Adverbs and Modality in English

Leo Hoye

• Editorial: Routledge
• Año: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781317893592
• Edición: 1
• Categoría: Languages & Linguistics
• Categoría: Linguistics

This new study on modality in English represents a departure from more traditional approaches to the subject, where the modal auxiliaries have been the usual focus of attention, by examining in detail the nature of their association with different categories of modal adverb. Modality is notoriously complex but the present work offers an accessible introduction to the topic, a comprehensive account of modal-adverb co-occurrence, and a reappraisal of the English modal system. The descriptive framework draws fresh insights from syntactic, semantic and pragmatic approaches to the study of language and communication, and from recent work in corpus linguistics. The book includes contrastive reference to the expression of modality in Spanish and a discussion of modality in such applied contexts as language teaching. A major feature is its reliance on authentic spoken and written language data. The study is suitable for undergraduate and postgraduate students of linguistics, English language, communications studies and related disciplines.

One
The scope of the study and some earlier proposals

Her terrible tale you can't assail
With Truth it quite agrees;
Her taste exactfor faultless fact
Amounts to a disease.

(W. S. Gilbert, 'The Mikado')

1.1 General Introduction

The study of modality in English remains one of the most pervasive and intriguing areas of philosophical and linguistic inquiry. The wealth of literature on the subject, much of it recent, attests the continuing need for new insights into the definition, description and analysis of this elusive and fundamental category of human language and thought. The notion of modality is tantalizingly problematic in that its scope and treatment depend on whether the inquiry is essentially philosophical or language based. The question 'What is modality?' produces different answers according to the orientation of the approach adopted. The philosophical treatment of modality and the modal concepts of possibility, probability, and necessity takes place at a relatively high level of abstraction and the problems raised are not typically susceptible to solution by observation and experiment. Linguistic investigation, however, is founded in empirical and scientific method and examines these same concepts in terms of the human attitudes and behaviour from which they are extrapolated. There is considerable interpenetration between the philosophical and linguistic approaches, but they have fundamentally different research aims and proceed at different levels of abstraction. The present book is primarily a linguistic study of modality in natural language, namely, modern spoken and written English.

Linguists normally take as the basic modal notions those expressed by the central modal auxiliary verbs MAY, MIGHT; CAN, COULD; WILL, WOULD; SHALL, SHOULD; MUST. In general, the modal auxiliaries are used not to express statements of fact but events or actions which exist only as conceptions of the mind and which may or may not eventuate in the future. The modals express a wide range of meanings which grammars usually describe in terms of the modal concepts of possibility, probability, necessity and the related notions of permission, obligation, volition. For example, related to MAY are the ideas of possibility and permission:

• (1) I think that actually may be his name. (CG/107)¹
• (2) mi "lord# "may I 'very re'spectfully at this stàge# ex"plain 'what this man dìd# (S. 12.3.798/9)²

Related to MUST are the ideas of necessity and obligation:

• (3) He couldn't believe his box had been taken away altogether; they must simply have been moved around. (PH/231)
• (4) But now we really must get down to business. (CG/167)

Linguistic discussions of modality in English have traditionally focused on an examination of the behaviour of the modal auxiliaries, also referred to in the literature as 'modal verbs', or 'modals' for short, and the ways in which they affect the meaning of the sentence or clause in which they appear. In comparison with other modal expressions, the modals readily lend themselves to formal definition and analysis and are the most grammaticalized exponents of the system of modality in English. Indeed, the category of modal auxiliary is more readily established in English than in other European languages, be they Germanic or Romance in origin. As Palmer (1986: 33) points out: 'There is no doubt that English has a set of modal verbs that can be formally defined' and Perkins (1983: 25) observes that 'the modals are syntactically distinct from other modal expressions .. The study of the modals is often regarded as synonymous with the study of modality itself 'for the meanings expressed by the modal verbs in English represent, to a large degree, those that are to be included in a typological account of modality' (Palmer 1990: 2). However, this is not to imply that linguists fail to recognize the existence of other carriers of modality: English has a variety of means by which it can signal modal contrasts. These would include, for instance, the use of: modal idioms such as HAD BETTER, WOULD RATHER, WOULD SOONER; adjectives such as POSSIBLE, LIKELY, SURE; nouns such as POSSIBILITY, LIKELIHOOD, CERTAINTY; adverbs such as PERHAPS, PROBABLY, DEFINITELY, and modal lexical verbs such as DOUBT, RECKON, BELIEVE. In speech, the prosodic features of intonation and stress interact with the lexical carriers of modality and can be associated with a range of modal meanings; the speaker's doubt or uncertainty, for instance, is regularly conveyed by a fall-rise intonation pattern.

There are many ways in which modality can manifest itself and there is rich potential for the association of diverse modal elements within the sentence. Palmer (1986: 45) suggests that 'Modality is not, then, necessarily marked in the verbal element, nor is there any obvious reason why it should be, apart from the fact that the verb is the most central part of the sentence'. It is of course this very centrality which has caused linguists to rehearse modal concepts almost exclusively in terms of the modal auxiliaries and at the expense of other modal expressions. Given that the underlying concern of linguistics is with linguistic form and that the modals are a syntactically coherent and distinct class of items, the predilection is understandable. But the picture of modality which emerges as a result of this bias is skewed and wanting in descriptive scope. Despite widespread recognition that modal contrasts are not signalled by the modals alone, other modal expressions available in English tend to be used heuristically to elucidate the meanings of the modals, rarely attracting much attention in their own right. On occasions, a group of expressions such as MAY, PERHAPS, IT is POSSIBLE THAT, THERE'S A POSSIBILITY THAT are seen as synonymous, merely representing characteristic variations in style. The semantic category of modality cannot be adequately accounted for by focusing on the modals alone, nor by discussing them in isolation from other modal elements which may be functioning synergetically within the same environment; analysis of language corpora supports the view that modal elements frequently combine and interact dynamically, there seldom being one carrier of modality operating in isolation within the clause: 'modality ... does not relate semantically to the verb alone or primarily, but to the whole sentence' (Palmer 1986: 2). Different realizations of modality do combine, having a cumulative effect on the modality expressed.

The present work is meant to examine in detail a specific type of modal realization as expressed through the combination of modals with their adverb satellites. Its motivation is due to a complex of reasons. Modal-adverb collocations remain a largely neglected area, even though the study of co-occurrence restrictions and regularities has always been an essential aspect of grammatical description.³ In recent years, important advances have been made in the field of lexicology based upon the study of co-occurrence and collocation. The now widespread use of language corpora, which involves the study of naturally occurring written text and transcribed recorded speech, has revolutionized the way linguists approach the analysis and description of linguistic phenomena. The present study is very much the product of a corpus approach to the subject of modality. It endorses the view that 'the majority of text is made of the occurrence of common words in common patterns, or in slight variants of those common patterns. Most everyday words do not have an independent meaning, or meanings, but are components of a rich repertoire of multi-word patterns that make up text. This is totally obscured by the procedures of conventional grammar' (Sinclair 1991: 108). Modal-adverb collocations conform to lexicographical principles of patterning and tendency; there is little that is random or that cannot be predicted with assurance. Indeed, we would argue that profiles of the modals' behaviour with their various adverb satellites is yet a further defining characteristic of the modals themselves. Modal—adverb collocations therefore play a relatively central role in the expression of modality in English,

The incidence and nature of modal—adverb combinations vary considerably according to which modal auxiliary is involved (some are more common than others) and the basic meaning it conveys: possibility, permission, obligation and so forth. The grammar and semantics of co-occurrence are dealt with in detail later, but the following prototypical examples illustrate the broad characteristics of modal-adverb synergism which are the central focus of this study. This sample is purely illustrative and at this juncture is not meant as an exhaustive typology of the modal—adverb combinations to be found in English.

• (5) He might - just might - succeed in reaching the woods. (CG/243)
• (6) it "may wèll bé# that "there were faùlts# (S. 12.4 1120/1)
• (7) That she could quite possibly identify him was something he didn't stop to consider ... (AA/337-8)
• (8) We'll send a car ... as soon as we possibly can. (CG/268)
• (9) By the time you come back from honeymoon, probate will probably be granted. (W. 7.10.25)
• (10) Perhaps you would bring to the notice of those who instructed you to write to me the custom of sending stamped envelopes in making requests of this sort. (W. 17.2.36)
• (11) As prices go on rising and the value of money declines (as, it seems to me, must inevitably happen) ... (W 11.2.147)

In each instance the modality expressed undergoes some form of modification, complementation or even transformation. In (5) the adverb JUST has a lowering or diminishing effect on the force of the modal meaning of possibility expressed by the auxiliary, and this contrasts with the situation in (7) and (8) where the effect of the adverb is to strengthen or heighten the force of the verb. In (6), WELL, operating within the restricted environment of MAY, actually transforms the modal's inherent meaning of possibility into one of probability. In association with other modals, such as CAN, for instance, WELL behaves quite differently and modifies not the modal but the main verb; in Ί can well understand', the lexical verb is intensified and the phrase could be glossed: Ί have no difficulty whatsoever in understanding.'⁴ In (9), probably approximates in meaning to the modal notion of probability expressed by the auxiliary and thus complements rather than alters the modality expressed. In (10), PERHAPS, which shares no obvious semantic feature with WOULD, is used tentatively to introduce what could be best described as a sardonic recommendation, PERHAPS regularly co-occurs with the modals in the making of suggestions, whatever the overtones. Finally, in (11), INEVITABLY reinforces the notion of inference or plausible assumption conveyed by MUST, complementing that modal's widespread use in expressing the strength of the speaker's attitude or opinion to what he or she is saying. Furthermore, example (6) also demonstrates how in speech prosodic contrasts may interact with and highlight the modal elements already present, thereby signalling their importance to the message of the utterance.

Adverbial mobility and position within the sentence have implications for their formal classification and the manner in which they function in harness with their modal verb heads. Because of its close association with the modal which it clearly modifies, WELL in (6) is relatively integrated in the structure of the sentence; moved to, say, initial position: 'Well, it may be that there were faults', that association is entirely disrupted. The adverb loses all vestiges of modal meaning and becomes a speech initiator (Quirk et al. 1985: 444 and 852)⁵ on a par with other formulae used in stereotyped communication, such as reaction signals 'Yeah!', 'Right' or expletives 'Blast', 'Fiddlesticks'! By contrast, in (9), even though there is an obvious semantic link between the adverb PROBABLY and the modal WILL, the adverb retains its modal status regardless of whether it occurs in initial position or, for that matter, is tagged on at the end, almost as an afterthought: 'By the time you come back from honeymoon probate will be granted, PROBABLY.' Given its potential for mobility within the sentence, PROBABLY seems relatively peripheral in terms of sentence structure; it is a typical sentence adverb. The range and nature of the adverbials involved in co-occurrence with the modals, their transmobility within the structure of the sentence and the importance of this to their classification in terms of formal and notional criteria, are explored in detail in Chaper 4.

In his study Verb-Intensifier Collocations in English, Greenbaum (1970: 9) opens with the comment that Ά complete linguistic description needs to take account of the restrictions on the collocability of one lexical item with another in certain syntactic relationships.' He continues, 'In addition to establishing the restrictions on collocability, we may also wish to take account of the tendency for certain collocations rather than others to be likely in the language.' This study seeks to demonstrate that modal—adverb co-occurrences follow identifiable trends; patterns emerge, and collocational restrictions and tendencies come into force. Investigation into the cohesiveness between the two word classes means we are dealing with probabilities rather than absolutes; the syntactic and semantic association between the modals and their adverb satellites is therefore a matter of degree. The modal—verb combination we saw in (6) above, MAY WELL, is fixed in form and sequence; its holophrastic nature suggests we are dealing with a type of modal idiom on a par with what grammars commonly recognize as modal idioms such as WOULD RATHER or HAD BETTER. The semantic cohesion between modal and adverb is weaker in (9), where adverbs such as MAYBE or PERHAPS, which express possibility rather than probability, also have the potential to combine, or are collocable, with the modal. Collocations are important in the grammatical and lexical structure of the language because they are repeated with regularity; a large part of our mental lexicon is made up of combinations of words which customarily co-occur and where the occurrence of one enables prediction of the other in the more idiomatic combinations, as with MAY WELL, or where the occurrence of one word suggests the company of another derived from a finite set of choices, as in the association of WILL with either MAYBE or PERHAPS.

The descriptive need to examine modal-adverb combinations must by now be apparent. By primarily focusing on the modals alone, linguistic inquiry into the workings of modality in English is incomplete. Rarely is there just one exponent of modality at work in the clause or sentence but often two or more elements operating interdependently and dynamically. The range of adverbs which keeps company with the modals is a finite set of items but there are a number of different grammatical and semantic processes involved. The linguistic description of modality at its higher levels of abstraction must take into account the collocational bonds and tendencies revealed through an explicit examination of modal-adverb co-occurrence.

1.2 The Nature and Organization of the Study

In general terms, this study is a corpus-based, descriptive account of native speaker performance across the modal-adverb domain as attested by authenticated instances of language data.⁶ The focus is on surface structure and potential as well as actual use. This study does not embrace the theory of any one specific school nor does it adopt a particular syntactic theory such as transformational grammar or systemic grammar. Our approach is typically eclectic. Given the complexity of the subject and the vast array of analyses currently available, we draw on the reasearch of others whose works and findings are considered central

The language data used for exemplificatory purposes is mostly drawn from the Survey of English Usage (SEU) corpus which contains representative samples of modern, standard, British English: historical precedence, dialectal and national varieties are specifically excluded, as to examine co-occurrence in terms of these would have taken us well beyond our present brief.⁷ Moreover, rarely is reference made to differences obtaining between British and American English, although it is recognized that there are corresponding variations in patterns of usage.

We examine both the modals and their adv...