TimeML is a specification language for the annotation of events and temporal expressions in natural language text. In addition, the language introduces three relational tags linking temporal objects and events to one another. These links impose both aspectual and temporal ordering over time objects, as well as mark up subordination contexts introduced by modality, evidentiality, and factivity. ...

The present contribution deals with the epistemic readings of the Italian modal verbs dovere ('must') and potere ('may'/'can'). The two verbs show striking differences — both quantitative and qualitative — with respect to the possibility of epistemic interpretation, differences which have gone so far completely unnoticed in the — rather scarce — semantic literature on modal verbs in Italian. Ev...

This article discusses some of the ways in which natural language can express modal information—information which is, to a first approximation, about what could be or must be the case, as opposed to being about what actually is the case. It motivates, explains, and raises problems for Angelika Kratzer’s influential theory of modal auxiliaries, and introduces a new approach to one important deba...

Evidence occupies a paramount position in any logical endeavor and research article is consensually considered a predominant site of such an endeavor. One interesting area of rhetoric which addresses the source and reliability of evidence is quality metadiscourse. In this qualitative study, quality metadiscourse strategies (i.e., evidentials, hedges, boosters and disclaimers) are examined to in...

This study explored a discourse analysis of the online newspapers reportage news about COVID-19 using Van Dijk’s parameters and J. Austin’s speech acts concepts. To do this, 91 stories were retrieved from two Nigerian newspapers. An search was conducted keywords: ‘Coronavirus in Nigeria’, ‘updates on Coronavirus ‘COVID-19 Nigeria November to December 2021’. The total articles consisting ‘news’,...