DO-INSERTION or DO-SUPPORT
In English grammar, ‘do-insertion’ or ‘do-support’
refers to the use of the auxiliary verb ‘do’, including its reflected forms
‘does’ and ‘did'. There are some common uses of do-insertion which are
described below.
To ask
a question:
We
consider a sentence, “You want money”.
Here,
'you' is the subject, 'want' is the verb and 'money' is the complement. But
there is no auxiliary verb in this sentence. That's why we need to add a dummy
'do' to turn this assertive sentence into an interrogative sentence.
o You want money (You do
want money).
Do you want money?
Similarly,
o She likes the dress (She
does like the dress).
Does she like the dress?
o He got the job (He did
get the job).
Did he get the job?
To make
a negative sentence:
We need to add the word 'not' to the auxiliary
verb.
Example:
o You want money.
You do not want money/ you don't want money.
Similarly,
o She likes the dress.
She does not like the dress/ she doesn't like the dress.
o He got the job.
He did not get the job/ He didn't get the job.
Note: In most cases, we need to add the auxiliary
'do' to make a question or negative sentence except the use of the verb 'be'
and the verb 'have'.
Be:
Example:
You
are rich (are=be verb).
To make it
negative, we can say
You are not rich/ You aren't
rich.
But we can't
say :
You don't are
rich.
Similarly to
make a question, we can say: Are you rich?
But we can't
say, Do you are rich?
So instead of
adding an auxiliary 'do' with the verb 'be', we can invert the verb 'be' with
the subject.
Have:
In UK/ England, the
same rule works with the verb 'have' also. So when we say
I have a dream.
-Have I a dream?
(Question)
Or, Do I have a
dream? (Question)
-I have not a
dream/ I haven't a dream/ I don't have a dream. (Negative)
So there are only
two exceptions to the 'do-insertion' in question and in a negative sentence.
These are with the verb 'be' and the verb 'have'.
To put emphasis in imperative
sentence
We also use the
do-insertion with an imperative sentence when we want to put the emphasis.
Example:
Instead of saying
to a kid,
“Behave!”
We can say, “Do behave!”
It means to put emphasis on
'behave' which is like giving an order.
In
tag question
Example:
You want a bike,
don't you?
We are using dummy
'do' in this tag question because there is no auxiliary verb in this sentence.
So we are adding an auxiliary as well as 'not' because the tag question usually
has to be opposite to the actual sentence (if the question is positive, the tag
question will be negative).
Similarly,
We want freedom,
don't we?
She likes to play,
doesn't she?
To answer a question by using
'yes/no'
When we need to
answer shortly in 'yes' or 'no', we can use the dummy operator or the modal
verb or the auxiliary to answer.
Example:
Are you busy?
Yes, I do.
Here, the verb 'be' doesn't
take the 'do' operator', so this reply is wrong. We can reply
Yes, I am. (Positive)
No, I am not. (Negative)
Similarly,
Have you a car?
Yes, I have. (Positive)
No, I don't have. (Negative)
Do you want a pen?
Yes, I do. No, I don't.
Tense
inflection' and 'Third person inflection'
What's special
about 'do' is that it takes the 'tense inflection' and the 'third person
inflection'.
Example:
He has a sister.
he have a sister (this is wrong
because 'he' is third person singular number).
So we should say
Does he have a sister?
So only one of verb
the 'do' takes a person inflection.
He doesn't have a
sister.
He doesn't has a sister. (Wrong)
He don't has a sister. (Wrong)
When we say a
sentence in the past tense
He had a sister.
Did he have a sister? (Question)
Here, we put the tense
inflection on the 'do'. So 'do' becomes 'did' and 'has' becomes 'have'.
He had a sister.
He didn't have a sister.
(Negative)
Modal
verbs
Modal verbs are
verbs that act like auxiliary verbs. For example: can, could, be able to, May,
might, shall, should, must, have to, will, would, etc.
Example:
I will go.
Will I go?
She should leave
now.
Should she leave now?
The modal verbs act
like an auxiliary, and they invert with the subject to make a question, to make
a negative sentence and to make tag question.
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