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![]() Shall and will - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Shall and will are two of the English modal verbs. They have various uses, including the expression of propositions about the future, in what is usually referred to as the future tense of English. The traditional prescriptive grammar rule stated that, when expressing pure futurity (without any additional meaning such as desire or command), shall was to be used when the subject was in the first person (I or we), and will in other cases. In practice this rule is commonly not adhered to by any group of English speakers, and many speakers do not differentiate between will and shall when expressing futurity, with the use of will being much more common and less formal than shall. ![]() In many specific contexts, however, a distinction still continues. Shall is widely used in bureaucratic documents, especially documents written by lawyers. Due to heavy misuse, its meaning is vague and the US Government\'s Plain Language group advises writers not to use the word. Its cognates in other Germanic languages include Old Norseskal, Germansoll, and Dutchzal; these all represent *skol- , the o- grade of Indo- European *skel- . All of these verbs function as auxiliaries, representing either simple futurity, or necessity or obligation. The verb will derives from Old English willan, meaning to want or wish. Cognates include Old Norse vilja, German wollen, Dutch willen, Gothicwiljan. It also has relatives in non- Germanic languages, such as Latinvelle (. All of these forms derive from the e- grade or o- grade of Indo- European *wel- , meaning to wish for or desire. Within English, the modal verb will is also related to the noun will and the regular lexical verb will (as in . In English, shall and will are the auxiliaries that came to be used for this purpose. Because of this, like the other modal verbs, they do not take the usual - s in Modern English\'s third- person singular present; we say she shall and he will . Archaically, there were however the variants shalt and wilt, which were used with thou. ![]() Both verbs also have their own preterite (past) forms, namely should and would, which derive from the actual preterites of the Old English verbs (made using the dental suffix that forms the preterites of weak verbs). These forms have developed a range of meanings, frequently independent of those of shall and will (as described in the section on should and would below). Aside from this, though, shall and will (like the other modals) are defective verbs . Their negations, shall not and will not, also have contracted forms: shan\'t and won\'t (although shan\'t is rarely used in North America, and is becoming rarer elsewhere too). For more detail see English auxiliaries and contractions. The pronunciation of will is , and that of won\'t is . However shall has distinct weak and strong pronunciations: when unstressed, and when stressed. MODAL VERBS Different moods and different ways to express them ABILITY POSSIBILITY PERMISSION OBLIGATION EXPECTABILITY PROBABILITY Structure of Modal Verbs CAN is used to indicate the possession of an ABILITY. The principal English modal verbs are can, could, may, might, must, shall, should, will and would. However, need comes from the regular Old English verb neodian (meaning \'to beneed. Shan\'t is pronounced in England, New Zealand, South Africa etc.; in North America (if used) it is pronounced , and both forms are acceptable in Australia (due to the unique course of the trap. This use can blend with the usage of shall to express futurity, and is therefore discussed in detail below under . This blends with its usage in expressing futurity, and is discussed under Colored uses . For its use in questions about the future, see . For example: Will they be here tomorrow? I shall grow old some day. When will or shall directly governs the infinitive of the main verb, as in the above examples, the construction is called the simple future. Future marking can also be combined with aspectual marking to produce constructions known as future progressive (. English also has other ways of referring to future circumstances, including the going to construction, and in many cases the ordinary present tense . Generally, will is far more common than shall. Use of shall is normally a marked usage, typically indicating formality and/or seriousness and (if not used with a first person subject) expressing a colored meaning as described below. Www.autoenglish.org Written by Bob Wilson . TYPE USE MODAL VERBS EXAMPLE 1 expressing ability CAN Mar Grammar practice for ESL students. Modal verbs The modal verbs include can, must, may, might, will, would, should. They are used with other verbs to express ability. Modal verbs, sometimes called modals, are auxiliary verbs (helping verbs). They express such things as possibility, probability, permission and obligation. Can, could, might, may, must, should, will, would and shall are modal verbs. We use a modal verb before a. English for everyone.org Name. Here is a list of the modal auxiliary verbs: Will: “Will ” is used when you are volunteering to do something. Definitions Modal verbs are difficult to define in any language because of the wide range of pragmatic uses of modal verbs by native speakers. Some of the more common definitions (in no particular order) of the modal verbs in English are: can – ability, permission. In some dialects of English, the use of shall as future marker is viewed as archaic. According to this rule, when expressing futurity and nothing more, the auxiliary shall is to be used with first person subjects (I and we), and will is to be used in other instances. Using will with the first person or shall with the second or third person is asserted to indicate some additional meaning in addition to plain futurity. In practice, however, this rule is often not observed . This is discussed in more detail in the following sections. Prescriptivist distinction. It was customary to use will to translate the Latin velle (meaning to wish, want or intend); this left shall (which had no other equivalent in Latin) to translate the Latin future tense. ![]() This practice kept shall alive in the role of future marker; it is used consistently as such in the Middle English Wycliffe\'s Bible. However, in the common language it was will that was becoming predominant in that role. Chaucer normally uses will to indicate the future, regardless of grammatical person. An influential proponent of the prescriptive rule that shall is to be used as the usual future marker in the first person was John Wallis. In Grammatica Linguae Anglicanae (1. The Pocket Fowler\'s Modern English Usage, OUP, 2. Thus shall is used with the meaning of obligation, and will with the meaning of desire or intention. An illustration of the supposed contrast between shall and will (when the prescriptive rule is adhered to) appeared in the 1. They looked at each other hard a moment. An example is provided by the famous speech of Winston Churchill: . Some of these have already been mentioned (see the Specific uses section). However, there are also cases in which the meaning being expressed combines plain futurity with some additional implication; these can be referred to as . For example: You shall regret it before long. The use of shall is often associated with formality and/or seriousness, in addition to the coloring of the meaning. For some specific cases of its formal use, see the sections below on . Hence in enquiring factually about the future, one could ask: . To use will instead would turn the question into a request. In practice, however, shall is almost never used in questions of this type. To mark a factual question as distinct from a request, the going- to future (or just the present tense) can be used: . Normally the use of will in such questions would change the meaning to a simple request for information: . However, for many speakers in the United States, the will form can also be used as an offer (in which case . In the case of a reported question (even if not reported in the past tense), shall is likely to be replaced by should or another modal verb such as might: ? However, it is sometimes used to mean . The most famous example of both of these uses of the word . Most requirement specifications use the word shall to denote something that is required, while reserving the will for simple statement about the future (especially since . However, some documents deviate from this convention and use the words shall, will, and should to denote the strength of the requirement. Some requirement specifications will define the terms at the beginning of the document. Shall and will are distinguished by NASA. The legal reference Words and Phrases dedicates 7. When referencing a legal or technical requirement, Words and Phrases instead favors must while reserving should for recommendations. In some of their uses they can still be identified as past (or conditional) forms of those verbs, but they have also developed some specific meanings of their own. Independent uses. Examples: You should not say such things. This should is found in stock phrases such as . However its use in more general cases is old- fashioned or highly formal, and can give rise to ambiguity with the more common use of should to mean ought to. This is illustrated by the following sentences: You would apologize if you saw him. The use of should here (like that of shall as a plain future marker) is much less common and is generally confined to the first person. Examples: He left Bath in 1. Retrieved August 4, 2. Syntax - Shall and Will. The Virginia University Magazine. How to write and speak effective English: a modern guide to good form. Requirements modelling and specification for service oriented architecture. The stuff of thought: language as a window into human nature.
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