14. Verbs and Auxiliaries

• Verb

  Must appear in every clause
• Types of verbs

  • Verbs expressing physical action (swim, write, sit)
  • Verbs expressing mental action (think, guess)
  • Verbs expressing state of being (to be, to exist, to appear)
• Verbal paradigm


  All variations of one lexeme - inflectional morphology
• Verbal forms in English


  • Bare form
  • 3rd person
  • Past tense
  • Past participle
  • Present participle
• Exception "be" has 8 forms: be, am, is, are, was, were, been, being
• Primary verbal categories


  • Tense
  • Aspect
  • Mood
  • Voice
• Secondary verbal categories


  • Subject-verb agreement in person and number
• Person and number


  3 persons: first, second, third + numbers: singular, plural
• Standard agreement


  Only visible with 3rd person singular in present tense - other persons don't have visible suffix
• Notional agreement


  According to the meaning that could be stronger than the grammar
• Rule of proximity - subject containing "or" => the 2nd part is responsible for the agreement
• Tense


  Time = philosophical concept - language must deal with that
• Tenses in English


  • Past
  • Present
  • Future
• Tense doesn't have to be equal to time (e.g. reported speech)
• Aspect


  When it happened and how it was perceived by the speaker
• Aspects in English


  • Progressive (continuous - duration - in progress)
  • Perfective (reference to regency, completion)
  • Zero aspect
• Aspect morphology


  • Progressive - be + "-ing"
  • Perfective - have + "-en" form
• We can combine tense and aspect
• Voice


  Active and passive - it doesn't change the meaning, just the distribution of semantic roles
• Active sentence


  Subject frequently agent, object frequently patient
• Passive sentence


  Object promoted to subject position, agent from active sentence becomes adverbial or omitted
• Passive morphology


  "to be/get" + "en" verb
• Moods


  • Indicative
  • Imperative
  • Subjunctive
• Indicative


  Announcements, compatible with all tenses
• Imperative


  Orders, zero morphology, subject dropped, can't make for past tense
• Subjunctive


  Specific context, present subjunctive in subordinate clauses after certain verbs, past subjunctive in wishes, conditionals, subordinate clauses
• Auxiliaries


  • DO
  • BE
  • HAVE
• DO


  Also lexical meaning, auxiliary for questions and negations
• BE


  Aspectual, passive, copula, modal
• Modals


  Separate parts of speech, don't demonstrate agreement, aspect or tense, require bare infinitive
• Modal meanings


  • Deontic (permission, obligation, order, ability)
  • Epistemic (probability, certainty)
• Some sentences without context are polyfunctional for modal meanings