10. Verb Phrases: Tense/Modality, Aspect

When diagramming verb phrases, we mark tense/modality, aspect, voice, and valency. For now we are only learning tense/modality and aspect. Major Assignment 1 and Midterm Exam will only ask you to mark tense/modality and aspect and not voice or valency since we haven’t learned them. In the following examples, I provide the valency labels for some examples, but other times I will use an empty placeholder (MV: _____) in the diagram to remind you of where the valency information will go.

The Verb-Auxiliary-Modal hierarchy

  • Verbs
    • Auxiliary verbs (subset of verbs)
      • Modal verbs (subset of auxiliary verbs)
  • Core modal verbs:
    • can, could, may, might, shall, should, will, would, must
  • Semi-modal (aka phrasal modal) verbs:
    • had better, have to, have got to, need to, ought to, be supposed to, be going to, used to

What makes modals different from general auxiliaries?

  • grammatical tense: modal verbs have no tense
  • semantics: modal verbs express necessity or possibility

Tense/Modality

There are three possibilities:

  • present tense (pres)
  • past tense (past)
  • modal, no grammatical tense (modal (NT))

Note: We mark tense/modality and aspect on the VP node.

simple present tense (pres)

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simple past tense (past)

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Core modal verbs with simple aspect (no grammatical tense)

Core modal verbs: can, could, may, might, shall, should, will, would, must
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Semi-modal verbs (aka phrasal modals; no grammatical tense)

Semi-modal (aka phrasal modal verbs): had better, have to, have got to, need to, ought to, be supposed to, be going to, used to
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Aspect

Perfect, progressive, and perfect progressive aspect

  • Aspect marking is created through a combination of particular auxiliary verbs and participle forms of verbs:
    • HAVE + ed-participle → perfect aspect
    • BE + ing-participle → progressive aspect
    • HAVE + been + ing-participle → perfect progressive aspect
    • otherwise: simple aspect (unmarked)

Present tense + perfect aspect

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Present tense + progressive aspect

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Present tense + perfect progressive aspect

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Past tense + perfect aspect

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Past tense + progressive aspect

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Past tense + perfect progressive aspect

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Modal + perfect aspect

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Modal + progressive aspect

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Modal + perfect progressive aspect

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Modifiers within verb phrases

Single-word modifier within the VP

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Multiple modifiers within the VP, when both modify the main verb

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Phrasal modifier within the VP

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Negation in the verb phrase

Negation with BE as main verb

If BE is the main verb, the negator not is added after BE.
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Negation with auxiliary verbs

If there is an auxiliary verb, the negator not is added after the first auxiliary verb.
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Negation with DO as a dummy auxiliary

If there are no auxiliary verbs and the main verb is not BE, then add a dummy auxiliary DO and place the negator not after the newly added auxiliary verb.
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