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English auxiliary verbs are a small set ofEnglish verbs, which include theEnglish modal auxiliary verbs and a few others.[1]: 19 [2]: 11–12 Although theauxiliary verbs of English are widely believed to lack inherent semantic meaning and instead to modify the meaning of the verbs they accompany, they are nowadays classed by linguists as auxiliary on the basis not of semantic but of grammatical properties: among these, that theyinvert with their subjects in interrogative main clauses (Has John arrived?) and arenegated either by the simple addition ofnot (Hehas not arrived) or (with a very few exceptions) by negativeinflection (Hehasn't arrived).
When describing English, the adjectiveauxiliary was "formerly applied to any formative or subordinate elements of language, e.g. prefixes,prepositions."[3] As applied to verbs, its conception was originally rather vague and varied significantly.
The first English grammar,Bref Grammar for English byWilliam Bullokar, published in 1586, does not use the term "auxiliary" but says:
All other verbs are called verbs-neuters-un-perfect because they require the infinitive mood of another verb to express their signification of meaning perfectly: and be these,may,can,might ormought,could,would,should,must,ought, and sometimes,will, that being a mere sign of the future tense. [orthography standardized and modernized][4]: 353
In volume 5 (1762) ofTristram Shandy, the narrator's father explains that "The verbs auxiliary we are concerned in here, . . . , are,am;was;have;had;do;did;make;made;suffer;shall;should;will;would;can;could;owe;ought;used; oris wont."[5]: 146–147
Charles Wiseman'sComplete English Grammar of 1764 notes that most verbs
cannot be conjugated through all their Moods and Tenses, without one of the following principal Verbshave andbe. The first serves to conjugate the rest, by supplying the compound tenses of all Verbs both Regular and Irregular, whether Active, Passive, Neuter, or Impersonal, as may be seen in its own variation, &c.[a]
Along withhave andbe, it goes on to includedo,may,can,shall,will as auxiliary verbs.[6]: 156–167
W. C. Fowler'sThe English Language of 1857 says:
Auxiliary Verbs, orHelping Verbs, perform the same office in the conjugation of principal verbs which inflection does in the classical languages, though even in those languages the substantive verb is sometimes used as a helping verb. . . . I. The verbs that arealways auxiliary to others are,May,can,shall,must; II. Those that aresometimes auxiliary and sometimes principal verbs are,Will,have,do,be, andlet.[7]: 202
The verbs that all the sources cited above agree are auxiliary verbs are themodal auxiliary verbsmay,can, andshall; most also includebe,do, andhave.
Modern grammars do not differ substantially over membership in the list of auxiliary verbs, though they have refined the concept and, following an idea first put forward byJohn Ross in 1969,[8] have tended to take the auxiliary verb not as subordinate to a "main verb" (a concept that pedagogical grammars perpetuate), but instead as thehead of averb phrase. Examples includeThe Cambridge Grammar of the English Language and Bas Aarts'Oxford Modern English Grammar.[9]: 104 [10]: 237–239 This is shown in the tree diagram below for the clauseI can swim.
Theclause has a subject noun phraseI and a head verb phrase (VP), headed by the auxiliary verbcan. The VP also has a complement clause, which has a head VP, with the head verbswim.
A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (1985) says of "verbs in auxiliary function" that "In contrast to full [i.e. lexical] verbs, [these verbs] are capable of functioning asauxiliary or 'helping' verbs (cf 2.27f)", which seems to refer back to a table showing the "main verb" (sink in various inflected forms) following one to four auxiliary verbs (be andhave, again in variousinflected forms; andmay andmust). It is not obvious how this definition would exclude lexical verbs such astry (intried sinking,tried to have sunk,tried being sunk, etc)[11]: 62, 120 – although they would certainly fail the book's own list of criteria for auxiliary verbs, as listed later.[11]: 121–127
In his bookEnglish Auxiliaries: History and Structure (1993), Anthony R. Warner writes that the English auxiliary verbs "are rather sharply defined as a group by distinctive formal properties."[2]: 3
The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language (2002) describes auxiliary verbs as "a small list of verbs with very specific syntactic properties", differing from "all the rest of the verbs in the dictionary, which we will call the lexical verbs . . . in inflectional morphology as well as syntax"[9]: 74 And later: "A general definition of auxiliary verb is that it denotes aclosed class of verbs that are characteristically used as markers oftense,aspect,mood, andvoice."[9]: 102 It too adds a list of criteria.[9]: 92–102
The list of auxiliary verbs in Modern English, along with theirinflected forms, is shown in the following table.
Contractions are only shown if their orthography is distinctive. There are also numerous unstressed versions that are typically, although not necessarily, written in the standard way.[12]: 242–248 For these, seea later section. Where there is a blank, the auxiliary verb lacks this form. (In some cases, a corresponding lexical verb may have the form. For example, although lexical verbneed has a plain past tense form, auxiliary verbneed does not.)
| Citation form | Modal/ Non-modal | Plain | Present tense | Past tense | Participles | Confusible lexical homonym?[b] | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Neutral | Contr. | Negative | Neutral | Contr. | Negative | Present | Past | ||||
| will | Modal | will | 'll | won't | would | 'd | wouldn't | none | |||
| may[c] | may | might | mightn't | none | |||||||
| can | can | can't,cannot | could | couldn't | none | ||||||
| shall | shall | 'll | shan't | should | shouldn't | none | |||||
| must | must | mustn't | none | ||||||||
| ought | ought | oughtn't | exists[d] | ||||||||
| need[e] | need | needn't | exists | ||||||||
| dare[e] | dare | daren't | dared | exists[f] | |||||||
| be | Non-modal | be | am,is,are | 'm,'s,'re | %ain't,[g]isn't,aren't | was,were | wasn't,weren't | being | been | exists[h] | |
| do | do[i] | does,do | 's[j] | doesn't,don't | did | 'd[k],d' | didn't | exists | |||
| have | have | has,have | 's,'ve | hasn't,haven't | had | 'd | hadn't | having | exists | ||
A major difference between the results, shown above, of defining auxiliary verbs syntactically and doing so based on a notion of "helping" is that the syntactic definition includes:
A study of 17th-century American English found the formbe used for the 1st and 3rd person plural present;[15]: 192–193 was for the 3rd person plural preterite;[15]: 194 art andare for the 2nd person singular present;wast andwert for the 2nd person singular preterite;[15]: 193 anddost andhast (2nd person) anddoth andhath (3rd person) for the singular present.[15]: 185–187
One set of criteria for distinguishing between auxiliary and lexical verbs isF. R. Palmer's "NICE": "Basically the criteria are that the auxiliary verbs occur with negation, inversion, 'code', and emphatic affirmation while the [lexical] verbs do not."[1]: 15, 21 [l]
| Auxiliary verb | Lexical verb | |
|---|---|---|
| Negation | Iwill not eat apples. Iwon't eat apples. | *I eat not apples.[g] *I eatn't apples. |
| Inversion | Has Lee eaten apples? | *Eats Lee apples? |
| Code | Can it devour 3 kg of meat? Yes itcan. | Does it devour 3 kg of meat? *Yes it devours. |
| Emphatic affirmation | You say we're not ready? WeARE ready. | You say we didn't practise enough? *WePRACTISED enough. |
Clausal negation[m] most commonly employs an auxiliary verb, for example,Wecan't believe it'll rain today orIdon't need an umbrella. As late asMiddle English, lexical verbs could also participate in clausal negation, so a clause likeLee eatsnot apples would have been grammatical,[16]: vol 2, p 280 but this is no longer possible inModern English, where lexical verbs require "do‑support".
(At first glance, the grammaticality ofI hope/guess/suppose/think not may suggest that some lexical verbs too have no need fordo‑support; but ungrammatical *I hope/guess/suppose/think not you are right shows that this is quite mistaken.Not in these examples does not negate a clause but is instead the negative equivalent ofso, apro-form for a negative proposition.[9]: 1536 )
Palmer writes that the "Negation" criterion is "whether [the verb] occurs with the negative particlenot, or more strictly, whether it has a negative form",[1]: 21 the latter referring to negatively inflectedwon't,hasn't,haven't, etc. (As seen inthe paradigm table above, in today's Standard English not every auxiliary verb has such a form.)
Although English is asubject–verb–object language, an interrogative main clause is the most important among several constructions that put a verb before the subject. This is calledsubject–auxiliary inversion because only auxiliary verbs participate in such constructions:Can/should/must Lee eat apples?;Never have I enjoyed a quince. Again, inMiddle English, lexical verbs were no different; but in Modern English *Eats Lee apples? and *Never enjoy I a quince are ungrammatical, anddo‑support is again required:Does Lee eat apples?;Never do I enjoy quinces.
F. R. Palmer attributes this term toJ. R. Firth, writing:
There are sentences in English in which a full verb is later 'picked up' by an auxiliary. The position is very similar to that of a noun being 'picked up' by a pronoun. [. . .] If the initial sentence, which contains the main verb, is not heard, all the remainder is unintelligible; it is, in fact, truly in code.The following example is from Firth:
(What "picks up" is called ananaphor; what is picked up is called an antecedent.) Attempting to remove the complement(s) of a lexical verb normally has an ungrammatical result (Did you put it in the fridge? / *Yes, I put) or an inappropriate one (Did you eat the chicken? / #Yes, I ate[g]). However, if a number of conditions are met, the result may be acceptable.[9]: 1527–1529
F. R. Palmer writes that "a characteristic of the auxiliaries is their use in emphatic affirmation with nuclear stress upon the auxiliary", as inYoumust see him. He concedes that "any verbal form may have nuclear stress"; thusWesaw them; however, auxiliaries stressed in this way are used for "the denial of the negative", whereas lexical verbs again usedo‑support.[1]: 25–26
NICE is widely cited (with "emphatic affirmation" usually simplified as "emphasis"): as examples, byA Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (1985),[11]: 121–124 [n]The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language (2002),[9]: 92–101 and theOxford Modern English Grammar (2011).[10]: 68–69
A revised set of criteria, NICER, owes much to NICE but does more than merely add a fifth criterion to it.
| Auxiliary verb | Lexical verb | |
|---|---|---|
| (Finite) Negation | Leewill not eat apples. | *Lee eats not apples. |
| Auxiliary-initial constructions | Has Lee eaten apples? | *Eats Lee apples? |
| "Contraction" ofnot | didn't, shouldn't, isn't | *eatn't, *gon't, *maken't |
| (Post-auxiliary) Ellipsis | Lee was eating and Kimwas too. | *Lee kept eating and Kim kept too. |
| Rebuttal | A:We shouldn't eat apples. B:WeshouldSO. | A:We didn't try to eat apples. B: *We triedSO. |
In this section, a number of verbs – not limited to those inthe paradigm table above – are checked against four of the five criteria of NICER. Aswould,might,could andshould are sometimes understood as discrete verbs (and not merely as the preterite forms ofwill,may,can andshall), they are tested too.
Auxiliary verbs can be negated withnot; lexical verbs requiredo-support: a less stringent version of "negation" as the first criterion of NICE.[18]: 10, 38–48
We addnot immediately after the verb, and obtain:Shewill/would/may/might/can/could/shall/should/must/need/dare not live there. Each of these has clausal negation, as we see by adding a positive tag and thereby creating a straightforward question:She can not live there, can she?;She need not live there, need she?; and so forth. (CompareShe can live there, can she? andShe needs to live there, does she?. In both of these a positive tag is added to a positive clause, for a result that is not a straightforward question. Context and tone of voice may suggest that the speaker is impressed or incredulous.)
Similarly forSheought/used not to live there;Sheis not a resident;Shedoes not live there; andShehas not lived there; and indeed forShe wantsto not go, awkward though this may sound.
This criterion does not require the same verb for the tag as in the anchor (the part of the sentence that precedes the tag). So the informalbetter works as well:Shebetter not be late, had she? Irrespective of any tag, lexicaldo does not work (*Youdid not your homework), and neither doesgo (*Hegoes not to school). Puttingnot immediately after some other lexical verbs brings a grammatical result (Heseems/intends not to live there), but one that does not work as expected with a positive tag –Heseems/intends not to live there, does he? do not straightforwardly ask – showing that whatnot has negated is not the clause as a whole.
The same as "inversion" as the second criterion of NICE.[18]: 8–9, 27–33
Will/would/may/might/can/could/shall/should/must/need/dare I wear a mankini? – all of these can invert with the subject.
Likewise forOught/used/have you to wear a suit?;Am I forced to wear a suit?; andDo I wear a suit?
This again accounts for all of the verbs inthe paradigm table above, other thanto. The construction requires a tensed form of the verb;to lacks one, and therefore this criterion does not apply to it.
Attempts to invert lexical verbs such asdo (*Did you your homework?) orgo (*Goes he to school?) bring ungrammatical results. Surprisingly,How goes it? is grammatical; but even a minor adjustment to it (*How went it?; *How goes your job?) brings an ungrammatical result, showing that it is merely a fixed formula.
Most English auxiliary verbs have a negative inflected form with-n't,[9]: 1611 [18]: 10, 49–54 [19] commonly regarded as a contracted form ofnot. Available arewon't,wouldn't,mightn't,can't,couldn't,shan't,shouldn't,mustn't,oughtn't,needn't,aren't,isn't,wasn't,weren't,daren't,don't,doesn't,didn't,haven't,hasn't,hadn't, and %usedn't.
No lexical verb has such a form (*She gon't to bars much these days; *She didn't her homework last week).
A small number ofdefective auxiliary verbs lack this inflection: %mayn't and *daredn't are now dated, and there is no universally accepted negative inflection ofam: %amn't is dialectal, the acceptability ofain't depends on the variety ofStandard English, andaren't is only used when it andI are inverted (Aren't I invited?, compare *I aren't tired).[9]: 1611–1612
Fordo,must,used (/just/), and (depending on the variety of Standard English)can, the negative inflected form is spelt as expected but its pronunciation is anomalous (change of vowel indon't and perhapscan't; elision of/t/ within theroot ofmustn't andusedn't); forshan't andwon't, both the pronunciation and the spelling are anomalous.
The same as "code" as the third criterion of NICE.[18]: 9–10, 33–38
The possibility of ellipsis withwill,may,might,can't,should,needn't andhave (and indeedto) is illustrated inFirth's example of "code".
As for the other auxiliary verbs:
This is not possible withused (although it was in the past[o]), or with most lexical verbs: *I haven't swum much recently but Iused/want/hope.
It does however work with a number of lexical verbs:I'd be grateful if youtried/started/stopped.
When two people are arguing, one may use a stressedtoo orso immediately after the auxiliary verb to deny a statement made by the other. For example, having been told that he didn't do his homework, a child may replyI did too. (Or anyway, this is true for US English. For British English,indeed.[18]: 54n ) This kind of rebuttal is impossible with lexical verbs.[18]: 10, 54–57
Each of the two most compendious of postwar reference grammars of English offers a more detailed list of criteria for auxiliary verbs.
A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language has eight criteria. The first five of these approximate to the four of NICE, with the addition ofcliticization as inIt's raining orI've finished.[11]: 121–125 Slightly simplified, the sixth is that auxiliary verbs, unlike lexical verbs, "typically, but not necessarily" precede adverbs such asalways,never,certainly andprobably:He would always visit her (compare lexical verbvisit in *He visited always her). The seventh is that "Quantifiers likeall,both, andeach which modify the subject of the clause may occur after the [verb] as an alternative, in many instances, to the predeterminer position"; thus eitherBoth their childrenwill attend orTheir childrenwill both attend (compare lexical verbattend in *Their children attended both).[p] The last is "Independence of subject", a claim that, compared with most lexical verbs, auxiliary verbs can be semantically independent of their subjects. This in turn is claimed to be manifested in three ways.[11]: 126–127 (The book provides four additional criteria for modal auxiliary verbs.[11]: 127–128 )
The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language adopts NICE and criteria approximating to the sixth and seventh ofComprehensive Grammar, although it dispenses with the eighth.[9]: 101–102 (It provides five additional criteria for modal auxiliary verbs.[9]: 106–107 )
Linguists who cite or propound clear grammatical criteria for auxiliary verbs then proceed to include among auxiliary verbs certain verbs that do not meet all these criteria. Having said that the English auxiliary verbs[q] "are rather sharply defined . . . by distinctive formal properties",[2]: 3 Anthony R. Warner points out that a class:
normally has some internal differentiation whereby a "nuclear" or "prototypical"[r] set of members shows more of the properties of the class than other less fully characterized members. A class may also not show sharply definable boundaries.[2]: 10
He claims that what are the prototypical auxiliary verbs are themodal auxiliary verbs (other thanought,need, anddare) and that:
the presence of [be,do andhave] in the category [auxiliary verb] is justified from a semantic point of view not so much by their possession of prototypical properties as by the fact that they are even more remote [than are the modal auxiliary verbs] from the [lexical verb] prototype, which denotes an action or event. . . .[2]: 19
Various linguists, notablyGeoff Pullum, have suggested that theto ofI want to go (not theprepositionto as inI went to Rome) is a special case of an auxiliary verb with no tensed forms.[22][s]Rodney Huddleston argues against this position inThe Cambridge Grammar of the English Language,[9]: 1183–1187 but Robert Levine counters these arguments.[24] In a book on the historical emergence and spread of infinitivalto,Bettelou Los calls Pullum's arguments that it is an auxiliary verb "compelling".[25]
In terms of the NICER properties, examples likeit's fine not to go show thatto allows negation. Inversion, contraction ofnot, and rebuttal would only apply to tensed forms, andto is argued to have none. Although rebuttal is not possible, it does allow ellipsis:I don't want to.
With their normal senses (as inYou had better/best arrive early),had/'d better andhad/'d best are not about the past. Indeed they do not seem to be usable for the past (*Yesterday I had better return home before the rain started); and they do not occur with other forms ofhave (*have/has better/best).The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language observes:
If we take [thehad inhad better] as a distinct lexeme, we will say that it has been reanalysed as a present tense form (likemust andought). . . . [In view of its syntactic behaviour], it undoubtedly should be includedamong the non-central members of the modal auxiliary class.[9]: 113
Expressions ranging fromhad better towould rather have been argued to comprise "a family of morphosyntactic configurations with a moderate degree of formal and semantic homogeneity".[26]: 3 They would be:
Among these,had better,'d better,better occur the most commonly. They express either advice or a strong hope: a deontic and an optative sense respectively.[26]: 3–5
Among these three forms,'d better is the commonest in British English and plainbetter the commonest in American English.[26]: 11 However, the syntactic category of plainbetter when used in this or a similar way is not always clear: while it may have beenreanalysed as an independent modal auxiliary verb – one with no preterite form and also no ability to invert (*Better I leave now?) – it can be an adverb instead of a verb.[26]: 21–23
For more aboutwould rather/sooner andwould as soon, seeWould rather,would sooner, andwould as soon.
An auxiliary verb is traditionally understood as a verb that "helps" another verb by adding (only) grammatical information to it.[t] So understood, English auxiliaries include:
However, this understanding of auxiliaries has trouble withbe (He wasn't asleep;Was he asleep?),have (%He hadn't any money), andwould (Would you rather we left now?), each of which behaves syntactically like an auxiliary verb even when not accompanying another verb (or not merely doing so). Other approaches to defining auxiliary verbs are described below.
Be, followed by thepast participle of a lexical verb, realizes thepassive voice:Hewas promoted.[9]: 1427ff Its negative and interrogative versions (Hewasn't promoted;Was he promoted?), lacking the need fordo‑support, show that this is auxiliarybe. (This simple test can be repeated for the other applications ofbe briefly described below.)
(However, the lexical verbget can also form a passive clause:Hegot promoted.[9]: 1429–1430 This is a long-established construction.[27]: 118 )
Followed by thepresent participle of a verb (whether lexical or auxiliary),be realizes theprogressive aspect:Hewas promoting the film.[9]: 117, 119ff
Either may be confused with the use of a participial adjective (that is, an adjective derived from and homonymous with a participle):Hewas excited;Itwas exciting.[u]
WhatThe Cambridge Grammar of the English Language terms quasi-modalbe normally imparts adeontic meaning: that ofHeis never to come here again approximates to that of "He must never come here again".[9]: 113–114 In conditional contexts,was to (if both informal and with a singular subject) orwere to imparts remoteness:If Iwere to jump out of the plane, . . . (compare with the open conditionalIf I jumped out of the plane, . . .).[9]: 151 In common with modal auxiliary verbs, quasi-modalbe has no secondary form.[9]: 114
What the same work terms motionalbe only occurs asbeen, when it follows the verbhave in a perfect construction and is not followed by any verb:I've twicebeen to Minsk. Most of the NICE/NICER criteria are inapplicable, but sentences such asI don't need to go to the Grand People's Study House as I've alreadybeen show that it satisfies the "code" and "ellipsis" criteria of NICE and NICER respectively and thus is auxiliary rather than lexicalbe.[9]: 114
What theCambridge Grammar termscopularbe links a subject, typically anoun phrase, and a predicativecomplement, typically a noun phrase, adjective phrase, or preposition phrase. Ascriptive copularbe ascribes a property to the subject (The carwas a wreck); specifying copularbe identifies the subject (The woman in the green shoesis my aunt Louise) and can be reversed with a grammatical result (My aunt Louiseis the woman in the green shoes).Be in anit‑cleft (Itwas my aunt Louise who wore the green shoes) is specifying.[9]: 266–267
Auxiliarybe also takes as complements a variety of words (able,about,bound,going andsupposed among them) that in turn take as complementsto‑infinitivalsubordinate clauses for results that are highly idiomatic (was about/supposed to depart, etc).[28]: 209
In Early Modern English, perfect tenses could be formed with eitherhave (as today) orbe. The latter pattern persisted into the 19th century: a character inPride and Prejudice says,But before Iam run away with by my feelings on this subject, perhaps it will be advisable for me to state my reasons for marrying.[29]
The auxiliary verbdo is primarily used fordo‑support. This in turn is used for negation, interrogative main clauses, and more.
If a positive main clause is headed by an auxiliary verb, either the addition ofnot or (for most auxiliary verbs) a‑n't inflection can negate. SoThey could reach home before dark becomesThey couldn't reach home before dark. (This is the "negation" of NICE and NICER.) However, a lexical verb has to be supported by the verbdo; soThey reached home before dark becomesTheydidn't reach home before dark.[9]: 94–95
If a declarative main clause is headed by an auxiliary verb, simple inversion of subject and verb will create a closed interrogative clause. SoThey could reach home before dark becomesCould they reach home before dark?. (This is the "inversion" of NICE and NICER.) However, a lexical verb requiresdo; soThey reached home before dark becomesDid they reach home before dark? For an open interrogative clause,do has the same role:How fardid you get?[9]: 95
Although interrogative main clauses are by far the most obvious contexts for inversion usingdo‑support, there are others: While exclamative clauses usually lack subject–auxiliary inversion (What a foolish girl I was), it is a possibility (What a foolish girl was I[30]); the inverted alternative toHow wonderful it tasted! would beHow wonderfuldid it taste! A negative constituent that is not the subject can move to the front and trigger such inversion:None of the bottlesdid they leave unopened. A phrase withonly can do the same:Only oncedid I win a medal. Ditto for phrases starting withso andsuch:So hard/Such a beatingdid Douglas give Tyson that Tyson lost. And in somewhat old-fashioned or formal writing, a miscellany of other constituents can be moved to the front with the same effect:Welldo I remember, not so much the whipping, as the being shut up in a dark closet behind the study;[31]for years and yearsdid they believe that France was on the brink of ruin.[32][9]: 95–96
Negative imperative sentences require auxiliarydo, even when there is another auxiliary verb. The declarative sentenceThey were goofing off is grammatical with the single auxiliarybe; but the imperative sentenceDon't be goofing off when the principal walks in addsdon't. (Optionally,you may be added in front of or immediately afterdon't. A longer subject would normally come after:Don't any of you be goofing off. . . .)[9]: 928
Other than via a negative inflection (don't,doesn't), the verbdo does not typically contribute any change in meaning, except when used to add emphasis to an accompanying verb. This is described as an emphatic construction,[11]: 133 as an emphatic version of the declarative clause,[10]: 74 as having emphaticpolarity,[9]: 97–98 or is called the emphatic mood[according to whom?]: An example would be (i) IDO run five kilometres every morning (with intonational stress placed ondo), compared to plain (ii) I run five kilometres every morning. It also differs from (iii) IRUN five kilometres every morning (with the stress onrun): A context for (i), with its "emphasis on positive polarity", would be an allegation that the speaker didn't do so every morning; for (iii), with its "emphasis on lexical content", an allegation that the speaker merely walked.Do can be used for emphasis on negative polarity as well:He neverDID remember my birthday.[9]: 98
For emphatic positive polarity in imperatives,do is again added; thus standardBe quiet becomes emphatically positiveDo be quiet.[9]: 929
Followed by thepast participle of a verb (whether lexical or auxiliary), the auxiliary verbhave realizes aperfect tense:Has she visited Qom?;Has she been to Qom?. In addition to its tensed forms (have/‑ve,has/‑s,had/‑d,haven't,hasn't,hadn't), it has a plain form (She couldhave arrived) and a present participle (I regrethaving lost it), but no past participle.[9]: 111
("Perfect" is a syntactic term; in the context of English, "perfective" is a matter of semantic interpretation. Unlike, say, Slavic languages, which do have direct grammatical expression ofperfectivity,[33]: 136 in English, a sentence using a perfect tense may or may not have a perfective interpretation.[34]: 57–58 )
The present perfect tense is illustrated byI've left it somewhere; the past perfect (also called the preterite perfect) tense byI'd left it somewhere.[9]: 140–141 A full description of their uses is necessarily complex: the discussion inThe Cambridge Grammar of the English Language is long and intricate.[9]: 139–148
The perfect is often considered as referring to an indefinite past:I've been to Oslo might raise the question of when, but is acceptable as is; by contrast, #I've been to Oslo in 2016, specifying the time, would be strange. A more careful analysis brings the continuative perfect, the experiential (or existential) perfect, the resultative perfect, and the perfect of recent past.[9]: 143 [v] The first, with an unspecified starting point and continuing uninterruptedly to the present, is illustrated byI've lived in Oslo since 2016; the experiential byYes, I've watched a bullfight, and I never want to watch one again; the perfect of result byI've just watched a bullfight, and now I feel rather sick; and that of recent past byGeorge Santoshas just given a press conference (usable at the time of writing, but likely to become odder as time passes).[33]: 98–99
Very simply, the present perfect refers to the past in a way that has some relevance to the present.[34]: 63–64 The perfect is also used in contexts that require both past reference and an untensed verb form (He seems tohave left;Having left, he lit a cigarette).[34]: 65–66
Corpus-based research has shown that American English saw a marked decrease from around 1800 until the mid-20th century in the use of the present perfect, and that British English followed this in the late 20th century.[36]
When used to describe an event,have is exclusively a lexical verb (*Had you your teeth done?;Did you have your teeth done?; *Had you a nap?;Did you have a nap?). When used to describe a state, however, for many speakers (although for few Americans or younger people) there is also an auxiliary option: (he'd stop at a pub, settle up with a cheque because hehadn't any money on him;[37]Hasn't he any friends of his own?;[38]I'm afraid Ihaven't anything pithy to answer;[39]Thishasn't anything directly to do with religion[40]).[9]: 111–112 [34]: 54 An alternative to auxiliary verbhave in this sense ishave got, although this is commoner among British speakers, and less formal[9]: 111–113 (Has he got old news for you;[41]It hasn’t got anything to do with the little green men and the blue orb;[42]What right had he got to get on this train without a ticket?;[43]Hasn't he got a toolbox?[44]).
With their meaning of obligation,have to,has to andhad to – rarely if ever rendered as've to,'s to and'd to[45] – can use auxiliaryhave for inversion (if he wants to compel A. to do something to what Courthas he to go?;[46]How much furtherhas he to go?;[47]Now whyhas he to wait three weeks?[48]), although lexicalhave is commoner.
Use/jus/ (rhyming withloose) satisfies only one ofThe Cambridge Grammar of the English Language'sfive criteria for modal as distinct from other auxiliary verbs. "It is also semantically quite distinct from the modal auxiliaries: the meaning it expresses is aspectual, not modal."[9]: 115
Likeought,use is followed by ato-infinitival clause. ThusI used to go to college means that formerly the speaker habitually went to college, and normally implies that they no longer do so.Use is highly defective, existing only in preterite form. For some speakers of English as a first language (though very few Americans), it can follow auxiliary-verb syntax: some speakers of British English can form questions likeUsed he to come here? and negatives likeHeused not (rarelyusedn't)to come here.[11]: 140 Far commoner, however, is treatment ofused as the preterite of a lexical verb.
Whether auxiliary or lexical,used expresses past states or past habitual actions, usually with the implication that they no longer continue. After noting how constructions employingused (Weused to play tennis every week),would (We would play tennis every week), and the preterite alone (We played tennis every week) often seem to be interchangeable, Robert I. Binnick teases them apart, concluding thatused is an "anti-present-perfect": whereas the present perfect "includes the present in what is essentially a period of the past", theused construction "preciselyexcludes [it]"; and further that
The whole point of theused to construction is not to report a habit in the past but rather to contrast a past era with the present. . . . It's . . . essentially a present tense. . . . Like the present perfect, it is about a state of affairs, not a series of occurrences.[49]: 41, 43
Use is far more commonly encountered as a lexical than as an auxiliary verb, particularly for younger or American speakers. This forms questions and negatives withdid. The plain formuse (sometimes spelt⟨used⟩) of the lexical verb is seen inDid you use to play tennis?). Its preterite perfecthad used is rare but attested. A simple declarative (I often used to play tennis) could be either auxiliary or lexical.
Use of the preteriteused should not be confused with that of the participial adjective (i.e. the adjective etymologically derived from the participle), meaning "familiar with", as inI am used to this,We must get used to the cold. (As is common for adjectives and impossible for verbs,used here can be modified byvery.) When the participial adjective is followed byto and a verb, the latter is a gerund-participle:I am used togoing to college in the mornings.
Data from a corpus of American and British spoken and written English of the 1980s and 1990s show thatused not to,usedn't to (both auxiliary), anddidn't use to (lexical) were then rare in both American and British English, other thanused not to in British novels.Never used to is a commonly used alternative.[50]: 165 Modal auxiliaryuse is not used in interrogatives in conversation (Used you to . . . ?); and even the lexical version withdo-support (Did you use to . . . ?) is rare.[50]: 218
In the context for an argument that infinitivalto is a subordinator,Rodney Huddleston points out that, just as for the subordinatorthat (I said (that) he could), there are contexts whereto is optional, with no change in meaning.[w] His example isAll I did was (to) ask a question; and from it he infers thatto is meaningless.[9]: 1186
Within an argument for categorizingto not as a subordinator but as an auxiliary verb, Robert D. Levine disagrees with the main thrust of Huddleston's argument, but not with the claim thatto is meaningless – something that is also true of "dummydo" and copularbe, both of them auxiliary verbs.[24]: 191–192 Its function is purely syntactic.
The modal auxiliary verbs contribute meaning chiefly viamodality, although some of them (particularlywill and sometimesshall) express future time reference. Their uses are detailed atEnglish modal verbs, and tables summarizing their principal meaning contributions can be found in the articlesModal verb andAuxiliary verb.
For more details on the uses of auxiliaries to express aspect, mood and time reference, seeEnglish clause syntax.
As modal verbs only have tensed forms in Standard English, they would not be expected to appear in subordinate clauses, or in sequence (might be able to help them, but *might could help them). Yet what appear to be sequences of modal auxiliary verbs do occur: see "Double modals".
They can hardly be regarded as part of Standard English, and they are therefore ignored in the description below.
There are constraints on the order within sequences of auxiliary verbs. As the modal auxiliary verbs anduse only have tensed forms (or anyway only have these in Standard English), they can only go at the front. If we put aside the highly anomalousto, the order is then modal > perfecthave > progressivebe > passivebe, and a lexical verb.
Patterns with two auxiliary verbs are exemplified bywas being eaten,has been eaten,might be eaten, andmight have eaten. Patterns with three include that exemplified bymight have been eaten. Noting that "Structures containing two secondary forms of be (progressive and passive) [. . .] are avoided by some speakers, but they do occasionally occur",Huddleston andPullum presentwill have been being taken as an example of a sequence with four.[9]: 104–106
Contractions are a common feature of English, used frequently in ordinary speech. In written English, contractions are used in informal and sometimes in formal writing.[51] They usually involve theelision of a vowel – anapostrophe being inserted in its place in written English – possibly accompanied by other changes. Many of these contractions involve auxiliary verbs.
Certain contractions tend to be restricted to less formal speech and very informal writing, such asJohn'd orMary'd for "John/Mary would". (Compare the personal pronoun formsI'd andyou'd, much more likely to be encountered in relatively informal writing.) This applies in particular to constructions involving consecutive contractions, such aswouldn't've for "would not have".[citation needed]
Contractions in English are generally not mandatory, as they are in some other languages, although in speech uncontracted forms may seem overly formal. They are often used for emphasis:IAM ready! The uncontracted form of an auxiliary or copula must be used inelliptical sentences where its complement is omitted:Who's ready? / Iam! (not *I'm!).
Some contractions lead tohomophony, which sometimes causes errors in writing, such as confusing‑'ve withof, as in "would of" forwould have.[52]: 188
The lists below derive fromF. R. Palmer'sThe English Verb[12]: 242–248 andThe Cambridge Grammar of the English Language.: 1613
For the contracted forms of the modal auxiliary verbs, seeEnglish modal auxiliary verbs.
In anon-rhotic dialect, clitic-final/ɹ/ is only realized as[ɹ] (or similar) when followed by a vowel (They're tired, no/ɹ/;They're angry, with/ɹ/).
For the contraction options foris, considerBill's arriving/ˈbɪlzəˈɹaɪvɪŋ/ versusJanet's coming/ˈd͡ʒænɪtsˈkʌmɪŋ/.
For the alternative nonsyllabic options fordoes, considerWhen's Bill leave?/ˈwɛnzˈbɪlˈliv/ versusWhat's Bill do?/ˈwɒtsˈbɪlˈdu/.
The form'd might appear in for exampleWhat'd he do?, spoken informally.
Uniquely among the forms for any of the auxiliary verbs,d' is aproclitic. It attaches to the front of the single wordyou (D'you follow me?).[9]: 1614
For the alternative nonsyllabic options forhas, considerBill's arrived/ˈbɪlzəˈɹaɪvd/ versusJanet's come/ˈd͡ʒænɪtsˈkʌm/.
Beingclitics, the contractions can replace their full equivalents in most (although not all) contexts: thus we see‑ve not only inThey've left but also inMy friends've left (or even inMy friends I hadn't seen in three years've left); not only inYou should've been there but also inYou shouldn't've been there, in which a contraction has clitized onto an auxiliary verb with negative inflection.
Double contractions are possible.Will have broken is grammatical, and thusHis arm/helmet/glasses/rib/collarbone/nose [etc] 'll've broken are all grammatical too.
| After, or as an inflectional suffix of, the auxiliary verb | After the subject | |
|---|---|---|
| not | *Would not you like another glass? | Would you not like another glass? |
| -n't | Wouldn't you like another glass? | *Would you n't like another glass? |
Contractions such as‑d/(ə)d/ (fromwould) areclitics. By contrast, the‑n't/(ə)nt/ ofwouldn't is in reality a "contraction" only etymologically:wouldn't,isn't,haven't and so forth have long beeninflected forms, and an auxiliary verb with negative inflection can behave differently from the combination ofnot and the same verb without the inflection:[9]: 91
This article will continue to use "contraction" to include early instances of what at the time may not have become inflected forms.
During the early 17th century,not lost its requirement for stress, and subsequently came to be written as‑n't, particularly in comedies and in the mouths of rustic characters or others speaking nonstandard dialects. In the 19th and 20th centuries, the use of‑n't in writing spread beyond drama and fiction to personal letters, journalism, and descriptive texts.[53]An't,ben't,can't,don't,han't,shan't andwon't were well established by the end of the 17th century;isn't,aren't,wasn't,weren't,didn't,doesn't,don't,hadn't,hasn't,haven't,can't,couldn't,daren't,mayn't (now obsolete or dialectal),mightn't,mustn't,needn't,shan't,shouldn't,won't andwouldn't by the end of the 18th; andoughtn't in the early 19th.[53]: 176, 189
There were various other negative contractions that have not survived: as examples, Barron Brainerd cites A. C. Partridge as showing that from 1599 to 1632Ben Jonson usedi'not ("is not"),sha'not ("shall not"),wi'not ("will not"),wu'not andwou'not ("would not"),ha'not ("has/have not"), anddo'not ("do not").[54][53]: 179–180
Standard English has no first-person singular form corresponding to theisn't ofit isn't andisn't it? that is completely unproblematic. However, the following informal or dialectal options have been used:
Otto Jespersen callsamn't "unpronounceable"[55]: 120 andEric Partridge calls it "ugly",[56] but it is the standard inflected form in some varieties, mainlyHiberno-English (Irish English) andScottish English.[19][57] In Hiberno-English the question form (amn't I?) is used more frequently than the declarativeI amn't.[58] (The standardI'm not is available as an alternative toI amn't in both Scottish English and Hiberno-English.) An example appears ina poem byOliver St. John Gogarty:If anyone thinks that Iamn't divine, / He gets no free drinks when I'm making the wine. These lines are quoted inJames Joyce'sUlysses,[59] which also contains other examples:Amn't I with you?Amn't I your girl? (spoken by Cissy Caffrey).[60]
Amnae exists inScots, and has been borrowed intoScottish English by many speakers. It is used in declarative sentences rather than questions.[58]
Ain't is an inflected alternative toam not – and also tois not,was not,are not,were not,has not, andhave not;[61]: 60–64 and in some dialects alsodo not,does not,did not,cannot (orcan not),could not,will not,would not andshould not. The usage ofain't is a perennial subject of controversy in English.[62]Geoffrey Nunberg has argued thatain't is used by Standard English speakers "to suggest that a fact is just obvious on the face of things".[63]
Aren't is a very common means of filling the "amn't gap" in questions:Aren't I lucky to have you around? It was common by the early 20th century:Otto Jespersen writing in a book published in 1917 that:
Nowadays [/ɑːnt/] is frequently heard, especially in tag-questions: I'm a bad boy [/ɑːntaɪ/], but when authors want to write it, they are naturally induced to writearen't. . . . I find the spellingaren't I orarn't I pretty frequently in George Eliot . . . but only to represent vulgar or dialectal speech. In the younger generation of writers, however, it is also found as belonging to educated speakers. . . .[55]: 119 [x]
The style guides have disagreed onaren't: Eric Partridge considered thearen't inaren't I an "illogical and illiterate" spelling of "the phonetically natural and the philologically logical"a'n't;[56]H. W. Fowler (as revised byErnest Gowers) wrote thataren't I? was "colloquially respectable and almost universal".[64] In 1979, however, it was described as "almost universal" among speakers of Standard English.[65] As an alternative toam not,aren't developed from one pronunciation ofan't (which itself developed in part fromamn't). Innon-rhotic dialects,aren't andan't arehomophones, and the spelling⟨aren't I⟩ began to replace⟨an't I⟩ in the early 20th century,[61]: 115–116 although examples of⟨aren't I⟩ (or⟨arn't I⟩) foram I not appear in the first half of the 19th century, as inarn't I listening; and isn't it only the breeze that's blowing the sheets and halliards about? from 1827.[66]
An't (sometimesa'n't) arose from "am not" (via "amn't") and "are not" almost simultaneously. "An't" first appears in print in the work of English Restoration playwrights. In 1695 "an't" was used for "am not", and as early as 1696 "an't" was used to mean "are not". "An't" for "is not" may have developed independently from its use for "am not" and "are not". "Isn't" was sometimes written as "in't" or "en't", which could have changed into "an't". "An't" for "is not" may also have filled a gap in the paradigm for the verbbe. From 1749,an't with a long "a" sound began to be written asain't. By this time,an't was already being used for "am not", "are not", and "is not".An't andain't coexisted as written forms well into the 19th century.
Bain't, apparently from "be not", is found in a number of works employingeye dialect, includingJ. Sheridan Le Fanu'sUncle Silas.[67] It is also found in a ballad written in Newfoundland dialect.[68]
Han't orha'n't, an early contraction forhas not andhave not, developed from the elision of thes ofhas not and thev ofhave not.Han't also appeared in the work of English Restoration playwrights. Much likean't,han't was sometimes pronounced with a longa, yieldinghain't. With H-dropping, theh ofhan't orhain't gradually disappeared in most dialects, and becameain't.Ain't as a contraction forhas not/have not appeared in print as early as 1819. As withan't,hain't andain't were found together late into the nineteenth century.
Hain't, in addition to being an antecedent ofain’t, is a contraction ofhas not andhave not in some dialects of English, such asAppalachian English. It is reminiscent ofhae (have) inLowland Scots. In dialects that retain the distinction betweenhain't andain't,hain't is used for contractions ofto have not andain't for contractions ofto be not.[69] In other dialects,hain't is used either in place of, or interchangeably withain't.Hain't is seen for example in Chapter 33 ofMark Twain'sAdventures of Huckleberry Finn:I hain't come back—I hain't beenGONE.
Don't is the Standard English negative inflected form ofdo. However, in nonstandard English it may also be used for third person singular:Emma? She don't live here anymore.