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Tag Questions
A question tag or tag question is a grammatical structure in which a declarative statement or an imperative is turned into a question by adding an interrogative fragment. Forexample, in the sentence "You're John, aren't you?", the statement "You're John" is turned into a question by the tag "aren't you". The term "question tag" is generally preferred by Britishgrammarians, while their American counterparts prefer "tag question".
English tag questions, when they have the grammatical form of a question, are atypically complex, because they vary according to fourfactors: the choice of auxiliary, the negation, the intonation pattern and the emphasis.
Auxiliary
The English tag question is made up of an auxiliary verb and a pronoun. The auxiliary has toagree with the tense, aspect and modality of the verb in the preceding sentence. If the verb is in the present perfect, for example, the tag question uses has or have; if the verb is in a presentprogressive form, the tag is formed with am, are, is; if the verb is in a tense which does not normally use an auxiliary, like the present simple, the auxiliary is taken from theemphatic do form; and if the sentence has a modal auxiliary, this is echoed in the tag:
* He's read this book, hasn't he?
* He read this book, didn't he?
* He's reading this book, isn't he?
* Hereads a lot of books, doesn't he?
* He'll read this book, won't he?
* He should read this book, shouldn't he?
* He can read this book, can't he?
A special case occurs when the mainverb is to be in a simple tense. Here the tag question repeats the main verb, not an auxiliary:
* This is a book, isn't it?
(Not doesn't it?, as the normal rules for present simple wouldsuggest.)
If the main verb is to have, either solution is possible:
* He has a book, hasn't he?
* He has a book, doesn't he?
Bibliography: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tag_question
A question tag or tag question is a grammatical structure in which a declarative statement or an imperative is turned into a question by adding an interrogative fragment. Forexample, in the sentence "You're John, aren't you?", the statement "You're John" is turned into a question by the tag "aren't you". The term "question tag" is generally preferred by Britishgrammarians, while their American counterparts prefer "tag question".
English tag questions, when they have the grammatical form of a question, are atypically complex, because they vary according to fourfactors: the choice of auxiliary, the negation, the intonation pattern and the emphasis.
Auxiliary
The English tag question is made up of an auxiliary verb and a pronoun. The auxiliary has toagree with the tense, aspect and modality of the verb in the preceding sentence. If the verb is in the present perfect, for example, the tag question uses has or have; if the verb is in a presentprogressive form, the tag is formed with am, are, is; if the verb is in a tense which does not normally use an auxiliary, like the present simple, the auxiliary is taken from theemphatic do form; and if the sentence has a modal auxiliary, this is echoed in the tag:
* He's read this book, hasn't he?
* He read this book, didn't he?
* He's reading this book, isn't he?
* Hereads a lot of books, doesn't he?
* He'll read this book, won't he?
* He should read this book, shouldn't he?
* He can read this book, can't he?
A special case occurs when the mainverb is to be in a simple tense. Here the tag question repeats the main verb, not an auxiliary:
* This is a book, isn't it?
(Not doesn't it?, as the normal rules for present simple wouldsuggest.)
If the main verb is to have, either solution is possible:
* He has a book, hasn't he?
* He has a book, doesn't he?
Bibliography: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tag_question
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