Would you expect to find languages using a form of the verb "to go" to express intention? . . . or a form of the verb "to have" to express obligation?
Well, English does. In fact, you just read a sentence (the title of this post) where forms of those words appear in those senses.
They’re somewhat strange senses. Consider:
- I am going to Rome.
- I am going to visit Rome.
- I am going to study now.
In the first sentence the verb "go" has its normal, literal sense of moving from one place to another. In the last sentence it clearly has a metaphorical meaning. You may be sitting in the chair where you plan to study when you say it and may not be physically going anywhere at all. The middle sentence is actually using the same metaphorical sense as the last one, but you may not have noticed it since the topic under discussion was a visit, which would involve moving from one place to another.
Now consider:
- I have a book
- I have a headache.
- I have to study now.
In the first sentence the verb "have" is in its original, literal meaning of possessing a physical object. In the last sentence it has a clearly metaphorical meaning that speaks of an obligation (to study now) as if it were a physical object that could be possessed. The middle sentence also involves a metaphorical sense since headaches are not physical objects that can be possessed, though this is somewhat masked since "a headache" is more obviously a noun phrase than "to study now" is (though, in actuality, "to study now" is a noun phrase since it is based on the infinitive "to study" and infinitives are verbal nouns).
Pretty weird, huh? There’s no necessary connection between the verb and the metaphor that is built out of it. That’s not to say that there is no logic in basing the metaphors on these verbs, it’s just that there is no necessity that the words be used in these metaphorical ways. We could not, for example, substitute synonyms for these verbs and have the resulting metaphors sound normal at all:
- I am travelling to study now. (When you’re sitting in the chair where you intend to study)
- I possess to study now.
Nor could you do the reverse:
- I intend to Rome.
- I am obligated a book.
With no requirement for "go" and "have" to bear the metaphorical meanings that English ascribes to them, most langauges (at least most languages I’ve studied) do not do this. To express intent and obligation they either use special words (their equivalents of "intend," "obligated," "must," etc.) or they may put the verb in a special mood. In any event, they don’t do what English does.
Imagine my surprise when I found a language that does.
Lately I’ve been studying Pimsleur Spanish I. (I’m now in the last lesson). It’s been a long time since I studied Spanish systematically, so I’ve forgotten lots of stuff and was quite rusty when I started the course.
Early on I started getting distracted by the way Pimsleur was using the verb voy ("I go" or "I am going"). For example, it would want me to express intention by saying things like "Voy a comer" ("I am going to eat"). "That’s too much like English," I thought. "Can that be right? Can it be that simple? It sounds like a too-literal translation of English." But no, thinking back to when I’d taken Spanish before, I realized that "Voy a comer" is how one would say "I’m going to eat." So I just accepted it.
Then I hit the part of the course where it starts wanting me to express obligation with tengo ("I have") by saying things like "Tengo que ir ahora" ("I have to go now"). I’m used to tengo being used in its literal sense, like "Tengo un libro" ("I have a book") and the idea that Spanish would use the exact same metaphor of obligation for tengo that English does for "have" seemed incredible to me.
It couldn’t be a coincidence.
But what was the source? Since English is a Germanic language and Spanish is a Romance language, they aren’t that closely related. They are both Indo-European languages, but Indo-European was spoken a long time ago, and it didn’t strike me that such metaphors were likely to survive that long a passage of time with that much linguistic change going on around them (change so severe it resulted in the creation first of Old High German and Latin and then of English and Spanish). I also have no way to check it out as I don’t have good resources on Indo-European (what little is known about it).
But I thought: "There might be a closer explanation. The metaphor might have spread to English and Spanish from ecclesiastical Latin (which also may have spread it to other European langauges)." I couldn’t think of any examples off the top of my head in which forms of tenere (Latin for "to have" and the ancestor of tengo) is used to express obligation, so I called my Latin mentor and asked him if he knew if it was used this way.
"Oh, yeah! All the time!" he replied.
So there you have it: The metaphors may be derived from ecclesiastical Latin. (Or maybe somewhere else.) Unfortunately, I don’t have time to investigate further right now.
I have to go write another blog entry for tomorrow.
As an ex-high school Spanish teacher, the verb “to have” is fun and interesting to explain. Of course the Spanish language has a couple of ways to say, “to have,” and they use it even more than we do. I find that the easiest way to explain it is:
(1),the verb “tener” means “to have” in a physical way, i.e., “I have a pencil”.
(2),It is also used for our verb, “to be”, i.e., I have hunger, I have fear, etc.
(3) Now, to have to do something, Spanish uses “tener que”, “I have to go to the bathroom ” is “tengo que ir al baño.”
(4) And Spanish uses “tener ganas de” for something we don’t have the best translation for. I translate it as “I have a craving for” or “I have a hankering for” or “I really feel like doing…” such and such. “Tengo ganas de ir al parque” is “I feel like going to the park” and “Tengo ganas de comer helado de chocolate” would be, “I have a hankering for some chocolate ice cream.” It is by far my favorite use of the verb, “tener.”
There is your Spanish lesson for the day!
Ecclesiastical Latin? So a correct use of the word “tenere” in a sentence could be:
Sribere in Blogo Jimmii teneo.
It’s been a while since I studied French, but I believe it has a version of the “going to” dual meaning.
Also the intransitive “How’s it going?”
“Ca va?”
(“How’s it going?”)
Shrug. “Ca va.”
(Shrug. “It’s going.”)
French also uses its verb for “to have, to possess” as part of the “composed past” and related tenses (the equivalent of I have done, I had done, that kind of thing).
I think we can blame William the Conqueror.
Strangely you did not consider the Southern verbiage “fixin” for preparing or repairing. That would add even more fun to the “going to” and “have to” situation. I’m “fixin to” 🙂
I noticed this same thing when I took a few Spanish classes in high school and college. I also thought it was a bit strange that both languages use the same double meanings for both of these words. But not having studied any other languages, I thought that perhaps this was something that is common to all European languages. If it’s only English and Spanish, that is indeed rather strange.
When I studied French at the university, we would use the verb aller, meaning to go, in several different ways, almost exactly like in English:
I am going to go to the school.
Je vais aller au lycee.
I am going to study my homework.
Je vais etudier mes devoirs.
Debere is the verb we were taught to use in Latin when trying to give a sense that one ought/must do something. Of course, it’s only the introductory course, so that’s probably oversimplifying it.
If tenere doesn’t pan out, perhaps habere might.
Yeah, I completely forgot about “haber” in Spanish which is just like latin and just like English. It is the present particple, or helping verb.
Example:
Ya he visto esta película.
I have seen this movie already.
Hey, if God really did the thing at the Tower of Babel, why couldn’t these languages kind of follow the same pattern? I guess it doesn’t pan out with the Asian languages and others that are absolutely nothing like the germanic and latin languages. CRAZY!
Now, as you can see I am not as smart as the rest of you, plus I am homeschooling four children, so please cut me some slack!
Suzanne: I have no earthly idea what you’re trying to say. From a Christian point of view, all languages in the world are descended from whatever Adam and Eve spoke, by way of the dialects God splintered the common tongue into at Babel (however you interpret that part of Holy Writ). There is a “family resemblance” between Latin, German, English, Spanish, French etc. because they are much closer “relatives” to each other than they are to the languages that they are “nothing like.” Just as you are more likely to look like your aunts, uncles and cousins than like someone from another part of the world, even though all are descended from the same first two parents.
Unrelated: the linguist Tolkien used to coopt St. Augustine’s “O felix culpa!” to refer to the Babel incident. Always thought that was funny.
Tous les faces d’Avoir
I am studying French in high school, and everyone who has comented on French is correct, “aller” is used anywhere in English we’d say “to go” (including “How are you? / Comment allez-vous?” and “I am fine / Je vais bien”). However, for to have an obligation to do is not really the same in French. If you want to say “I have to go to the bathroom”, it is not correct to say “J’ai aller aux toilettes” (I have to go to the bathroom). One should use the expression “Il faut” and other tenses (It is necessary for ), the expression “avoir besoin de” (litterally to have need of / to), or the verb “devoir”, literally to “should” or to have to (this is closest to the English, but not always). So, to sum it up, to say “I need to go to the bathroom”, there are three ways: Il me* faut aller aux toilettes, j’ai besion d’aller aux toilettes, and Je dois aller aux toilettes.
*me is not necessary. It is perfectly correct to say “Il faut” (it is necessary).
There is also another thing in English that confounds americans…”to have” (avoir) does NOT mean to have a drink or food. That is prendre. Which also means to take. Oh, là là (my goodness).
1.) avoir – to have, literally physical – I have a pencil, J’ai un crayon (si on vient de l’ouest de France, je suis désolé! J’ai un crayon de bois!)
2.) avoir (expression) – to be hungry / thirsty, avoir faim / soif
3.) avoir – to have done something, as in the past tense (Je l’AI fait, I did it). Also être here.
4.) Il…faut, devoir, avoir besoin de…-see above
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