Double modals as single lexical items in American English

e.g : It picked up the door .

and the nominalizing morpheme -er can attach to both elements ;

e.g : garage door picker upper

Other multiword lexical items are also sometimes treated as units by the morphology : Smith and Wessoned (shot) .

On the contrary , Verb-Adjective constructions never act as a unit as far as morphology is concerned . The adjectives can take comparative

clauses and the accompanying morphology while the verbs take the appropriate verbal morphemes :

e.g : Mary hammered it flatter than ever today .

He wiped it cleaner than I thought .

He shot it deader than a doornail .

DMs , in their turn , behave similarly to most multiword lexical items : sometimes they act as units and sometimes they do not . For example , Adverb placement can follow the DM indicating that they are acting as a unit :

e.g : I might could sublegally get it for you .

or interrupt DM indicating that they can act like separate words :

e.g : I might just couldn’t see it .

If we had known , we may still could have done it .

Another syntactic rule that can treat DMs as separate words is the Non-Productive Auxiliary Inversion . Questions built according to this rule may contain a DM component where only the second modal is inverted :

e.g : Could you might find you a seat somewhere ?

However , there are cases when all three possible types of inversion second modal only , first modal only , and both modals as a unit – are present :

e.g : Might should we have invited Jim ?

In general , the type of inversion depends to a great extent on the particular DM involved . Here are most preferable variants of the DM question constructions :

for might could Could + Subject + might ? (81 %)

for might should Might should + Subject ? (55 %)

for might oughta Might + Subject + oughta ? (58 %)

the most acceptable inversion type for might would is :

Would + Subject + might ? (63,6 %)

Negative placement can also either treat DMs as a unit , producing end negation ( type 1) :

e.g : I was afraid you might couldn’t find it .

or as separate elements producing medial negation ( type 2 ) :

e.g : The mother might should not put a blanket over her baby .

I don’t hear too well . I think maybe I better put it on or I might not could understand you .

Different DMs show differential preference for these two types of negation . The preference for might could and might oughta is medial negation . In the responses containing the negation of these two DMs , the overwhelming majority of users preferred to say might not could and might not oughta , respectively . On the other hand , people who accepted sentences containing negated might should or might would preferred end negation : might should not/n’t and might would not/n’t.

In spite that end position is clearly preferred for DM responses with the Past tense or irrealis have , some individuals accepted medial placement . Furthermore , for a small number of DM speakers , both negation and have can iterate within a DM so that they can appear in both medial and end position simultaneously :

e.g : He might not couldn’t be at home now .

He mighta should have gotten home by now .

Another rule involving morphology and DMs is tense concord , as discussed above . Other indications that tense treats DMs as units is that the verbal elements following the DM are almost never marked for tense , nor does have ever appear in quality of such following verbs. In other words , tense and have can iterate in this regional variety of English , but only within the DM , becoming this way quite complicate for a syntactic treatment of DMs .

3. SEMANTIC AND SYNTACTIC IRREGULARITIES

The third characteristic of multiword lexical items is that of semantic and syntactic irregularities . Multiword lexical constructions such as idioms and compound words have quite an unpredictable nature of their semantics , so the most available and traditional means in their study is the lexicon . For example , throw cold water and blackboard exhibit such semantic peculiarities ;

He is always throwing cold water on my ideas .

I prefer the green blackboards .

Until recently the word blackboard had only the compound type of semantics . This type of semantics has a trend to restrict the full range of this compound word’s meaning . That is , a blackboard was a black-coloured board used as a chalkboard , not just any black-coloured board . Now , however , since blackboard can also refer to a green chalkboard , the word begins to acquire the idiom-type , so-called noncompositional semantics.

Individual DMs have many similar traits with multiword lexical constructions in specific restrictions on their semantics . These restrictions , even if they show some systemacity , are usually referred to the lexicon .

Multiword lexical combinations typically exhibit syntactic irregulari- Ties as well . For example , idioms are usually not as syntactically flexible as their literal forms :

Her father laid the law down when she came home late .

He blew some steam off after he got home .

DMs also have some specific syntactic properties , some of which were already discussed . One point that hasn’t been made is that positive declarative DMs are more acceptable to a greater percentage of the population than negated or inverted DMs are .

CONCLUSION

In spite of being exclusively regional phenomenon , Double Modals are significant and commonly acknowledged realia of Modern American English . Like the other multiword modals (such as would rather) they are taking their own function in human communication processes.

As to multiword modals’ attribution , they serve as necessary , basic expressions for all dialects of English . Thus , all dialects of English , both “double modal” and “single modal” ones , have such a set of expressions , and they do not differ qualitatively . The difference is quantitative one : Double Modal dialects have more of these multiword modals. There is also no doubt that Double Modals have many common properties with other multiword lexical constructions . Furthermore , being lexical items they contribute to simplify the syntax of the Auxiliary system of the English language .

In general , it could be wrong to consider Double Modals as any kind of gram-mar distortion . Their grammatical form is steady and scientifically recognized .As to their stylistical definition , they could be rather attributed to Regional Colloquialisms than to Slang . Also, while dealing with them special linguistic approach is necessary and the context should be taken into account .

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