El modelo de doble eje como base de organización del sistema verbal

Abstract

This paper deals with the Spanish verbal system, one of the fundamental topics in the study of our language, since it is related to categories that are at the very heart of discourse. It proposes the basis of a theoretical framework capable of shaping a new organisational model different from that of academic models.The verbal system has been considered by tradition as the set of inflectional paradigms in which the verb, as a word class, is organised on the basis of a double temporal and modal criterion which understands that the verbal forms (called tenses) can be systematised on the basis of a series of deictic marks which, ideally, would correspond in a primary way to the classical temporal segments (present, past and future). These temporal forms, in turn, would carry a modal meaning, as a mark of the speaker's presence in the discourse. Finally, to this division we should add a new category, that of aspect, which would mark the internal time of the events signified by the verbal lexemes. This consideration, inherited from the classics through the grammatical work of Nebrija, is currently maintained in our official academic grammar and underpins the view that speakers have of the system. However, it has been observed that the foundations on which it rests lack in many respects the descriptive and explanatory rigour that would be desirable to achieve a real understanding of the functioning of the verb as a flexible category of words...