Might/May

Subject: Might/May January 26th 2009, 10:34 pm

Used when there is a possibility of something, if I'm not mistaken. But when exactly do I use "might" and when "may"?

Is there someone who can explain that to me (us)? I'd appreciate it a lot!

Subject: Reply January 26th 2009, 11:15 pm

Might is the past tense of may. In normal professional writing, you are supposed to use past tense. Thus, you will normally use 'might' in your sentence structure. You would only use 'may' in the quoted speech of someone.

Present tense: "May I have an apple?" "I may go to the store."
Past tense: "Might I have had an apple?" "I might have gone to the store."

Yes, they seem to be interchangeable to most of us that are not well trained in grammar. They are however no more interchangeable than do/did, eat/ate, or have/had.

Subject: Re: Might/May January 26th 2009, 11:25 pm

Oh I see, it is actually just a time thing. Thank you so much Terish. That was bothering the hell out of me not knowing when to use which one.

So am I correct when I say that you actually use "may" in just regular daily chit-chat, right? Or better say that it's used more then "might"?!

Subject: Re: Might/May January 26th 2009, 11:53 pm

Snacker wrote:: So am I correct when I say that you actually use "may" in just regular daily chit-chat, right? Or better say that it's used more then "might"?!

Yes. In daily chit-chat you are normally speaking in present tense (unless you are talking about something that happened [past] or something you want to happen [future]). Of course, daily chit-chat normally does not use grammar properly, so you can use may or might without a problem (at least, that is what many tell me -- as I often hear that my characters speak too formally).