Glossary of Linguistic Terms

Permissive Mood

Definition: 

Permissive mood is a directive mood that signals the speaker’s act of giving permission.

Examples: 

(English)

Here is an example of a word that signals permissive mood:

  • You may have another cookie.
Source: 
Pei and Gaynor 1954
165
Chung and Timberlake 1985
247

This page is an extract from the LinguaLinks Library. Version 5.0 published on CD-ROM by SIL International, 2003.

LinguaLinks Ordering Information

Glossary Hierarchy

  • Grammatical Category
  • Mood And Modality
  • Deontic Modality
  • Directive Modality
  • Permissive Mood