habitual be

noun

linguistics

: the use of the verb be in its uninflected form (as in "she be jogging") or sometimes in the form bes or be's in African American English and to varying degrees in some other varieties of English to indicate that an action or state is habitual or frequent : aspectual be, invariant be

Habitual be, which is different from inflected be, indicates that some activity occurs habitually, as in Those athletes be running fast ("Those athletes usually run fast.").

—Lisa Green

I remember nodding in recognition as he [Orlando Taylor, professor and author] … explained features such as use of "habitual be" to convey an extended activity or ongoing trait: "I take the bus when I be going to the doctor."

—Karen Beverly Ducker

Note: The feature of African American English called habitual be often occurs between the subject and predicate of a sentence, and can precede noun phrases, prepositional phrases, adverbial phrases, adjectives, passive verbs, -ing verbs, and the African American English feature perfective done.

Word History

First Known Use

1969, in the meaning defined above