The English Double Modal Conspiracy

Diachronica ◽  
1994 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 199-212 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen J. Nagle
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Northern Ireland ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Southern United States ◽  
Generative Syntax ◽  
Syntactic Theory ◽  
Early Modern English ◽  
Xviie Siecle

SUMMARY The English double-modal combinations such as might could, used by over 20,000,000 speakers in the southern United States and by much smaller populations in Scotland and Northern Ireland, are nonetheless unknown to speakers of standard and colloquial varieties of other types of English. In syntactic theory, they are somewhat problematic for versions of generative syntax that hold that in English the modal auxiliary is the head of its clause, ruling out modal combinations. This article assumes, based on previous investigations (Nagle 1993, Montgomery & Nagle 1994), that today's double modals are innovations. It then argues that their rise in Early Modern English reflects a conspiracy of syntactic and semantic factors. RÉSUMÉ Les combinaisons anglaises des expressions modales doubles comme might could, malgr6 le fait que'elles sont utilisées par 20 millions locuteurs au sud des Etats Unis et en Ecosse et Irlande du Nord par une population beau-coup moins grande, ne sont pas connus parmi les locuteurs d'autres variantes anglaises, standard ou colloquial. En theorie syntaxique, elles s'averent un peu problématiques pour des types de syntaxe generative qui maintiennent que la modale auxiliaire represente la 'tete' de sa clause, ainsi excluant les combinaisons modales. Le present article, se basant sur des investgations precedantes (Nagle 1993, Montgomery & Nagle 1994), suppose que les modales doubles d'aujourd'hui représentent des innovations. II constate que son apparition dans 1'anglais moderne du XVIIe siecle reflete une 'conspiration' de facteurs syn-taxiques et semantique. ZUSAMMENFASSUNG Kombinationen doppelter Modalwörtern im Englischen wie might could, die von iiber 2 Millionen Sprechern in den Siidstaaten verwendet werden und auch von einer geringeren Bevolkerungszahl in Schottland und Nordirland, sind unter Sprechern anderer Varietaten, des Standards wie auch der Um-gangssprache, nicht bekannt. Fur die Syntaxtheorie, vor allem fur gewisse generative Modelle, sind solche Verwendungen dieser Art problematisch, und zwar deshalb, weil sie behaupten, daB das modale Hilfszeitwort gewisser-maßen den 'Kopf der jeweiligen Wortgruppe darstelle. Auf vorangegangene Forschungen (Nagle 1993, Montgomery & Nagle 1994) aufbauend, nimmt der vorliegende Aufsatz an, daB es sich bei diesen doppelten Modalkombinationen um Neuerungen handelt. Ihr Aufkommen im Frühneuenglischen sei eine 'Ver-schworung' syntaktischer und semantischer Faktoren.

The Early Modern English Short Vowels Noch Einmal, Again

Diachronica ◽  
1992 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger Lass
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Middle English ◽  
Old English ◽  
17Th Century ◽  
West Germanic ◽  
Short Vowels ◽  
Early Modern English ◽  
Xviie Siecle

SUMMARY The received wisdom among historians of English is that the modern quality/length distinction in the pairs /I, i:/, /u, u:/ is of ancient date, going back at least to Middle English, if not Old English or earlier (WGmc * /i, e:/, * /u, o:/ are the main sources). In a recent paper (Lass 1989), I claimed that these pairs were distinct only in length (/i, i:/, etc.) until well into the 17th century. This was contested by Minkova & Stockwell (1990) on the grounds that, inter alia, no such systems exist in modern West Germanic, and therefore cannot be reconstructed for earlier periods. In the present paper it is shown that in fact such systems are attested in geographically peripheral West Germanic dialects (Dutch, South German), and argued that this supports the conservative interpretation of the orthoepic descriptions of these pairs, which consistently show qualitative identity until the 1680s. RÉSUMÉ Selon l'opinion reçue dans l'érudition parmi les historiens de la langue anglaise la distinction qualité/longueur dans les paires A, i:/, /u, u:/ a des origines lointaines, remontant au moins à l'anglais moyen, peut-être même au viel anglais ou plus loin encore (germain occ. * /i, e:/, * /u, o:/ comme sources principales). Dans un article récent (Lass 1989), j'avais émis l'hypothèse que ces paires ne restaient distinctes qu'au niveau de la longueur (/i, i:/, etc.) et cela jusqu'à la fin du XVIIe siècle. Une telle opinion fut contestée par Minkova & Stockwell (1990) qui, en autres chose, se basèrent sur l'argument de tels systèmes n'existent pas dans les langues ouest-germaniques modernes et que, par conséquent, on ne pouvait pas reconstruire un tel système pour des périodes plus anciennes. Dans le présent article il est démontré qu'en effet de tels systèmes sont attestés dans des dialectes ouest-germains qui se trouvent géogra-phiquement à la périphérie (le hollandais, l'allemand méridional). Selon l'argument présenté ici, cette évidence mène à une interpretation conservatrice des descriptions orthoépiques de ces paires qui démontrent, d'une façon consistante, une telle identité qualitative jusqu'aux années 1680. ZUSAMMENFASSUNG Der traditionellen, von Historikern der englischen Sprache rezipierten Auf-fassung zufolge ist die Unterscheidung Qualität/Länge der Paare /I, i:/, /u, u:/ von hohem Alter, wenigstens bis zum Mittelenglischen zurückgehend, wenn nicht gar zum Altenglischen oder soger früher (WGerm. * /i, e:/, * /u, o:/ als deren Hauptquellen). In einem jüngeren Aufsatz (Lass 1989) vertrat ich die Auffassung, daß diese Paare (/i, i:/, usw.) bis weit ins 17. Jahrhundert hinein bestanden hätten. Diese Auffassung ist von Minkova & Stockwell (1990) zu-riickgewiesen worden, und zwar u.a. mit dem Hinweis darauf, daB solche Systeme in modernen westgermanischen Sprachen nicht bestünden und daher auch nicht fur frühere Zeiträume rekonstruiert werden könnten. Im vorlie-genden Artikel wird nachgewiesen, daB in der Tat solche Systeme in geogra-phisch am Rande befindlichen westgermanischen Dialekten (Niederländisch, Siiddeutsch) vorhanden sind. Dies sollte die vom Autor vertretene konservative Interpretation der orthoepischen Beschreibungen dieser Phonem-Paare unter-stiitzen, die bis in die 80er Jahre des 17. Jahrhunderts hinein in konsistenter Weise qualitative Identitaten aufgewiesen haben.

Preposition stranding with wh-relatives: a historical survey

2000 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 295-316 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gunnar Bergh ◽  
Aimo Seppänen
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Middle English ◽  
General Trend ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Historical Survey ◽  
Spoken English ◽  
Early Modern English ◽  
Preposition Stranding ◽  
Grammatical Change

In the course of their history, English wh-relatives are known to have undergone a syntactic change in their prepositional usage: having originally occurred only with pied-piped prepositions, they came to admit preposition stranding as an alternative pattern. The present article presents an overview of this process, showing a modest beginning of stranding in Late Middle English, an increase in Early Modern English, and then a clear decrease in the written language of today, against a more liberal use in spoken English, standard as well as nonstandard. The drop in the incidence of stranding is thus not an expression of a genuine grammatical change but due to notions of correctness derived from the grammar of Latin and affecting written usage. The general trend of the development outlined is mirrored by relative that, with which the pied piping attested in Middle English completely disappeared from the language.

Why worser is better: The double comparative in 16th- to 17th-century English

2001 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 193-208 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Schlüter
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Present Article ◽  
17Th Century ◽  
Written Language ◽  
Corpus Studies ◽  
Early Modern English ◽  
Corpus Data ◽  
Diachronic Development

In Early Modern English, double comparatives were often encountered in both spoken and written language. The present article investigates the redundantly marked comparative worser in relation to its irregular, but etymologically justified, counterpart worse. My aim is to examine the diachronic development of the form as well as its distribution in the written language of the 16th and 17th centuries. Two detailed corpus studies are used to reveal the set of parameters underlying the variation between worse and worser, which include system congruity, semantics, and standardization effects. However, the focus here is on the tendency to maintain an alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables, known as the Principle of Rhythmic Alternation. This prosodic principle (which has been argued to be particularly influential in English) turns out to be responsible for most of the results obtained in the analysis of the corpus data.

Variation in subject-verb concord in Early Modern English

1989 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 285-300 ◽  
Author(s):  
Guy Bailey ◽  
Natalie Maynor ◽  
Patricia Cukor-Avila
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Regional Variation ◽  
The United States ◽  
Similar Data ◽  
Number Agreement ◽  
Black And White ◽  
Early Modern English ◽  
Blacks And Whites ◽  
And Function

ABSTRACTDetermining the function of verbal -s in the Black English Vernacular (BEV) has been a major problem in sociolinguistics. Linguists have offered four answers to questions about the feature's origins and function, with -s seen as a case of hypercorrection, as a marker of durative/habitual aspect, as a variable marker of present tense (with the variation stemming from dialect mixture), and as a marker of historical present regardless of person and number. This article argues that confusion about -s results largely from four mistaken assumptions about it: (1) that -s did not exist in earlier varieties of BEV, (2) that the use of -s in the plural bears no relation to its use in the singular or to other processes such as the use of is as a plural or copula and auxiliary absence, (3) that -s has always functioned simply as a person/number marker in white vernaculars, and (4) that any role white vernaculars may have played in the variability of -s was a consequence of regional variation brought to the United States. This article addresses these assumptions by examining the function of -s, both in the singular and plural, and of plural is in the Cely Letters, written between 1472 and 1488, and by comparing the results to similar data in black and white vernaculars. The analysis shows that in the Cely Letters the presence of an NP subject strongly favors the occurrence of both singular and plural -s and also plural is. The same constraint operates on the same forms in older black and white vernaculars, and it affects copula and auxiliary absence as well. In the speech of younger blacks and whites, this constraint has begun to disappear as -s has become solely a marker of person/number agreement in white speech and as -s itself has disappeared in BEV.

scholarly journals The Development of long in Early Modern English: Impersonal Verbs of Desire in Focus

2021 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 110-132
Author(s):  
Noelia Chao-Castro
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Middle English ◽  
Construction Grammar ◽  
Grammatical Subject ◽  
Early Modern English

The class of English verbs of Desire in Present-Day English comprises verbs such as long or thirst, several of which are attested in earlier English in impersonal constructions characterised by the lack of a grammatical subject. In English, the impersonal construction decreased in frequency between 1400 and 1500, and effectively went out of use during the sixteenth century. Previous research has suggested that there is a need for a corpus-based study of not just Middle English, but also Early Modern English, in order to explore the different path(s) of development followed by individual impersonal verbs. The present article, therefore, investigates the development of the impersonal verb long (< OE langian) with the following objectives: a) to determine when long ceases to occur in impersonal constructions; b) to provide a diachronic overview of the personal syntactic patterns that came to replace impersonal constructions in Early Modern English; and c) to identify, within the framework of Construction Grammar, factors that may account for the development of long as a prepositional verb.

scholarly journals Early Modern English Scientific Manuscripts in the Hunterian Collection: A Physical Description of Gul, MS Hunter 135

2019 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jesús Romero-Barranco
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Physical Description ◽  
The Third ◽  
Early Modern English ◽  
Manuscript Production ◽  
Object Of Study ◽  
English Manuscript ◽  
Shed Light

RESUMEN: El presente artículo ofrece un análisis codicológico y paleográfi co del manuscrito Hunter 135, un volumen del siglo XVI que contiene cinco tratados de los cuales el segundo y la mitad del tercero son objeto de estudio (chirvrgia libri, ff. 34r-73v; y medica qvaedam, ff. 74r-121v). La descripción física no solo ha permitido aportar la posible fecha de composición del manuscrito sino que también ha hecho posible el análisis de las técnicas en la producción de manuscritos en el Periodo moderno temprano (1500-1700).ABSTRACT: The present article provides a codicological and palaeographic analysis of MS Hunter 135, a sixteenth-century volume containing fi ve treatises, the second and approximately half the third being the object of study (chirvrgia libri, ff. 34r-73v; and medica qvaedam, ff. 74r-121v). The physical description has not only shed light on the likely date of composition of the witness but also on the different practices in early Modern English manuscript production.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document