Memoire Online - The use of english modals by first-year students of the department of anglophone studies

DEDICATION..................................................................................................................ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT....................................................................................................iii

LIST OF CHARTS.............................................................................................................iv

INTRODUCTION

This study deals with the deontic and epistemic uses of the English modals in the writings of first year students of the department of Anglophone Studies at the University of Ouagadougou. The deontic use refers to modals expressing permission, advisability, necessity and obligation; whereas the epistemic use refers to modals expressing possibility, probability, and certainty.

Our interest in this study was aroused by our notice that the first year students in the department of Anglophone Studies rarely use the English modals in their speech; those who use some modals do so often inappropriately. Why is that so? Do students master the deontic and epistemic uses of English modals?

Many linguists and grammarians such as Leech, Wardhaugh, Celce - Murcia and Larsen - Freeman implicitly disagree with the idea that students master the meaning of modals since they claim that the meanings of modals are almost incomprehensible, and even difficult to teach. Leech (1987:71) is very aware of these difficulties as he asserts:

is that their meaning has both a logical and a practical (or pragmatic) element.»

Leech's view is shared by Wardhaugh (2003:56), who recognizes that even if it is possible to make a distinction between the epistemic use and the deontic use of modals, the distinction is not always clear in practice. He sustains that «the modal verbs are complicated in the kinds of meanings that they express».

Other grammarians sceptical about the correct use of modals by learners are Celce-Murcia and Larsen- Freeman (1983:83). They worsen the picture by placing the difficulties at teachers' level. Addressing their book to teachers, they make this warning: «An additional problem in the teaching of modals arises when you attempt to convey to your ESL/EFL students the meaning of modals, periphrastic modals, and modal-like forms». If teachers have problems to convey their EFL students the meaning of modals, no one would logically expect from students to handle the use of modals, because modals have both deontic meanings and epistemic meanings.

Do students of first year of the department of Anglophone Studies at the University of Ouagadougou make any difference between the epistemic uses and the deontic uses of modals? That is the question we shall try to answer in this piece of research.

We shall assume that all the students we shall test are English as a Foreign Language learners, that they attended all the course of English at secondary school, and that they will answer our questions fairly. We hypothesize that students will misuse modals and misunderstand their meanings, because modals convey both deontic meanings and epistemic meanings, which they are not clearly aware of.

We shall clarify the meaning of modals and then, test students through written exercises to know whether the hypothesis should be confirmed or invalidated.

Our work is divided into four chapters. The first chapter deals with the review of literature on pragmatics and modality in order to present modals in their linguistic milieu. The second chapter is about the research methodology, that is, how we collected and processed our data. The third chapter displays the finding from our data analysis. The last chapter provides some suggestions which, hopefully, may be useful for teachers, as they could utilize them to improve their teaching of English modals for communication, for students as they will be made aware of their strengths and weaknesses in the use and understanding of English modals, and finally, for researchers, because we intend through our piece of research to enlighten more the issue of EFL learning.

The purpose of this chapter is, firstly, to make an overview of pragmatics as a linguistic science by giving its origin and historical vagaries, its definition and that of some related key terms. Secondly, this chapter explores definitions of modality and discusses the meanings of modals.

I.1 - THE ORIGIN AND HISTORICAL VAGARIES OF THE TERM «PRAGMATICS» ACCORDING TO LEVINSON ( 1983)

Crystal (1996:301) recognizes that pragmatics is not easy to define, for «no coherent pragmatic theory has been achieved because of the variety of topics it has to account for». The term pragmatics is as vague as Searle, Kiefer and Bierursh suggest in Levinson (1983:6) «pragmatics is one of those words (societal and cognitive are others) that give impression that something quite specific and technical is being talked about when often in fact it has no clear meaning». They say that pragmatics deals with all aspects of language use, understanding and appropriateness.

The philosopher Charles Morris (1938:6) is reportedly^1(*) said to be the «father» of the term pragmatics in its modern usage. He sought to establish a general shape of a science that studies signs: semiotics. Morris divided semiotics into three branches: syntax, semantics and pragmatics. He defines syntax as the study of «the formal relation of signs to one another», semantics as the study of «the relation of signs to the objects to which the signs are applicable», and pragmatics as the study of «the relation of signs to interpreters». Each branch consisted of pure studies, dealing

with the construction of the relevant metalanguage, and descriptive studies, applying the metalanguage to the description of specific signs and their usages.

It is the analytical philosopher and logician Carnap who narrowed the scope of pragmatics to the study of the users of the language. He explains the trichotomy of semiotics as follows:

Carnap's definition of pragmatics coincides with Morris's (quoted in Levinson, 1983) descriptive semiotics, and Carnap finds a pure pragmatics which he considered to deal with concepts like belief, utterance and intention and their logical inter-relation.

Sayward (1974) quoted in Levinson (1983) noticed that Morris's and Carnap's usages of the term pragmatics was ambiguous because the particle «Oh» in English could be analyzed pragmatically as well as semantically. Therefore, defining pragmatics as «the study of aspects of language that required reference to the users of language» will limit the scope of pragmatics to the study of indexical or deictic words like the pronouns I and you, because in natural language they are used to refer to the users of the language. Yet, it is this definition that Montague (1968)^2(*) developed.

To summarize, Morris defined pragmatics as the study of psychological and sociological aspects involved in language, whereas Carnap defined it as the study of concepts that make reference to users. But Montague defined pragmatics as the study of deictic or indexical words; yet Anglo- American linguistics and philosophy have a different sense, which we are concerned with. Our next point is about the Anglo-American linguistics definition of pragmatics.

I.2 - DEFINITION OF PRAGMATICS

Anglo-American linguistics and philosophy define pragmatics, in its simplest terms, as the study of language use. But, this definition is not satisfactory since language use embraces many parameters as various as each of them deserves a particular field of study. The diversity of these fields leads to miscellaneous definitions that we are going to look into now.

The lesser satisfactory (but possible) definition of pragmatics is as follows: «Pragmatics is the study of those principles that will account for why a certain set of sentences are anomalous». In this sense, a sentence like «I am dead» would be incorrect because there is no usual social context where someone would say «I am dead», for if I am dead I cannot say it. The definition is unsatisfactory because this pragmatic anomaly is presupposed rather than explained.

Another unsatisfactory definition is: «Pragmatics is the study of language from a functional perspective.» That definition includes any aspect that contributes to the production of language, that is, non-linguistic pressures and causes. It includes psycholinguistics, and sociolinguistics; so it is too large.

A more limited scope of pragmatics needs to be set. A possible definition might be, as Katz and Fodor quoted (in Levinson (1983)) «Pragmatics is concerned solely with performance principles of language use». This definition implies that pragmatics is not concerned with the description of linguistic structure but with the context of language use. It does not refer to irony or understatement, where the context is quite opposed to the use. The problem is that, if the definition wants to depart from the description of linguistic structure, it will fail to analyze the aspects of linguistic structure which directly encode features of the context.

Levinson (1983) states that any definition of pragmatics must include the study of deixis, implicatures, presupposition and speech acts. He defines pragmatics as «the study of deixis (at least in part), implicature, presupposition, speech acts and aspects of discourse structure». In fact, the definition unfolds the subject matter of pragmatics.

McCarthy (1991:2) defines pragmatics as «the study of how meaning is created in context». This means that, to understand the meaning of an utterance one should refer to the context. It presupposes that the hearer and the speaker are in the same context. Richards et al. (1985:225) give the scope of pragmatics:

According to Cook (1989:157) pragmatics is «the study of how the meaning of discourse is created in particular contexts for particular senders and receivers». Discourse being the «stretches of language perceived to be meaningful, unified and purposive» (P. 156), and context being the «social and physical world which interacts with text to create discourse». (P.156). Context includes the participants to discourse production, the surroundings, the previous situation, etc..

In light of these definitions, pragmatics can be defined as the study of language used in communication. That is, the study of language which is concerned with the adaptation of symbolic expressions to the referential, situational, actional and interpersonal context.

I.3 - PRAGMATICS AND DISCOURSE CONTEXT

The discourse analyst searches the relationship between sentences in the same text whereas the pragmaticist wants to find out the relationships between sentences and the real world. Some linguistic items require contextual information. If, for example, a speaker says «I prefer this table to that one», the hearer expects to see tables or he is aware of the existence of tables. The words «I», «this», and «that» used in the discourse refer to concrete existing things. These terms are known as referring expressions. In pragmatics, some technical terms such as reference, presupposition, implicature and inference are used to explicate the relationships between the language users and the world in which they live. Let us explain these terms.

I.3.1 - Pragmatic reference

Pragmatic reference is what Halliday and Hasan (1976:31)^3(*) call exophoric reference. They say that exophoric references are forms which, «instead of being interpreted semantically in their own right...make reference to something else for their interpretation». The exophoric reference need not be analyzed within the text - its interpretation lies outside the text - but within the context of situation. So it refers to context. Levinson (1983:58) defines context as a «set of pragmatic indices, co-ordinates or reference points (as they are variously called) for speakers, and whatever else is needed». When someone says, «Look at that» without any other linguistic item, we expect him to point at something concrete. Example of pragmatic or exophoric reference:

In the following sentence knowledge of the referred person is necessary to understand the meaning of the modal.

The referring term is «He». If «He» refers to someone of a higher social status than the speaker, the modal «may» expresses a possibility; otherwise «may» will express either possibility or permission.

I.3.2 - Pragmatic presupposition

Pragmatic presupposition is well described in French by the use of tu and vous. Levinson (1983:175) notes that the presuppositions concerning the relationship holding between speaker and addressee, expressed by the use of tu or vous, simply do not affect «truth conditions». Thus, quoting Keenan (1971:51), Levinson (1983:175) says that in «Tu es Napoléon» the use of tu presupposes the addressee is socially inferior to the speaker or personally intimate with the speaker». Keenan (1971) then, defines pragmatic presuppositions as «a relation between a speaker and the appropriateness of a sentence in context». In «Vous êtes Napoléon», the use of vous shows a polite or a formal way of talking to the addressee. All in all, the use of tu or vous depends on the relationship between the addresser and the addressee. When there is respect we use vous when there is less respect we use tu.

In English, pronouns are not used to show when the request is perceived more polite or less polite. The distinction is made through the use of modals. Then an English native speaker would find «Could you give me your pen?» more polite than «Can you give me your pen?». By presupposing that the addressee is socially important, the speaker uses «could» (a French speaker will use vous).

The meaning expressions that capture presuppositions are called implicature expressions or conventional implicatures. What is implicature?

I.3.3 - Implicature

The term «implicature» is used by Grice (1975)^4(*) to account for what a speaker can imply, suggest, or mean, as distinct from what the speaker literally says. In conversational implicature the speaker means more than what he says.

For instance if a teacher says to his student: «You shall not go out before I tell you», the student knows that «shall not» expresses prohibition. He understands that if he trespasses, he will be punished. So, the student will not do so. His attitude will be deferent if the teacher says: «You may not go out before I tell you so». The student will not be afraid to go out. By using «shall» instead of «may», the teacher need not add: «If you go out, I shall punish you». He makes economy of words.

I.3.4 - Inference

The term inference is used by Brown and Yule (1983:256) to «describe that process which the reader (hearer) must go through to get from the literal meaning of what is written (or said) to what the writer (speaker) intended to convey». In fact, there is no concrete relationship between what is heard or read and what is meant. It is the hearer (reader) who establishes a connection between utterances and the context. In this regard, references, presuppositions and implicatures are kinds of inferences.

Inference is of paramount importance in the understanding of the epistemic meaning of modals.

For instance, if A says, «The man may be there»; B infers that A is not sure the man is there. The implicature is that the man may not be there.

I.3.5 - Speech act theory

All the terms we have defined (reference, presupposition, implicature) are used to indicate the relationship between discourse and discourse context. Knowing the real world, the participants and their expectations we can predict what they are likely to say and study the relationship between what they say and what they think of their utterances. The relation between the utterance and the speaker is studied within Speech Act Theory.

Austin (1962)^5(*) observes that some declarative sentences are not used just to say things, i.e. describe states of affairs, but rather actively do things. He suggests that the sentence «I declare you married» is not simply asserting something but it is making something happened. Before the sentence is pronounced you were a bachelor, but as soon as it is pronounced, your matrimonial status has changed. Austin calls these kinds of sentences, i.e. sentences used to make things happen, performatives.

Austin distinguishes two kinds of performatives: explicit performatives and implicit performatives. In explicit performatives the speaker avoids to be ambiguous by describing what he is performing. Hence, instead of using some specific items like modals (as in «You must be back at ten o'clock») or adverbs (as in «I shall be there without fail») the speaker uses expressions like «I impose the obligation on you to be back at ten o'clock» or like in «I promise Ishall be there».

On the contrary, in implicit performatives, short statements are used, with specific grammatical devices. But many problems of identification arise. For instance, how to know that «go» performs an order or a daring or advice. This raises a context issue.

Austin identifies three basic senses in which when one is saying something one is doing something and whereby three kinds of acts that are simultaneously performed:

Austin's illocutionary act has come to refer only to speech act. In the example «Shoot her» Levinson (1983:236) comments, «In appropriate circumstances, it had illocutionary force of variously, ordering, urging, advising the addressee to shoot her; but the perlocutionary effect of persuading, forcing, or frightening the addressee into shooting her».

Austin's three kinds of acts that one can perform in speaking are improved by Searle (1976)^6(*). He lists five types of utterance:

Searle's theory demonstrates that speech act deals with the relation of the speaker to the utterance and specifically his attitudes towards the utterance (asserting) or his commitment to the utterance (promising, threatening). It also refers to the context of sentences especially to participants, because depending on the addressee, «You can go» expresses permission (if the addressee is of lower social status) or advice (if the addressee is peer). In this regard, modals will be treated within speech act. The relationship between speech and context needs a larger development. We deal with it in our next section.

I.4 - THE CONTEXT OF SITUATION

According to Firth (1957) context of situation refers to the different features that contribute to the production of discourse and make it particular. To determine the context of a discourse, Brown and Yule (1983) suggest that we should ask ourselves «what would be the discourse if the context had been slightly different». The discourse may change if only one feature changes.

Firth's study mentions the speaker and the addressee (their speech and their gesture), the

purpose of the interaction, and the results of the interaction. Firth's categories will be detailed by the ethnographer Hymes (1964)^8(*).

- The audience: the overhearers or those who are not addressed directly but they are part of the speaker context

- The topic: what is talked about, including what is previously said and how things come sequentially.

The setting: the place and time where the event is situated. It takes into account the physical relations of the interactants with respect to posture and gesture and facial expression.

Knowledge of the addressee slightly influences the language of the addressor. Thus, if you know the addressee is the president of the Republic or the headmaster of a secondary school or your mother or your classmate it is easier to predict the style or register you will choose to address him. If the audience is political partners or students attending an English course the language will be selected according to their expectations. Knowledge of the context is essential to the use of modals. You would not say to your teacher: «You must see a doctor» (obligation), when you mean «You should see a doctor» (piece of advice).

I.5 - MODALITY

I.5.0 Introduction

The third edition of Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English (1974) defines modality as «being modal» (p.544) and modal as «relating to the mood of a verb» (P.544) It defines mood as «one of the groups of forms that a verb may take to show whether things are regarded as certain, possible, doubtful, etc. (p.548). These definitions are defective for two reasons. Firstly, they don't distinguish mood from modality; secondly, they confine modality to the only category of the verbs. Moreover, the term «modality» is not defined as such, it appeals us to refer to «modal». The term modality needs, therefore, a specialized definition which can distinguish it from mood.

The terms «mood» and «modality» are so linked that Palmer (1986:21) states that the distinction between mood and modality is similar to that between tense and time, gender and sex. Yet, this distinction will give some insight into the understanding of mood and modality. Gender is to sex what modality is to mood. It then appears that, since gender includes sex, breast, voice etc. modality includes moods and maybe other things.

Jespersen (1924:313)^9(*) restricts mood to a «syntactic not a notional category, which is shown in the form of the verb». And Lyons (1977:848)^10(*) remarks that «mood is a grammatical category that is found in some, but not all, languages». If mood is a syntactic category and modality a notional category, and if mood is not found as a grammatical category in all languages whereas modality exists in all languages, we can infer that modality is not expressed by mood in all languages. Consequently, mood is a grammatical category and it is an element of modality while modality is a notional or semantic category and as Palmer (1986) says, «the notion of modality is much more vague and leaves open a number of possible definitions.»

Another distinction - though implicit - between mood and modality is given by the sixth edition of the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English (2000:760). The dictionary does not have an entry for the word «modality,» nevertheless it gives two grammatical meanings to the term «mood».

The first definition refers to modality and the second definition is mood itself. How do linguists and philosophers define modality?

I.5.1 - Defining modality

In modal logic, the branch of logic that deals with modality, the term «modality» is not clearly defined. However, scholars propose, implicitly or explicitly, some criteria for its definition. The criteria we shall propose here are to be found in Palmer (1986). Basing his discussion on Lyons (1977), Palmer identifies six criteria: proposition, subjectivity, factuality, epistemic and deontic, possibility and necessity, mood.

Jespersen (1924) and Lyons (1977) insist on the distinction between proposition and modality. Proposition refers to the «contents of the sentence» while modality refers to the «speaker's attitude or opinion».

Rescher (1968:24-6)^11(*) makes the distinction between proposition and modality in the following way: «A proposition is presented by a complete, self-contained statement which, taken as a whole, will be true or false: `The cat is on the mat', for example». He goes on:

Thus Rescher's definition of modality includes negation, tense, aspect and clauses. Palmer concludes that it is «reasonable enough, in a study of modality to consider not only the ways speakers express their attitudes and opinions, but also the ways in which others may report their expressions of them».

The second criterion in the definition of modality is subjectivity. Lhérété and Ploton's (1990:132) explanation of modality is worth noting:

Subjectivity is then of paramount importance in modality. Palmer (1986:16) suggests that modality is essentially subjective because reference is made to the «speaker's opinion and attitude». He further argues that modality could be defined as «the grammaticalization of speaker's (subjective) attitudes and opinions». Thereby, the modal verb «can» cannot be considered as modal when it expresses the subject's ability - instead of the speaker's opinion. Palmer (1986:17) notes, «If modality is concerned with the attitudes and opinions of the speaker, subjectivity is clearly basic». Modality can then be expanded to adverbs such as frankly, fortunately, possibly; verbs such as appear, assume, think ^13(*).

The third criterion in the definition of modality is set by Lyons (1977)^14(*). He suggests that we should consider the commitment of the speaker to the statement. Whenever the speaker commits himself to the truth of what he asserts, there is no modality. For Lyons, «straight forward statements of fact are non-modal» because there are propositions. He proposes some examples:

He notes that there is modality in the examples because they contain a modal verb, a modal adverb and a modal adjective respectively.

The fourth criterion to be considered is the epistemic and deontic interpretations of modals. Most scholars agree that there are two types of modality. Jespersen (1924:320-1) ^15(*)recognizes two sets of modality: modality `containing an element of will' and `not containing an element of will'. These sets correspond to Lyons' (1977:452)^16(*) reference to `the speaker's opinion or attitude towards the proposition that the sentence expresses or the situation that the proposition describes'. Von Wright (1977:93)^17(*) uses `epistemic modality' versus `deontic modality' whereas Hofmann (1966)^18(*) used `epistemic modality' and `root modality'. Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman (1983:83) use the terms `logical probability use' and `social interactional use' of modals. In this work we shall use Von Wright's terms. The following examples illustrate the different types of modality and interpretation between brackets.

The fifth criterion is possibility and necessity. Palmer (1986:20) notes, «Where epistemic and deontic modality are so clearly linked, the link depends upon possibility and necessity». Quoting Lyons (1977:787), he says that possibility and necessity are «the central notions of traditional modal logic». He argues that they are logically related in terms of negation, and this account for the fact that cannot as an expression of negative possibility appears to function as the negative of epistemic must.

Palmer (1986) remarks that in (a) may not corresponds to `possible' and cannot corresponds to `not possible' while in (b) cannot equates to `necessary' and may not corresponds to `not necessary'. He notes that in (a), may not expresses a positive fact and cannot a negative one whereas in (b) it is the reverse. To enlighten this point let's group the utterances:

The last criterion for the definition of modality is the distinction between mood and modality. Mood is a grammatical category whereas modality is a notional or semantic category. Mood is an element of modality^19(*). All criteria considered, we admit that the English modal auxiliaries appertain to modality.

Although some criteria are set to determine when an utterance is modalized, and though modality is not only made by grammatical devices but also by lexical items, McCarthy (1991:84) remarks that modality is often thought of as the province of the closed class of modal verb and treated as part of grammar of English. This account for the definitions English grammar books give to modality.

Wardhaugh (2003:56) writes, «Modality refers to the possible world in which the state or event denoted by the verb is situated: the kinds of truth, possibility, necessity, etc. that must exit there. The modal verbs are can, may, will, shall and must». As for Huddleston (1984:165), modality is «a rather broad term for the kind of meaning characteristically expressed by modals». He interchangeably uses `modals', `modal auxiliary verbs' and `modal auxiliaries'. These authors limit modality to modals.

Another grammar book which has the same viewpoint is the one by Feigenbaum (1985:115). The introduction to modals is as follows:

Feigenbaum's `speaker's or writer's point of view about a situation' coincides with Lyons' (1977:452)^20(*) `speaker's opinion or attitude towards the proposition' in his definition of modality. The most daring definition which confines modality to modal verbs is that of Wardhaugh (2003:275) in the glossary. It states that modality is «the meaning expressed by a modal verb». How does modality come to be confined to modals? To know this, let us look into modals.

I.5.2 - Forms and uses of modals

Modals are a type of auxiliary verbs used to indicate an attitude about an action or a state. Most modals can be used when discussing the present, past or future meanings.

There are five basic or central modals: CAN, MAY, MUST, SHALL, WILL. The verbs NEED, DARE, OUGHT (TO) are also sometimes classified as modals, because of some of the characteristics they share with the modals above.

Modals have specific properties and diverse meanings. We shall present first the grammatical forms of modals and then discuss their meanings.

Modals have some grammatical properties they share with the auxiliary verbs BE and HAVE. Huddleston (1976:333) quoted in Palmer (1986), calls them the NICE properties = modals occurrence with Negation, Inversion, `Code' and Emphatic affirmation as in:

In English there are three lexical forms of modals: one-word modals, periphrastic modals and modal-like forms.

NEED and DARE are used sometimes as modal auxiliaries and sometimes as main verbs.

There are plenty of modals with several forms, nevertheless their properties can be easily learned by a diligent student. Would it be the same with the meaning of modals? Let us discuss the meanings of modals.

Most scholars agree that each English modal verb has two uses^22(*): the deontic use and the epistemic use. We shall present first, the deontic use of modals, and then their epistemic use. Finally, we shall compare the two uses.

The term `deontic' is used in the study of modals to include them in the set of modality Jespersen (1924:320)^23(*) characterizes as «containing an element of will». Jespersen's list of deontic uses is as follows:

A close look at the compulsive, obligative, advisory and permissive shows that they contain a modal verb, and they express some interaction between the speaker and the hearer. Specifically, the speaker is addressing someone, using a kind of authority. Deontic modality in this sense seems to be directives or commissives in accordance with Searle's study of speech act. Searle (1979:14)^24(*) defines commissives as «where we commit ourselves to do something» and directives as «where we try to get our hearer to do something» (Searle, 1983:166)^25(*). It is remarkable that both are subjective (they are about the intention of the speaker) as well as performative (they are about things to perform). For that reason, they will always express future actions. Palmer (1986:97) notes, «At the time of speaking a speaker can get others to act or commit himself to action only in the future». By using directives or commissives the speaker may be giving permission, advice, or he may be imposing obligation or warning of necessity. We shall discuss these elements separately.

Not only can speaker express his own attitudes but he can also ask the addressee about his - whether he considers an action deontically permissible or necessary. He does it through request.

The use of the interrogative form with the possibility modal may is a request for permission. Thus, May I come in? does not mean `Is it the case that I have permission to come in?' but it means `I ask you to give me the permission to come in'. Conversely the use of must is essentially a request for information alone. Must I come in? would never be a request for the hearer to place an obligation upon the speaker (Wardhaugh, 2003).

Shall I come in? does not ask for permission or for information, but it is a request for advice involving the first person. In this way, shall is a consultative, and it can be replaced by should:

SHALL can be used to express invitation; in this case, should cannot substitute for shall without changing the meaning.

In addition to the use of questions for invitation, modals are used for requests.

Can and will in making request seem to imply: is this possible...? While could and would seem to query the willingness of the person being addressed. Could and would are more formal.

MAY, MIGHT, CAN, COULD are used in request for permission. `I/we' are used. In deontic modality, may and can are interchangeable, which is not the case in epistemic modality.

Leech(1987:89) notes that Shall I/we is favoured by politeness because «it is more polite to consult the wishes of the listener, than to assert one's own wishes as speaker». In request the `authority figure' is the hearer.

Krupp and Tenuta (2002) remark that with modals of invitation you ask someone to go someplace or to do something with you, while with modals of request you ask someone else to do something for you or to grant you the permission to do something. Between equals, asking permission is like making a request. Thus, «Can I take your pen?» is almost the same as «Can you let me take your pen?»

The distinction between general request and request for permission becomes clear when statements are expressed:

Feigenbaum (1985:118) notes that very conservative grammar books maintain that only may expresses permission; however can is common in many situations except in the most formal ones. Can is traditionally considered less polite and less `correct' than may.

By using may or can the speaker is qualified to grant permission. When the speaker says, «You may go now» he means that he gives the permission to go, but he cannot predict whether the hearer will go.

Wardhaugh (2003:57) signals that some language users think that Can I open the window? does not mean Do I have your permission? because can must be epistemic in this use (do I have the ability) not deontic. Only the context says the meaning of the modal. Compare:

Palmer (1986:103) notes that with can the speaker is dissociating himself from the permission, whereas he is associating with it in using may. Examples:

MAY and CAN have the past tense form MIGHT and COULD but MIGHT is very rarely used at all to indicate past time. By saying, «You could come» the speaker means the subject was permitted to come yet when he says «You might come» might does not express past time but a strong force than may. Huddleston (1984:170) asserts that substituting may for might in the past is a special use of might.

Besides the fact that the speaker can allow someone to do something, he can undertake the decision by himself through advice.

According to Lhéhéré and Ploton (1990), SHOULD, OUGHT TO are used to give advice or recommendation. The results may not be bad if the advice is not taken. The listener may or may not take the advice, i.e., the speaker thinks that the obligation may not be fulfilled. Should is more often used than ought to. The use of should implies that a certain behavior characterizes the subject. In «Your wife should write you letters», the speaker thinks that the wife does not write enough. He recommends her to do so. The use of ought to implies that the circumstances should bring the subject to have a definite behavior, it is not unfortunately the case. In «Your wife ought to write you letters», the speaker thinks that it is normal, and natural that a wife writes letters to her husband.

Stronger advice can be expressed by the use of HAD BETTER. If the advice is not taken the result may be bad for the listener. It is almost an obligation.

Should and ought to are also used to talk about beliefs and opinions. In these cases, there is no recommendation or advice.

Necessity is stronger than advisability. There is no feeling of choice whether to do something or not. MUST is a common way of indicating necessity. (Wardhaugh, 2003)

In necessity and advisability the speaker does not speak as holding an authority but he speaks as a member of society: the speaker believes it is a social duty for him to advise; advice can also come from the love the speaker has for the addressee.

NEED also is used to express necessity as in «You need to see a doctor, father».

If the speaker thinks the listener will not respect his advice, he can impose upon him his intention by using authority. It becomes an obligation.

Obligation is often expressed by Searle's (1983:166) commissives. SHALL with 2^nd and 3^rd person form expresses obligation.

The speaker commits himself to ensuring that the event takes place: he promises to arrange that the person addressed will go to school and that James will receive the money.

Modals of obligation are also used for something a person is required or obliged to do because of laws, customs, rules or circumstances. When the source of obligation is not the speaker we use HAVE TO. There may be a penalty or consequences for not fulfilling the obligation.

With have to the speaker is dissociating himself from the obligation. It is objective because the obligation tends to come from a source outside the speaker. The usual implication of must as an obligation is that the speaker is the person who exerts authority over the person(s) mentioned in the clause, i.e., the source of obligation is the speaker. This calls for pragmatic presupposition since a person from an inferior social rank cannot compulse his superior to do something. Moreover, the implicature of «You shall go to school» is that, «If you do not go to school I shall punish you».

Therefore, a deep analysis of deontic modality requires the study of implicature, presupposition and speech act for many reasons. Firstly, within speech act there are commissives and directives whereby permission is given or obligation is imposed. Secondly, through implicature advice can be taken or not, something judged necessary or not. Finally, for an obligation to be fulfilled or a permission to be granted, there is the presupposition of the speaker's authority over the listener. Thence, if a boy says, «Dad, you must go to school» it will be interpreted as a necessity. But if the father says, «John, you must go to school» it will be interpreted as an obligation; such an interpretation depends on the social relationship between the speaker and the hearer, and the necessity of the advice. It is possible to order the modals according to the speaker's degree of authority and/or conviction, or the urgency of the advice.

Students need to know the degrees of the deontic use of modals and be able to use modals that are deontically appropriate. For Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman (1983:84), «many ESL/EFL students, even at the advanced level, do not recognize that they are often perceived by native speakers of English as being abrupt and aggressive with their requests». They suggest that if we could teach them to soften their requests by employing the historical past-tense forms of the modals, they might find their request being better received.

The term `epistemic' should apply not simply to modals that basically involve the notion of possibility and necessity, but to any modal that indicates the degree of commitment by the speaker to what he says. The term `epistemic' etymologically comes from Greek and means `understanding' or `knowledge'. It should be interpreted as showing the status of the speaker's understanding our knowledge. This includes the speaker's own judgments, his beliefs and the kind of warrant he has for what he says. Palmer (1986:54) believes that the purpose of epistemic modals is to provide an indication of the degree of commitment of the speaker. He says that the speaker «offers a piece of information, but qualifies its validity for him in terms of the type of evidence he has». Epistemic modals bear subjectivity in that they indicate the status of the proposition in terms of the speaker's commitment to it. Wardhaugh (2003:56) states, «If it is a statement, the proposition in sentence containing an epistemic modal may be true or false, and if it is not a statement, the proposition it expresses may also be true or false».

Jespersen (1924:321) quoted in Palmer (1986:10) defines epistemic modality as «containing no element of will». The speaker does not assert his will but states what he thinks of a situation on the basis of what he knows or sees. Jespersen provides a list of epistemic uses of modals:

Though the assertive, the conditional, the hypothetical and the concessional express modality in its broad sense, we cannot consider them in the current study because they do not contain modal auxiliaries. By contrast, the apodictive, the necessitive, the presumptive and the dubitative contain modals and they express the commitment of the speaker to the utterance, because the speaker infers or predicts, from what he knows, the probable state of facts. The potential corresponds to Palmer's dynamic modal. In deontic modality, the speaker tells how he wants things to happen while in epistemic modality the speaker tells how he thinks things are or will be. Inference is the basis of epistemic modality. The speaker uses the epistemic modals to indicate how sure he is that an action or situation takes place, will take place, or took place. Sureness can be low (possibility), high (probability), or 100% (certainty).

Modals of possibility are used to refer to an intention that is not definite at the time of speaking. CAN, COULD, MAY, and MIGHT are used for present and future situations. Could and might show a less strong possibility than can and may. May does not occur in questions to express possibility. Example of possibility:

Leech (1987:81) notes that, in general, may represents `factual possibility', and can represents `theoretical possibility'. He provides two sets of equivalent statements:

He comments that «the road can be blocked» describes a theoretical conceivable happening, whereas «the road may be blocked» feels more immediate, because the actual likelihood of an event's taking place is being considered. Leech concludes that «factual possibility» is stronger than «theoretical possibility». Then, may is stronger than can. The scale of possibility is as follows (decreasingly):

While possibility is about something that is 50%certain to happen, probability is something that is very certain of occurring if one considers the evidence. It may not occur, but it probably will.

Something is probable when it is expected. Modals of probability indicate a conclusion or deduction, an evaluation based on earlier information. SHOULD and OUGHT TO are used to express probability. Ought to is normally stressed, whereas should is not so. (Leech, 1987:82)

MUST is used to express inference. This is a conclusion based on specific evidence or information. It is more certain than expectation.

E.g. Someone is knocking at the door. I was expecting to receive Mary. So the person knocking must be Mary.

Must is stronger than ought to because ought to is based on assumptions while must relies on known facts.

E.g. A lazy student might say, «I remember that the teacher has repeated this rule over, and over again; I shall no longer study other rule, the test must be about this rule». A more cautious student will say, «The test ought to be about this rule».

With ought to the speaker lacks confidence in what he says, with must the speaker has confidence in what he says. If he is more than confident in what he says he will use straightforwards statement, but as the action does not yet occur, the speaker uses modals of certainty.

Modals of certainty indicate a prediction, agreement, or promise. WILL (and sometimes SHALL with I or we) is used for present and future statements of prediction, agreement, or promise. (Feigenbaum, 1985)

Will is used for prediction when the speaker makes a `forecast about the present' concerning an event not directly observable. For instance when someone says, «That will be Dick. I was expecting him to call me. [On hearing the telephone ring]. In this case must can replace will, but with a weaker force.

The prediction can be based on the force of `typical or characteristic behavior'. This is common in general statements, whether of a proverbial, scientific or some other kind. Accidents will happen could be paraphrased as, «It is a predictable or characteristic fact about life that accidents happen».

Will is also used for future time promise. I will meet you at nine o'clock could be paraphrased: «Do not worry; I will come, I promise».

SHALL (with I/we) is used for emphatic certainty. In the example, «Unless you die, I shall meet you again», shall expresses more than just a prediction; it is a very strong insistence of my invitation to meet you again.

The study of epistemic modals shows how a speaker can move from simple supposition to assertion. The following examples display the degree of certainty. The degree are not equidistant.

(This scale of prediction is adapted from Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman: 1983:87)

The prediction or inference can be weak (could/might), stronger (may), strong (should), very strong (must), or absolutely certain (will).

It is noteworthy that epistemic modals have corresponding adverbs and adjectives:

Now that we have stated the inner differences between epistemic modals, we can contrast them with deontic ones.

Though both epistemic and deontic uses are expressed in a single modal, there may be differences between them. To interpret a modalized utterance some parameters should be considered.

The first thing to determine is the intention of the speaker. If the speaker thinks that the person involved in the utterance is more or less free to act or to be, he will put emphasis on the subject. In this case we deal with deontic modality.

If the speaker believes that he can more or less predict the occurrence of events or state of facts, he will put focus on the predicate. Here we are within epistemic modality.

We can provide a chart of the five central modals in terms of deontic and epistemic use regarding the speaker's intention.

Lhérété and Ploton note that with must, the speaker is concerned with the link between the subject and the predicate by considering both: no one is favored. Subject Predicate

The second difference between epistemic and deontic uses of a modal lies on the use of paraphrase. Adverbs and adjectives can often be used to paraphrase the epistemic but not the deontic use of a modal^26(*).

The third distinction between the epistemic and the deontic use can be made by using periphrastic modals.

Time also can be used to distinguish the deontic use from the epistemic use of a modal. With deontic modality the time involved in the idea of the speaker is future: the speaker requires or permits something to be done after the obligation is imposed or the permission is granted.

With the epistemic modality, by contrast, the time involved in the speaker's idea is generally present or past.

Another criterion which might differentiate the two types of modalities is the identities of participants. Depending on the social status of the participants, we may be dealing with the epistemic or deontic use of a modal.

To summarize, a distinction of the epistemic use from the deontic use of a modal might be made by considering the chart below.

This chart is valid only for the central modals in the present tense. The reader might notice that we did not discuss forms such as past, conditionals and negation. We want to deal, in this work, with the simplest forms, with hope to undertake further studies on the complex forms. With past tense or with negation, the meanings of modals do not follow the framework of our discussion. The reader may also remark that we dealt only with differences. We focus on differences between the epistemic use and the deontic use of modals because we want to know whether students perceive this distinction. It does not mean that there are no similarities. We can note en passant that they have common criteria which make them modals.

Modality is broadly defined as the use of words that carry important information about the stance and attitude of the sender to the message. These words can be verbs, adverbs, or adjectives. However, many grammarians reduced modality to the set of verbs (will, shall, can, may, must) known as modals. This is certainly due to the fact that the study of modality reveals two large types of modality: epistemic modality and deontic modality. The English modals seem to be the only words that express both senses. Modals have particular grammatical properties, and each modal has semantically intricate meanings. However, a pragmatic approach can help state the differences between these meanings.

CONCLUSION

Pragmatics is the study of how to interpret the meaning of an utterance depending on context. Any pragmatic study requires the analysis of some key terms (reference, presupposition, implicature, speech act, and inference) which show the relations of participants to discourse. Indeed, it is the context that shapes the meaning of words; however, the speaker's intention can affect his utterances so that the study of these utterances could demonstrate how far the speaker is committed to his utterance. The appearance of the attitude and the stance of the speaker towards the proposition is known as modality. In English, modality is often limited to the set of modals because they are the only words that have the criteria of double-meaning epistemic and deontic. At first sight, the epistemic and the deontic senses overlaps since a single modal conveys both meanings. A deeper analysis proves the existence of distinctive features of the epistemic and the deontic uses. Having in mind these criteria the student can not only know whether a modal is appropriate but also he can use it appropriately. The issue is to find out whether students bear these features in mind when interpreting the meaning of a modal or when using a modal. To solve the problem, we must test students but, how to undertake this test so that the recognition and the production of a modal in an appropriate situation will reflect students' knowledge and understanding of modals? The following chapter will provide the research methodology.

In this chapter we shall describe our research methodology. For this, we shall divide the chapter into five sections: the approach, the data collection techniques and instruments, the sampling, the problems encountered in the field and solutions provided, and the data analysis procedure.

II.1 - APPROACH

The main objective of our study is to find out how well first year students at the department of Anglophone Studies, understand and make use of English modals. That is, how well they use modals in appropriate contexts. Do they consistently use the right modal in the right context? Do they understand the meaning of modals?

Our hypothesis is that students don't always understand the meanings of modals and that they do not always use modals appropriately because modals express both deontic and epistemic meanings. The modals we shall study are: must, may, should, will, shall, can, might, could and would.

We will check our hypothesis in the production and comprehension of a sample of students. To test this hypothesis, two concepts should be considered: production and understanding. By production, we mean the use of modals through writing; Understanding refers to the capacity to recognize the meaning of modals in written sentences. (cf. section II.2). The appropriate use and the understanding of modals depend on the knowledge of the speaker's subject (Who the speaker is and of whom he is speaking), his action orientation (The speaker is talking about the state of facts or he is talking about something that should be performed), the focus of his intention (The speaker is drawing attention on a subject or on an event), the basis of his point of view (The speaker's point of view rests on known facts or on forthcoming facts), the periphrastic equivalence of the modals, and the paraphrase of the modals (An adjective or adverb is convenient, or a past participle).

A piece of research including all these points requires the adoption of a pragmatic approach, since they would be well displayed through the study of reference (speaker, addressee, subject), presupposition (social status), implicature (knowledge of the speaker's action orientation); inference ( knowledge of the speaker's evidence) and speech act (representatives, performatives). We used a quantitative approach to determine how many students understand the meanings of modals and how many students use modals appropriately. We used specific techniques and instruments to collect our data.

II.2 - DATA COLLECTION TECHNIQUES AND INSTRUMENTS

As research instrument, we used written tests. The identification cards were designed to discover the students. In the cards we wanted to identify the gender of the testee and check also if he/she is a newcomer. The second aspect is important for us because we aimed at assessing the level of students just coming from secondary schools. We were interested in the gender because we wanted to know the rate of participation of girls in the test.

To go into the study proper, we followed Katz's (1977:19) proposition quoted in Levinson (1983) stating that a pragmatic theory is part of performance because pragmatic theories explicate the reasoning of speakers and hearers in working out the correlation in a context with a token proposition. We used the written test as the performance item.

The written test was preferable to the oral test because the data collection was easier and quicker. In fact, a prior informal observation of students' spoken data had allowed us to notice that they are almost bare of modals. In addition, students' understanding of the modals used in some interviews was more difficult to check. We thought the solution was in written test. We made a pretest to see if the test would be adapted to the level of students. The pretestees made some suggestions and we made the final test.

We utilized two modal understanding /production tests of forty sentences, each test made of three series of exercises. The first test embodying twenty sentences was designed to assess the students' understanding of modals. We proposed the context wherein we used the modal and we asked the students to find the pragmatic meaning in a multiple choice format.

The first series, made of seven sentences, was about the deontic meaning of modals; the second series, composed of three sentences, was about the epistemic meaning of modals; and the third series, containing ten sentences, was a combination of deontic or/ and epistemic meaning. The contexts were made clear enough to avoid confusion of meanings, except in the third series where we intentionally left two sentences without clear contexts. By doing so, we wanted to assess the students' modality tendency. (cf. Appendix II)

In the second test we used twenty sentences. We utilized a gap filling test where we asked the students to fill in the blank with the appropriate modal verb. In this test also divided into three series, the first series had seven sentences and was about the deontic meaning of modals; the second series, with three sentences, dealt with the epistemic meaning of modals; and the third series had ten sentences and was a combination of deontic and epistemic meanings.

In each series, we proposed a list of modals and gave a context where a modal should be used. We ask the students to give the right modal referring to the pragmatic meaning of the modal indicated in front. The context was so that only one right modal was appropriate. To assess the students' modality tendency we left two sentences without contexts but with two meanings and we arranged that only one modal expressed both the deontic and the epistemic meanings.

In both tests, we used miscellaneous meanings and modals to display the differences between the deontic and the epistemic meanings, and the inner differences between modals within each type of meaning. (cf. Appendix II)

All the sentences were formulated taking into account the distinctive features of the meanings of modals.

We asked the students to fill in the identification cards before dealing with the test. The session lasted more than two hours and the following section describes our sampling.

II.3 - SAMPLING

To select the sample, we enquired about the exact number of first year students at the Anglophone Studies Department. The registry staff gave us a total number of 1,135 students, who constituted our population. The research took place in an amphitheatre at a period when the students were supposed officially to have course. We chose this place and that time because we wanted to ensure that the students tested were from the English department and that they were in first year.

Powell and Connaway (2004:90) sustain that the most straightforward type of survey research is descriptive, and it is designed to ensure that the sample is reasonably representative of the population to which the researcher wishes to generalize, and that the relevant characteristics have been accurately measured. Suggesting that Simple Random Sample (S.R.S.) being used for survey research, they note that Systematic Sample, which is a Simple Random Sample is considered by most researchers to be reliable and accurate. We used a systematic sample, a technique that involves taking every n^thelement from a list until the total list has been sampled. It enhances the likelihood of every element to be selected. We used the S.R.S. technique by taking every 10^th student from one row to the other until the three rows were sampled and the sample size completed. By taking every 10^th student our sample size should be made of 113 students, which should correspond to 10 per cent of our total population. Unfortunately, we ultimately got 64 testees.

This piece of research was not done without difficulties on the ground; nevertheless, some solutions were found.

II.4 - PROBLEMS ENCOUNTERED IN THE FIELD AND SOLUTIONS PROVIDED

During the administration of the test we encountered some major problems from the beginning to the end.

One of the problems we encountered is that students were not very disciplined, and we could see some students working in group. We told them many times not to work in group and explain to them what could be the consequences of group work in the results of our study. Some students stopped working in group but some did not.

Another problem is time limitation. We wanted to administer the test in two hours, but, as there were not so many students taking the test, we did not want to discourage the few volunteers who were doing the exercises. So, instead of two hours, we gave students all the time they needed. They worked until they rendered their papers without any time constraint.

The third problem is relative to the number of the testees. In addition to the fact that we did not have the 113 volunteers for the test, among the 80 papers we dealt, only 62 gave back their papers. We wanted to have at all cost the sample we needed. So, the following day, we went back to the class and asked students to bring the copies they had about them. No one reacted. Whereupon, we gave another opportunity to students to take the test. We asked if there were volunteers to sit the test. Only two students accepted to be tested. That is the reason why we had 64 tested instead of 113 as we wished.

Last but not least, the class was noisy but there was nothing we could do to stop the noise and enable students to think deeply to do the test.

At the end of the test some students suggested to write their names on their papers, which we accepted as they wanted to see their marks later. Moreover, the students suggested to see the correction of the test, what we accepted on the spot.

After solving the problems and getting the adjusted data, we analyzed the data step by step.

II.5 - DATA ANALYSIS PROCEDURE

We analyzed first the identification cards of the 64 testees to classify them into repeaters and newcomers groups. Then we analyzed the test of the 62 newcomers by starting with the recognition of the meaning of modals. We assumed that it would be easier for the students to recognize the meaning of modals than to produce them. So we wanted to move from the simple elements to the complex ones.

We dealt with the identification cards, the recognition of the meaning of modals and the production of the meanings of modals separately in order to categorize them for a statistical analysis. Powell and Connaway (2004:232) says that statistical analysis can indicate how many persons, objects, scores, or whatever achieved each value (or fell into each category) for every variable that was measured. These calculations known as frequency distributions were usually reported in tables. The reported elements were followed by some comments or interpretations. The results are presented in the following chapter.

In this chapter we shall present the different results we got from the data we collected. We shall present first the identification items; then, the tests properly; and finally, some probable sources of misuses and misunderstandings.

III.1 - FINDINGS FROM THE IDENTIFICATION ITEMS

Among the 80 papers we gave to students only 64 did the exercises and gave the papers back. We may think that those who brought the papers home were not able to do the tests. There are not different from those who refused to take the papers though the exercises had been explained. Among the 1,135 students that compose the class only 64 accepted to try our test. They represent 5.63 % of the class. The percentage is low, that tends to show that students avoid modals. That is the reason why they use them rarely in the compound of the university; thence, the difficulties to have natural data with them.

When we analyzed the identification citems, we discovered that there were 49 boys, including 2 repeaters; and 15 girls, all newcomers. Repeaters did not take profusely the test because they may have thought that they already knew the modals; which is not obvious as a test on them needs to be done to know if they do better than newcomers in modals.

As we were not concerned with the use of modals by repeaters or with a comparative

study between repeaters and newcomers, we did not analyze the papers of the 2 repeaters.

If we consider the participation of boys and that of girls we remark that boys participated

more than girls. In fact, the rate of participation of boys, regarding their number in the class, is 7.31% while that of girls is 3.22 % since the class is composed of 670 boys and 465 girls. In this regard, we might think that girls are more reluctant to be tested on modals than boys; that is, girls avoid modals more than boys do. This can explain why girls did not want to react to modals when we were attempting to have natural data of the use of modals by first year students. We did not analyze the data separately because we did not want to do a comparative study between boys and girls performances. We made a common analysis of data.

In this section we shall present the different results we got from the data collected. We shall present first the recognition of the meaning of modals, then the production of modals and ultimately we shall draw some conclusions and verify our hypothesis.

III.2.1 - Meaning Recognition

In the first test we wanted to know which meaning students would give to the modals proposed in sentences.

The results on scores, the distribution of meanings to modals, the confusions between types of meanings, the confusion between kinds of meanings and the students' modality tendency are presented.

The first part was scored out of seven and was about the deontic meaning of modals. Here are the different marks with the number of students.

On the left of the chart there are marks and on the right there are the numbers of students who get these marks. For example, five (5) students get the mark one out of seven (1/7). The students who get the average, that is, more than four out of seven (4/7) are separated from those who don't get it. So, thirty-one (31) students out of sixty two get the average. This number corresponds to fifty per cent (50%) of the testees. Half of the testees recognize the right meanings and half of them fail to recognize the appropriate meanings within the deontic meaning. 2 students get 7/7.

The second part dealt with the epistemic meanings. It was scored out of three. The results are as follows:

(24) do. This makes respectively 61.29 % and 38.70 %. In this regard, we can say that most of the testees don't know the epistemic meanings. Though 16 students get 3/3, 10 students get 0/3.

III.2.1.1.3 - Scores of the deontic or/and epistemic meaning recognition and comments

Part three was a combination of the deontic meaning and the epistemic one. There were four sentences in each kind of meaning. The following chart displays the marks with the number of students corresponding to them.

Chart 6: - Scores of the deontic or/and epistemic meaning recognition and comments

By combining the two types of meanings, 56.45 % of the testees get the average, opposed to 46.54 %, those who don't get the average (27/62 and 35/62). 1 student gets 10/10 while the lowest mark is 1/10.

The test one aimed at finding how many students could recognize the meanings of modals. The answer is as follows:

In the test on recognition, in general, 33 students out of 62 get the average while 29 get less than 10 out of 20; this is respectively 53.22 % and 46.77 %. More than half of the testees get the average, they recognize the right meanings. The best mark is 18/20 and the lowest is 4/20.

When scores are analyzed, it appears that students do better in deontic meanings (50%) than in epistemic meanings (38.70 %). When the two meanings are mixed up, students do better (56.45 %). The last performance may be due to the fact that some students, who have not got the right meaning in the first two parts, get the right meaning in the third part. In part one 50% of students got the average; logically, in part three less than 50% of students were expected to get the average (44.35 %). The result is reverse as 56.45 % of students have the average in part three. There is an increase of 12.10 %. We may conclude that 12.10 % find the right meanings by chance. After having analyzed students' marks we shall analyze the answers to the exercise.

By asking students to find the right meanings for the modals proposed we wanted to know if they would give the right meaning to the modal. We notice that every student attributes at least one wrong meaning to a modal and every meaning was attributed at least one wrong modal. These wrong meanings attributed to modals appear in the following chart. From left to right there are meanings attributed to modals wrongly; from up to down there are the different modals. The box «nothing» is used for the sentences not filled by students. The modals «could» and «would» were not used in our test. At the intersection of modals and wrong meanings there are the numbers of students who used ithem and their percentages in comparison to the total number of students. For example, 6 students wrongly think that WILL expresses General Request, that is 9.67 % of the testees think so.

WRONG

MEANING

MODAL

GENERAL REQUEST

ASKING FOR PERMISSION

INVITATION

GIVING PERMISSION

ADVISABILITY

NECESSITY

OBLIGATION

POSSIBILITY

PROBABILITY

CERTAINTY

NOTHING

CAN

03.22%

6.45 %

4.83%

8.06%

WILL

09.67%

01.61%

03.22%

06.45%

22.58%

01.61%

27.41%

32.25%

1919

30.64%

4.83%

MAY

25.30%

12.92%

11.29%

24.19%

11.29%

4.83%

6.45%

4.83%

58.06%

1.61%

1.61%

SHALL

17.74%

12.92%

9.67%

6.45%

24.19%

1.61%

3.22%

1.61%

MUST

4.83%

40.32%

6.45%

8.06%

11.29%

27.41

74.19%

17.74%

1.61%

32.25%

4.83%

MIGHT

1.61%

51.61%

16.12%

SHOULD

6.45%

1.81%

8.06%

1.61%

8.06%

17.74%

14.51%

46.77%

6.45%

29.03%

6.45%

According to the above chart, 74.19 % of students wrongly attribute Obligation to MUST; that is, whenever they see MUST they think of obligation. This can be due to the fact that they are taught that MUST expresses Obligation. They do not know that MUST can express something else according to the addressor. Most of them think so in the sentence «You must see a doctor, father». Students focus on what they are taught than to reality. «Father» is the addressee, the speaker is probably a child. Morally speaking, a child cannot oblige his father to do whatsoever. 58.06 % of students wrongly believe that MAY expresses probability while 51.61% wrongly say that MIGHT expresses probability. The results show that the meanings of modals are ignored. We have classified modals from the least known to the best known in the following chart, derivated from the above chart.

In the chart below, we use the term «case» to qualify the number of wrong meanings attributed to the modal. For example, there are 4 meanings wrongly used for «can» (general request, invitation, probability and certainty). So there are 4 cases. The term «uses» refers to the number of times wrong meanings are attributed to modals. The uses of «can» are 14 [(2general request) + (4 invitation) + (3 probability) + (5 certainty) = (14 uses)]. It is the horizontal line that is considered.

The least known modal is MUST because it is used in 11 cases or situations, and 142 times. The above chart does not include the results of the sentences number one and number four of part three as these sentences contain two meanings at the same time. We constructed them so because we wanted to identify students' modality tendency through them. It's the reason why we did not say their meanings.

We purposely left two sentences without contexts for the students to give the meanings according to their perception. The modals being ambiguous, each student interprets them.

meaning, 90.32 % of students preferred the deontic meaning with MUST, and 8.06 % of students opted for the epistemic meaning with MUST. 72.58 % of students chose the epistemic meaning for CAN whereas 17.74 % of the students chose the deontic meaning. Averagely 40.32 % of students preferred the epistemic meaning while 54.03 % had a deontic tendency. So, students' modality tendency is the deontic meaning.

Regarding the percentage, we can say that the percentage of the deontic meaning with MUST may be linked to students' perception of obligation since most of them believe that MUST always expresses obligation. As for the high percentage of CAN with the epistemic meaning students may be confusing possibility with ability. Furthermore, the high percentage of the deontic meaning over the epistemic may be related to the fact that students have social values that conditioned them to have social tendency. Psychologically, students may be giving little importance to logic as logic is the basis of epistemic meanings. They may not be very futuristic by projecting events; they may lack entrepreneurial flair. The tendency may also be due to the confusion of meanings. In the following point, we shall verify whether they make differences between meanings.

By «kinds of meanings» we mean the different meanings modals express such as «obligation, possibility». To find whether students make differences between modals, we use a chart on which there are expected meanings from students, and the meanings students attributed wrongly to modals. We use here the methods used for chart 8.

WRONG

MEANING

EXPECTED

MEANING

GENERAL REQUEST

INVITATION

GIVING

PERMISSION

ASKING FOR

PERMISSION

ADVISABILITY

NECESSITY

OBLIGATION

POSSIBILITY

PROBABILITY

CERTAINTY

NOTHING

GENERAL

REQUEST

3.22%

8.06%

37.09%

20.96%

17.74%

1.61%

INVITATION

14.51%

4.83%

12.92%

1.61%

3.22%

GIVING PERMISSION

9.67%

11.29%

3.22%

4.83%

3.22%

1.61%

1.61%

ASKING FOR PERMISSION

16.12%

4.83%

17.74%

6.45%1

1.61%

ADVISABILITY

4.83%

8.06%

1.61%

17.74%

14.51%

3.22%

4.83%

3.22%

NECESSITY

1.61%

9.67%

70.96%

1.61%

OBLIGATION

8.06%

11.29%

6.45%

1.61%

12.92%

48.32%

3.22%

4.83%

32.25%

3.22%

POSSIBILITY

1.61%

9.67%

4.83%

3.22%

1.61%

75.8%

24.19%

PROBABILITY

3.22%

1.61%

6.45%

4.33%

19.35%

54.83%

4.83%

CERTAINTY

4.83%

1.63%

4.83%

1.61%

20.96%

29.03%

4.83%

DEONTIC OR

EPISTEMIC

1.61%

In the chart we observe that students confuse meanings. Many meanings are confused with others: 75.80 % of students wrongly use probability for possibility; 70.96 % of students confuse obligation with necessity; 54,83 % of students confuse possibility with probability; certainty with probability.

Students' confusion between probability and possibility may be due to their misunderstanding of these meanings or to their thinking systems. Indeed, if they don't know the meanings they cannot use them appropriately. However, there may be some psychological attitudes that urge them to think that what is possible is probable. They are confusing, someway, theory and practice as possibility is linked to theory and probability to facts. Students may be dealing in their everyday life with theories; they may not be realistic enough. Is this phenomenon due to the social context or to the teaching and learning system? Further research needs to be done in this sense.

If we analyze the students' answers under a psychological viewpoint, we may say that most of them fear the authority. That is, they are still under the control of some authority. They don't have the freedom of acts. 70.96 % of them think that what is necessary is obligatory. Which is not true for someone who can resist and disobey to what other people think is obligatory. What is necessary is not necessarily obligatory.

Students confuse kinds of meanings, and the most confused meaning is supposed to be the least known. The board below ranks them by using the term cases and uses as for the chart 9.

By «both,» we mean «the epistemic meaning and the deontic meaning». Students seem to ignore deeply obligation. Instead of saying obligation, they use the other meanings. 10 other meanings are proposed instead of obligation, and this, 82 times. Then come advisability (10cases, 40 uses) and giving permission (9 cases, 26 uses). The kinds of meanings more confused are deontic. In the following section we shall analyze the confusions between the epistemic meaning and the deontic meaning.

By «types of meanings» we mean the deontic meaning and the epistemic meaning. Our interest in this point is to find out how much students confuse the two meanings: how many students use the deontic meaning wrongly for the epistemic meaning and vice versa. The analysis of the data leads us to the following chart.

The chart shows that 53.22 % of students wrongly use the epistemic meaning for the deontic meaning and 43.54 % do the reverse. 11.29 % of students do not make up their minds. This result proves that students are deontic-based since most of them (53.22 %) attribute the epistemic meaning to the deontic one. That is, besides the deontic meanings use rightly they think some epistemic meanings are also deontic. This chart also witnesses the miscellaneous confusions within the deontic meaning. The epistemic meaning may be less confused because it is not well known: the phenomenon of avoidance.

After having studied the different confusions students have, we shall give an overall comment on test one.

A glance at recognition reveals that students have a low understanding of the meanings of modals regarding the hair-raising confusions they make about the meanings of modals.

If the average level of the sample is calculated, the students' level is under average with the epistemic meaning (part two of the test), 1.48/3; and fairly good with the deontic meaning (part one of the test), 3.59/7. Their level is fairly good when meanings are combined (part three of the test), 5.06/10; thereon the level in the test about the recognition of the meanings of modals is fairly good (test one), 10.09/20.

The level of students is not null, but they make some confusions that bring us think that they use the meanings randomly and thoughtlessly. For example, according to the chart 5, 40.32 % of students say that MUST expresses asking for permission and 6.45 % say that MAY expresses obligation, while 17.74 % confuse asking for permission and giving permission.

Those who don't want to make such mistakes leave some blanks. Thence, there were twelve (12) blanks in test one; that is, 19.35% of students leave blanks. Those who leave the blanks may be applying the language learning strategy of avoidance. They can be therefore ranked in the group of those who did not take the test.

The recognition of modals seems not to be easy for students. We shall analyze their production in the next point.

III.2.2 - Modal Production

We wanted to know how appropriately students could use the modals. First of all, we shall present the results and comment them; and then, we shall make some comments on production.

We shall present scores and comments, the distribution of modals to meanings, the confusions between modals, the use of modals to express ambiguity, and the students' preference of modals.

Part four was designed to assess the use of modals to express the deontic meanings. It was scored out of seven. The scores and comments follow:

One student scores 7/7 while 3 students score 1/7. The chart shows that 36 students get the average whereas 26 fail to have it. The numbers give respectively 58.06 % and 41.93 %. More than half of students get the average in the production of modals to express deontic meanings. What is the case of the epistemic meanings?

This part was about the epistemic meanings; it was scored out of three. The scores follow:

40 students fail to get more than 1.5 out of 3 in this part while 22 do. That is, 35.48 % succeed in this part, against 64.51%. There is more failure than success in the production of modals to express the epistemic meanings. Only 1 student gets 3/3 whereas 9 students scores 0/3.

Students were given all the meanings - the deontic meaning and the epistemic meaning - and they had to use modals to express them. This part was scored out of 10. The scores are presented in a chart.

1 student has 0 out of 10; the best mark is 7 out of 10 and 2 students have got it.

39 students failed to get the average whereas 23 students took the part successfully. The percentage of success is 37.09% and that of failure is 62.90%. More than half of students fail in this part, where meanings are mixed. Let's now analyze the test one in general.

The test number two aimed at finding how well students can produce modal verbs appropriately in say contexts. The analysis of data gives the following results.

The chart shows that 2 students got 3 out of 20 and 1 student got the best mark of 14 out of 20. 35 students missed the average whereas 27 passed the test. Only 43.54 % of students succeeded in production of modals while 56.45 % failed. In all, there is more failure than success.

When all the scores of production are considered in terms of failure, the epistemic use of modals has the highest percentage (64.51 %). It means that the use of the epistemic modals is the least known domain of students. If we compare the two meanings it appears that students do better in the deontic use of modals (58.06 % of success) than in the epistemic use (35.48 % of success). In the sixth part, where the uses are mixed, the degree of success is 37.09 %. In fact, the combination of the deontic meaning and the epistemic one should give, logically, 46.99 % of success in part six. But it is not so in part six as the percentage of success is 37.09 %. There is a decrease of 9.9 %. This means that 9.9 % of students found some of the right modals in the preceding parts but they failed in the part six. We are allowed to say that they have found the right modals by chance, or they failed in using the right modals by chance. At all account, modals are used haphazardly.

In our attempt to assess students' use of the modal verbs we proposed the ideas and ask them to use modals to express them. Each student used modals to express the ideas. Sometimes the right modal is used and sometimes, the wrong modal is used.

WRONG

MODAL

MEANING

CAN

WILL

SHALL

MAY

MUST

COULD

WOULD

MIGHT

SHOULD

NOTHING

INVITATION

12.92%

3.22%

1.61%

14.51%

9.67%

8.06%

4.83%

GIVING PERMISSION

6.45%

22.58%

6.45%

29.03%

6.45%

14.51%

6.45%

20.96%

9.67%

3.22%

ADVISABILITY

3.22%

12.92%

4.83%

8.06%

30.64%

34.83%

16.12%

12.92%

4.83%

NECESSITY

8.06%

3.22%

14.51%

3.22%

4.83%

17.74%

37.09%

3.22%

OBLIGATION

1.61%

87.09%

3.22%

24.19%

GENERAL

REQUEST

29.03%

6.45%

3.22%

22.58%

27.41%

8.06%

9.67%

ASKING FOR PERMISSION

1.61%

3.22%

POSSIBILITY

20.96%

6.45%

8.06%

11.29%

12.92

8.06%

1.61%

6.45%

PROBABILITY

11.29%

22.58%

4.83%

27.41%

1.61%

30.64%

11.29%

20.96%

6.45%

6.45%

CERTAINTY

8.06%

3.22%

6.45%

16.10%

4.83%

8.06%

11.29%

9.67%3

4.83%

BOTH

9.67%

19.35%

3.22%

19.35

9.67%

12.92%

3.22%

54 students out of 62, that is 87.09% of students wrongly used WILL. Either they don't know that WILL expresses obligation or they don't take into account the context, or they do think obligation is expressed only by MUST. In the sentence «You will go to war or my name is not Captain Blood» the context is situated in a wartime. So, the speaker, who is authoritative, will oblige certainly a soldier to go to war. It is imperative. Here, the testees underlook the context of situation (wartime), the addressor (a captain) and the addressee (a soldier, presupposed). Students failed to infer the addressee. Moreover, 37.09 % of students used SHOULD to express necessity when they should use MUST. By using SHOULD it may appear a piece of advice instead of a necessity. So, they fail to transmit the right idea. In the sentence, «Honey, you are sick, you must take these tablets to feel well» the lover is not advising, he is implicitly saying «if you don't take these tablets you will not feel better or you will die». The testees did not perceive this implicature. Besides, some students failed to use modals to express say ambiguity. For instance, 12 students used MAY to express both obligation and probability whereas 8 students used SHOULD to express both permission and possibility.

Furthermore, we wanted to know the least known meaning. We counted the number of modals attributed wrongly to meanings, and the number of times wrong modals were used to express each meaning. We ranked them in decreasing order in the following chart.

The chart displays that probability is the meaning to which students give wrong modals the most. The 9 modals plus «blanks» are used to express probability and happens 89 times. By «both» we mean the deontic meaning and the epistemic meaning. Students could not use a simple modal to express the two meanings at the same time (8 cases and 54 times). The following section is about the wrong use of modals to express ambiguous meanings.

In the test, one sentence was given with two meanings (possibility or giving permission) and another sentence with the meanings (obligation or probability). We aimed at finding out how far students perceive the ambiguity of meanings and the difficulties to use a single modal to express both meanings. By determining the rates of ambiguity of modals we shall know if they are aware of the ambiguous meanings of modals. Apparently, very few are not aware of this ambiguity. The chart below shows the results.

WRONG

MODAL

AMBIGUOUS

MEANINGS

CAN

WILL

COULD

WOULD

MIGHT

SHOULD

SHALL

MAY

MUST

NOTHING

POSSIBILITY OR

PERMISSION

1.61%

8.06%

11.29%

1.61%

6.45%

3.22%

1.61%

OBLIGATION

OR PROBABILITY

8.06%

1.61%

8.06%

6.45%

19.35%

1.61%

19.35 % of students think that MAY expresses the ambiguity between obligation and probability. No student uses would or shall. We shall study the cases and uses.

The use of modals to express both obligation and probability seems more difficult (7 cases, 33 uses) than that of possibility or permission.

To use one modal to express both meanings is easier (7 cases) than to use one modal to express specific meaning (10 cases, cf. chart 12).

The fact that students used wrong modals to express meanings or the ideas suggested in the test may be due to the confusions they make about modals.

Many students confuse meanings. They use one modal to express a given meaning instead of using the appropriate modal. When the appropriate modal is not used, the meaning of the sentence or the idea suggested is changed into another idea, or into delirious meaning. For instance, a student used must instead of will to express certainty. So, the sentence «...accidents will happen» became «...accidents must happen», and «...a girl can betray her lover» became «...a girl must betray her lover».

WRONG

MODAL

MEANING

CAN

MAY

MUST

COULD

MIGHT

SHALL

SHOULD

WILL

WOULD

NOTHING

CAN

35.48%

11.29%

46.77%

29.09%

9.67%

16.12%

12.92%

4.83%

MAY

25.80%

12.92%

30.64%

8.06%

9.67%

19.35%

30.64%

3.22%

8.06%3

MUST

20.96%

30.64%

25.80%

22.58%

16.12%

59.67%

22.58%

9.67%

4.83%

COULD

30.64%

25.19%

6.45%

4.83%

8.06%

9.67%

MIGHT

3.22%

1.61%

SHALL

14.51%

1.16%

17.74%

6.45%

3.22%

SHOULD

8.06%

22.58%

32.25%

24.19%

27.41%

8.06%

17.74%

19.35%

8.06%

WILL

8.06%

11.29%

95.16%

32.25%

14.51%

6.45%

24.19%

19.35%

4.83%

WOULD

29.03%

22.58%

6.45%

1.61%

6.45%

9.67%

The highest confusion lies between MUST and WILL: 95.16 % of students misused MUST for WILL. 59.67 % of students used SHOULD where they had to use MUST. Some modals are confused with others. The degree of confusions follows:

The least known modal, that is the most confusing, is WILL as it is used in 9 cases and 134 times. Then come MUST (9 cases, 132 uses), CAN (9 cases, 113 uses), SHOULD (9 cases, 104 uses).

If students confuse modals, it may be due to the fact that many modals can be used to express the same idea or meaning without changing the meaning of the sentence. Thus, the modals CAN or Will can be used to express general request as in «...can/will you help me with this job?». Also, the modals CAN/MAY/COULD/MIGHT can be used to express «asking for permission as in «...can/may/could/might I go now?». Some students prefer some modals to others.

USE OF RATHER THAN	CAN	MAY	COULD	MIGHT	WILL	WOULD
CAN		35 56.45 %	5 8.06 %	22 35.48 %	4 6.45 %
MAY	25 40.32 %		5 8.06 %	22 35.48 %
COULD	13 20.94 %	17 27.41 %		28 35.48 %		5 8.06 %
MIGHT	11 17.74 %	16 25.80 %	5 8.06 %
WILL	28 45.16 %
WOULD			4 6.45 %

When students have the choice to use modals they prefer some to others. On the chart, it appears that if students have the choice between MAY and CAN, 40.32 % prefer CAN whereas 56.45 % opt for MAY. If they have the choice between CAN and COULD, 8.06 % prefer COULD while 20.96 % will use CAN. The degrees of preference between can, may, could, might, will, would are as follows, decreasingly:

The preferred modal is CAN. In the current chart, «cases» is the sum of the numbers taken vertically from the preceding chart.

After the presentation of the different results of the production, we shall comment the findings from these results on the production of modals.

When we consider all the results we have found, we are bound to say that students can't use the modal verbs appropriately. 41.93 % of students fail to use the appropriate modals to express the deontic meaning, while 64.51 % of students fail when it comes to the epistemic meanings. It appears that students have more difficulties to express the epistemic meanings than the deontic ones.

The students' level is very low regarding the average level of the sample. Their level is fairly good when they are asked to express the deontic meanings (3.79/7), insufficient when they have to express the epistemic meanings (1.22/3) and when meanings are combined (3.98/10).

In general, students fail to use the modals to express meanings. The level of students in production is insufficient (9/20).

The low scores of students may be due to their ignorance of modals though they can be using modals as they were taught to do so. If some students confuse modals, some do not try at all. The latter leave the blanks maybe because of ignorance. Thus, in the test on production, there were 28 blanks left empty. That is, about 45.16 % of students leave a blank. The reason they have blank may not be different from the one of students who refused to take the test. Here again, there is the strategy of avoidance as in recognition. The similarities between recognition and production bring us to draw some general conclusions.

Our findings evidence that students don't master the English modal auxiliary verbs since, averagely, 48.38 % get the average in our tests on the English modals. The students' level is low since their average level on modals is 9.54/20. A comparison of the two tests reveals that students can identify the meanings of modals (53.22 %) more than they are able to produce modals (43.54 %). Students understand the meanings of modals when they are addressed but they cannot use modals to express their thoughts. Some students do produce modals «correctly» or understand their meanings, however, about 11 % of students use them haphazardly, which may bring them sometimes to betray their thoughts. Those who do not want to say nonsense about modals abstain. About 32.25 % of students abstain to react about modals, not to mention those who did not take the test. Only 5.63 % of the students of first year accepted to be tested. Girls seem to be more reluctant than boys regarding modals, as only 3.22 % of the 465 girls of the class sat for the tests while 7.31 % of the 670 boys of first year took the tests. Among the testees, there were only 2 repeaters of the class. Repeaters may believe they master modals, although they need to be tested to confirm their belief.

We have also found that students do better in deontic meanings than in epistemic ones. In fact, in recognition 50 % succeed in deontic meanings versus 38.70 % in epistemic ones. As for production, 58.06 % succeed in deontic versus 35.48 % in epistemic. These numbers may be attributed to students' deontic tendency. As a matter of fact, we have found that 54.04 % of students are inclined to deontic meanings though they confuse them with one another.

There are also confusions between the deontic meanings and the epistemic meanings. However, there is more confusion between the kinds of meanings than between their types. Indeed, the highest confusion between the kinds of meanings is 75.80 % (confusion between obligation and necessity), 70.96 % (confusion between probability and possibility); whereas the confusion between the deontic meaning and the epistemic meaning is 53.22 %. We can conclude that students misuse modals not because modals express both deontic meaning and epistemic meanings, but because modals are subtle in the kinds of meanings they express.

We discover further that students mix up meanings together as well as modals. They do not master meanings and modals to the same level. Talking of production, the least known modals are, decreasingly, WILL, MUST, CAN etc., and the least known meanings are, decreasingly, probability, giving permission, possibility etc. they confuse modals such as MUST with WILL (95.16%), SHOULD with MUST (59.67%).

Students also prefer some modals to others. Thus, CAN is preferred to COULD, COULD to MAY, etc.

As recognition is concerned, the least known modals are MUST, MAY, SHOULD etc., and the least known meanings are, decreasingly, obligation, advisability, giving permission etc.

It appears that the mastery of meanings or modals depends on recognition and production. That is, there is a variation of knowledge depending on, whether students are addressed or they address. They may recognize some meanings, but be unable to use modals to express them.

III.3 - PROBABLE SOURCES OF MODAL MISUSE AND MISUNDERSTANDING

The fact that students confuse meanings, or have tendency, or fail to use right modals or right meanings or even avoid using modals has multiple sources. The causes may be psychosocial, psychological or mere ignorance.

Ignorance can be a source of the misuse of modals because if a student has never met a modal or one of the meanings of modals, it is obvious that he will not be able to use the modals appropriately. For example, if a student doesn't know what is giving permission it is normal that he uses WILL to express it. In our data, 22.58% students did so. Ignorance can also be attributed to the fact that students have forgotten what they have learnt in secondary school. They may had known what modals express and how meanings are expressed but the lack of reading and practice may urge them to forget modals; this may account for the low participation in the tests. Of course, the misuses can be due to other factors.

If we look at the lack of mastery of modals from a psychosocial angle, some external agents to students may favor the misunderstandings or misuses of modals.

First of all, students may have been induced to errors by their peers. While doing the test, students may have ignored some modals or meanings and asked their peers to help them. The misleading can have happened before the test or during the test. It may have happened during the test if the student has attempted to cheat (some students did group work though they were told not to do so). The misleading may have happened before the test if students have been told so by a peer or by a teacher.

The relation between the teacher and the students is our second concern in the psychosocial point of view. Indeed, students' misuse of modals or misunderstanding of meanings can be attributed to teachers if the latter taught the former erroneous meanings or if they failed to teach what they had to. On the one hand, if the teacher himself doesn't master modals, he will teach them erroneously and students will learn them defectively. On the second hand, if the teacher does not explain the context of use of modals and make students aware of the pragmatic meanings of modals, students will not be able to use them appropriately.

The third aspect in our psychosocial reasons is the interference of the mother tongue or French. We know that the testees are EFL learners; so, they may be transferring the French modality system to English or the modality system of their mother tongues since modality exist in all languages but it is not expressed in the same way in all of them. A contractive analysis of English modals and native languages modality systems would be helpful to clear this point. Though other people may induce students to make errors in the use and understanding of modals, students can misinterpret modals by themselves. This may be due to their psychology.

The analysis of the data springs us to think that some psychological reasons lead students to produce modals or to give them some kinds of meanings. For instance, we have found that students have a deontic tendency. This allows us to say that students pay more attention to social events than to logic and mathematics. Their education may have conducted them to be inclined to social use of modals. Furthermore, although we did not want to do a comparative study between the use of modals by girls and by boys, the recurrent occurrence of some elements struck our mind. We found that most of the girls said that CAN expresses permission while most of boys said that CAN expresses possibility. That makes us think that girls said so because they are educated as housewives and they implicitly recognize the existence of some authority to whom they will have to ask for permission. As for boys, we think that they said so because they believe in power, strength and accomplishment of their beliefs. We think that if there are differences according to gender, the differences may be due to the fact that the psychology of girls is different from that of boys.

In the end of our research there is evidence that students have many difficulties to understand the meanings of modals and to use modals appropriately, that there are more difficulties between the kinds of meanings than within the types of meanings, that the difficulties exist more in the deontic meanings, that few students use modals haphazardly, and that the causes of misuses and misunderstandings are various.

However, in spite of the variety of sources and the miscellany of difficulties, some suggestions can be made to improve the level of students in the use and the understanding of modals. This is our concern in the following chapter.

CHAPTER FOUR: RATIONALE OF MODALS TEACHING AND LEARNING AND SOME SUGGESTIONS

Our suggestions are primarily addressed to teachers because they are the mainspring of language teaching and learning system. They receive instructions from textbook designers and from language teaching and learning trainers. They have on charge to make students learn the language at the best. Students can also benefit from these suggestions because they can be inspired by our propositions. Textbooks designers and teacher supervisors can also benefit from these suggestions since the former can consider them in their textbooks and the latter in their training. Of course, researchers may evaluate the efficiency of our propositions.

IV.1 - THE RATIONALE OF MODALS TEACHING AND LEARNING

Before proposing how to teach modals, it may be necessary to tell why students have to learn them. There are at least three reasons why students should learn modals and use them instead of avoiding them.

First of all, as language learners, students must use English approximately like native speakers. By using modals, students will sound more like native speakers though they cannot be as fluent as them. For instance, by saying «Could (instead of can) I talk to you a minute?» or «Would (instead of will) you open the door?» the students will be perceived less abrupt and aggressive with their request by English native speakers, when they address someone who deserves respect.

The second reason why students must learn modals and use them is that they enable them to express their thoughts accurately. If students want to modalize their statements they must know the right modal to pass their idea on to their addressors. They will not say «The teacher will come today» when they mean «The teacher may come today».

Another reason is the authenticity and the economy of words. Students must appear authentic in their expression by avoiding circumlocutions. By using modals they make economy of words. Compare:

Now that we know the importance of modals, let's see how they can best be taught.

IV.2 - SOME SUGGESTIONS IN TEACHING MODALS

While teaching modals, the teacher should raise his students' consciousness about some pragmatic concepts and show the differences between the types of meanings and between the kinds of meanings. (cf section III.2.1.4 and III.2.1.5). We propose four steps for the teaching of modals.

Before teaching modals, the teacher himself should know what are reference, presupposition, implicature and speech act. He should also know the importance of these concepts in modals. In fact, by studying reference the teacher should tell students who are the speaker, the addressor and the addressee because the use of modals depends also on these participants. Presupposition is important for the teaching of modals since through the study of presupposition the image the speaker has of the subject or the importance the speaker attaches to the subject are determined. Yet politeness partly depends on the gap between the status of the speaker and that of the addressee. As for implicature, it is useful in the teaching of modals because it enables to know the intention of the speaker. Through the study of speech act the teacher can tell the students the circumstances of the use of modals. To summarize, the teacher needs to explicate the context of the use of modals because the main way to understand the meaning of a modals is by its context.

After defining the context to students, the teacher should explain the differences between the types of meanings.

The teacher should teach modals taking into account the epistemic meaning and the deontic meaning. As William DUBOIS said in Syntaxe du francais moderne (1932): «La langue est un perpétuel combat entre la rationalité et l'affectivité»^27(*); that is we use language to express our own opinion while trying to be objective. In other words, language is made of objectivity and subjectivity. The subjectivity refers to deontic meaning and the objectivity, which is a subjective objectivity, refers to epistemic meaning. Students must know the differences between these kinds of meanings because the ignorance of these differences urges students to rush into using modals. For instance, when they see the modal MUST, they say it expresses obligation (74.19/%) ^28(*) even if MUST expresses probability. The first meaning is deontic and the second is epistemic.

The teacher should draw his students' attention on the distinctive features of the types of meanings by asking them to find the speaker's subject social status, the speaker's action orientation, the focus of his intention, and to paraphrase the modals or to give their periphrastic equivalences.

By stating the differences between the types of meanings the teacher should put emphasis on the epistemic meaning while clarifying the subtleties between the deontic meanings.

IV.2.3 - Explain the differences between the kinds of meanings

After teaching the differences between the types of meanings, the teacher should tell the differences between the kindss of meanings within each type of meaning. He should tell the students the differences between necessity and obligation, probability and possibility, necessity and advisability, etc., and lay emphasis on meanings according to chart 12; and more on those expressed by MUST, MAY, etc. according to chart 9.

IV.2.4- Encourage the use of modals

The teacher should encourage his students to use modals to express meanings according to the scale given in chart 19. He should put emphasis on the expression of probability, giving permission, possibility, etc. by insisting on the use of WILL, MUST, CAN, etc. as shown in chart 23; and try to balance their preference of modals taking into account the results of chart 25, that is make them use more the modals they prefer the least.

Unlike most textbooks which present modals by giving the modal followed by its different meanings, we suggest that students should be taught the meanings of modals. Instead of going from modal to meanings, we suggest to go from meaning to modals. Instead of saying to students «MUST expresses obligation», or «CAN expresses possibility», it would be better to say «obligation» is expressed by MUST, SHALL and WILL». By doing so, students will be able to express their thoughts and feelings.

The teacher should make students learn modals actively. He may teach them vainly if he

spends his time teaching recognition of meanings such as «What is the meaning of must in the following sentence?» The teacher should train students to produce modals. We recognize that modals are so many, and meanings are close one to the other, which make the mastery difficult. The rule is «Practice makes perfect». Some practical exercises are given in the appendix IV.

CONCLUSION

In this paper, we have assessed the use of the English modals by first year students at the department of Anglophone Studies by means of an experimental test as a device for data collection. Our investigation mainly consisted in ascertaining whether the students of first year made differences between the epistemic meanings and the deontic meanings of modals and whether the incomprehension of the meanings of modals and their inappropriate uses pertained to the fact that modals have both deontic and epistemic meanings.

In light of our survey, students were found to have a patchy knowledge about the English modals. However, the incomprehension and the wrong uses of modals were not found only in the types of meanings but also, and even more in the kinds of meanings. We then made some suggestions to improve students' knowledge of the English modals. We do not pretend that our suggestions are the best ones. That is why we suggested that researchers and practitioners would evaluate even more the validity of our suggestions.

This work was not done without difficulties. Constraints of time and the lack of money limited our field of research. As an academic dissertation the piece of research was to be completed within a reasonable time limit; and as a student we could not take out subscriptions to many libraries and websites. Additionally, there was a lack of experience to conduct research, all the more so in English as we learned English as a foreign language. Moreover, we have never been teacher. Our teaching suggestions may appear too theoretical. In spite of these hindrances, this first experience in conducting research was worthwhile and enjoyable and we do believe that the reached results are reliable.

We hope that this paper will be of good avail to researchers and teacher trainers and particularly to teachers who may find in this book a new way of teaching modals. However, the suggestions should be adjusted to their students' level. As for researchers, further research need to be done on other modal words, modal-like forms, periphrastic modals, the past tense of modals, negation with modals, answer to questions with modals; and some contrastive studies of the use of modals by girls and boys, repeaters and newcomers, English modality system and students' native languages modality systems.

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(x) There are formal differences between the modal verbs, in their epistemic and deontic senses, in terms of negation and tense. The negative form mustn't is generally used only deontically, as in: He must be in his office. The only way of expressing the negative of epistemic MUST is to use can't: He can't be in his office.

(xii) Short answers with modals never include the main verbs, unless it is BE. But they always include any other auxiliaries.

(xiii) The negative is formed by putting not after the modal auxiliary; the auxiliary do (do, does, or did) is not used.

shall/should, may/might, can/could) can be used in describing a present or future

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Write the meaning of the modal for the sentences according to the context: Invitation / Permission / Advisability / Necessity / Obligation / General request /Asking for permission.

4- Shall we meet tonight? There is a dancing party to John's. Meaning .........

Write the meaning of the modal for the sentences according to the context: Possibility / Probability / Certainty.

Write the meaning of the modal for the sentences according to the context: Asking for Permission / Possibility / General Request / Giving permission / Necessity / Probability / Obligation / Certainty / Advisability / Invitation.

2- He should be in Paris by now. (Because his plane took off early) Meaning .........

5- You may leave. (Now that you have answered my questions) Meaning .........

8- You should tell your parents about this. (Because they can guide you) Meaning .........

Use the right modal for the sentences according to the meaning indicated between square brackets: Can / Will / Shall / Must / Could / Would / Might / Should / May.

e.g. «What would you say if you want to tell a close friend who needs money for an emergency that one possibility is for him to sell his bicycle?»

2 - [It is not forbidden] «You................ smoke here» Meaning [permission]

6 - Sir, I have been waiting for hours, ............ I go now? Meaning [asking for permission]

Use the right modal for the sentences according to the meaning indicated between square brackets: Can / Will / May / Shall / Must / Could / Would / Might / Should.

e.g.1. Someone is knocking at the door. That could be Sali. Meaning [weak inference]

e.g.2. someone is knocking at the door. That should be Sali. Meaning [very strong inference]

Use the right modal for the sentences according to the meaning indicated between square brackets: Can / Will / May / Shall / Must / Could / Would / Might / Should.

1 - .......you lend me your pen? (I want your willingness.) Meaning [general request]

2 - You.......go to school, (whether you like it or not.) Meaning [obligation]

The test.......be about this rule (this is my conclusion) Meaning [probability]

Student B: «I am afraid; my mother will not allow me to.» Meaning [permission]

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Write the meaning of the modal for the sentences according to the context: Invitation / Permission / Advisability / Necessity / Obligation / General request /Asking for permission.

4- Shall we meet tonight? There is a dancing party to John's. Meaning: Invitation

Write the meaning of the modal for the sentences according to the context: Possibility/Probability /Certainty.

3 - James will sing at the party. (Because he always does) Meaning: Certainty

Use the right modal for the sentences according to the meaning indicated between square brackets: Can / Will / Shall / Must / Could / Would / Might / Should / May.

e.g. «What would you say if you want to tell a close friend who needs money for an emergency that one possibility is for him to sell his bicycle?»

Use the right modal for the sentences according to the meaning indicated between square brackets: Can / Will / May / Shall / Must / Could / Would / Might / Should.

e.g.1. Someone is knocking at the door. That could be Sali. Meaning [weak inference]

e.g.2. someone is knocking at the door. That should be Sali. Meaning [very strong inference]

Use the right modal for the sentences according to the meaning indicated between square brackets: Can / Will / May / Shall / Must / Could / Would / Might / Should.

1 - Could/would you lend me your pen? (I want your willingness.)Meaning [general request]

2 - You will go to school, (whether you like it or not.) Meaning [obligation]

The test must be about this rule (this is my conclusion) Meaning [probability]

Student B: «I am afraid; my mother will not allow me to.» Meaning [permission]

The following suggestions are an excerpt from the work by Larsen-Freeman and Celce-Murcia. The authors are making suggestions to teachers:

1 - Several of the social interactional modals form a continuum from «weak suggestion» to order «commands!» this pattern can be taught both formally and informally using thermometers as visual aids to show the degree of necessity involved. (Remember that the different forms do not necessarily have equal semantic distance between them.)

Students would then be given hypothetical situations to respond. They would have to decide whether (a) the situation is formal or informal. (b) which degree of strength is called for. (Note: If one thermometer is used with, say, beginners, step (a) is not necessary.) For example:

a. You are a teacher who wants to let a certain student know that it is essential to come

b. You want to tell a close friend who needs money for emergency that one possibility

c. A fellow professor is not being paid the proper salary, and you think it would help if he saw the Dean.

2 - Other uses of social interactional modals can be taught using dialogs. E.g.:

Teacher; Class, for tomorrow you will read Chapter 4 and do the exercises for that chapter.

Student X: (at the end of class) I can do all those exercises. Would you please give me

Teacher: Do the first exercise anyway. But you may write an easy instead of doing the

3 - One of the uses of the logical probability modals is to predict something such as the chance of

rain tomorrow. Show your students what degree of prediction is expressed by each modal:

a. For oral practice, have students express (using a modal) situations such as the following with the degree of prediction suggested by the context (or the teacher):

b. For written practice, have students read a paragraph or essay using modals predictively.

Get them to describe in their own words the degree of each prediction. Have them write their own essay on a parallel topic.

4 - The other main use of the logical modals is to make inferences (guesses) about current

a. For oral practice, have students react to situations (using a modal) such as the following:

b. For written practice, one might try translation from the student's native language into

English or vice versa as a check on comprehension (i.e., reading) and production

(Celce-Murcia,M. and Larsen-Freeman D. 1983. The Grammar Book: An ESL/EFL Teachers' Course. Rowley, Massachussetts: Newbury House Publishers Inc. p.p. 89-91)

Dans le premier cas, l'énonciateur rend compte des événementss à la manière d'un historien qui s'efface derriere la réalité

Dans le deuxième cas, l'énonciateur raconte à l'auditeur ou au lecteur les faits tels qu'il les perçoit à travers le filtre de sa sensabikité.

* ²² CAN has a third use when it expresses ability. It is the dynamic use (Palmer,op.cit. p102)