אולי From Biblical to Modern Hebrew: A Semantic-Textual Approach

אולי is a biblical word that expresses possibility, hope, doubt, fear, and condition. Common to all these is the element of uncertainty, the semantic core of biblical אולי in all its uses.

The assumption of this paper is that study of a word's meaning must take into account the textual and situational context in which the word appears, אולי expressing hope is tightly linked to a textual pattern having a regular two-part structure. In the first part of the utterance, the speech act is directive, while the second part beginning with אולי, includes the result that the speaker hopes to attain through the desired action mentioned in the first part.

In order to illustrate how אולי functions in Modern Hebrew, examples have been collected from all sections of daily newspapers. A study of these occurrences produces two common textual patterns: an addition pattern and a concession pattern. In both, אולי assumes a rhetorical-persuasive function: It appears to qualify one part of the message, thus bolstering the truth of the second.

Another function of אולי in Modern Hebrew is to mark illocutionary force related to directive speech acts. It mitigates or increases the illocutionary force of the utterance. While its mitigating function is obvious, its strengthening function is not. This function, apparently related to the negative value of irony, requires explanation.