Each of the identified verb groups are given a label that gives the information about their tense, aspect and mood. Alongside, the label also
indicates whether the verb group is a passive construction and whether it also contains a compound verb construction.
The general structure of the TAM tag that this researcher has come up with is as follows:
In the tag structure shown above, the period ‘.’ plays as the delimiter between the categories. The first two letters of ‘VG’ is the identifiershowing that it is a verb group. The next would be an identifier for tense, then aspect and then mood.
For example, the template of ‘prs_aux’ will have the TAM tag of ‘VG.prs.sim.dcl’ wherein ‘prs’ stands for present, ‘sim’ stands for simpleaspect and ‘dcl’ stands for the declarative mood.
Some VG labels have the "cv" or "pas" or "pas_cv" followed by an underscore. These labels precede the tense slot. "cv" here stands for"compound verb" and "pas" stands for "passive" and "pas_cv" "passive compound verb".
The other labels are defined as below:
VG Marker |
| VG |
Verb Group |
|
|
Tense Slot Markers |
| prs |
present |
| pst |
past |
| fut |
future |
0 |
NULL |
| cp |
conjunctive participle |
| ip |
imperfective participle |
| nv |
non-verbal occurrence of a verb group |
| gp |
gerundive participle |
| pas_pst |
passive voice in past tense |
| pas_fut |
passive voice in future tense |
| pas_0 |
passive voice with null tense |
| pas_nv |
passive voice in non-verb group occurrence |
| pas_gp |
passive voice in gerundive participle |
| pas_prs |
passive voice in present tense |
| pas_ip |
passive voice imperfective participle |
| cv_nv |
compound verb in non-verb group occurrence |
| cv_fut |
compound verb in future tense |
| cv_pst |
compound verb in past tense |
| cv_0 |
compound verb with null tense |
| cv_prs |
compound verb in present tense |
| cv_pas_fut |
compound verb in passive voice and future tense |
| cv_pas_pst |
compound verb in passive voice and past tense |
| cv_pas_0 |
compound verb in passive voice with null tense |
| cv_pas_prs |
compound verb in passive voice with present tense |
| cv_cp |
compound verb in conjunctive participle |
Aspect Slot Markers |
| sim |
simple aspect |
| impf |
imperfective aspect |
| pft |
perfect aspect |
| pft_ince |
perfect inceptive |
| impf_pft_cnt |
imperfective perfect continuative aspect |
| pft_dur |
perfect durative |
| pft_frq |
perfect frequentative |
| pft_cnt |
perfect continuative |
| dur |
durative |
| sim_ince |
simple inceptive |
| cnt |
continuative |
| impf_frq |
imperfect frequentative |
| prog |
progressive |
| impf_ince |
imperfect inceptive |
| impf_cnt |
imperfect continuative |
| pft_impf_cnt |
perfect imperfect continuative |
| impf_dur |
imperfect durative |
| impf_pft |
imperfect perfective |
| prog_dur |
progressive durative |
| sim_cnt |
simple continuative |
| impf_sim_cnt |
imperfect simple continuative |
| sim_dur |
simple durative |
| impf_pft_dur |
imperfect perfect durative |
| pft_impf_dur |
perfect imperfect durative |
Mood Slot Markers |
| dcl |
declarative |
| imp |
imperative |
| opt |
optative |
| cgnt |
contingent |
| des |
desiderative |
| oblg |
obligative |
| apprx |
approximative |
| cfct |
counterfactual |
| abil |
abilitative |
| perm |
permissive |
| prsm |
presumptive |
| perm_imp |
permissive imperative |
| perm_opt |
permissive optative |
| sugg |
suggestive |
| dur |
durative |
| perm_cfct |
permissive counterfactual |
| oblg_prsm |
obligative presumptive |
| perm_sugg |
permissive suggestive |
| abil_prsm |
abilitative presumptive |
| perm_prsm |
permissive presumptive |
| opt_prob |
optative probabilitative |
| inf |
infinitive |
| cnd |
conditional |
| cfct_perm |
counterfactual permissive |