Year of the subjunctive

If you've studied language, the title of this column probably sent a little tingle of repulsion and inadequacy down your spine. Loathed by second-language students for its irregular forms and nebulous applications, the subjunctive mood represents an essential part of the grammatical and cultural canon in nearly all Indo-European languages.

The subjunctive is used "to express wishes, commands, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity or statements that are contrary to fact at present" (here I shamelessly cite Wikipedia because language belongs to the proletariat, as does Wikipedia Q.E.D.). Now I don't claim to be a grammar whiz, or even a buff-I too have spent long hours cursing the subjunctive for the hearty chunk of GPA it stole from me-but over the past year, I have come to appreciate the real value of the subjunctive, its diverse uses and, most importantly, the insidious complacency it implies.

I have been out of the country for 8 months-four months in Paraguay and another four in Spain. Since May, I have been watching America from the perspective of a spectator, and watching the world in a language that values the subjunctive in a big way. In these several months, one thing became clear to me. Herein I do not use the subjunctive: I do not express doubt, do not negate certainty and do not qualify the forthcoming statement as opinion or judgment. Straight-up indicative mood, present perfect tense: This world has gone crazy.

We watched a presidential election during which the irrelevance of Alaska's visual proximity to the Bering Strait had to be corroborated by pundits before it could be dismissed. We continue to apply sanctions and antagonistic rhetoric against petrol-states like Iran and Venezuela knowing fully well that a crippling blow would be dealt to these oppressive regimes if we were to invest in alternative energy and public transportation. We listened to lawmakers who told us that budget cuts in public schools and on other social spending was unavoidable, then watched as nearly $8 trillion appeared out of thin air to save the international monetary system before it crashed through its deregulated floor (More on this issue in future columns. Don't get comfortable, it's worse than you think, and it isn't nearly over). I could go on. From Iraqi oil field auctions to Madoff's giant Ponzi, this is an age that begs for outrage, but all I've seen recently is complacency, in the subjunctive.

It comes in forms as benign as passive desire. "I wish things were better." "I hope that Barack Obama enacts the change he promised." But then there is the more subtle though more sinister if-then statement. "If I weren't so busy, I'd tutor kids in my neighborhood." "If it were more convenient, I'd ride the bus to work." The subjunctive is, in a way, both the most powerful weapon and greatest enemy of our culture. While we could have used the subjunctive to express doubt in things like weapons of mass destruction that were "definitely" in Iraq, we've become comfortable using the subjunctive to legitimize our self-doubt, our perceived powerlessness and our endless, endless excuses.

A (very appreciated) handful of you may remember my columns from last year. I covered campaigns and organizations both on the grassroots and institutional level, and I promise I will get back to it. This is a column about activism, in students, in culture, in abstract and in practice. And although perhaps this first column seems like a grammar lesson wrapped in a wet blanket of "hell-in-a-hand-basket" social criticism, I wanted to use it to open 2009 for this reason:

In this new year, with this new president and administration, on this fresh lap around the sun, humor me as I pose to you one of the more eccentric requests you are likely to have heard lately. Resolve to start questioning your personal use of the subjunctive-maybe even try giving indicative a shot. If you find yourself wishing, ask yourself why you aren't taking action. If you find yourself expressing doubt, let it be against orthodoxy and not against yourself. It's an abstract resolution, to be sure, but it's simple. Let's stop watching our world as spectators in the subjunctive tense. Ditch the if-then statements and just take action.

Andrew Kindman is a Trinity junior. His column usually runs every other Monday.