neither
Listen:Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
neither /ˈnʌɪðə, ˈniː-/
▶determiner & pronoun not the one nor the other of two people or things; not either. ▶adverb
- 1 used before the first of two (or occasionally more) alternatives (the others being introduced by ‘nor’) to indicate that they are each untrue or each do not happen.
- 2 used to introduce a further negative statement.
– origin ME: alt. (by assoc. with either) of OE nawther, contr. of nāhwæther (from nā ‘no’ + hwæther ‘whether’).
usage: When neither is followed by nor, it is important in good English style that the two halves of the structure mirror each other: she saw herself as neither wife nor mother rather than she neither saw herself as wife nor mother. See also usage at either.
'neither' also found in these Oxford entries:
allophone
- betwixt
- comme ci, comme ça
- commensal
- contrary
- correlative
- discard
- free
- here
- incompleteness theorem
- indifferent
- mid
- more
- morganatic
- neuter
- neutral
- nomological
- nor
- no-show
- oblique
- penthouse
- prokaryote
- Roland
- sexless
- skew
- slack
- solitary wave
- so-so
- straight chain
- syllepsis
- Tajik
- weak interaction
- your
