Imperative mood


The imperative mood is a grammatical mood that forms a command or request.
An example of a verb used in the imperative mood is the English phrase "Die." Such imperatives imply a second-person subject, but some other languages also have first- and third-person imperatives, with the meaning of "let's " or "let him/her/them ".
Imperative mood can be denoted by the glossing abbreviation. It is one of the irrealis moods.

Formation

Imperative mood is often expressed using special conjugated verb forms. Like other finite verb forms, imperatives often inflect for person and number. Second-person imperatives are most common, but some languages also have imperative forms for the first and third persons.
In English, the imperative is formed using the bare infinitive form of the verb. This is usually also the same as the second-person present indicative form, except in the case of the verb to be, where the imperative is be while the indicative is are. The imperative form is understood as being in the second person, with no explicit indication of singular or plural. First and third person imperatives are expressed periphrastically, using a construction with the imperative of the verb let:
Other languages such as Latin, French and German have a greater variety of inflected imperative forms, marked for person and number, their formation often depending on a verb's conjugation pattern. Examples can be found in the specific language sections [|below]. In languages that make a T–V distinction the use of particular forms of the second person imperative may also be dependent on the degree of familiarity between the speaker and the addressee, as with other verb forms.
The second person singular imperative often consists of just the stem of the verb, without any ending – this is the case in the Slavic languages, for example.

Syntax and negation

Imperative sentences sometimes use different syntax than declarative or other types of clauses. There may also be differences of syntax between affirmative and negative imperative sentences. In some cases the imperative form of the verb is itself different when negated. A distinct negative imperative form is sometimes said to be in prohibitive or vetative mood.
Many languages, even not normally null-subject languages, omit the subject pronoun in imperative sentences, as usually occurs in English. Details of the syntax of imperative sentences in certain other languages, and of differences between affirmative and negative imperatives, can be found in some of the other specific language sections below.

Usage

Imperatives are used principally for ordering, requesting or advising the listener to do something: "Put down the gun!"; "Pass me the sauce"; "Don't go too near the tiger." They are also often used for giving instructions as to how to perform a task. They can sometimes be seen on signs giving orders or warnings.

The use of the imperative mood may be seen as impolite, inappropriate or even offensive in certain circumstances. In polite speech, orders or requests are often phrased instead as questions or statements, rather than as imperatives:
Politeness strategies can seem more appropriate in order not to threaten a conversational partner in their needs of self-determination and territory: the partner's negative face should not appear threatened. As well as the replacement of imperatives with other sentence types as discussed above, there also often exist methods of phrasing an imperative in a more polite manner, such as the addition of a word like please or a phrase like if you could.
Imperatives are also used for speech acts whose function is essentially not to make an order or request, but to give an invitation, give permission, express a wish, make an apology, etc.:
When written, imperative sentences are often, but not always, terminated with an exclamation mark.
First person plural imperatives are used mainly for suggesting an action to be performed together by the speaker and the addressee : "Let's go to Barbados this year"; "Let us pray". Third person imperatives are used to suggest or order that a third party or parties be permitted or made to do something: "Let them eat cake"; "Let him be executed".
There is an additional imperative form that is used for general prohibitions, consisting of the word "no" followed by the gerund form. The best known examples are "No Smoking" and "No Parking". This form does not have a positive form; that is, "Parking" by itself has no meaning unless used as a noun when it tells that parking is permitted.

In particular languages

For more details on imperatives in the languages listed below, and in languages that are not listed, see the articles on the grammar of the specific languages.

English

English usually omits the subject pronoun in imperative sentences:
However, it is possible to include the you in imperative sentences for emphasis.
English imperatives are negated using don't This is a case of do-support as found in indicative clauses; however in the imperative it applies even in the case of the verb be :
It is also possible to use do-support in affirmative imperatives, for emphasis or politeness: "Do be quiet!"; "Do help yourself!".
The subject you may be included for emphasis in negated imperatives as well, following don't: "Don't you dare do that again!"

Latin

Latin regular imperatives include amā and amāte, from the infinitive amāre ; similarly monē and monēte from monēre ; audī and audīte from audīre, etc. The negative imperative is formed with the infinitive of the verb, preceded by the imperative of nōlle : nōlī stāre and nōlīte stāre ; compare the positive imperative stā and stāte.
For third-person imperatives, the subjunctive mood is used instead.
Latin also has a future imperative form. The corresponding forms are amātō and amātōte, monētō and monētōte, audītō and audītōte. Unlike the present imperative, the future imperative also has special forms for the third person. See Latin conjugation.

Germanic languages

Dutch

A peculiar feature of Dutch is that it can form an imperative mood in the pluperfect tense. Its use is fairly common:
German verbs have a singular and a plural imperative. The singular imperative is equivalent to the bare stem or the bare stem + -e. The plural imperative is the same as the second-person plural of the present tense.
In order to emphasize their addressee, German imperatives can be followed by the nominative personal pronouns du or ihr, respectively. For example: Geh weg! – Geh du doch weg!.
German has T/V distinction, which means that the pronouns du and ihr are used chiefly towards persons with whom one is privately acquainted, which holds true for the corresponding imperatives. Otherwise, the social-distance pronoun Sie is used for both singular and plural. Since there exists no actual imperative corresponding to Sie, the form is paraphrased with the third-person plural of the present subjunctive followed by the pronoun:
Like English, German features many constructions that express commands, wishes, etc. They are thus semantically related to imperatives without being imperatives grammatically:

French

Examples of regular imperatives in French are mange, mangez and mangeons, from manger – these are similar or identical to the corresponding present indicative forms, although there are some irregular imperatives that resemble the present subjunctives, such as sois, soyez and soyons, from être. A third person imperative can be formed using a subjunctive clause with the conjunction que, as in qu'ils mangent de la brioche.
French uses different word order for affirmative and negative imperative sentences:
The negative imperative has the same word order as the indicative. See for detail.
Like in English, imperative sentences often end with an exclamation mark, e.g. to emphasize an order.
In French there is a very distinctive imperative which is the imperative mood of preterite tense also called, expresses a given order with previous future value which must be executed or fulfilled in a future not immediate, as if it were an action to come, but earlier in relation to another that will also happen in the future. However, this type of imperative is peculiar to French which has only one purpose: to order that something be done before the date or time, therefore, this will always be accompanied by a circumstantial complement of time. However, this imperative is formed with the auxiliary verb of the avoir compound tenses and with the auxiliary verb être that is also used to form the tenses composed of the pronominal verbs and some of the intransitive verbs, this means that the structure of the verb imperative in its entirety is composed. Examples:
In English there is no equivalent grammatical structure to form this tense of the imperative mood; it is translated in imperative mood of present with previous value.

Spanish

In Spanish, imperatives for the familiar singular second person are usually identical to indicative forms for the singular third person. However, there are irregular verbs for which unique imperative forms for tú exist. vos usually takes the same forms as tú but unique forms exist for it as well. vosotros also takes unique forms for the imperative.
If an imperative takes a pronoun as an object, it is appended to the verb; for example, Dime. Pronouns can be stacked like they can in indicative clauses:
Imperatives can be formed for usted, ustedes, and nosotros from the respective present subjunctive form. Negative imperatives for these pronouns are also formed this way, but are negated by no.

Portuguese

In Portuguese, affirmative imperatives for singular and plural second person derive from their respective present indicative conjugations, after having their final -s dropped. On the other hand, their negative imperatives are formed by their respective subjunctive forms, as well as both affirmative and negative imperatives for treatment pronouns and plural first person.
Infinitivetu
indicative		vós
indicative		affirmative tu
imperative		affirmative vós
imperative		negative tu
imperative		negative vós
imperative		você
imperative		vocês
imperative		nós
imperative
comercomescomeiscomecomeinão comasnão comais coma comam comamos
beberbebesbebeisbebebebeinão bebasnão bebais beba bebam bebamos
tertenstendestemtendenão tenhasnão tenhais tenha tenham tenhamos
dizerdizesdizeisdizdizeinão digasnão digais diga digam digamos

If a verb takes a pronoun, it should be appended to the verb:

Indic Languages

Sanskrit

In Sanskrit, लोट् लकार् is used with the verb to form the imperative mood. To form the negative, न is placed before the verb in the imperative mood.

Hindi

In Hindi there are two ways to form the imperatives. First, by conjugating the verbs to their imperative forms, and second, from the subjunctive mood verb forms. For negative imperatives, Hindi uses the preposition मत or नहीं before the command imperative verb forms. However, in certain contexts मत ' can also appear after the verb. The preposition ना or न is used before the subjunctive imperative forms.
In most cases, the command and the subjunctive imperatives are not used interchangeably. The command imperatives are used to give direct orders, which may sometimes sound rude or condescending and hence the subjunctive imperative is used to tone down the directness of the command imperative form, when needed. The subjunctive imperative is most often used in formal situations or other situations where you cannot command someone out of respect. A rough difference in nuance can be shown by the following sentences: "Do not shout." and "Please do not shout.".
A peculiar feature of Hindi is that it has imperatives in two tenses; present and the future tense. The present tense imperative gives command in the present and future imperative gives command for the future. The command imperative can be formed only for the 2nd person singular and plural pronouns but the subjunctive imperative can be formed for both the 2nd and the 3rd person for both singular and plural pronouns.
Command Imperatives
Command Imperatives for Compound Verbs
  • For compound verbs of Hindi the imperatives are formed by conjugating the verb at the end to their imperative forms. मत can be put either before or after the first verb when forming the negative imperatives. So, मत पी लेना and पी मत लेना both are correct and mean the same.
  • Sometimes, when the final verb in the compound verb is of just one syllable after conjugating, then for certain such verbs, the final verb in the compound verb and the first verb are combined together and written as one single word. For example, पीलो and पीले , देदे and देदो . Writing them separately as पी लो and पी ले, दे दे and दे दो are also considered correct but are less common in the written language.
  • Combining the above two points, it can be concluded that दे मत दो and मत देदो both are equivalent ways of writing the same sentence meaning "Do not give !".
Formation of Command Imperative for compound verbs is shown in the table below:
Subjunctive Imperatives
The formation of imperatives from subjunctives makes it possible for Hindi to have third person imperatives. Although Hindi has subjunctive forms for the all the grammatical persons, not all of them can be used to form subjunctive imperatives. The 1st person singular and plural subjunctive forms are not shown in the table below because they cannot be used to form neither positive nor negative imperatives. Subjunctives in some grammatical persons, namely, the 2nd person intimate and the 2nd person neutral, can be used as subjunctive imperatives only when they are negatives. The way to form subjunctive imperatives for compound verbs is exactly the same as shown for the command imperatives for compound verbs. Take the root verb and add the subjunctive conjugation of the final verb after it to form the positive imperative and add न or ना before the root verb. In this case the position of न or ना is strictly fixed and it can be present only before the root verb and never after it. Note that the subjunctive imperatives cannot be used to give future commands but only commands in the present.
Standard modern Bengali uses the negative postposition /nā/ after a future imperative formed using the -iyo fusional suffix.

Other Indo-European languages

Greek

has imperative forms for present, aorist, and perfect tenses for the active, middle, and passive voices. Within these tenses, forms exist for second and third persons, for singular, dual, and plural subjects. Subjunctive forms with μή are used for negative imperatives in the aorist.
Present Active Imperative: 2nd sg. λεῖπε, 3rd sg. λειπέτω, 2nd pl. λείπετε, 3rd pl. λειπόντων.

Irish

has imperative forms in all three persons and both numbers, although the first person singular is most commonly found in the negative.

Non-Indo-European languages

Finnish

In Finnish, there are two ways of forming a first-person plural imperative. A standard version exists, but it is typically replaced colloquially by the impersonal tense. For example, from mennä, the imperative "let's go" can be expressed by menkäämme or mennään.
Forms also exist for second and third person. Only first person singular does not have an imperative.

Hebrew and Arabic

Generally, in Semitic languages, every word belongs to a word-family, and is, actually, a conjugation of word-family's three consonant roots. The various conjugations are made by adding vowels to the root consonants and by adding prefixes, in front or after the root consonant. For example, the conjugations of the root K.T.B, both in Hebrew and in Arabic, are words that have something to do with writing. Nouns like a reporter or a letter and verbs like to write or to dictate are conjugations of the root K.T.B. The verbs are further conjugated to bodies, times, and so on.
Both in classic Hebrew and in classic Arabic, there is a form for positive imperative. It exists for singular and plural, masculine and feminine second-person. The imperative conjugations look like shortages of the future ones. However, in modern Hebrew, the future tense is often used in its place in colloquial speech, and the proper imperative form is considered formal or of higher register.
The negative imperative in those languages is more complicated. In modern Hebrew, for instance, it contains a synonym of the word "no", that is used only in negative imperative, and is followed by the future tense.
The verb to write

in singular, masculine		Future IndicativeImperative / Prohibitive
Affirmativetikhtov – תכתוב
ktov – כתוב
اكْتـُبْ- uktub

Negativelo tikhtov – לא תכתוב
al tikhtov – אל תכתוב

The verb to write

in singular, feminine		Future IndicativeImperative / Prohibitive
Affirmativetikhtevi – תכתבי
kitvi – כתבי
اكْتـُبْي- uktubi

Negativelo tikhtevi – לא תכתבי
al tikhtevi – אל תכתבי
لَا تَكْتُبِي- lā taktubī

The verb to dictate

in singular, masculine		Future IndicativeImperative / Prohibitive
Affirmativetakhtiv – תכתיב
hakhtev – הכתב

Negativelo takhtiv – לא תכתיב
al takhtiv – אל תכתיב

Japanese

uses separate verb forms as shown below. For the verb kaku :
IndicativeImperative
/ Prohibitive
Affirmative kaku kake
Negative kakanai kakuna

See also the suffixes and /.

Korean

has six levels of honorific, all of which have their own imperative endings. Auxiliary verbs 않다 anta and 말다 malda are used for negative indicative and prohibitive, respectively. For the verb gada :
LevelIndicative AffirmativeImperativeIndicative NegativeProhibitive
Hasipsio-style가십니다 gasimnida가십시오 gasipsio가지 않으십니다 gaji aneusimnida가지 마십시오 gaji masipsio
Haeyo-style가세요 gaseyo가세요 gaseyo가지 않으세요 gaji aneuseyo가지 마세요 gaji maseyo
Hao-style가시오 gasio가시오 gasio가지 않으시오 gaji aneusio가지 마시오 gaji masio
Hage-style가네 gane가게 gage가지 않네 gaji anne가지 말게 gaji malge
Hae-style가 ga가 ga가지 않아 gaji ana가지 마 gaji ma
Haera-style간다 ganda가라 gara가지 않는다 gaji anneunda가지 마라 gaji mara

Mandarin

uses different words of negation for the indicative and the prohibitive moods. For the verb 做 zuò :
IndicativeImperative
/ Prohibitive
Affirmative做 zuò做 zuò
Negative不做 búzuò别做 biézuò

Turkish

For the most common imperative form, the second person singular, Turkish uses the bare verb stem without the infinitive ending -mek/-mak. Other imperative forms use various suffixes. In the second person plural there are two forms: the formal imperative with the suffix -in/-ın/-un/-ün, and the public imperative used for notices and advice, which uses the suffix -iniz/-ınız/-unuz/-ünüz. All Turkish imperative suffixes change depending on the verb stem according to the rules of vowel harmony. For the verb içmek :
The verb içmek 1st person singular1st person plural2nd person singular/informal2nd person plural/formal2nd person plural/public advice3rd person singular3rd person plural
Imperative formiçeyim içelim iç için içiniz içsin içsinler

Negative imperative forms are made in the same way, but using a negated verb as the base. For example, the second person singular imperative of içmemek is içme. Other Turkic languages construct imperative forms similarly to Turkish.

Footnotes