Basic Clause Patternsevents is denoted, but other examples may be interpretable as denoting ei-
ther a single future scheduled event or a series of events: Flight 1750 leaves
at 6 p.m. unless a unique time is understood from the context or specified in
the sentence: Flight 1750 leaves at 6 p.m. tomorrow.
This usage is not possible with events that are not schedulable. For ex-
ample, It freezes tonight is strange because, even if the freeze were accurately
and confidently forecast, it is still not scheduled. However, even though
scheduling is typically done by humans, nature may be regular enough so
that certain events may be regarded as scheduled. We can say, El Niño re-
turns next year during the year prior to when we know that phenomenon
regularly returns.
However, Comrie (1985: 47 fn 15) points out, sentences like “The train
departs at five o’clock tomorrow morning” is not synonymous with sentences
like “The train is scheduled to depart at five o’clock tomorrow morning.” The
first “does say explicitly that the train will depart at the said hour, and more-
over that this is the result of scheduling; the latter, however, says only that
according to the schedule five o’clock is the train’s departure time, but does
not say that the train will in fact leave according to that schedule.” So there
is no contradiction in saying The train is scheduled to leave at five o’clock to-
morrow morning, but in fact it won’t leave till six, but it is contradictory to
say The train departs at five o’clock tomorrow morning, but in fact it won’t leave
till six.
Performatives
Performatives (utterances that name the verbal act as they are performing it,
such as, I admit that I am guilty, which both admits and names the admit-
ting) always occur in the simple present tense because their effect coincides
with the time of the utterance. Performative utterances often contain such
adverbs as now and hereby: I now pronounce you husband and wife, I hereby
declare this park open. These adverbs indicate the simultaneity between the
time of the utterance and the time of its effect. Other performative verbs
include promise, reject: I promise that I will never do that again, I reject your
suggestion that I resign.
Exercise
- Collect five naturally occurring sentences referring to scheduled fu-
ture events and test the claim we have made by checking the tense(s)
used.