a word into its negative. As an example, you can turn “happy” into “unhappy”, “honest” into “dishonest”, and “fiction” into “non-fiction”. There are 12 different negative prefixes in English. This lesson will cover seven of them. The other five are covered my other lesson here, so be sure to complete your negative prefix collection by watching the other lesson after this one: Take the quiz on this lesson at TRANSCRIPT Hello. I’m Gill from engVid, and today we have a lesson on a way of increasing your vocabulary by turning a positive word into a negative one just by adding a few letters at the front, which is called a “negative prefix“. Okay. So, it’s a rather nice way of adding to the... All the words that you know in English. And in English, there are actually 12 different prefixes, negative prefixes, so what we’ve done: We have done two separate lessons. There’s another lesson covering five of the negative prefixes that all begin with the letter “i“. This one, we have seven, the other seven which all begin with different letters. Okay. So, just a way to increase your vocabulary, turning a positive word to a negative one. Right. So, let’s... let’s start. And looking first of all at the prefix: “un“ which makes something negative. So, if something is “believable“, you believe it. “That seems believable.“ If someone makes an excuse, why they’re late for... For their class or for work - they had a believable excuse; a believable reason why they were late. But if you think: “Oh, that doesn’t sou-... I don’t think I believe that. That doesn’t sound right. I think they’re lying“, basically. Telling a lie, then their... their reason is “unbelievable“. “That was unbelievable.“ Okay, so that turns it to the negative. So, there are a lot of words in English which you can add “un“ at the beginning. So, another one, if you’re “certain“ about something, you’re... You’re very sure about it. You know it’s true. But if you’re “uncertain“, then you’re not sure. Okay. “Fair“. If things are fair, then it’s... Everything is good; everybody is being treated equally and treated well. But if something is “unfair“. If someone’s handing out chocolates... I keep coming back to chocolates - I wonder why. If someone is handing out chocolates to a room full of people and they give five chocolates to one person, one chocolate to another person, and no chocolates to another person, then that seems a little bit unfair. That’s unfair; everyone should have an equal number. Okay. So, “unfair“. “Friendly“. We all try to be friendly and nice to each other. If people are friendly, that’s great. But if they’re “unfriendly“, if they’re not very nice, then that’s the opposite, of course. “Unfriendly“. “That woman was rather unfriendly.“ Okay. And then: “happy“. If you’re happy, everything’s going well; but then something bad happens and it makes you “unhappy“. “Unhappy“. Okay. “Kind“. When people behave nicely, they’re kind to each other. And then the opposite would be “unkind“, again, if someone does something not very nice. “That was an unkind thing to do.“ Okay. “Lucky“. If you’re a lucky person, if you... If you go in for competitions, and the lottery, things like that and you win some money or you win a prize quite often, then you’re a lucky person; good things happen to you. Or just life in general, you feel: “I’ve... I’ve been very lucky; getting a good job, finding somewhere nice to live, etc. I’ve been very lucky.“ But if... if it’s the opposite and a lot of things go wrong all the time, or you never win a prize or anything, or a competition, then you’re “unlucky“. “That was unlucky. That was an unlucky day; everything went wrong.“ Okay. “Popular“. If lots of people like you, then you’re popular. But if there’s someone that people don’t seem to like; they don’t have much to do with them, they don’t have a nice chat, a conversation with them, they stay away from them, then that person is “unpopular“. For whatever reason, people don’t like to be with that person; they’re unpopular. Okay. So, “sure“ is a bit like “certain“. “Certain“ and “sure“. “I’m... I’m sure I did well in the exam. I’m sure.“ But if you’re not sure, you feel a little bit “unsure“. You’re unsure about how you did in the exam; it’s hard to know: “Did I do well? I... I’m not sure. I’m unsure.“ Okay. And then, finally, in this column: “tidy“ is when you keep your room, your house tidy, everything looks nice, there’s not a lot of stuff lying all over the place. […]