Author Topic: The moods and attitude of English verbs  (Read 5445 times)

Joe Carillo

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The moods and attitude of English verbs
« on: January 29, 2018, 04:05:07 AM »
The moods and attitude of English verbs
(First of a 6-part series on the subjunctive form)

This presentation starts a six-part series on the subjunctive form, decidedly the most deviant and most intimidating of the three moods of the English language. It starts today, January 29, 2018, with this general overview of the moods and attitude of English verbs and the series runs every other day (except Sunday) until February 9.




What is it about the subjunctive that makes not a few English users, whether native and nonnative speakers of the language, get so intimidated and so prone to error when using it?

The reason is that to start with, verbs in the singular third-person subjunctive ignore the well-established subject-verb agreement rule in English. They drop the “-s” or “-es” at their tail ends and take the base form of the verb (meaning the infinitive form of the verb without the “to”).

So, contrary to what’s normally expected, the verb forms in these two examples of subjective sentences are incorrect: “It is imperative that he submits himself to the jurisdiction of this court.” “The law requires that she divests herself of her business holdings before assuming public office.” Instead, the correct verb forms for those subjunctive sentences are these: “It is imperative that he submit himself to the jurisdiction of this court.” “The law requires that she divest herself of her business holdings before assuming public office.”

On top of this departure from the norm, there’s also this very important and very instructive general rule for subjunctive “that”-clauses: their operative verbs don’t change form at all regardless of what number or person the subject takes. We will discuss this in much greater detail in this series, during which we will discover that the subjunctive actually acts in several other baffling ways.

To increase our confidence in using the subjunctive, we need to clearly understand all of these unusual behaviors, and a good way to get the process started is to reacquaint ourselves with the so-called moods or attitudes of verbs in the English language.              

Some of us probably can still recall that English verbs have three general moods, mood being that aspect of the verb that expresses the state of mind or attitude of the speaker toward what he or she is saying. These three moods are the indicative mood, the imperative mood, and the subjunctive mood.


Both the indicative and the imperative moods deal with actions or states in factual or real-world situations. The subjunctive mood, on the other hand, deals with actions or states only as possible, contingent, or conditional outcomes of a want, wish, preference, or uncertainty expressed by the speaker.

The indicative mood. This mood is, of course, the most familiar and most commonly used of these three moods. It conveys the idea that an act or condition is (1) an objective fact, (2) an opinion, or (3) the subject of a question. Statements in the indicative mood seek to give the impression that the speaker is talking about real-world situations in a straightforward, truthful manner. And from a usage standpoint, indicative statements have one very reassuring aspect: their operative verbs take their normal inflections in all the tenses and typically obey the subject-verb agreement rule at all times.

Here are indicative sentences stating an objective fact: “The Philippines is the world’s second largest labor exporter, next only to Mexico.” “Most manufactured consumer products are now being made in China.” Stating an opinion: “Our client seems uninterested in the survey findings.” “We believe that the accused will eventually be acquitted of all the charges.” And posing a question: “Who used my computer this morning?” “How do you justify this change of plan?”

The imperative mood. On the other hand, this mood denotes that all-too-familiar attitude of a speaker who (1) demands or orders a particular action, (2) makes a request or suggestion, (3) gives advice, or (4) states a prohibition. We all know that this mood uses the base form of the operative verb (the verb’s infinitive form without the “to”), and is most often used in second-person, present-tense sentences that use an elliptical subject or the unstated second-person pronoun “you.”

Here are some imperative statements demanding a particular action: “Stop that car!” “Report to headquarters in ten minutes!” Making a request or suggestion: “Please take your seats.” “Join me this afternoon to review the sales report.” Giving advice: “Study your lessons well to pass tomorrow’s test.” “Get a good night’s sleep for tomorrow’s race.” And stating a prohibition: “Don’t enter this one-way street.” “Avoid making any noise during the ceremony.”

The subjunctive mood. Although it only has present-tense and past-tense forms, this mood actually has a more varied and complex grammatical repertoire than the indicative and imperative. It can take several forms to perform the following tasks: (1) indicate a possibility (2) express a desire or wishful attitude, (3) express insistence on a particular action, (4) express doubt about a certain outcome, (5) describe an unreal situation or an idea contrary to fact, or (6) express a request or suggestion.




Moreover, when the subjunctive works in tandem with such auxiliary verbs as “could,” “would,” and “should,” it can convey even more intricate and sophisticated shades of possibility and conditionality. We will discuss these functions of the subjunctive in detail in the next part of this series.

(Next: The subjunctive and its functions)      January 31, 2018

This presentation first appeared as part of a weekly series in Jose A. Carillo’s “English Plain and Simple” column in The Manila Times from 2004 to 2007 and it subsequently formed Chapter 77 of his book Give Your English the Winning Edge, © 2009 by Jose A. Carillo. All rights reserved.
« Last Edit: January 29, 2021, 05:44:34 PM by Joe Carillo »