Subject-auxiliary inversion

In English, subject-auxiliary inversion (SAI) occurs when an auxiliary verb precedes a subject. This is an exception to the English word order convention of subjects preceding their corresponding verbs. See also Inversion (linguistics).

Circumstances for inversion

Subject-auxiliary inversion occurs in the following cases:

• Questions where the answer is, generally, a "yes" or "no" response (as opposed to wh-questions); such questions are also known as polar questions. Yes-no questions must typically begin with an auxiliary verb.

Example #1: Did you finish your homework?

Example #2: Are you going to the store?

Example #3: Should I answer the phone?

• Wh-questions with auxiliary verbs.

Example #1: When did you come back?

Example #2: What did he do with the car?

Unlike yes-no questions, wh-questions in which the matrix subject is questioned can be formed without inversion of an auxiliary verb.

Example: Who ate all the pies?

• Declarative sentences with negative elements (i.e. never or not) are formed. See also Negative inversion.

Example #1: Never again will I watch that opera!

Example #2: Not since childhood did she eat cotton candy.

• Declarative sentences with restrictive elements (i.e. only or so) are formed.

Example #1: Only on Fridays does he go to the bar.

Example #2: So hard did she work that she overslept the next day.

Example #3: So did I.

SAI also occurs in tag questions (He left, didn't he?), imperatives with overt subjects (Don't anybody move!), certain counterfactuals (Had the general not ordered the advance, the front wouldn't have fallen), and, optionally, in certain comparatives (She knows more languages than does her father) and related constructions.

SAI is usually thought to be a syntactic remnant in modern English of the more widespread verb-second (V2) phenomenon found in earlier stages of the language (and in all the other Germanic languages still), and still attested in archaic prose such as:

• Example: Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

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This syntax-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.v · Categories: Syntactic entities Syntactic transformation Linguistics stubs Syntax stubs Wikimedia Foundation. 2010. Игры ⚽ Нужен реферат? Ernest Westfield Auditory masking Look at other dictionaries: Auxiliary verb — In linguistics, an auxiliary verb is a verb that gives further semantic or syntactic information about a main or full verb. In English, the extra meaning provided by an auxiliary verb alters the basic meaning of the main verb to make it have one… …   Wikipedia List of English auxiliary verbs — The following English verb forms can appear as auxiliary verbs. Note that some of these forms can also be used as main verbs. The main criterion for whether something is an auxiliary verb used here is whether it participates in subject auxiliary… …   Wikipedia inversion — /in verr zheuhn, sheuhn/, n. 1. an act or instance of inverting. 2. the state of being inverted. 3. anything that is inverted. 4. Rhet. reversal of the usual or natural order of words; anastrophe. 5. Gram. any change from a basic word order or… …   Universalium inversion — noun a) the action of inverting (with an auxiliary verb) Inversion takes place in the sentence Is she here? mdash; is, the predicate, is before she, the subject. b) being upside down, in an inverted state (for the purpose of emphasis) Inversion… …   Wiktionary inversion — in•ver•sion [[t]ɪnˈvɜr ʒən, ʃən[/t]] n. 1) an act or instance of inverting 2) the state of being inverted 3) anything that is inverted 4) rht anastrophe 5) gram. a reversal of the usual order of words, as in the placement of the subject after an… …   From formal English to slang Ebonics — /i bon iks/, n. (used with a singular v.) See Black English. Also, ebonics. [1970 75, Amer.; b. of EBONY and PHONICS] * * * ▪ dialect also called  African American Vernacular English (AAVE) , formerly  Black English Vernacular (BEV)  …   Universalium Do-support — In English grammar do support or do insertion refers to the use of the auxiliary verb do in negative or interrogative clauses that do not contain other auxiliaries. While the English word do may also serve as a main verb, as in We do the laundry… …   Wikipedia Transformational grammar — In linguistics, a transformational grammar, or transformational generative grammar (TGG), is a generative grammar, especially of a natural language, that has been developed in a Chomskyan tradition. Additionally, transformational grammar is the… …   Wikipedia French pronouns — are inflected to indicate their role in the sentence (subject, direct object, and so on), as well as to reflect the person, gender, and number of their referents. While English draws some of these distinctions as well, French draws them in many… …   Wikipedia Poverty of the stimulus — The poverty of the stimulus (POTS) argument is a variant of the epistemological problem of the indeterminacy of data to theory that claims that grammar is unlearnable given the linguistic data available to children. As such, the argument strikes… …   Wikipedia 18+ © Academic, 2000-2024 Contact us: Technical Support, Advertising Dictionaries export, created on PHP, Joomla, Drupal, WordPress, MODx. Mark and share Search through all dictionaries Translate… Search Internet Share the article and excerpts Direct link … Do a right-click on the link above and select “Copy Link”