Chapter 97: ‘Want’ complement subjects
1. ‘Want’ complements⇫¶
In a complement clause, the subject can either be referentially different from or referentially identical to the superordinate subject. For ‘want’ complement clauses, these two possibilities are illustrated in (1a-b).
| He1 wants [Ø1 to come home]. | (same subject) |
| He1 wants [her2 to come home]. | (different subject) |
In English and the other well-known European languages, same-subject complement clauses have an implicit subject (indicated by Ø in example 1a). This is economical, because with ‘want’, subject identity is far more common than subject distinctness (Haspelmath 2013b).
But in some languages, the subject of the ‘want’ complement clause is expressed overtly even when it is identical to the superordinate subject, e.g.
Example (2) is translated literally as ‘He wants that he eat something sweet’.
This chapter follows Haspelmath’s (2005f) WALS chapter. It only considers same-subject ‘want’ constructions (for different-subject ‘want’ constructions, see Chapter 98). We primarily ask whether the complement clause has an implicit subject or whether it is expressed overtly. The distribution of the four values distinguished here is shown in the value box. As can be seen, the great majority of APiCS languages follow the implicit-subject pattern in (1a).
| excl | shrd | all | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | The complement subject is left implicit | 58 | 13 | 71 |
 | The complement subject is expressed overtly | 0 | 13 | 13 |
 | Desiderative verbal affix | 1 | 1 | 2 |
 | Desiderative particle | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Representation: | 73 | |||
2. Implicit-subject ‘want’ constructions⇫¶
Implicit-subject ‘want’ constructions (value 1) are found in the great majority of APiCS languages, illustrated below. (In all examples in this chapter, the complement clause is enclosed in brackets in the gloss line.)
In many Indo-European languages, the verb ‘want’ combines with a special “infinitive” form of the verb, but in most pidgin and creole languages, the form of the verb is the simple verb stem, without any marking. The stem typically derives from the infinitive of the lexifier, but occasionally it may derive from another form. In the English-based languages, the infinitival to is preserved only in varieties that are quite close to the lexifier. For example, it is missing in Bahamian Creole in (4).
In some English- and Dutch-based languages of the Caribbean region, a special “infinitival” (or subjunctive) form based on a preposition deriving from for may be used in ‘want’ complements:
3. ‘Want’ constructions with overtly expressed subject⇫¶
In 13 languages of APiCS, the subject may be overtly expressed (value 2, already seen in (2) above). However, in none of the languages is this the only possibility, or even the majority option, and in some it is marginal. Most of these languages are spoken in central and western Africa. In the European-based languages, there is usually a complementizer present, such as pa in Angolar (ex. 2) and Santome (8), pou in Haitian Creole (9), fu/fa in Saramaccan (10), and se in Nigerian Pidgin (11). These complementizers are also used in different-subject ‘want’ constructions (see Chapter 98).
Since all these languages also have the simple implicit-subject constructions of the type seen earlier, the existence of the more complex overt-subject constructions is particularly surprising. Examples (12) and (13) show the corresponding implicit-subject patterns for Angolar and Haitian Creole.
It seems that the only conceivable explanation is that the patterns in (2) and (8)-(11) are due to West African substrate influence. And indeed, Haspelmath (2005f) found that overt-subject constructions with ‘want’ are particularly common in West Africa, e.g.
One of the APiCS languages with an African lexifier also has this pattern as an option:
A very special overt-subject construction is found in Media Lengua:
Here the complement-clause subject is first person, and (17) is literally ‘The teacher does not say I will come’.
4. Desiderative verbal affix ⇫ ¶
Two languages (Michif and Media Lengua) have a verbal affix that expresses ‘want’ (value 3). Here the subject is expressed only once, as in value 1, but not necessarily in close association with ‘want’.
5. Desiderative particle ⇫ ¶
One language has an uninflected particle that expresses the notion ‘want’: