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ESL forum >
Ask for help > unreal past or past subjunctive ??
unreal past or past subjunctive ??
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swing swan
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unreal past or past subjunctive ??
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hi mates, do we say "if there was no daylight...." or "if there were no daylight.." who could help me explain this to my pupils . I �ve told them that we must use" were" with all subject pronouns as this is the past subjunctive .I �m I right ? |
24 Feb 2014
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cunliffe
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�If there were no.... � �If I were you.... � etc is fine, but going out of the language. Most people say �If there was... � and so on. I think using �were � is a sort of subjunctive. There have been previous posts on this, going into some detail, maybe someone else will be able to locate them for you. |
24 Feb 2014
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swing swan
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ok I see !! thank you esl friend ;)
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24 Feb 2014
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almaz
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I was discussing this on another forum just the other day and this blogpost from Geoff Pullum came up again (Lynne, this also appeared in one of the posts you were talking about):
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=4042
Basically, Professor Pullum is saying that there�s no such thing as the �past subjunctive� in English - although the term is still used in �traditional� grammars - and that counterfactual were would be better considered as the form of the �irrealis� mood (indicating that it "conveys varying degrees of remoteness from factuality").
Oh, and using the simple past was instead of were is really a matter of style and choice nowadays - it�s less formal.
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24 Feb 2014
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adel boukhchina
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Both uses are correct. If you check a grammar book you will find "If I were you" and "If I was you" used. The problem is that many teachers ask their students to use "were" instead of "was" and that is a mistake. Even in the "Bac Exam" teachers are supposed to accept both uses. |
24 Feb 2014
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dackala
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What �s more, at some exams like Cambridge CPE , teachers don �t accept- if I was, but I don �t know why. Maybe, as said in some books, it is an informal use of the second conditional.
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24 Feb 2014
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markell
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When I was studying English, I was taught "If I were...." as being the correct form but then I was taught British English. Now living in the States, everyone says "If I was..." It �s just the same with using "who" instead of "that". For example: the person who....., but again, here, everyone says:"the person that...." So, like any other language, English changes and new forms of the language are accepted. Personally, I don �t like it so, I will still say "if I were" and "the person who".
Martine |
24 Feb 2014
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yanogator
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@Martine I like the examples you gave, and I have a comment about them in US usage. "If I was..." is a fairly recent development, but "The person that..." is not so recent. About 45 years ago we were taught that it is fine to use "who" or "that" for people, but never "which". Bruce |
25 Feb 2014
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