Modalization in Azerbaijani Turkish Language Based on Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar

 This research analyzes and evaluates modalization based on Halliday's systemic functional grammar (SFG) in the Azerbaijani Turkish language. In this SFG-based approach, mood and modality are examined within the mood structure which consists of two parts: (i) mood with elements of subject and finite and (ii) residue. In short, modality in this system refers to the space between two polarities, namely 'yes' and 'no'. In modalization, the commodity being exchanged is information and the utterance is considered as a proposition in which the speaker's attitude to the event is in the form of degrees of probability or possibility of occurrence or degrees of usuality; this means the possibility of recurrence. Despite the lack of attention to modality and its integration into the concept of mood in the Turkish grammar, the concept of modality in this system has been significantly distinguished from the category of mood. This research is an attempt to address the issues about (i) the presentation of modalization, (ii) the role of adjuncts in distinguishing between degrees of certainty and usuality and (iii) the presentation of past and present tense in mood finites in the Turkish language.

Methods & Materials 

First of all, to investigate modalization in the Azerbaijani Turkish language, the elements and constituents that make up mood structure and modalization in terms of possibility of occurrence, frequency, degrees, levels and elements involved in their formation were examined. In so doing, Azerbaijani Turkish clauses and their English and Persian equivalents were used. The theoretical framework of the current analysis was based on the mood structure in SFG) and the corpus was taken from the clauses in the literary and fictional sources in the Turkish language. The concept of modality has not been mentioned at all in the sources of the Azerbaijani Turkish grammar, and no study was found in the literature to address this issue based on SFG. Aijmer (2016), Nuyts (2001), Eggins (2004), and Halliday and Matthiessen (2004) have widely examined modality based on SFG. Considering the integration of the concept of mood and modality in Turkish grammar, the aim of this research was to study the Azerbaijani Turkish language based on an approach that can make a clear distinction between these two categories.

The findings show that the mood structure in the Turkish language is also made up of two parts: mood and residue. The mood itself is composed of two components: the subject and the finite, and the residue includes the three functional elements of predicator, complement and adjunct. Results also show that predicators are an integral part of the mood structure and determine the presence, absence and number of complements in this constituent, while the presence of adjuncts in this structure is not mandatory and they can be removed from the clause. Concerning modalization, the study of the syntactic behavior of the elements and the morphemes involved in the clauses indicates that Azerbaijani Turkish expresses modality with "high" and "medium" degrees of certainty by means of the finite -mali. Also, unlike the English language that uses different finites, i.e., may and could, Azerbaijani Turkish uses the morpheme -abil which does not represent the semantic differences in its English equivalents. Examining the clauses of modalization in terms of probability and only with the presence of mood adjuncts showed that the ambiguity in Azerbaijani Turkish in terms of making a distinction in the degree of probability of occurrence is removed due to the presence of mood adjuncts. Furthermore, examining the modalization in terms of usuality with the presence of adjuncts of frequency in Azerbaijani Turkish showed that there is no ambiguity in the levels of usuality. A third state related to modalization in terms of probability with high and low degrees of certainty was also found. It was evident that the mood finites and the mood adjuncts were employed simultaneously. Despite the fact that the mood finites are the same in Azerbaijani Turkish, the ambiguity in the distinction between high and medium levels has been removed due to the presence of mood adjuncts; different mood adjuncts have raised the scale of certainty. Finally, the examination of modal verbs showed that in Azerbaijani Turkish - unlike English - the concept of tense does not appear in an integrated form with lexical verbs, but it emerges as a dependent morpheme. These morphemes are -di in the past tense and zero in the present tense. Surprisingly enough, in the current grammar sources of Azerbaijani Turkish, the morpheme -ir is mistakenly introduced as the morpheme of the present tense.

Overall, it is concluded that modalization in terms of probability in the Azerbaijani Turkish language is represented in three levels and states: (i) only with the presence of mood finites, (ii) only with the presence of mood adjuncts, and (iii) with the simultaneous presence of mood finites and mood adjuncts. The only difference is that the distinction between high and medium levels and also the semantic distinction between could and may at the low level is not possible in Azerbaijani Turkish. Modalization in terms of usuality is manifested only with the presence of mood adjuncts, and no ambiguity in different levels is observed. Not only the presence of mood adjuncts in modalization removes the ambiguity in the distinction between levels, but also their presence along with the mood finites can raise the degree of certainty of modalization in terms of probability. The combination of the morphemes of modality and tense generates mood finites in Azerbaijani Turkish. The morpheme -di indicates the past tense and its absence indicates the present tense, i.e., zero morpheme. Although the morpheme -ir is often reported to indicate the present tense in the Azerbaijani Turkish grammar sources, the SFG-based approach to Azerbaijani Turkish shows the process of the occurrence of verbs.