Some grammarians prefer to call it a "question tag," and the whole statement inclusive of that mini-question the "tag question." Native English speakers purposively use tag questions to get a quick confirmation or reaction from their listeners. With this in mind, we should be able to form English tag questions ourselves with greater confidence. Of course, since tag questions are meant to be spoken, it's normal to use contractions of the negative forms of verbs either in the tag question or in the main statement itself. Next week, we'll round up these discussions with other special cases and even finer aspects of tag questions.

Source: Manila Times July 20, 2022 22:08 UTC