Given two be’s, how do they Agree?

Abstract

This squib contributes to the literature on intrusive-be constructions in English, examples of which appear in (1). Notably, there are two main sub-types, commonly referred to as double-be (la) and single-be (lb) constructions, which together have been termed intrusive-be constructions (Massam 2013). In this squib, we focus on double-be constructions, in which two instances ofbe (belandbe2) appear adjacent to each other as in (la), and we examine the tense and agreement forms thatbecan take in such constructions.