linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of language. The areas of linguistic analysis are syntax (rules governing the structure of sentences), semantics (meaning), Morphology (linguistics), morphology (structure of words), phonetics (speech sounds ...

, a desiderative (

abbreviated An abbreviation () is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method including shortening, contraction, initialism (which includes acronym), or crasis. An abbreviation may be a shortened form of a word, usually ended with a trailing per ...

or ) form is one that has the meaning of "wanting to X". Desiderative forms are often verbs, derived from a more basic verb through a process of morphological derivation. Desiderative mood is a kind of volitive mood.

Sanskrit

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

, the desiderative is formed through the suffixing of /sa/ and the prefixing of a reduplicative syllable, consisting of the first consonant of the root (sometimes modified) and a vowel, usually /i/ but /u/ if the root has an /u/ in it. Changes to the root vowel sometimes happen, as well. The acute accent, which indicates high pitch in

Vedic upright=1.2, The Vedas are ancient Sanskrit texts of Hinduism. Above: A page from the '' Atharvaveda''. The Vedas ( or ; ), sometimes collectively called the Veda, are a large body of religious texts originating in ancient India. Composed ...

, is usually placed at the first vowel. For example:

Meadow Mari

In Meadow Mari, the desiderative mood is marked by the suffix -не ''-ne''.

Positive present

Negative present

Japanese

In Japanese, the desiderative takes two main forms: () and (). Both forms conjugate for tense and positivity, but in different ways: with the ending, the verb becomes an , or a conjugable adjective, while the ending (

suffix In linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns and adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs. Suffixes can ca ...

) creates a godan/ yodan verb. Though there are other, compound forms to demonstrate wanting, these two alone are demonstrated because they are inflections of the main verb. These two forms are plain/informal in nature, and can be elevated to the normal-polite and other levels through normal methods. is an absolute statement of desire, whereas indicates the ''appearance'' of desire. Generally, one does not say things such as 'Tarō wants to eat' because one cannot read Tarō's thoughts; instead, one says 'it appears that Tarō wants to eat.'

Godan Verbs

Ichidan Verbs

Proto-Indo-European

Proto-Indo-European Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. No direct record of Proto-Indo-European exists; its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-Euro ...

likely had a desiderative. In some

daughter language In historical linguistics, a daughter language, also known as descendant language, is a language descended from another language, its mother language, through a process of genetic descent. If more than one language has developed from the same pro ...

s like Albanian, Indo-Iranian,

Balto-Slavic The Balto-Slavic languages form a branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European family of languages, traditionally comprising the Baltic languages, Baltic and Slavic languages. Baltic and Slavic languages share several linguistic traits ...

and possibly

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language *Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Foot ...

, it acquired the meaning of a

future tense In grammar, a future tense ( abbreviated ) is a verb form that generally marks the event described by the verb as not having happened yet, but expected to happen in the future. An example of a future tense form is the French ''achètera'', mea ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Desiderative Mood Grammatical moods