Merging of Time and Modality:Evidence from the Epistemic Function of the English Present Tense
In Langacker's Cognitive Grammar,grounding,a key theoretical tenet in ensuring successful communication,is realized by tense and modality.The motivation and ways of tense fulfilling the grounding function are well elaborated,but modality is not.Similarly,why modal particles in Chinese can fulfill the function of sentence completion(grounding in nature)also leaves much room for theoretical explanation.The merging of tense(temporality)and modality as expostulated by the present paper,taking the English present tense as our case here,can serve a feasible theoretical perspective for the solution to the above mentioned issues and at the same time give a sound explanation for why Chinese is a subjectivity-dominant language,due to the subjective nature of modality.
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