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THE PERIPHRASTIC USE OF SHALL AND WILL IN MODERN ENGLISH
Author(s) -
Fries Charles C.
Publication year - 1956
Publication title -
language learning
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.882
H-Index - 103
eISSN - 1467-9922
pISSN - 0023-8333
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-1770.1956.tb00858.x
Subject(s) - citation , linguistics , french fries , psychology , history , philosophy , library science , computer science , chemistry , food science
One cannot read through the mass of discussions of the problem of shall and will published during the past century’ nor even those written since 19002 without being impressed by the wide diversity of the points of view and the definite conflict of the opinions and conclusions thus brought together. Even among those articles that can be grouped as expressing the conventional rules3 there is considerable variety and contradiction, not in the general rule for independent declarative statements (that a shall with the first person corresponds with a will with the second and third) but in the other rules concerning questions, reported discourse, and subofdinate clauses. That there is a considerable body of literary usage which conflicts with the conventional rules is indicated by the many pages in these articles devoted to pointing out instances in which “the best of our authors” have violated the rules? Opposed to those articles giving the conventional rules is not only this fairly large amount of usage, the number of instances pointed out as “blunders.” but also the views ex-