Grammar: mood and modality

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Jonathan Marks explains the difference between mood and modality.

This reply is in two parts. See the related page at the bottom of this article for the second half of this question.

Reply by Jonathan Marks

The word 'modal' is, in origin, connected with the mode, manner, or fashion of doing something, rather than the substance. But from the 16th century onwards, it was used in logic and philosophy to refer to propositions involving the affirmation of possibility and impossibility, existence and non-existence, contingency and necessity, and this is the meaning that has been taken into grammar.

'Mood', as used in grammar, is also derived from 'mode', but at some stage the vowel changed by association with the completely different word 'mood', meaning a state of mind (e.g. a good/bad mood).

If we wanted to make a very broad distinction between different kinds of meanings we express in language, we could say that the sentence:

expresses a straightforward fact objectively, whereas sentences like these:

are basically 'about' the same thing, but show the speaker (or writer, of course) taking different approaches towards it. We find out about the speaker's attitude towards, or perception of, an event which may or may not take place, or have taken place. Mood and modality are both concerned, in their different ways, with this distinction between objective statement and speaker-centredness.

Mood

Let's start with mood. Descriptions of English grammar usually recognize up to four 'moods':

1. declarative (or indicative)
2. interrogative
3. imperative
4. subjunctive

Sometimes 'indicative' is used to include declarative (statements) and interrogative (questions). (Some languages have other 'moods', apart from these three or four.)

Declarative

These sentences would be regarded as examples of the 'declarative mood':

Declarative sentences express statements, but they often have other functions too:

Declarative sentences typically have subject + verb word order. But sometimes there's no subject:

- and sometimes the subject is after the verb:

- or between the auxiliary and main verbs:

Interrogative

These sentences would be regarded as examples of the 'interrogative mood':

Interrogative sentences express questions, but they often have other functions too:

And there are other ways of asking questions:

In interrogative sentences, the subject is typically after the verb (if there's only one verb) or between the auxiliary and main verbs. But sometimes the order is subject + verb:

Imperative

These sentences would be regarded as examples of the 'imperative mood':

Imperative sentences express directives, such as orders, instructions, requests, invitations etc. They typically have a verb with no subject and in the infinitive form - except for 'be', this is the same as the non-3rd person singular present simple. 'Don't' can be put before the verb to form negatives. But positive imperatives can also include an auxiliary 'do', and the subject can be included in positives or negatives:

There may also be a 'please' or a question tag appended:

Some languages have specific imperative verb forms, but English doesn't: the form of the verb used in an imperative sentence is the infinitive.

Subjunctive

And these sentences, finally, would be regarded as examples of the 'subjunctive mood':

Subjunctive sentences express uncertainty, unreality, hypotheses, wishes, etc. They often contain verb forms different from those that would be used in equivalent indicative sentences:

But sometimes the verb forms would be the same in indicative sentences:

Some languages, e.g. German, Spanish, French, Latin, Old English, etc. have some specific subjunctive verb forms, different from indicative forms. For example, look at these third person plural forms of the verb 'be':

As you can see from the example sentences above, modern English doesn't have separate indicative and subjunctive forms; the forms which are called 'subjunctive' are:

1. the infinitive (which also, with the exception of 'be', serves as the non-3rd person singular present simple.)
2. 'were', i.e. the past tense plural form of 'be'

Some fixed phrases with subjunctives, such as If I were you ..., as it were, Long live ..., Be that as it may and So be it are probably best learned as idioms. (Long live ... can also be regarded as a third person imperative.)

The word 'subjunctive' means 'placed underneath, subordinated, added at the end', and derives from a Latin translation from Greek; it was used in classical Greek because in that language the subjunctive mood is used almost exclusively in subordinate clauses, and in English, too, it most often appears in subordinate clauses. But because it doesn't have its own specific verb forms in English, I don't find it a very useful concept in English grammar, except maybe as way of referring to a very broad type of meaning: uncertainty, unreality, hypotheses, wishes, etc.

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