{"id":74008,"date":"2020-04-15T05:44:23","date_gmt":"2020-04-15T05:44:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/?p=74008"},"modified":"2020-04-15T05:44:23","modified_gmt":"2020-04-15T05:44:23","slug":"modal-auxiliary-verb-may","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/modal-auxiliary-verb-may\/","title":{"rendered":"Modal Auxiliary Verb May"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><b>May\u00a0<\/b>is a modal <a href=\"http:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/primary-auxiliary-verbs\/\">auxiliary verb<\/a>. There is no\u00a0<b>\u2013s\u00a0<\/b>in the third person singular.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>She\u00a0<b>may\u00a0<\/b>be here soon. (NOT She mays \u2026)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>May\u00a0<\/b>is followed by an <a href=\"http:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/infinitives-without-to\/\">infinitive without to<\/a>.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>You\u00a0<b>may be\u00a0<\/b>right. (NOT You may to be right.)<\/li>\n<li>He\u00a0<b>may come.<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Questions and negatives are made without <a href=\"http:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/do-as-an-ordinary-verb-and-an-auxiliary-verb\/\">do<\/a>.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>May\u00a0<\/b>I come in, please? (NOT Do I may come \u2026)<\/li>\n<li>He\u00a0<b>may not\u00a0<\/b>come. (NOT He do not may come.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>May\u00a0<\/b>does not have <a href=\"http:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/infinitive-phrases\/\">infinitives<\/a> (to may) or <a href=\"http:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/participles\/\">participles<\/a> (maying, mayed). When necessary, we use other words.<\/p>\n<h3>Meaning<\/h3>\n<p><b>May\u00a0<\/b>is used to talk about possibility, and to ask for and give permission.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>It\u00a0<b>may\u00a0<\/b>rain this afternoon.<\/li>\n<li><b>May\u00a0<\/b>I play carroms, mummy?<\/li>\n<li>Yes, you\u00a0<b>may.<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Possibility<\/h3>\n<p><b>May\u00a0<\/b>is used to talk about the chances of something happening.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I think it is going to rain. You\u00a0<b>may be\u00a0<\/b>right.<\/li>\n<li>There\u00a0<b>may be<\/b>\u00a0a strike next week.<\/li>\n<li>Where is John? He\u00a0<b>may be\u00a0<\/b>out shopping.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>May well\u00a0<\/b>is used to suggest a strong possibility.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I think it is going to rain. You\u00a0<b>may well\u00a0<\/b>be right.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>May\u00a0<\/b>is not normally used in direct questions about probability.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Are they likely to help us? (BUT NOT May they help us?)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>But note that\u00a0<b>may\u00a0<\/b>is possible in indirect questions about probability.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>May we not\u00a0<\/b>be making a big mistake?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>May + perfect infinitive<\/h3>\n<p>The structure\u00a0<b>may + perfect Infinitive\u00a0<\/b>(have + past participle) can be used to say that it is possible that something happened or was true in the past.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Alice is very late. She\u00a0<b>may have missed\u00a0<\/b>her train. (= It is possible that she missed her train.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>May + perfect infinitive\u00a0<\/b>can also refer to the present or future.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I will try phoning him, but he\u00a0<b>may have gone\u00a0<\/b>out by now.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Permission<\/h3>\n<p><b>May\u00a0<\/b>can be used to ask for permission. It is more formal than\u00a0<b><a href=\"http:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/modal-auxiliary-verb-can\/\">can<\/a>\u00a0<\/b>and\u00a0<b><a href=\"http:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/could-modal-auxiliary-verbs\/\">could<\/a>.<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>May I come in?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>May\u00a0<\/b>is used to give permission;\u00a0<b>may not\u00a0<\/b>is used to refuse permission and to forbid.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>May I come in? Yes, you\u00a0<b>may.<\/b><\/li>\n<li>May I have a look at your papers? No, I am afraid you\u00a0<b>may not.<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b><a href=\"http:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/must-in-questions-and-negatives\/\">Must<\/a> not\u00a0<\/b>is also used to forbid. It is stronger than\u00a0<b>may not.<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Students\u00a0<b>must not\u00a0<\/b>use the staff car park.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>May\u00a0<\/b>and\u00a0<b>might<\/b>\u00a0are not normally used to talk about permission which has already been given or refused, about freedom which people already have, or about rules and laws. Instead, we use\u00a0<b>can, could\u00a0<\/b>or\u00a0<b>be allowed.<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>Can you\/Are you allowed to\u00a0<\/b>park on both sides of the road here? (More natural than May you allowed \u2026)<\/li>\n<li>When we were children, we\u00a0<b>could\u00a0<\/b>watch TV whenever we wanted to. (NOT \u2026we might watch TV \u2026)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>May in wishes and hopes<\/h3>\n<p><b>May\u00a0<\/b>is used in formal expressions of wishes and hopes. May often comes at the beginning of the sentence.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>May\u00a0<\/b>God bless you!<\/li>\n<li><b>May\u00a0<\/b>you both be very happy!<\/li>\n<li><b>May\u00a0<\/b>the devil take him!<\/li>\n<li><b>May\u00a0<\/b>you prosper in all that you do!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>May\u00a0is a modal auxiliary verb. There is no\u00a0\u2013s\u00a0in the third person singular. She\u00a0may\u00a0be here soon. (NOT She mays \u2026) May\u00a0is followed by an infinitive without to. You\u00a0may be\u00a0right. (NOT You may to be right.)&#46;&#46;&#46;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[251],"tags":[1611,2654,2653],"class_list":["post-74008","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-grammar","tag-may","tag-modal-auxiliary-may","tag-modal-may"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74008","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74008"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74008\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":74009,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74008\/revisions\/74009"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/perfectyourenglish.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}