You can/you may

[Banglardon]

When talking about Permissions, are both can and may correct?

1- John, you can call me tomorrow.

2- John, you may call me tomorrow.

 

[emsr2d2]

When talking about permission, are both "can" and "may" correct?

1. John, you can call me tomorrow.

2. John, you may call me tomorrow.

Note my corrections above. Use "permission" (singular). Remember to mark out the words you're asking us about in some way. I have put them in quotation marks. This is the third thread in which I've changed the punctuation mark after the numbers in a list. I changed the dash to a full stop. You can also use a close bracket. If you really want to use a dash, you need to put a space before it as well as after it. Here are your options:

1. John, you can ...

1) John, you can ...

1 - John, you can ...

 

[Banglardon]

Note my corrections above. Use "permission" (singular). Remember to mark out the words you're asking us about in some way. I have put them in quotation marks. This is the third thread in which I've changed the punctuation mark after the numbers in a list. I changed the dash to a full stop. You can also use a close bracket. If you really want to use a dash, you need to put a space before it as well as after it. Here are your options:

1. John, you can ...

1) John, you can ...

1 - John, you can ...

I have seen 'may' is also used to give permission. Then why is it not appropriate here?

 

[emsr2d2]

I have seen 'may' is also used to give permission. Then why is it not appropriate here?

I didn't say it wasn't. Admittedly, I completely forgot to answer your question after I'd made the corrections and explained them! They can both be used for permission. Both sentences are acceptable and mean the same.

I just happened to choose the "can" sentence to exemplify the ways that the number list can be punctuated.

 

[Phaedrus]

When talking about Permissions, are both can and may correct?

In the old days, at least in the U.S., prescriptive teachers held that only may (not can) was appropriate for giving and asking for permission.

Geoffrey Pullum made a delightful little video (here) debunking this "silly rule" and endorsing the correctness of can and may in both uses.

 

[Tdol]

In the old days, at least in the U.S., prescriptive teachers held that only may (not can) was appropriate for giving and asking for permission.

We had the same in the UK. If you said Can I go to the toilet? at school a long, long time ago, you might get, and we did, some smug teacher telling us that they didn't know if we could but allowing us.

 

[Tdol]

Geoffrey Pullum made a delightful little video (here) debunking this "silly rule" and endorsing the correctness of can and may in both uses.

It is a good video, but I would say that it is about the silly "rule". ;-)

 

[Phaedrus]

It is a good video, but I would say that it is about the silly "rule". ;-)

I meant for the quotation marks to signal a quotation; I didn't mean them as scare quotes. Pullum actually uses the plural, though.

The subject phrase of his first sentence is "One of the oldest silly rules that people hand out about how to use the English language."