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You Can Use the Simple Past
Tense to Make Polite Offers |
Imagine you are at a café in the United States. The
server walks toward you and asks the following question:
Did you want cream for your coffee?
You might ask yourself how you should answer.
What is the server talking about?
Why did the server use a past tense construction, "Did
you want?"
Why did the server not say "Do you want cream for your
coffee?"
In today's Everyday Grammar, we will try to solve a
mystery: why do some Americans use the past tense when
they are talking about the present?
Simple Past Tense
The simple past tense is used for actions or situations
that happened in the past. These actions or situations
are finished.
For example, you might hear a person say, "Did you have
a good weekend?"
When they ask this question, they are using the past
tense construction, "Did you have…", and they are
clearly discussing a recent weekend that is now
finished.
They might ask such a question when they see you on
Monday or Tuesday – when you are back at work or school,
for example.
The traditional use of the simple past tense is this: to
note complete actions or situations in the past. This
definition is true most of the time in English
conversation.
Simple Past Tense with "want" and
"need"
However, there are exceptions.
For example, in conversation, Americans often use the
simple past tense of the verbs want or need even though
they are asking a question about the present.
Let’s go back to the American café. You might hear a
conversation such as this:
Server: Did you want cream for your coffee?
Customer: No thanks!
Server: Did you need more water?
Customer: Yes, please!
In the conversation, the server uses the simple past
tense when asking questions.
It would be grammatically correct to say "Do you want
cream for your coffee” or "Do you need more water?"
So, why did the server use the simple past tense instead
of the present tense?
Culture and Grammar
Susan Conrad and Douglas Biber are grammar experts. They
say that different cultures have different rules about
politeness. In American culture, it is often considered
polite to speak indirectly.
One way some Americans speak indirectly, Conrad and
Biber say, is by using a past tense verb when asking
about a present desire. Americans do this by using the
construction did + want and did + need.
Even close friends may use this polite form with each
other. When they are asking about what another person
wants to do, some Americans say, "Did you want to go to
the concert?" instead of "Do you want to go to the
concert?"
However, speakers do not answer such questions in the
simple past tense. The answer usually comes in the verb
forms that you would expect -- a simple present, present
progressive or future tense verb, for example.
Consider one of our example sentences: "Did you want to
go to the concert?"
The response to this question could be in the simple
present tense: "No, I don't want to."
Or the response could be in the present progressive:
"No, I'm watching a movie."
Or the answer could be in the future tense: "Yes, I'll
go to the concert."
You can read more about these verb forms in previous
Everyday Grammar stories.
Past tense with other verbs
We started this program with a question: why do some
Americans use the past tense when talking about the
present?
We have discovered that Americans generally only do this
when asking about a present desire or preference – and
usually only with the verbs want and need.
In general, Americans do not use the simple past in this
way when they are asking for information or using other
verbs, such as like, love, prefer, and so on.
This lesson is not designed to give you yet another
grammar rule to remember. The point is to show you that
native speakers will use language in ways that do not
always follow the grammatical definitions that you may
have learned about.
Today's lesson will be useful if you are ever listening
or speaking to an American. You might be able to ask
polite questions, or understand what Americans mean when
they ask you a question.
Remember: we have talked about a grammatical structure
that you might hear or use in conversation. It does not
follow the traditional rules of grammar, so we do not
advise that you use it on your next English grammar
test!
I'm Alice Bryant.
And I'm John Russell.
John Russell wrote this story for Learning English. Caty
Weaver was the editor.
*See Conrad and Biber Real Grammar: A Corpus-Based
Approach to English. Pearson Education. 2009. Pgs. 1-3 |
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