What role does tense play in English?

Question

It does NOT indicate the time setting. For instance, jokes, which are narrations of past events, are often told in the present tense. Books are sometimes written in the present tense (look at the works of Patricia Cornwell for one), yet are about the past. Polite requests are often made in the past tense yet relate to the present. There are too many instances where tense does not indicate the time setting for anyone to say that it is the exception that proves the rule.

Answer 1

English speakers cannot explain this, i know that i can't.

The best thing to do is buy a grammar book and read though that, although it will be extremely boring and hard to take in (understand)

We just speak as we are taught, like when we learn a foreign language it is not possible to learn all the grammar rules even native speakers don't understand their own grammar. We just have to listen to them speak and emulate their patterns of sentence construction/word endings...

Answer 2

Paul M's answer is good. Tense is most usually used to indicate the time setting. However, if the time setting is already understood, it is not necessary to indicate it, and therefore the speaker/writer can choose to use the tense for some other purpose.

You could, incidentally, argue that a joke doesn't actually have a time setting, since it is a fictitious account - whether the man is walking in to a bar right now, or whether he walked into a bar in the past, is irrelevant to the joke. The present can therefore be used to make the story seem more immediate - to draw the listener in. Some people (by no means all) use this same technique when recounting any story verbally: "So I'm walking along the High Street and who do I see?" Clearly, unless the listener can see that the person is actually walking along the High Street, the story must be in the past. Use of the present tense appears to project the end of the story into the future, making it uncertain and therefore more interesting and exciting.

Similarly in literature - it is obvious to the reader that the events must be in the past since someone has had the time to type out the story, publish the book, etc. Using the present tense is still unusual, but it can make the narration sound more like someone telling a story orally, and using the techniques described above.

Polite requests in the form of "I was wondering if you w ould pass the salt" are obviously a roundabout way of making the request, but in fact this is a correct use of the past tense - the speaker is no longer wondering, because he/she is now asking. The wondering is therefore in the past.

Just to correct one thing on a previous answer, "would" indicates conditional, not subjunctive or past. "I would do it if I had time". Past conditional is generally would have "If I'd known you were coming I would have baked a cake".

Answer 3

As the lone writer stated, there is indeed no future tense in English. The word 'will' is a modal auxiliary verb, used in English to express the speaker's attitude to the likelihood of an event occurring. We use it in a way that expresses futurity, but in terms of linguistics, no inflected future form exists. We only have past and non-past. However, for the sake of your question, there isn't really any problem with referring to the use of 'will' as future tense. By the way, very interesting concept you have here. It's like having your fortune read. I think it would be quite fun to read actually, but only as a short story. I can't imagine anything more god-awful than reading 300 pages of your future (which you know to be fake anyway). Another thing to note about this so-called 'future' tense. You will find when you write such a story, that you can get away without using 'will' for the most part, and still express futurity. I guess that's another reason why English doesn't have true future tense. In a language with true future tense, you would not be able to mix it with present. Here's a mind-bending second-person future tense paragraph for your enjoyment. (I actually confused the hell out of myself while writing it). "Four weeks from now, you will enter an old, abandoned house, and climb the rotten panels of the termite-infested staircase in the centre of the room. At the top of the stairs, you will see a door slightly ajar. You slip through the gap and enter into the master bedroom, where you will find a note lying on the bed. The note will say 'This is all in your imagination, for English has no future tense. The narrator is simply expressing an affirmative attitude to events that are likely to occur in the future, but might not.' You will place the note back upon the pillow in utter dismay, and you will realise that I, the narrator, will have been tricking you into thinking that these events are transpiring, because until this future point in time, you will have believed that there is a future tense in English. But alas, these future events will no longer be able to occur, because you now know that future tense does not exist in English, so you will no longer be surprised when you read the note, unlike what I previously said." Hmm... I kind of like this pseudo-future tense. Much more interesting than present tense novels. (ahh how I despise present tense novels)

Answer 4

Well, the thing is, a lot of our tenses serve multiple purposes such as subjunctive and passive.

"Would you pass me the salt?" is not, in this sentence the past tense of will, but a subjunctive. So it is used to present a wish, or a request and is often used for things that are not actually happening, or did not actually happen.

"If it had not been so hot, I would have ridden my bike" Notice the would have, that is a past subjunctive. It presents something that didn't happen. It is past tense, but it also represents something that did not happen but could have or would have.

Jokes are told in the present because it didn't actually happen. It's not a true narrative, it's basically a story, and if you used past tense, it wouldn't change it "A man walks into a bar and says..." "A man walked into a bar and said..." In fact many jokes are also told in the past tense.

As far as books, it may just be stylistic and they cannot really stand as a representative of the entire English language. Usually they take on a case called "historical present" It is just to make the story seem more vivid

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/historical+present
That's a good link to understand it.

Also, passive seems like past tense but it isn't, it's just passive.

Present Passive-
The ball is hit. vs. I hit the ball
Past Passive-
The ball was hit vs. I hit the ball
Future passive-
The ball will be hit vs. I will hit the ball
Pluperfect-
The ball had been hit vs. I had hit the ball

etc.

The role of the tense is the time setting, but it includes a lot more. Tense(present, past, etc.), voice (active, passive), number (sing., plural., 1st person, 3rd person), mood(indicative, imperative, subjunctive) so it is not so simple to look at a verb and decide exactly what it means. As native speakers we understand how they function, but we don't really know what they mean.
e.g. If I became a millionaire, I would give my money away
This looks like two past tenses, but they are actually subjunctive. It displays a situation that has not happened and may not happen, but what would happen if it did.

Essentially, you need a much deeper understanding of the purpose of the English verb in order to say what role it plays.

Answer 5

Your first statement isn't correct, tense DOES indicate time setting, it just doesn't do it in the same way all of the time. Even though jokes may be told in the present tense, the use of the present still indicates the past, by way of transporting the listener BACK to when the incident apparently happened. The use of the present tense is simply to add the effect that the incident is happening at the time, but it doesn't set the time setting as actually the present.

Similarly, the use of tense to ask polite questions ie. "I was going to ask you for a glass of water" is still indicating past tense, even though it's perceived as being asked in the present. It basically says that you WERE going to do something but considerations for the other person made you reconsider, all the while this is in the past tense.

Tense may not appear to literally indicate the proper time setting but really the times when it doesn't are just to convey an extra meaning in a context where the time setting is already understood by the listener.

Answer 6

You have some answers that make valid points so far. I would sum it up as follows:

Verb tenses in English DO indicate time. A good grammar book is needed to explain each individual tense: I recommend 'Oxford Practice Grammar' to my students.

However, the use of present tenses in jokes and narratives is a stylistic choice on the teller/writer's behalf. This gives the piece immediacy and is used to draw the listener/reader into the story.

The polite requests you refer to, I imagine, include such examples as:

...'Would you open the window, please?'...

The modal verb 'would' (not past tense here) is used with the main verb 'open'; otherwise 'Open the window!' would be an order rather than a polite request.

'Would' could be replaced by other modals 'could' or 'can' - in reverse order of politeness.

OR

...'I wonder if you could open the window.'...
...'I wish you would open the window.'...

'Wonder'/'wish' are used in the present here but are followed by 'could'/'would', which are considered 'softer' than 'can'/'will'.

BTW, another very good grammar book - more detailed, and including an interesting section on 'taboo words' (!) - is 'Practical English Usage' by Michael Swan. I find it indispensable.

Answer 7

There are several ways verbs are inflected - the big ones are TAM (tense/aspect/mood) but others include things like voice (active/passive). Verbs in English obviously do have tense, and we use it quite a bit. We are also big fans of the 'historical present' - using the present tense to tell things a/b the past. There are quite a few exceptions - but I mean...look at all the ways we DO use tense. past/present/future is just the beginning. There are some languages that have only 2 (usually past and not past)! They have to use context to figure out what the verb means based on context.

Actually, I think tense is the only universal verbal inflection (not all languages have mood/aspect/voice). So...it does serve a purpose for sure =)

Answer 8

But you still know what era the person is talking about. If you talk in present tense, it helps the story feel more real.

Answer 9

Present, Past & Past Participal
Go Went Gone
Lets Go to town.
we went to town yesterday.
we have gone to town before.

Answer 10

I run
I am running
I shall run
I ran
I was running
I used to run
I had run....
All these are different tenses and convey something different.
The same is true for other languages..eg Welsh
Rhedaf,
Rhedais,
Rhedwn,
Rhedaswn ...........
..... all show 'when' the running took place.