Bělíková Zuzana The Modal Verb Could and its Equivalents in Translation
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Blkov Zuzana The Modal Verb Could and its Equivalents in
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MODAL AUXILIARY VERBS IN GENERAL Lewis (1986, 100) defines modal auxiliaries as a closed class. “Such a closed class consists of a small number of words which: A. fulfill the same grammatical function B. are reciprocally defined C. are reciprocally exclusive.” (Lewis 1986, 99) As Swan (2005, 76) mentions, relevant information of an English sentence is carried by the verb phrase. There are mostly five forms of English verbs – see, sees, seeing, saw, seen and they need help by auxiliary verbs to add meaning to them. Auxiliary verbs BE, DO and HAVE creates progressive, perfect and passive forms, they make questions, negatives and emphatic structures: 11) Is it raining? (Swan 2005, 76) 12) What have you done? (ibid.) 13) She was imprisoned for three years. (ibid) 14) Do you smoke? (ibid.) 15) It didn’t matter. (ibid) 16) Do come in. (ibid) Modal verbs are generally referred to as MODAL AUXILIARIES and they also add meaning to full verbs. They can behave as auxiliary verbs as well as they have their own group as modal verbs (Swan 2005, 77). Modals do not occur alone in the sentence except a short answer to Yes/No question (Rochowanská and Tárnyiková 1976, 59). They are used when a speaker is concerned with a relationship with someone else and they express various levels of politeness (Alexander 1988, 207). “One thing that can make it difficult to account for the use of these words [...] is that their meaning has both a logical (semantic) and a practical (pragmatic) element.” (Leech 2004, 72) “Sémanticky se modální slovesa liší jak od sloves pomocných, tak od sloves lexikálních. Na rozdíl od pomocných sloves, která nemají vlastní význam, nýbrž spolu s ostatními Philosophical Faculty, Palacký University Olomouc 16 složkami slovesného tvaru tvoří jeden formální a významový celek, modální slovesa mají význam, avšak oproti lexikálním slovesům nikoliv samostatný.” (Dušková 1988, 182) [Modal verbs semantically differ from auxiliary verbs and lexical verbs. In contrast to auxiliary verbs which do not have their own meaning but they form one formal unit together with other verbal components. Modal verbs possess meaning, however in contrast to lexical verbs not an independent one.] According to Quirk et al. (1985, 137), modal verbs are divided into CENTRAL MODALS – can, could, may, might, shall, should, will, must and MARGINAL MODALS – dare, need, ought to, used to. Marginal modals have some exceptional sings that will be discussed within the text. Leech (2004, 73) also distinguish them into two groups of present (primary) forms – may, can, must, will and shall and past (secondary) forms – might, could, would and should. He points out the fact that modals are sorted into three categories according to frequency: - very frequent: will, would, can, could - quite frequent: must, should, may, might, have to - infrequent: shall, ought (to), need Download 0.6 Mb. Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: |
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