Spanish: Subjunctive Mood
From UniLang Wiki
Contents |
Tenses
In Spanish there are two tenses for the subjunctive mood: present and past. There is a third tense, the future, which is rare in modern Spanish.
Present Tense
The present tense is made by taking the first person singular of the present indicative, removing -o, and adding the affixes.
The affixes are dependent on the conjugation:
ar: -e, -es, -e, -emos, -éis, -en
ex: cante (that I sing), cantes, cante, cantemos, cantéis, canten
<p>er/ir: -a, -as, -a, -amos, -áis, -an
ex: coma (that I eat), comas, coma, comamos, comáis, coman
If the first person singular is irregular, then the present subjunctive will be too:
<p>
pido "I ask" --> (que) pida "(that) I ask" [fr. pedir]
conozco "I know" --> (que) conozca "(that) I know" [fr. conocer]
caigo "I fall" --> (que) caiga "(that) I fall" [fr. caer]
Some verbs form present subjunctives from forms not derived from the present indicative:
<p>
he "I have" --> (que) haya "(that) I have" [fr. haber]
voy "I go" --> (que) vaya "(that) I go" [fr. ir]
soy "I am" --> (que) sea "(that) I be" [fr. ser]
sé "I know" --> (que) sepa "(that) I know" [fr. saber]
Past Tense
Spanish has one past tense, but this can be formed in two ways, either with affixes in -ra or in -se. Unlike the present subjunctive, the affixes are the same for the three conjugations.
The affixes are formed by taking the third person plural of the preterite, dropping the -ron, then adding the affixes:
<p>-ra, -ras, -ra, '-ramos, '-rais, -ran
or -se, -ses, -se, '-semos, '-seis, -sen
ex: cantara/cantase, cantaras/cantases/ cantara/cantase, cantáramos/cantásemos, cantárais/cantáseis, cantaran/cantasen
If the third person plural of the preterite is irregular, then the past subjunctive will be irregular:
<p>
pidieron "they asked" --> (que) pidiera/pidiese "(that) I asked" [fr. pedir]
cayeron "they fell" --> (que) cayera/cayese "(that) I fell" [fr. caer]
hubieron "they had" --> (que) hubiera/hubiese "(that) I had" [fr. haber]
fueron "they went" --> (que) fuera/fuese "(that) I went" [fr. ir]
fueron "they were" --> (que) fuera/fuese "(that) I were" [fr. ser]
supieron "I know" --> (que) supiera/supiese "(that) I knew" [fr. saber]
Now, the two forms are for the most part interchangeable. However, the -ra forms are preferred.
The -se form was most often used, in literature, with the conditional (the way its cognates are used in Portuguese and Italian), while the -ra form could basically stand alone (the way its cognate does in Portuguese):
Si tuviese dinero, iría al cine "If I had money, I would go to the movies (but I don't)"
(Archaic) Cuando tuviera dinero, fui al cine "When I had money, I went to the movies"
In some areas of Latin American and Spain, the -ra form is still used as a standalone tense, without a subjunctive meaning as a substitute for the pluperfect:
Obtuviera un collar para la navidad = Había obtenido ... "I had gotten/got (Br) a necklace for Christmas."
Future Subjunctive
This tense is extremely rare in modern written Spanish, and is almost never used in speech. However, it was used in older Spanish, and should be recognized.
It is like the -ra form above, but with affixe -re:
-re, -res, -re, '-remos, '-reis, -ren
ex: cantare, cantares/ cantare, cantáremos, cantáreis, cantaren
It was used with the future (and its associated forms). Nowadays, it has been replaced by the present subjunctive.
Si tuviere dinero, iré al cine = Si tenga dinero... "If I have money, I will go to the movies.
>> Spanish >> Spanish grammar
