Mood and Modality in Sorani Kurdish: A Functional Analysis

Abstract

The current research aims to investigate mood and modality in Sorani Kurdish within the Systemic Functional approach (Halliday and Matthiessen 2014). Specifically, the present study is an attempt to explore the nature of mood markers and the formalization of modality in Sorani Kurdish. The primary data has been collected using the Plank Questionnaire, administered to 442 participants. To explore mood-marking, the mood constituent in Kurdish clauses will be delineated, with the subject, finite, and mood adjuncts identified as the three main components of the mood constituent. Then, system of modality in Kurdish, modalization, and modulation will be discussed. Data analysis suggests that finite in Kurdish does not stand on its own and needs to be conflated with the predicate. The main grammatical categories used in Kurdish to represent modalization and modulation are modal verbs and pseudo-grammaticalized modal clauses. Statistical data also shows that mood adjuncts are only sporadically used in Kurdish to describe modality. Moreover, the morphological subjunctive mood will be analyzed as operative over verbal categories and hence not part of the mood constituent.

Keywords

• sorani kurdish
• mood
• modality
• mood constituent
• modalization
• modulation