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2) The Category of Tense.

The existence of the morphological category of tense with English verbs finds no objections in linguistic works. It is quite logical that events exist and develop only in time. Hence, the morphological category of tense is aimed at reflecting the objective category of time. The difficulty is that we should differentiate between the objective and relative time.

The matter is that when giving a temporal characteristic of some action we take some moment of time as a starting point. If this starting point is the actual moment of speaking, then the action taking place at that moment belongs to the present period of time and we use the present tense. If the action precedes the moment of speaking excluding it, then it belongs to the past and we use the past tense. If the action follows the moment of speaking then it belongs to the future and we use a future tense. In all these cases the morphological category of tense reflects the objective time. But in most cases the morphological category of tense reflects not the objective but the relative time. The matter is that mostly we correlate actions not with the actual moment of speaking but with some relative moment of time or temporal center. It is usually behind the actual moment of speaking or the objective time.

e.g. He says that he works at school.

The verb-form “says” is used in the Present tense but the action does not coincide with the moment of speaking.

Taking into consideration relative temporal centers we speak of three principal tense forms: present, past, future.

The past and the future are separated by the plane of the present and don’t get in touch but in order to express the idea of futurity, related to the past, the English system of tense-forms includes a special form – Future-in-the-Past.

e.g. He said that he would do his best.

Past Present Future

Traditional grammar speaks of 16 tense-forms in the active voice but actually there exist 4 tense-forms in English. All the other predicate verb-forms (is reading, has done) are not pure tense-forms. They appear as a result of expressing not only the category of tense, but also of some other verb categories: perfect and aspect.

The latter two categories are secondary to the primary tense category and only modify it. So such forms as “is working, “has done” are not different self-dependent tense-forms. They are the same basic tense forms modified by the categories of aspect and perfect and as a result they have compound forms different from pure tense-forms.

So when speaking about the category of tense, we differentiate 4 temporal centers reflecting objective or relative time. These temporal centers include 4 basic tense-forms which are traditionally called Present Indefinite, Past Indefinite, Future Indefinite and Future Indefinite in the Past and three additional verb-forms when the tense form is modified by the categories of perfect or aspect. It means that each temporal center unites four verb-forms.

Speaking of the category of tense, we can’t but touch upon the problem of the sequence of tenses, typical of English, but unknown in Russian. The traditional English grammar treats the sequence of tenses as a mechanical shift of the verb tense form in the subordinate clause if the predicate verb in the principal clause is used in the Past tense.

e.g. Язнал, что онживётв Лондоне.I knew that he lived in London.

However, it does not seem quite right to speak of any mechanical shift. The matter is that we should sooner speak not of the sequence of tenses but of the sequence of actions and events. It means that if the actions are simultaneous we use tense-forms not modified by the category of perfect.

As soon as we want to stress the idea of priority of one action to another, we modify the basic tense-form by the category of perfect.

e.g. I knew that he lived in London – simultaneity;

I knew that he had lived in London then – priority.

The category of ASPECT if it modifies the basic tense-form of the predicate verb does not influence the sequence of actions. So what is meant by the traditional term “sequence of tenses” is a synthesis of two categorial notions:

  1. the category of tense, which implies the relation of the action to some temporal center;

  2. the category of perfect which implies the relations of actions to each other or to some temporal center.

Characterizing the category of tense it is necessary to say that the formal oppositions between verb-forms expressing different tense-forms can be reduced in the meaning of some other tense-form. The most typical cases of reduction are:

  1. the usage of the perfect tense-form or its aspectively modified variant instead of future tense, e.g. comes – is coming to express a planned or anticipated as well as in subordinate clauses of time and condition.

  2. The usage of the past tense-form or its aspectively modified variant instead of the Future-in-the-Past tense to express a planned or anticipated action as well as in subordinate clauses of time and condition. E.g. She said she was leaving on Monday and she would be glad if he came to see her off.

The established formal oppositions expressing particular tense-forms holdgood only for the indicative mood.

Oblique mood forms radically change the tense-meaning of the verb-form. E.g. They were here last month (Past Indefinite). I wish they were here now (Subjunctive II Present).

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