"(1) Would you prefer that we wait a little longer?

(2) Would you prefer that we waited a little longer?"

My take on (2) is that the past tense-marking here (-ed) has subjunctive
meaning. In English over the centuries, the past subjunctive and
indicative forms of the verb became identical (unlike in German, for
instance). The present subjunctive came to be the base form of the verb.
(Old English had more-distinct subjunctive forms, although the collapse
was underway. See any grammar of Old English.)

So, we have two ways of expressing the subjunctive after 'would'
clauses; with the current present subjunctive (which looks just like the
'plain' base form of the verb) or the past subjunctive form (which looks
just like the past indicative form of the verb). The collapsing together
of indicative and subjunctive forms is what causes some analysts to say
that English no longer has subjunctive mood, but meaningwise these
examples make clear that it does. It's just that its markers are
homonyms with indicative forms. We still have distinct subjunctive
meaning, but no longer have distinct subjunctive forms.

The change continues. Past perfect and past subjunctive are on the way
out altogether. The younger generation increasingly uses simple past
where us fogies would use past perfect, and is replacing subjunctive
verb forms with 'would' + base form. In fact, this month's 'Word Court'
in the Atlantic Monthly magazine had a letter lamenting the latter
change. The answer to the letter did not acknowledge that this is a
change underway and is probably inescapable.

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Johanna Rubba   Assistant Professor, Linguistics
English Department, California Polytechnic State University
One Grand Avenue  • San Luis Obispo, CA 93407
Tel. (805)-756-2184  •  Fax: (805)-756-6374 • Dept. Phone.  756-259
• E-mail: [log in to unmask] •  Home page: http://www.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
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"Understanding is a lot like sex; it's got a practical purpose,
but that's not why people do it normally"  -            Frank  Oppenheimer
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