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This typological overview compares the degree to which different languages have means to give expression to modality (possibility, necessity) without lexical and direct inflectional means. The criterial patterns derive from a variety of languages such as German, English, Chinese, French, Scandinavian, Italian, Romanian, Russian, Polish, and Gothic as well as Old High German. They encompass mainly the auxiliaries HAVE and BE, together with either an infinitival embedding of a full verb linked by the infinitival preposition TO, or other aspectual means. It is demonstrated that what appears as typical covert modal expressions in the Germanic languages, and the Indo-European ones in a wider sense, cannot be seen as a recurrent pattern in non-Indo-European languages. Yet, there are recurrent and plausible forms that allow for generalizations.

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9781443840590

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Werner Abraham held the Chair of German Philology and Mediaeval Literature at the University of Groningen for 30 years, before he retired. He was appointed Honorary Professor in the Department of General Linguistics at the University of Vienna and presently teaches German(ic) linguistics at the University of Munich.Elisabeth Leiss holds the Chair of German Linguistics at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany. She is Head of the BA/MA Studies in Speech and Language Therapy at the University of Munich. Her main focus is on all aspects of categorization in language and mind.

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