Questions tagged [subjunctive]
The subjunctive tag has no usage guidance.
15 questions
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Aorist forms in Rigveda
I am going through the Rigveda and the aorist forms are used very commonly as expected. The aorist (लुङ्) by itself denotes an action occurring in the past tense from my understanding, but:
For ...
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"If John bought food, Mary would cook dinner." — Why is this a counterfactual conditional? The fact that John will buy food or not is unestablished
A Concise Introduction to Logic by Patrick J. Hurley, page 332:
Subjunctive conditionals are often called counterfactual conditionals because their antecedents are typically false.
terminology from ...
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Why do we actually use the subjunctive in languages like Spanish?
I am aware of when to use it; that is not my question. Why do we say "Sugiero que vayas" rather than "Sugiero que vas" when it is clear that the latter would express the meaning ...
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how does government binding theory account for verbs taking bare form in a subjunctives
In "he demanded that you be silent"
How does the gb theory accounts for the bare form of the verb "be" ?
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What are wish and if-clause called as a group?
I'm not sure about the grammatical category of wish and if-clause. I have found some names like hypothetical sentences, conditional, subjunctive mood. But I don't think they are the academic name for ...
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Transitivity analysis of subjunctives and imperatives
I'm attempting a functional analysis of the text of the Catholic Mass, primarily in English but with reference to the Latin. The use of grammatical moods is quite rich, with plenty of subjunctives ('...
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Why "were" for subjunctive?
Is the subjunctive (what I learned in school as "Konjunktiv 2") Ger. "wäre" ("Ich wäre gern ..." - I'd like to be ...) cognate to "were" even for singular person ("*als ob ich sicher wäre " - as if I ...
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Difference between English and French in the use of subjunctive mood in counter factual protasis
The following is from English Conditional Sentences in Wikipedia.
If I liked parties, I would attend more of them.
If it rained tomorrow, people would dance in the street.
The past tense (...
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Mood and tense in (Gibbon's) "Rome was saved, if the wisdom of Belisarius had not been defeated" [closed]
The question regards the highlighted words in this clause from Edward Gibbon.
and Rome was saved, if the wisdom of Belisarius had not been defeated by the misconduct of his officers.
What is it in ...
user10711
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About Subjunctive/Konjunctive
What is the reason for the difference between German dass-Sätze (which are in the indicative mood) and French que-sentences (which are in the subjunctive mood)?
My German understanding is far better ...
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Is there something deeper behind the “verb classes swapping” of the subjunctive endings in Romance languages?
I first asked this question in https://spanish.stackexchange.com/q/15929/11155
However the Spanish community has not found any answer yet and the phenomenon is observable in many Romance languages. I ...
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Use of subjunctive in various languages
The subjunctive is most often used when expressing volition. Using English and Spanish as examples:
The doctor recommends that you eat vegetables and fruits.
El médico recomienda que comas verduras y ...
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Present Subjunctive as Optative
In many European languages - at least those I looked into - it is possible to use Present Subjunctive as optative mood (although often considered dated or of limited availability):
Thy Kingdom come
...
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Is the Figure-Ground Theory adaptable for inversion in subjunctive condition clauses in English?
People use Figure-Ground Theory to explain inversions. By putting ground before figure, emphasis focus changes.
But how to explain inversion in condition clauses for subjunctive mood?
In English, if ...
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Is the German "conjunctive" the same as the "subjunctive" of other languages? If so why the different name?
Many languages have a subjunctive mood but German has a conjunctive. However is the German conjunctive just a different name for the same mood?
If the two are different what is the difference? If not ...
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