1887
Volume 19, Issue 2
  • ISSN 1566-5852
  • E-ISSN: 1569-9854

Abstract

Abstract

This study examines the affirmatives and in Early Modern English, more specifically in the period 1560 to 1760. Affirmatives have an obvious role as responses to yes/no questions in dialogues, and so this study demanded the kind of dialogical material provided by the . I examine the meanings and contexts of usage of each affirmative: their distribution across time and text-types, their collocates and their occurrence after positive and negative questions. The results challenge a number of issues and claims in the literature, including when the “Germanic pattern” (involving and after positive or negative questions) dissolved, whether or were dialectal, and the timing of the rise of and the fall of .

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2019-02-01
2024-10-06
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  • Article Type: Research Article
Keyword(s): affirmatives; ay; Early Modern English; response forms; yea; yes
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