Talk:English modal auxiliary verbs

Supposed disallowance
Somewhere in this set of edits added


 * Two rules from different grammatical models supposedly disallow the construction. Proponents of Phrase structure grammar see the surface clause as allowing only one modal verb, while main verb analysis would dictate that modal verbs occur in finite forms.

(citing Di Paolo).

That (and much else) got scrambled 53 weeks later, by some IP who didn't know what they were doing. The result makes no sense to me. Like so much crap in Wikipedia, it lived on.

Here's what Di Paolo writes:


 * In general, there have been two main approaches for ruling out such sequences of modals [as in "I could must do that"]: the phrase-structure (P-S) rule approach advocated by proponents of the Aux analysis which relies on P-S rules containing only one modal per surface clause (e.g., Chomsky 1957; Akmajian, Steele and Wasow 1979); and the subcategorization approach, proposed by advocates of the Main Verb analysis, which assumes that modals are finite forms and are subcategorized for stem forms (e.g., Baker 1981; Gazdar, Pullum and Sag 1982).

I'm about to revert to the Drmies version. -- Hoary (talk) 11:32, 14 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Wow, I wrote that? Thanks . Drmies (talk) 13:41, 14 December 2023 (UTC)

"didn't use(d) to"
Here you'll find a bulky and lovingly crafted footnote that, I'm pretty sure, is about the not-so-obviously-major question of whether or not one should type a in "I didn't use to watch Youtube". (I'm not entirely confident: I neither created it nor have edited it, and am not sure how its ellipses are intended to be understood.)

That's a question about lexical use(d), not about auxiliary (and perhaps modal auxiliary) use(d) (using which, one would say "I used not to watch Youtube" or "I usedn't to watch Youtube"). But this article is about modal auxiliary verbs, not their lexical homonyms, and therefore I removed this footnote in the following edit. Maybe it belongs in some other article.

(In conversational English, I suspect that "I never used to watch Youtube" would be more likely than anything above, but I can't immediately produce evidence supporting this belief.) -- Hoary (talk) 05:00, 15 December 2023 (UTC)

Use(d (to)): modal or not?
Use /jus/ is these days a lexical verb, more often than not. But it used not only to be. It used to be an auxiliary verb too, usedn't it? (Yes, it used to.) And for some speakers, it still is.

Now, the question is of whether to treat it as a modal auxiliary verb, or as just a (non-modal) auxiliary verb. Two authorities that treat it as a modal:





Three that do not:







Wikipedia shouldn't pretend that there's agreement. But it also shouldn't treat use as a modal in this article and as a non-modal in the article English auxiliary verbs -- which is what it does now.

Plan: A week from now, if nobody objects, I'll:
 * remove most of the material in this article about use;
 * in this article, acknowledge that a "modal auxiliary verb" status of use has its supporters;
 * in this article, point to the discussion of use in the other article;
 * paste into the other article the material about use from this article (acknowledging its source);
 * edit the material in that article about use (cutting duplication, etc);
 * make sure that in that article is an acknowledgement that a "modal auxiliary verb" status of use has its supporters.

How about it? -- Hoary (talk) 12:15, 17 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Quirk et al. admit that it is not semantically modal, "in formal terms, however, it fits the marginal modal category." If modality is a semantic concept, then this appears simply to be sloppy terminology. I think your plan is sound.--Brett (talk) 14:40, 17 December 2023 (UTC)


 * , I wrote the lengthy question cum tentative announcement above while 80% asleep, and wake to find that it's about as prolix and incoherent as would be expected. Well done on your success in making sense of it. Yes, after considering the syntax of use, Huddleston similarly adds "It is also semantically quite distinct from the modal auxiliaries: the meaning it expresses is aspectual, not modal." But if we were using semantic criteria, we'd have considerable trouble (at best) with need and would have to reject dare. -- Hoary (talk) 21:46, 17 December 2023 (UTC)
 * I'm all for rejecting dare. My understanding of semantics isn't nuanced enough to say whether need can qualify as modal. Brett (talk) 20:19, 18 December 2023 (UTC)
 * , for clarity, I should have titled this "Use(d (to)): modal auxiliary verb or not?" Because I think that expression of modality as a criterion for modal auxiliary verbs is akin to reference to a thing as a criterion for nouns. But FWIW in my (hoary?) idiolect, the parental complaint Need you make so much noise? is indistinguishable from Must you make so much noise?: dynamic modality. And the impatient You needn't make such an issue of it has some similarity to You shouldn't make such an issue of it: deontic modality. -- Hoary (talk) 21:56, 18 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Point taken.--Brett (talk) 11:51, 19 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Done. -- Hoary (talk) 08:38, 24 December 2023 (UTC)

Dialect verb darest (allegedly)
On 28 December 2012, somebody added:
 * There is also a dialect verb, nearly obsolete but sometimes heard in Appalachia and the Deep South of the United States: darest, which means "dare not", as in "You darest do that."

-- with no reference. Despite their later block, the writer seems to have been serious. But as there's little hope that they'll reappear and source this claim, I'm about to delete it. Anyone is free to readd it, but with a source. -- Hoary (talk) 07:20, 19 December 2023 (UTC)

Change of referencing style
I've offered to help Hoary with converting the references in this article to use sfn style short form refs, rather tha the current use of refnames and rp trmplates. If no-one objects I'll start the work tomorrow. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 12:35, 27 December 2023 (UTC)


 * No objection, but what's the benefit? Brett (talk) 17:20, 27 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Hoary is looking to do a lot of work on the article and is looking to tidy how references look in the article. Currently there's one that looks like this in the middle of the text, "[4]: 128–131, 141–143 [8]: 46 [1]: 111–114 [2]: 301–302, 304–305". Once converted that will becomes"[4][8][1][2]", with the pages appearing in the reference section instead. The once Hoary's work is complete this would be reduced to just "[4]" using sfnm, with all the details appear to together in the reflist. The point is to have a better flow of text, while maintaining all the details for verification. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:54, 27 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Neat! Brett (talk) 20:34, 27 December 2023 (UTC)


 * Yes,, I can confirm what says. Incidentally, I once strongly disliked the use in articles of sfn, and for what I still think were good reasons; but these reasons have evaporated (thanks to, I suppose, some change to Mediawiki). -- Hoary (talk) 22:44, 27 December 2023 (UTC)


 * On Hoary's advise I'm putting this off till the second, in case anyone does object. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 22:39, 27 December 2023 (UTC)
 * Yes, good: there's no immense rush. -- Hoary (talk) 22:44, 27 December 2023 (UTC)


 * As there has been no objections I'll be starting the work today. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 13:58, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
 * all the references have been converted to sfnp templates. When you've completed the overhaul of the article ping me if you still want any multiple references converted to sfnpm. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 16:51, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

Amazing conversion job done! A tip of the hat to ActivelyDisinterested for this series of edits and a much improved look 'n' feel for the article. I fear that all of that would have taken me most of one day. Thank you, ActivelyDisinterested! -- Hoary (talk) 04:40, 3 January 2024 (UTC)