Verbsignals

Verbsignals is a term used in some linguistic discussions to refer to the signals or information carried by verb forms that extend beyond the lexical content of the verb. The term is not universally standardized, but it captures how verbs encode grammatical and discourse-related information. Verbsignals can indicate tense, aspect, mood, evidentiality, negation, voice, or subject–argument agreement, among other functions.

In languages with rich verbal morphology, verbsignals appear as affixes or clitics attached to the verb, sometimes accompanied by auxiliary words. They may be suffixes, prefixes, or enclitics, and can also be expressed through periphrastic constructions. The shape of the signals varies by language family, but the common function is to mark information about time, mode of action, source of knowledge, or the relationship between participants.

Illustrative examples include English, Turkish, and Mandarin. English marks tense and aspect primarily with auxiliaries (I am eating; I ate). Turkish attaches several verbal suffixes (gidiyorum for I am going, gittim for I went) signaling tense, aspect, and mood; it also uses evidential suffixes like -miş to indicate reported or inferred information. Mandarin uses particles such as le to indicate completed actions and guo to signal experiential occurrence, rather than inflection on the verb itself.

The concept of verbsignals helps separate the information encoded by the verb from other sentence material. It is closely related to the study of verbal morphology, aspect, relative clause formation, and evidentiality. Because the term is not standard, readers should compare it with established notions such as verbal inflection and mood markers for precise analysis.