In common usage, particularly in English language teaching, particular tense–aspect–mood combinations such as "present progressive" and "conditional perfect" are often referred to simply as "tenses". The tenses, aspects and moods that may be identified in English are described below (although the terminology used differs significantly between authors). In contrast to languages like Latin, though, English has only limited means for expressing these categories through verb conjugation, and tends mostly to express them periphrastically, using the verb combinations mentioned in the previous section. (For another type of combination involving verbs – items such as go on, slip away and break off – see Phrasal verb.)Īs in many other languages, the means English uses for expressing the three categories of tense (time reference), aspect and mood are somewhat conflated (see tense–aspect–mood). The uses of the various types of combination are described in the detailed sections of the present article. As the last example shows, the words making up these combinations do not always remain consecutive.įor details of the formation of such constructions, see English clause syntax. Such combinations are sometimes called compound verbs more technically they may be called verb catenae, since they are not generally strict grammatical constituents of the clause. The first verb in such a combination is the finite verb, the remainder are nonfinite (although constructions in which even the leading verb is nonfinite are also possible – see § Perfect and progressive nonfinite constructions below). In English, verbs frequently appear in combinations containing one or more auxiliary verbs and a nonfinite form (infinitive or participle) of a main (lexical) verb. Some forms of be and of certain other auxiliary verbs also have contracted forms ( 's, 're, 've, etc.).įor full details of how these inflected forms of verbs are produced, see English verbs. The verb be has a larger number of different forms ( am, is, are, was, were, etc.), while the modal verbs have a more limited number of forms.
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