LINGUIST List 21.3479 Tue Aug 31 2010 Confs: English, Morphology, Syntax, Semantics/UK Editor for this issue: Amy Brunett <brunettlinguistlist.org> LINGUIST is pleased to announce the launch of an exciting new feature: Easy Abstracts! Easy Abs is a free abstract submission and review facility designed to help conference organizers and reviewers accept and process abstracts online. Just go to: http://www.linguistlist.org/confcustom, and begin your conference customization process today! With Easy Abstracts, submission and review will be as easy as 1-2-3! Directory         1.    Emma uelle Labeau, The Evolution of the Modals and Quasi-modals in New Englishes Message 1: The Evolution of the Modals and Quasi-modals in New Englishes Date: 31-Aug-2010 From: Emma uelle Labeau <E.labeauaston.ac.uk> Subject: The Evolution of the Modals and Quasi-modals in New Englishes E-mail this message to a friend The Evolution of the Modals and Quasi-modals in New Englishes Date: 18-Apr-2011 - 20-Apr-2011 Location: Birmingham, United Kingdom Contact: Dirk Noel Contact Email: dnoelhkucc.hku.hk Meeting URL: http://www1.aston.ac.uk/lss/news-events/conferences-seminars/chronos-10/ Linguistic Field(s): Morphology; Semantics; Syntax Subject Language(s): English (eng) Meeting Description: Panel 5: The Evolution of the Modals and Quasi-modals in New Englishes Dirk Noël (The University of Hong Kong) & Johan van der Auwera (University of Antwerp) Theme and Purpose of the Panel: The purpose of this panel is to explore to what extent the significant decline in the frequency of use of modal auxiliaries and the concomitant rise in the frequency of so-called 'quasi-modals' that has been observed to be taking place in British and American English (Leech 2003) is also occurring in New Englishes, and to consider explanations for possible differences in this respect between 'inner' and 'outer circle' varieties of English. Both morphosyntactic factors and semantic/pragmatic factors linked up with societal changes have been adduced as explanations for the dwindling frequency of the modals (will, would, shall, should, can, could, may, might, must, need, ought) and the emergence of the quasi-modals (be able to, be about to, be bound to, be expected to, be going to, be guaranteed to, be meant to, be supposed to, be to, have to, have got to, need to, want to) in inner circle Englishes, specifically British and American English (Myhill 1995, Leech 2003, Smith 2003, Nokkonen 2006). If modals and quasi-modals turn out to be evolving differently in outer circle Englishes, as previous research appears to suggest (notably Collins 2009a), this could be due to differences in the societal context in which these Englishes function, including their modes of transmission, or to substrate languages exerting an influence on these largely non-native varieties (cf. Lim & Gisborne 2009). Scientific Committee: -TBCPeter Collins, University of New South Wales (p.collinsunsw.edu.au) -Marianne Hundt, University of Zurich (mhundtes.uzh.ch) -Gerald Nelson, Chinese University of Hong Kong (geraldanelsongmail.com) -Valerie Youssef, University of the West Indies (Valerie.Youssefsta.uwi.edu) Read more issues|LINGUIST home page|Top of issue Page Updated: 31-Aug-2010       About LINGUIST    |   Contact Us       While the LINGUIST List makes every effort to ensure the linguistic relevance of sites listed on its pages, it cannot vouch for their contents.