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From: deb5@midway.uchicago.edu (Daniel von Brighoff)
Subject: Re: Verb moods
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References: <32D04BD9.24D9@postoffice.worldnet.att.net> <E3LM1K.J3J@midway.uchicago.edu> <sullivan.190.87.32D17FF6@osu.edu> <5as9pa$5md@dfw-ixnews8.ix.netcom.com>
Date: Wed, 8 Jan 1997 03:12:52 GMT
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In article <5as9pa$5md@dfw-ixnews8.ix.netcom.com>,
 <ajhowey@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>sullivan.190@osu.edu (Ryan P. Sullivan) wrote:
>
>>In article <E3LM1K.J3J@midway.uchicago.edu> deb5@midway.uchicago.edu (Daniel von Brighoff) writes:
>
>>>Several languages have a mood distinction between reported statements and
>>>statements known from one's own experience.  The latter is often called
>>>the "experiential mood", if I'm not mistaken.  In Korean, for example,
>>>this is represented by the infix 'te', which can be used with a variety of
>>>tense/aspectual affixes.
>
>>This is also true in Bulgarian.  According to Charles Gribble, "the reported 
>>mood is marked to specify that the speaker  in some way does not vouch for the 
>>truth of what he is reporting [...]."  He also mentions the dubitative mood, 
>>which "conveys an attitude of disbelief, extreme skepticism, wariness, 
>>surprise, disapproval, irony, etc. toward the statement."
>
>German also does this by use of what's called the "primary
>subjunctive" or "Subjunctive I" (depending on your grammar book), ie
>"er sagt, er sei an dem Abend zu Hause".  It's used to in indirect
>discourse to report what somebody else said without needing to verify
>the truth or untruth of the statement.

But so is Konjunktiv II (which, despite the names, is much more common
than Konjunktiv I).  You can equally well say "Er sagt, er w"are an dem 
Abend zu Hause".  Or, even more commonly (IMHO), "Er sagt, dass er an dem
Abend zu Hause ist."

In other words, Konjunktiv II can always replace Konjunktiv I.  The latter
seems to be purely literary, with no footing in the dialects, and can only
be used for indirect discourse--where it can always be replaced by the
indicative (with a slight change in syntax).  I think it's better viewed
as a specialised variant form of the subjunctive rather than as a distinct
mood.

To "convey an attitude of disbelief...toward [a] statement", German is
more likely to rely on modals.  For example, "Er will an dem Abend zu
Hause gewesen sein" means "He claims to have been at home that evening (but 
I have my doubts)".  The disbelief can be heightened by putting the modal
itself in the subjunctive:  "Er wollte an dem Abend zu Hause gewesen
sein."  (The simple indicative form of these statements is "Er ist an dem
Abend zu Hause gewesen".)

This form is not used in the present tense because there it would be
ambiguous ("Er will an dem Abend zu Hause sein" would be interpreted as 
"He wants/plans to be at home in the evening.") unless there is a
predicate adjective.  In these cases, the form of the copula disambiguates
the statement:  "Sie will fr"ohlich werden" is "She wants to be[come]
happy", while "Sie will fr"ohlich sein" is "She *claims* to be happy".

I'll leave it up to you experts in verbal morphology out there to
determine whether this class of statements represents a separate mood
("dubtative" or otherwise) or not.  In any case, the parallel to Korean
/te/ is weak indeed (I can't speak to the Bulgarian case).

-- 
	 Daniel "Da" von Brighoff    /\          Dilettanten
	(deb5@midway.uchicago.edu)  /__\         erhebt Euch
				   /____\      gegen die Kunst!
