Semi-Auxiliaries In Maritime Treaty English

This paper attempts to analyze systematically, with the assistance of computer software especially SNOBOL4 and SPSS, the features and distribution of semi-auxiliaries in Maritime Treaty English. After a thorough investigation work in comparing the use and distribution of semi-auxiliaries in the corpus of MTE with that in other five corpora, MEE, NEC, T4, BROWNA, and LOB A, I get the following conclusions: semi-auxiliaries are to a great extent avoided and less preferred in formal written English; semi-auxiliaries for logical necessity expression and volition expression are absent in MTE, semi-auxiliaries for possibility expression and obligation expression have a denser distribution in MTE than in other corpora, semi-auxiliaries for other modality expressions have an extremely low frequency in MTE; the existence of nonfmite forms of semi-auxiliaries accounts for a considerable part of the occurrences of semi-auxiliaries. In this thesis, I also analyze the reasons why there is such a distribution from the perspective of discourse and grammar.