Prospective in Pashto and the usage of wǝ́- and ba/bǝ, with sideviews on Persian bi- (and its predecessors)

International audiencePashto is classified as an East Iranian language, and is principally spoken in Afghanistan and Pakistan. In Afghanistan it has official status, together with Persian, whereas it only has regional status in Pakistan as the dominant language of the province Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Although Pashto could easily be mistaken for an Indic language in terms of pronunciation and phonetics, it has clearly maintained its Iranian character, especially in grammar and lexicon. The “Iranianness” of Pashto has also been reinforced by the massive borrowing of Persian forms and even grammatical elements, one of which will be discussed here.In this contribution I will examine the question whether there is a prospective category in Pashto, together with its eventual origin and formal expression. Particularly relevant here are two aspectual-modal particles. In the first place, there is the particle wǝ́- , which is prefixed to the finite verb and is always accented. It conveys a modality or aspectuality that is usually referred to as “subjunctive”, or “perfective”, depending on the definition of the researcher. The second particle, ba/bǝ, is enclitic, and is usually found after the first word (or nominal phrase) of the clause. With the present tense it indicates “future”. Finally, we shall also look at the origin or historical background of these two particles