Chapter 7
On deconstructing mood
A construction grammar approach
to the Spanish subjunctive
The Spanish subjunctive has traditionally been
described by some linguists as an inflection expressing mood and by
others as a marker of subordination. In this contribution I will
argue that both functions can be observed, but that Spanish (and
Romance) subjunctives increasingly become associated with
subordination and lose their modal semantics in the process. I will
therefore claim that taking the subjunctive paradigm as a monolithic
category with one central semantic value is inadequate for
representing all the various constructions in which subjunctive
forms appear. As an alternative, I will suggest to model the various
Spanish subjunctive constructions within a construction grammar
framework informed by Traugott & Trousdale’s work on
constructionalisation. An abstract subjunctive schema is posited
from which a non-assertion, a modal agreement and a modal trigger
subschema are derived. Of these three, two are essentially
procedural with little to no semantic content, while only the
non-assertion schema partly corresponds semantically to the
traditional assertion vs. non-assertion analysis.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Two theories and a logical conundrum
- 3.The theory of a central value: Diachronically conclusive, synchronically
inadequate
- 4.The subjunctive in independent clauses?
- 5.A grammaticalisation account of the Romance subjunctive
- 6.A constructionalisation account of the Romance
subjunctive
- 7.The Spanish subjunctive schema
- 7.1The subjunctive schema [S [que Vsubj]]
- 7.2The non-assertion subschema ( = ‘nonassertion’) [S [que
Vsubj (/Vind)]
- 7.3Modal agreement subschema [[Vtrigger] [que
Vsubj]]
- 7.3.1Orphaned subordinate subschema S
[[(que) Vsubj]]
- 7.3.2Imperative-subjunctive subschema
- 7.4Modal trigger subschema [S [Conjtrigger
Vsubj]]
- 7.5Protasis construction
- 8.Deconstructing the modal analysis for the Spanish
subjunctive
- 9.Conclusion and outlook
-
Notes
-
References