Transcript Clauses and moods

Clauses and Moods
by
Prashanth Kamle
Under the guidance of Prof. Pushpak Bhattachharya
Department of Computer Science
IIT Bombay
Overview
•
What are clauses?
•
Finite and Non-finite clauses
•
Properties
•
Moods
Clause
Group of words that forms part of a
sentence, has a Subject & a predicate of its
own
Types of sentences
•
Simple
–
1 subject, 1 predicate, only 1 Finite Verb
•
•
His courage won him honour.
Compound
–
Made up of 2 (or more) independent (main) clauses
–
Joined by co-ordinating conjunction and, but etc
•
Ram went to Nagpur and Shyam went to Pune
•
I did my best, nevertheless I failed.
Types of sentences (contd)
• Complex sentence contains
–
One main clause
–
One or more subordinate clauses
• They rested when the night came on
–
“when night came on” cannot be a sentence by
itself
–
Hence lower rank, called subordinate clause
• Anil called at 5:30 and I told him that you had gone out
Types of clauses
•
Based on the verb
–
Finite
–
Non-finite
Finite and non-finite verbs

Finite

Verbs inflected by tense and person



I/he/she/it was late
You/we/they were late
Non-finite

Verbs are not inflected by tense and person
Non finite clauses - types
1.Infinitive – I've never known [ John to be so
rude to anyone ]
2.Gerundial – We don't want [ it raining on your
birthday ]
3.Past participle – I had [ my car stolen from the
car park ]
Tests to detect finite/non-finite


Change tense/person and see whether verb
gets inflected

It would be silly [ for me/you/him/her/us/them to
hate science ]

It would be silly [ for him/her to hates science ]

It would have been silly [ for you/them to hated
science ]
Any clause which contains a modal is finite

I know [ that you will/might/could/should hate science ]
Observations


Clause containing inflected verb or modal is
finite
Is the converse true?

Not always!



I know [ that you leave for Hawaii tomorrow ]
I demand [ that you leave for Hawaii tomorrow ]
Both indicative and subjunctive clauses are finite
Why are subjunctive clauses finite?

Both Indicative and Subjunctive clauses share
certain morphosyntactic properties
Property 1

Both indicative and subjuntive clauses MUST
take a subject, non-finite clauses can be
subjectless


Indicative: I know [ that leaves for Hawaii tomorrow ]
Subjunctive: I demand [ that leave for Hawaii
tomorrow ]

Infinitive: I intend [ to leave for Hawaii tomorrow ]

Gerund: I intend [ leaving for Hawaii tomorrow ]
Property 2
•
Subjunctive clauses pattern like indicative
clauses with respect to case marking
Cases
•
English personal pronouns are typically said to
have three morphological cases
Nominative
I
he
we
they
Objective
me
him
us
them
Genetive
my
his
our
their
Property 2 (contd)
•
•
Subject of subjunctive and indicative clauses
are always assigned nominative case
–
I know [ that they/them/their leave for Hawaii
tomorrow ]
–
I demand [ that they/them/their leave for Hawaii
tomorrow ]
Subject of infinitive clauses is assigned
objective case
–
I want [ them/their/they to leave for Hawaii
tomorrow
Property 2 (contd)
•
Gerund clauses take either objective or
genetive case
–
I don't like the idea of [ them/their/they leaving
for Hawaii tomorrow ]
Therefore, subjunctive clauses have been
classified as finite
Moods
Mood


Mood is a term in grammar that identifies
utterances as being statements, expressions of
wish, commands, questions, etc
'Mood' is derived from 'mode', but at some
stage the vowel changed by association with
the completely different word 'mood', meaning a
state of mind
Moods in English grammar

Declarative/Indicative

Subjunctive

Imperative

Interrogative

Conditional
Declarative mood


a statement in the active voice of a verb
auxiliaries take their "usual" position following
the 'subject'





He was seen
I am walking home.
They are singing.
He is not a dancer.
We are very happy.
Subjunctive mood


Used to express counterfactual or if-then
statements
Typically marked in the present tense by the
auxiliary "were" plus the continuous (-ing) form
of the verb





I am eating, so I will sit. (Factual/Declarative)
Were I eating, I would sit. (Counterfactual)
If they were eating, they would sit. (Counterfactual
conditional / If-then)
God save the king (subjunctive)
If I were you... (subjunctive)
Conditional mood


Denote or imply a probable future action
verbal auxiliaries could, would, should, may and
might in combination with the root stem of the
verb



I may think of quitting
You could go to the store
I might meet you tomorrow
Imperative mood


used for commands or instructions
occurs only in the second person, and the
subject ("you") is generally not explicitly stated




Listen!
Do not smoke here.
Let me do the talking.
Let them dance.
Interrogative mood


Question
marked by starting a clause with an auxiliary
verb or a WH-word


Can you do that?
What time is it?
References
•
Transformational Grammar by Andrew
Radford
•
Wikipedia article
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_grammar
accessed 24 Aug 2009