Classifications of tense shift

After having identified all finite verb phrases matching the above classification, I went through the texts and marked all instances of tense shift. It was the tense shift itself that counted, which means that the shift was marked once, regardless of whether the new tense occurred in one isolated verb phrase or if it was followed by one or more instances of the new tense. Reversions to the default tense were not counted. That means that in (1), where the simple past is the default tense, only the shift into the past perfect was counted. The reversion to the default simple past, in wanted, was not classified as a tense shift.

(1) I didn’t want to tell them about my experience, what I had

remembered. I wanted to talk to my mum alone about it. [NPC 14 (3)]

Moreover, cases where a tense shift would have been necessary but the writer continued using the default tense were also disregarded. The reason for leaving such cases out of the count is simply that they are not examples of tense shift. One such example can be seen in (2), where simple past died should have been replaced by past perfect had died.

(2) ... a police stood and talked to me about a man that died in the forest. [IBA 37 (1)]

Since the mere occurrence of tensed verbs does not automatically imply functional use, it is necessary to distinguish between functional and unfunctional use (Klein, 1994:245). Harder’s (1994:62; 1996:396) tense system (see 5.1.1) is very valuable in this context, since it illustrates the possibilities as well as the restraints in shifting tenses within the default tense of a narrative. Consequently, once the tense shifts had been identified, they were classified as either motivated or random. During that procedure, I partly followed Bardovi- Harlig’s (2000:120f) approach, and distinguished between the tense and the form of the verb phrases in question. If there was a tense shift and the form of the verb phrase was correct, this was counted as a motivated tense shift, as had lived in (3):

(3) It was the same village as my grandfather had lived in for about 60 years ago. [NPA 109 (2)]

If a tense shift had been made into the wrong tense, it was classified as a random tense shift, e.g. smile in (4). Such cases do not necessarily represent intentional tense shift, but might as well be the result of spelling errors or accidental omission of the past tense suffix. Although a broad category, these cases are all verb errors that involve tense mistakes. In the sample compositions in 8.3, random tense shifts are marked with an asterisk (*).

(4) I nodded and *smile back at him. [IBB 22 (2)]

Motivated tense shifts with a correct verb phrase rendered 1 point. However, in cases where the tense shift was motivated but the verb phrase contained an error, the tense shift was counted as 0.5 motivated tense shift, as in *had drove in (5). In the sample compositions, such cases are written within square brackets:

(5) I thought about just leaving it all at wons, but my mom, who [had drove] me here, had already left. So now I just stood there watching. [IBA 7 (2)]

This kind of classification also includes e.g. *putted, which in the study on vocabulary quality was not regarded as part of the learners’ vocabulary and consequently excluded from the count. Here, however, the past tense suffix shows that the learner was aware of the need for the past tense of the verb put, although s/he was not familiar with its irregular form. Therefore, if *putted were used in a motivated tense shift, the attempt would render 0.5 points.

Example (5) also illustrates that it was only the tense shifts themselves that counted. While had driven represents a shift from the default simple past into the past perfect, had already left, although different from the default tense but the same tense as the preceding verb phrase, was just counted as a finite verb phrase.

Regarding cases where the finite verb, or parts of the finite verb phrase, was missing, the following rules were applied: omission of a finite verb phrase, exemplified in (6), was classified as a random tense shift.

Cases where the auxiliary verb was left out were also regarded as cases of omission and classified as random tense shift. An example is given in (7).

(7) When we reached his flat he smiled at me and *telling me not to worry. [IBB 16 (1)]

However, the auxiliary may also be part of a preceding progressive or perfective verb phrase. In such cases, only the first main verb was counted. One such example can be seen in (8), where were laughing was counted while smiling was not, since it is part of the preceding verb phrase.

(8) (...) and all these animals (...) were laughing and smiling. [IBA 5 (1)]

In cases where more than one tense was used for the same finite verb phrase, that verb phrase was categorized as containing a random tense shift. Such misuse indicates a poor understanding of verb phrases and only occurred in very few cases, one of them exemplified in (9):

(9) My father was the biggest monkey *I’ve had ever seen. [NPA 184 (1)]

Misspellings were treated with tolerance; as long as it was clear what verb the writer intended to use, misspellings were disregarded.