This dissertation explores the interplay of grammar and context in the interpretation of modal
words like ought, necessary, and need. The empirical foci of the discussion are patterns in …

Page 1 A Historical Syntax of English Bettelou Los EDINBURGH TEXTBOOKS ON THE
ENGLISH LANGUAGE – ADVANCED Page 2 Page 3 A Historical Syntax of English Page 4 …

Impersonal constructions in the history of English form a puzzling category, in that there has
been uncertainty as to why some verbs are attested in such constructions while others are …

The decline of central modal must and the increase in frequency of the semi-modals have
(got) to, need (to), and want to is one of the most conspicuous grammatical changes that …

The first decade of the 21st century has seen a number of interesting developments in the
study of modality in English. First, there has been a strong interest in recent changes in the …

The evolution of verbs expressing necessity in the history of English, such as* þurfan and
need, has been studied in detail, especially their semantic competition and their …

Early English impersonals have been the subject of numerous studies, and many systems of
classification have been proposed, as well as theories on their evolution into personal …

Modality in New Englishes: A Corpus-Based Study of Obligation and Necessity Page 1
Modality in New Englishes: A Corpus-Based Study of Obligation and Necessity Inaugural-Dissertation …

The terms subjectification, intersubjectification and construction are very often used in
relation to grammaticalisation, although the relationship between them is not always clear …

This paper studies NEED TO, a semi-modal of obligation and necessity, and its
semantic/pragmatic functions in the spoken registers of the British National Corpus. The …