Re: Auxiliary verbs

On 5/6/06, Alain Lemaire <alargule@...> wrote:
> My question is as follows: is this distinction between two possible forms of
> negation of the modal verb 'have to'/'must'/'should' (Dutch 'moeten') a
> typical feature of European (German, Latin) languages? Or is it a
> distinction that is made universally - so every language has it's own way of
> saying either 'je hoeft niet te gaan' or 'je moet niet gaan'? Are there
> languages that don't make that distinction (and have only one negating form
> of the verb 'have to')?
In German, you have "Du musst gehen" = "You must go" and "Du musst
nicht gehen" = "You need not go" / "You (must not) go".

To express "You must (not go)", I'd say "Du darfst nicht gehen"  =
"You may not go" -- but the converse of that is "Du darfst gehen" =
"You may go", with a different modal verb. So in that sense, "have to"
has only one negating form, one which negates the modal.

I'm trying to think whether the alternative meaning (negating the
verb) is possibly by emphasising the word "nicht", but I think that
the sentences would still sound better if constructed with "dürfen"
rather than "müssen" -- e.g. ?"Du musst NICHT AUFGEBEN!" vs "Du darfst
nicht aufgeben!"

Cheers,
--
Philip Newton <philip.newton@...>