The value of may as an evidential and epistemic marker in English medical abstracts

Dados Bibliográficos

ID5827874
AutoresFrancisco J Alonso-Almeida (0000-0003-4676-3831, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria), Francisco Alonso-Almeida (Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria), Laura Cruz García (0000-0001-7826-0142, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria), Laura Cruz-García (Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria)
Ano2011
Volume46
Fascículo3
Páginas59-73
Data de publicação2011-01-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoSTAP (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0081-6272 • E-ISSN: 2082-5102
EditoraDe Gruyter Open (PUBLISHER • PL)
DOI10.2478/v10121-010-0004-7
OpenAlexW1973275709
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas5
Referências citadas13

The value of may as an evidential and epistemic marker in English medical abstracts Our article addresses the issue of the relationship between epistemic modality and evidentiality. Earlier works such as Lazard (2001) claim that English does not hold grammatical markers for the source of knowledge in contrast to other languages, e.g. Quechua, that seem to do so. Dendale and Tasmowski (2001), however, think that grammatical evidentials are possible in English, and Aikhenvald (2004) admits that modal verbs in English are a borderline case. In our article, we seek to explore the use of may and might in a corpus of medical abstracts to demonstrate (i) their value as grammatical evidential markers, and (ii) their value as epistemic markers that show the author's attitude to the proposition manifested. In doing so, we follow Cornillie (2009), who defines these two concepts as independent categories. The results of our analyses indicate that these modals may be used as grammatical markers of evidentiality, regardless of other semantic and pragmatic meanings

Epistemic modality · Evidentiality · Modality (human–computer interaction · Proposition · Value (mathematics · Discourse Analysis in Language Studies · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition