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W ho'll cook the spaghetti? I will. M ay I jo in you? Yes, you may.

72 Part 11: Ihe Grammar o f Basic Sentences

B. Identify chc components of the predicating verb in each of the following sentences. Your answers will look like the strings given in Part A.

Example:

Mike was having a bad day = ptXS~t -r fc>£ + -irlfl + k&i/6 1. Hie students were studying in che libraiy.

2. T have finally found my lost scarf. [Note: Adverbs, such as finally, should not appear in your verb string.]

3. T lost it on the first day of classes. 4. Mickey has been skipping classes lately. 5. He could be in big trouble.

6. Joanie certainly seems happy in her new apartment. 7. She will probably be having a party this weekend. 8. I should have studied harder for this test.

T H E “FU TU R E T E N S E ”

As we saw in our discussion of the verb-expansion rule, our five verb forms include only two tenses: present and past. W e’re quite capable of discussing future time, o f course, b u t we do so using means other than a special verb form. In rhe traditional description o f verb tenses, the ad­ dition o f the modal auxiliary w ill to denote a future action is called the “future tense”:

I will finish my project later.

W hen have + -en is added, the result is called “future perfecc,” denoting a future action before another future action:

I will have finished it bv Friday.

H o w ever, o n e o f o u r m o st c o m m o n ways o f ex pressin g fu tu re is w ith the semi-auxiliary be + going to, which, in speech, is pronounced

it >»

gonna :

I’m going to finish my project this afternoon.

And both the simple present and the present progressive can express future time with the addition o f an appropriate adverbial:

Ihe bus leaves at 7:00. W e’re having pizza tonight.

Chapter 4: Expanding the Main Verb 73

W e should also note that the m odal w illis n ot used exclusively for future time. In his “Language Log” posted on the Internet in March 2008, British linguist Geoffrey K. Pullum estimates that perhaps 20 percent o f the occurrences o f w illdo n ot express the future. Here are a few o f his m any examples:

Step this way, if you will, sir. (Means “if you wish to ”. . . .) lh at will be Mike. (Uttered when the doorbell rings. . . .) Metallic potassium will explode on contact with water. (Means potassium already does explode on contact with water. . . .)

The reason that W arren Buffet has made so much money in his life is that he will not invest in fly-by-night operations. (Means that he has a firm policy" of not investing, exemplified by his past practice. . . .) So even though we use the term future tense, we recognize that it does not designate a particular verb form , one w ith a special ending, as past

tensedoes. It can refer to any o f our various ways of discussing future time.

T H E SU BJU NC TI VE M O O D

Unlike the conditional m ood, the subjunctive m ood does n o t involve modal auxiliaries. Rather, it is simply a variation o f the verb that wc use in special circumstances:

1. In thatclauses after verbs conveying a strong suggestion or rec­ om m endation, we use rhe base form o f che verb:

W e suggesced that M ary go with us. Kathy insisted that Bill consult the doctor. I move that the m eeting be adjourned.

Even for third-person singular subjects, which w ould norm ally take the form, we use the base form in these clauses: Mary go;Bill consult; che meecing be. O th er verbs that com m only take clauses in the subjunctive m ood are command, demand, ask, require, order, recommend, and propose. A subjunctive thatclause also follows certain nouns and adjectives related to commands and suggestions:

The suggestion that Bill see the doctor was a good one. It is advisable that he get a thorough checkup.

2. In i f clanscs chac express a wish or a condirion contrary to fact, we use wereas rhe standard form o f be, no matcer what the subject:

If I were you. I’d be careful.

I h e use o f was is also fairly common in sentences like the second example: If loe was here, he’d agree w ith me.

In writing, however, the subjunctive were is the standard form.

In C hapter 9 we will see i f clauses th at discuss a possible condition rather than a wish or a condition contrary to fact:

If it is cold tom orrow , we’ll cancel the picnic.

Here we do not use the infinitive form o f be as wc do in che subjunctive mood.

TE NS E A N D ASPECT

At the opening o f this chapter you learned that French verbs have more th an seventy different form s— in contrast to the mere five we have in English. Does that mean th at our language is less expressive? N ot at all. Instead o f expressing concepts o f time and duration and com pletion by adding inflectional endings to our verbs, as the Frcnch do, wc use aux­ iliaries, either singly or in com bination. T h e verb-cxpansion rule th at you learned, w ith its tense marker and optional auxiliaries, describes our system for doing so.

The auxiliaries be and have co ntribute to w hat is called aspect, refer­ ring to w heth er an action is in progress or com pleted. In traditio n al term in olo gy , verbs in the -in g form w ith the auxiliary be are called “progressive” or “contin uo u s”; those in the -en, or past participle, form w ith the auxiliary have are called “perfect” tenses. The term “perfect” com cs to us from L atin g ram m ar, w here it refers to “action th a t is com pleted before the present m o m en t.” However, in English our pres­ ent perfect,

Bill has lived in Florida since 1992,

while referring to past, includes a connection to the present. This sentence tells us that Bill still lives in Florida. That present connection o f one kind or another is implicit in the perfect tenses with have. And, as the examples in the following section show, verb strings w ith had refer to a p o in t o f time in the past connected to a more recent past time.

The tense marker, T , in our verb-expansion rule, however, is lim ited to only two tenses: present and past. These are the only two tenses rep­ resented by the form o f the verb itself. Following are illustrations o f our com m on tenses and auxiliary-verb combinations.