10.3 Clausal Sources of Pragmatic Markers 291Sections 8.2.3 and 8.3.2 explore whether the comment clauses if I may/
might say so and for what it’s worth , both used to preface speaker opinion,
can be traced back to full biclausal origins. In neither case is the clause itself
elliptical: so serves to complete the if I may might say so clause and what
the for what it’s worth clause. If I may say so serves as an indirect condition
on an implicit speech act. Thus, If I may say so, that’s totally unrealistic.
(1992 CBS_ Face Nation [COCA]) has an implied apodosis of the general
form “(then) I would say.” However, we do not fi nd any historical evidence
for explicit apodoses of this sort in either Middle English or Early Modern
English and thus cannot reconstruct a full biclausal structure. For what it’s
worth presents a different case. Structures in which for what it’s worth is the
protasis to an implied clause of communication (e.g., For what it’s worth, I
would say X ) prove to be rare and relatively late, thus likewise arguing against
a full biclausal origin. Rather, two other constructions – one in which for
what it’s worth is the complement of a structure such as Take it/ I tell you for
what it’s worth and one in which it is an adverbial modifi er of a noun phrase
such as view , judgment , suspicion , etc. (e.g., My view, for what it is worth,
is X ) – seem to have contributed to the development of this comment clause.
In the former, ellipsis of the main clause followed by attachment of the now
syntactically independent for what it’s worth to the following clause occurs.
In the latter, loosening of the anaphoric bond between it and the noun phrase
modifi ed in the main clause leads to increased syntactic freedom and mobility
of for what it’s worth.
These developments thus present a challenge to the view proposed by
scholars of insubordination , namely, that insubordinated – or, in this case, par-
enthetical – if - clauses develop from full biclausal structures with an historic-
ally reconstructable apodosis. In the cases I have studied here and elsewhere
(Brinton 2014a , 2014b , forthc.), I found evidence in only two cases for the
historical existence of an apodosis. As discussed above, if only monoclauses
may originally have served as the protasis of a subsequently deleted apodosis
(see Chapter 8 ). In Brinton (forthc.), I show that it does seem to be the case
that if you ask me is typically adjoined to a clause of communication such as I
will tell you in its earliest instances. In three cases, an alternative construction
or constructions appear to provide the source for the pragmatic parenthetical.
If you choose/ like / prefer / want/ wish parentheticals may have originally been
adjoined to a call it X construction (see Brinton 2014b ), while as if - clauses
(e.g., as if I cared ) may arise as complements in verbal constructions with
seem , look , or feel (see Brinton 2014a ) and for what it’s worth may originate as
a complement of constructions such as take X or I tell you X (see Chapter 8 ).
As Elizabeth Traugott has observed,^1 it is quite likely that “reduction” is not
1 Elizabeth Traugott (p.c., October 2015).