Double Modal Syntactic Patterns as Single Modal Interactions

Double modal constructions (DMCs) such as \u27I might could get it for you\u27 are employed by speakers of Southern American and African American English. These constructions appear to counter-exemplify traditional analyses of English modal structure which typically (i) allow only one tensed element per clause and (ii) locate modal auxiliaries only in the tensed position. Previous analyses have attempted to account for these structures by treating DMs as single lexical units (Di Paolo, 1989), or by treating one of the two modals as a non-modal (Turner, 1981; Battistella, 1995; Marrano, 1998; Van Gelderen, 2003). Di Paolo’s lexicalist analysis is contraindicated by the separability of the constituent modals, while the others are contradicted by the modals’ tense-like behavior. Following observations in McDowell (1987), we claim that \u27might,\u27 \u27may,\u27 and \u27must\u27 (in their epistemic readings) are sentential polarity operators (P-modals). P-modals head a POLP (Cormack and Smith, 2002), must raise at LF to take scope over the proposition, and may also bear Tense (in which case they move to T at LF). V-modals (i.e., all other modals) head VP and behave as AUX verbs, moving to T overtly when they bear Tense. Under this account, both modals in the DMC can be analyzed as true modals, behaving exactly as they would in a single modal construction. They are, at the same time, syntactically distinct, and the properties of the DMC result from the interactions between these two modal types

Single and Double Modal Syntax: A Unified Account

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Little Words Their History, Phonology, Syntax, Semantics, Pragmatics, and Acquisition

Little Words is an interdisciplinary examination of the functions and change in the use of clitics, pronouns, determiners, conjunctions, discourse particles, auxiliary/light verbs, prepositions, and other "little words" that have played a central role in linguistic theory and in language acquisition research.Intro -- Contents -- List of Illustrations -- Preface -- Chapter 1. Introduction -- PART I: HISTORY -- Chapter 2. From "Two" to "Both": Historical Changes in the Syntax and Meaning of Oba in Slavic -- Chapter 3. When Small Words Collide: Morphological Reduction and Phonological Compensation in Old Leonese Contractions -- PART II: PHONOLOGY -- Chapter 4. Distinguishing Function Words from Content Words in Children's Oral Reading -- Chapter 5. Motivating Floating Quantifiers -- PART III: SYNTAX -- Chapter 6. Applicative Phrases Hosting Accusative Clitics -- Chapter 7. The Little DE of Degree Constructions -- Chapter 8. The Complementizer The -- Chapter 9. What Is There When Little Words Are Not There ?: Possible Implications for Evolutionary Studies -- Chapter 10. Spanish Personal a and the Antidative -- PART IV: SEMANTICS -- Chapter 11. Predicting Argument Realization from Oblique Marker Semantics -- Chapter 12. Aspect Selectors, Scales, and Contextual Operators: An Analysis of by Temporal Adjuncts -- Chapter 13. Distributive Effects of the Plural Marker -tul in Korean -- PART V: PRAGMATICS -- Chapter 14. The Pragmatics of the French Discourse Markers donc and alors -- Chapter 15. "Little Words" in Small Talk: Some Considerations on the Use of the Pragmatic Markers man in English and macho/tío in Peninsular Spanish -- Chapter 16. Little Words That Could Impact One's Impression on Others: Greetings and Closings in Institutional E-mails -- PART VI: ACQUISITION -- Chapter 17. Instructed L2 Acquisition of Differential Object Marking in Spanish -- Chapter 18. The Role of Pedagogical Tasks and Focus on Form in Acquisition of Discourse Markers by Advanced Language Learners -- Chapter 19. Article Acquisition in English, German, Norwegian, and Swedish -- Chapter 20. A Continuum in French Children's Surface Realization of AuxiliariesLittle Words is an interdisciplinary examination of the functions and change in the use of clitics, pronouns, determiners, conjunctions, discourse particles, auxiliary/light verbs, prepositions, and other "little words" that have played a central role in linguistic theory and in language acquisition research.Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, YYYY. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries