Mood – Modality

Grammatical mood is how the speaker feels about or regards an action or event. It includes all non-time information and nuances of a verb, overarchingly whether an action occurred or not. This overarching difference is classified either as realis and irrealis. Below is a table of moods and modalities.

Moods & Modalities
Realis
(real events)

Irrealis

(non-real events)

Deontic
(what should be)
  • Benedictive
  • Commissive (promises, threats)
  • Directive (commands, requests, requirements)
  • Debitive
  • Deliberative
  • Dynamic
  • Hortative (+ subtypes)
  • Imperative
  • Injunctive
  • Jussive
  • Necessitative
  • Permissive
  • Precative
  • Prohibitive
  • Propositive
  • Volitive (hopes, wishes, fears)
  • Desiderative
  • Imprecative
  • Optative
Epistemic
(what may be)
  • (inferences, possibilities, questions, etc.)
  • Alethic
  • Assumptive
  • Deductive
  • Dubitative
  • Hypothetical
  • Inferential/renarrative/oblique
  • Interrogative
  • Potential
  • Speculative
  • Subjunctive
Dependent
(what would be)
  • Conditional
  • Eventive

REALIS

 

Realis moods relate to ‘real’, factual events. This can cover generic statements of truth, varying degrees of evidence, and even surprise toward an event happening. Most languages have one realis mood, the ‘indicative’, however others might distinguish between others.

 

 

INDICATIVE

 

The ‘indicative’ (or ‘declarative’) describes a statement of fact, a known action or event. It's often used for questions, too. As mentioned above, the indicative tends to be the only realis mood in many languages, thus being used for generic statements of truth or non-hypothetical, certain events. Examples from Latin:

a. artifex amulētum vīderat.
  artist-NOM amulet-ACC see.PLUPRF
           ‘The artist had seen the amulet.’
b. est=ne frāter intus?
  is=Q brother inside
           ‘Is my brother inside?’

 

Gnomic/generic

 

The ‘gnomic’ (or ‘generic’) describes a general statement of fact, distinguishing from situational truths (sometimes called ‘episodic’) that the indicative otherwise expresses. Languages can express this distinction, though few codify it in morphology – languages with the distinction often exhibit gnomic nuances only on a select few verb forms. An example from Swahili distinguishing between ‘present definite’ and ‘present indefinite’:

a. Ng'ombe anakula majani.
  cows PRS.eat grass

           ‘The cows eat grass.’

b. Ng'ombe ala majani.
  cows GNO.eat grass
          ‘Cows eat grass.’

 

Evidential

 

Evidentiality is an encoding of truthfulness and reliability of information. Some languages have two levels, and others have many to reflect different senses or how one remembers an event. Here are some distinctions in Turkish:

a. Başkan geldi.
  president come-PST
          ‘The president arrived.’
b. Başkan gelmiş.
  president come-IND.PST
          ‘Apparently, the president arrived.’
c. Başkan gelmişmiş.
  president come-IND.PST~IND.PST
          ‘Apparently, the president arrived, but I doubt it.’

 

Bulgarian is a language that makes many distinctions between different levels of evidence:

Indicative:

a. ко́тката изя́де ри́бата.
  kótka-ta izjád-e ríba-ta
  dog-DEF eat-AOR.3sg fish-DEF
          ‘I know (firsthand) that the cat ate the fish.’
Renarrative:
b. ко́тката____ изя́ло ри́бата.
  kótka-ta izjál-o ríba-ta
  dog-DEF eat.AORPT-N.SG fish-DEF
        ‘I've been told the cat ate the fish.’
Inferential:
c. ко́тката е изя́ло ри́бата.
  kótka-ta e izjál-o ríba-ta
  dog-DEF be.3sg eat.AORPT-N.SG fish-DEF
         ‘The cat must have eaten the fish.’
Dubitative:
d. ко́тката би́ло изя́ло ри́бата.
  kótka-ta bíl-o izjál-o ríba-ta
  dog-DEF be.AORPT-N.SG eat.AORPT-N.SG fish-DEF
          ‘I've been told the cat ate the fish, but I doubt it.’

 

Mirative

 

Mirativity encodes surprise or unpreparedness of mind towards an event. This is often linked to evidential marking. Some examples from Wakhi, an Eastern Iranian language:

a. Salīm pešawar reɣda.
  Salim Peshawar go-PST

          ‘Salim went to Peshawar.’

b. Salīm pešawar rexk tiwetk.
  Salim Peshawar go-PRF be-PRF

         ‘Oh, Salim went to Peshawar!’

 

Aggressive

 

This is a term recently coined for the Finnish language (called ‘aggressiivi’), where certain realis constructions of obscene and expletive expressions use unique paradigms. In Finnish, it resembles a negative clause, but almost always omits the negative auxiliary. This special case of mood can thus be used to specifically express profanity with emphasis. Some examples from Colloquial Finnish:

a. Paskat tiedän!
  shit.INTERJ know-1sg

         ‘Shit [if] I know!’

b. Mä paskat välitän siitä!
  PN.1sg shit.INTERJ care_about.1sg it-ELA

         ‘I don't give a shit!’ (lit. ‘I shit care about it’)

 

Energetic

 

The energetic mood expresses something which is strongly believed or which the speaker wishes to emphasize. Arabic (and several other Semitic languages) have two types, a long energetic (LENRG) and a short energetic (SENRG). In Arabic, adding ‘لَا’ (‘la’) changes the meaning of the energetic, too:

Long:

a.  تَكتُبِننَ  =  تَكتُبِننَ
  ta-ktub-inna
  2sg-write-LENRG.F

                    ‘You certainly write (female).’

c. لَتَكتُبِننَ  =  لَتَكتُبِننَ
  la-ta-ktub-inna
  2sg-write-LENRG.F

                    ‘You must write (female).’

Short:

b. نَقُولَن  =  نَقُولَن
  na-qūl-an
  1pl-say-SENRG

                    ‘We almost say.’

d. لَنَقُولَن  =  لَنَقُولَن
  la-na-qūl-an
  INT-1pl-say-SENRG

                    ‘We should say.’