Word
weren't
Phoneticswer·ent
Definition
v. the short way to say 'were not'. You use it to talk about more than one person or thing in the past.
v. the contracted form of 'were not'. Functions as the past plural or second-person singular indicative of 'be' in the negative.
Examples
“They weren't at home when I called.”
“The students weren't prepared for the surprise test, so the teacher decided to postpone it until Friday.”
“If the conditions weren't so hazardous, the rescue team would have reached the summit hours ago, but the visibility made any further progress impossible.”
Examples
simple
“They weren't at home when I called.”
contextual
“The students weren't prepared for the surprise test, so the teacher decided to postpone it until Friday.”
complex
“If the conditions weren't so hazardous, the rescue team would have reached the summit hours ago, but the visibility made any further progress impossible.”
Usage
Used with 'you', 'we', 'they', and plural nouns. In formal writing, the full form 'were not' is often preferred.
Pitfall
They wasn't there
They weren't there
Learners often use 'wasn't' for all subjects, but 'weren't' must be used with plural subjects and 'you'.
Etymology
were + -n't
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Collocations
Scan code
englishreference.com/q/werent