Aspect: aspect
| Values: | ¨¨Imp | Perf |
Aspect is an inflectional verbal feature describing the duration of an action in time. There are two main values of aspect: imperfective and perfective. Moreover, there are compound past forms with habitual meaning, but none of their parts bears the corresponding aspect value.
For overview of verb stems and verb endings mentioned below see Pashto verbal system.
Imp: imperfective
The imperfective (or durative) aspect describes an action that happans or is happening for a period of time, e.g. either continuous (like continuous tenses in English) or repetitive actions.
Simple uses and formation
- present: present imperfective stem + present endings
- past: past imperfective stem + past endings
- imperative: present imperfective stem + imperative endings
- conditional: past imperfective stem + conditional ending
- infinitive: past imperfective stem + infinitive endings
Compound use
- future: auxiliary word بۀ bë (with aux:fut relation) + present
Examples
- present, continuous: اوس لولم os lwalë́m “I am reading now”
- future, repetitive: بۀ تا ته هره ورځ لکم bë tâ ta hára wraż likë́m “I will write you every day”
- past, continuous: ما پرون یو کتاب لوستۀ mâ parún yaw kitấb lwastë́ “I was reading a book yesterday”
- imperative: کتاب لوله kitấb lwalá “Write a book”
- conditional (potential use): کور جوړولای شم kor ǰoṛawë́lây šëm “I can build a house”
- infinitive (passive use): کتاب لوستل کېږي kitấb lwastë́l keǧí “The book is being read”
Perf: perfective
The perfective (or punctual) aspect describes an action understood as occurring in one moment.
Uses and formation
- past (indicative): past perfective stem + past endings
- imperative: present perfective stem + imperative endings
- conditional: past perfective stem + conditional ending
- infinitive: past perfective stem + infinitive endings
The present itself is a moment, moving towards, so it is not possible to speak about a punctual action in the present, because it immediately falls into the past. The present forms of the perfective, that would otherwise not have any meaning, are used for the subjunctive mood, that do not distinguish the aspect. The subjunctive is then used to form the future perfective (see Mood for details).
The Aspect=Perf feature is also used for the separate word ونۀ wënë́ preceding the verb and combining
the usual perfective prefix و wë́ and the negation particle نۀ në́.
The verb form itself is then marked with Aspect=Imp, although together both words form the negative perfective form.
Examples
- past: تۀ ما ته راغلې të mâ ta rấġle “You came to me”
- future: به یو کتاب ولیکم bë yaw kitấb wë́likëm “I will write a book”
- imperative: کتاب ولوله kitấb wë́lwala “Write a book”
- conditional (potential use): په ماښام راغلای شم pë mâx̌ấm râġë́lây šëm “I can come in the evening”
Habitual
In addition to the two main aspects for the simple forms, there is a much less frequent habitual aspect. No word is marked in this way, as the habitual occurs only in compound forms.
Use and formation
- habitual: auxiliary word به bë (with aux:hab relation) + past imperfective
Tha habitual describes actions that used to happen habitually in the past. Usually, it is not used on its own in a simple clause, but only in a compound sentence alongside another habitual expressing simultaneousness of the two habitual actions or with usual past tense expressing the habitual circumstances, in which a main past event took place.
Examples
Aspect in other languages: [arr] [bej] [bg] [bm] [bor] [cs] [el] [eme] [ga] [gn] [gub] [ha] [hu] [hy] [hyw] [jaa] [ka] [ky] [la] [mdf] [myu] [myv] [naq] [nci] [nmf] [pcm] [ps] [qpm] [ru] [say] [sl] [tpn] [tr] [tt] [u] [uk] [urb] [urj] [xcl] [yrl]