Tense of a clause embedded in a subjunctive statement

Hello guys

Surfing online, I came across a bit tough question from an English learner from Japan. The question is:

[QUESTION] The passage below is from a retold version of "Edith's Book" by Edith Velmans.

I thought of turning myself in from time to time. I thought: "If I wanted to, I could go over to Gestapo headquarters and tell them <who I really was.> 'Edith van Hessen,' I would announce. 'I'm a Jew.' If I did so, I would be sent to Westerbork"

Why did the writer write "who I really was", not "who I really am"? [END OF QUESTION]

My thought is that Edith used intentionally "was" to suggest that in those days she really had a psyche that "being Edith van Hessen" was in a remote past. But some native speakers answered that there is a possibility Edith might use "was" to make it match with the past form of the verbal phrase "could tell" in the subjunctive main frame. I would like to hear your opinions.

Hanako

Hanako,

I think that "was" is used because she is talking in the past tense. Standard English is still sensitive about the past tense as are most Indo-European languages. On the other hand, Irish English and Creole Englishes often use the present tense in situations where Standard English would use the past tense.

You got "intentionally" and "was" the other way around.

To me, it's more natural to use "was" to match the past form, as you suggested. For that reason, the use of "am" in its place wouldn't really change the meaning, as far as I'm concerned. But "am" is fine, too.

Brennus and Bob

Thank you for the quick replies. I'd like to confirm my knowledge about this kind of tense usage in this occasion. How about the examples below.
(1) I wish she knew I am a Japanese student with basic English skills.
(2) I wish she knew I was a Japanese student with basic English skills.
In these sentences I am intending to mean "I am a Japanese student with basic English skills" is a current fact. In this case, do you still choose #2 ?

Hanako

Hanako (Hanako-san in Japanese - honorific case?) ,

Number 2) "I wish she knew (that) I was a Japanese student with basic English skills" sounds correct to me generally speaking, although you could use number 1) if you wanted to emphasizethe fact as in "I wish she knew (that) I AM a Japanese student with basic English skills!"

Please wait for other replies. Some of our best experts on English grammar are actually the ladies who post on here.

Brennus

Thanks for the reply. Your choice is very interesting because it is very contrary to what I was taught in school. Anyway this kind of collocation is rather rarely used even among native speakers. So I will be waiting other people's opinions. By the way, you are right that 'san' is a honorific title used in addressing other people. Why did you know it? Did you ever learn Japanse?

Enjoy Sunday.

Hanako

Hanako,

Thanks for your reply. I know relatively little Japanese and Korean. However, the popularity of the martial arts in North America, especially judo and karate has made many Americans and Canadians aware of some aspects of Japanese language and culture they might not otherwise know.

I find it interesting interesting that even though Japan is in Asia and Japanese has borrowed many words from Chinese, it is actually closer related to languages like Finnish, Estonian and Hungarian - languages considered to be very European. Even your name, Hanako, would sound like a good Finnish name too if we merely spelled it Hanakko instead. Take care and good luck!

--- Brennus

Brennus

Thank you. Seems you learned many languages. I also heard Hungarian and Finnish are someway similar to Japanese. Anyway I envy people who can learn many languages. To me only English is too much.

Hanako

>>I find it interesting interesting that even though Japan is in Asia and Japanese has borrowed many words from Chinese, it is actually closer related to languages like Finnish, Estonian and Hungarian - languages considered to be very European. Even your name, Hanako, would sound like a good Finnish name too if we merely spelled it Hanakko instead. Take care and good luck!<<

Well, this is just because Japanese is more like a typical agglutinative language, like Finnish, Hungarian, or Turkish, than what most Americans would associate with languages spoken in East Asia, that is, analytic and tonal (i.e. the Chinese languages and Vietnamese). Furthermore, it is not tonal in so as much as tone-stressed, like Swedish, with only a relatively limited number of minimal pairs being distinguished by such. Likewise, the phoneme inventory of Japanese is more "European" than that of, say, Mandarin, the only main feature of such which is at all thought of as being typical of languages spoken in East Asia being the lack of any /l/-/r/ contrast. Of course, Japanese is not at all unique as languages spoken in East Asia go in this sort of regard, as Korean is similarly typically agglutinative and not tonal or tone-stressed at all, as are the Altaic languages spoken throughout the more northern parts of East Asia.

Hanako-san:

Re: Your 11-20-05, 5:10 a.m. GMT message

Your 11-20--5, 6:05 a.m. GMT reply to Brennus & Bob

The information given below may help you understand the proper use of the present tense of verbs in "a clause embedded in a subjunctive statement."

The follwoing is written in "Effective Revenue Writing 1 Department of Treasury Internal Revenue Service Training 9960-12 (8-69), ":

"The present tense may express a universal or relatively permanent truth, such as a scentific or historical fact.

I WAS TAUGHT that two and two ARE four.

He REPORTED that his client IS dead.

He SAID that Atlanta IS the capital of Georgia.

The taxpayer SAID that his wife IS dead.

(Note: I purposely capitalized the verbs in each sentences for emphasis.)

So in the above messages of yours "who I really was" and "I wish she knew I was a Japanese student with basic English skills." are grammatically correct ones.

The book mentioned above is intended for use by noncollege persons and is very easy to comprehend. It contains numerous practical examples showing correct sentences against incorrect sentences with clear, concise explanation. It's the best English grammar book I've ever owned.

Travis:

I thank you for your informative and interesting 11-20-05, 9:20 a.m. GMT message. While reading it I noticed two words, AGGLUTINATIVE and PHONEME, which I've never encountered previously. According to my "Webster's New World Dictionary," AGGLUTINATIVE means "characterized by AGGLUTINATION," and AGGLUTINATION means "the systematic combining of MORPHEMES into words without marked change of form or loss of meaning." The same dictionary defines MORPHEME as "the smallest meaningful unit or form in a language." After learning the definitions of those words I still fail to understand what you mean by "Japanese is a typical agglutinative language..." Please explain to me what an agglutinative language is and why and how Japanese is such a language. I'm Japanese, and I feel strongly that I need he information to better understand my own language.

Your message seems to suggest that you're a language expert. Do you speak and/or write Japanese? What is your nationality? What is your educational background? I apologize for asking you personal questions. If you're offended by them, please disregard them.

Travis, I myself wouldn't say that I'm a "language expert" per se, but primarily because I probably would not use the term "expert" at all in any sense to refer to myself; on another note, I'm not formally a linguist per se, even if I most likely am more interested and informed about linguistic matters than most. As for Japanese, I have studied Japanese for a while, in middle and high school, but my Japanese is actually very rusty today (and is much worse than my German, even though I've studied Japanese far longer than German, which I've only been studying for a little less than two semesters), even though it's only been a few years since I've been in high school. I myself am from Wisconsin, in the US, and am currently in college as an undergraduate at UW Madison, but am majoring in Computer Science, not in Linguistics.

Ack, that should be "Tetsuo, I myself wouldn't say" above.

(2) I wish she knew I was a Japanese student with basic English skills.

I would go with this one, too. I'm not sure that I can explain the rules for why that is, but it may have to do with agreement of tense between "knew" and "was".

If you were to change the tense, you would say something like:

I hope she knows I am a Japanese student with basic English skills.

I'm hoping she will know that I am a Japanese student with basic English skills.

Travis:

You did not explain what an agglutinative language is and why Japanese is such a language.

I really want the information.

Thanks for your help.