Imperative mood

The imperative mood is a grammatical mood that forms a command or request.
The imperative mood is used to demand or require that an action be performed. It is usually found only in the present tense, second person. They are sometimes called directives, as they include a feature that encodes directive force, and another feature that encodes modality of unrealized interpretation.
An example of a verb used in the imperative mood is the English phrase "Go." Such imperatives imply a second-person subject, but some other languages also have first- and third-person imperatives, with the meaning of "let's " or "let them ".
Imperative mood can be denoted by the glossing abbreviation. It is one of the irrealis moods.

Formation

Imperative mood is often expressed using special conjugated verb forms. Like other finite verb forms, imperatives often inflect for person and number. Second-person imperatives are most common, but some languages also have imperative forms for the first and third persons.
In English, the imperative is formed using the bare infinitive form of the verb. This is usually also the same as the second-person present indicative form, except in the case of the verb to be, where the imperative is be while the indicative is are. The imperative form is understood as being in the second person, with no explicit indication of singular or plural. First and third person imperatives are expressed periphrastically, using a construction with the imperative of the verb let:

Let me see.
Let us go.
Let us be heard.
Let him/her/it/them run.
Let him/her/it/them be counted.

Other languages

Other languages such as Latin, French and German have a greater variety of inflected imperative forms, marked for person and number, their formation often depending on a verb's conjugation pattern. Examples can be found in the specific language sections [|below]. In languages that make a T–V distinction the use of particular forms of the second person imperative may also be dependent on the degree of familiarity between the speaker and the addressee, as with other verb forms.
The second person singular imperative often consists of just the stem of the verb, without any ending.
For example, Te Reo Māori has the imperative me, which in addition to being put in front of sentences to command, is used to assert the imperative mood in sentences that would be translated as "let's " in English. An example of this is Me haere tāua, which translates to "let us go", but the "us" component goes last.

Syntax and negation

Imperative sentences sometimes use different syntax than declarative or other types of clauses. There may also be differences of syntax between affirmative and negative imperative sentences. In some cases the imperative form of the verb is itself different when negated. A distinct negative imperative form is sometimes said to be in prohibitive mood.
Negative imperatives tell the subject to not do something. They usually begin with the verb "don't" or the negative form of a verb. e.g., example, "Don't be like that."
Many languages, even not normally null-subject languages, omit the subject pronoun in imperative sentences, as usually occurs in English. Details of the syntax of imperative sentences in certain other languages, and of differences between affirmative and negative imperatives, can be found in some of the other specific language sections below.
In writing, imperative phrases and sentences may terminate in an exclamation mark.

Usage

Imperatives are used principally for ordering, requesting or advising the listener to do something: "Put down the gun!", "Pass me the sauce", "Don't go too near the tiger." They are also often used for giving instructions as to how to perform a task: "Install the file, then restart your computer". They can sometimes be seen on signs giving orders or warnings "Stop", "Give way", "Do not enter".
The use of the imperative mood may be seen as impolite, inappropriate or even offensive in certain circumstances. In polite speech, orders or requests are often phrased instead as questions or statements, rather than as imperatives:

Could you come here for a moment?
It would be great if you made us a drink.
I have to ask you to stop.

Politeness strategies can seem more appropriate in order not to threaten a conversational partner in their needs of self-determination and territory: according to some strands of politeness theory the partner's negative face should not appear threatened. As well as the replacement of imperatives with other sentence types as discussed above, there also often exist methods of phrasing an imperative in a more polite manner, such as the addition of a word like please; or a phrase like if you could; or substituting one directive for another, as in the change from will to may e.g, "you will do that" becomes "you may / can do that".
Imperatives are also used for speech acts whose function is not primarily to make an order or request, but to give an invitation, give permission, express a wish, make an apology, et cetera:

Come to the party tomorrow!
Eat the apple if you want.
Have a nice trip!
Pardon me.

When written, imperative sentences are often, but not always, terminated with an exclamation mark.
First person plural imperatives are used mainly for suggesting an action to be performed together by the speaker and the addressee : "Let's go to Barbados this year", "Let us pray". Third person imperatives are used to suggest or order that a third party or parties be permitted or made to do something: "Let them eat cake", "Let him be executed".
There is an additional imperative form that is used for general prohibitions, consisting of the word "no" followed by the gerund form. The best known examples are "No Smoking" and "No Parking". This form does not have a positive form; that is, "Parking" by itself has no meaning unless used as a noun when it shows that parking is permitted.
The following sentences demonstrate several different forms of the imperative mood.

In the second person without personal pronouns: "Go to your cubicle!"
With reflexive pronouns: "Give yourself a break."
With a direct object: "Hit the ball."
Referring to third-person objects of the main verb: "Okay. The test is over now. They win. Let them go back to the recovery annex. For their cake."
As an affirmative imperative : "Go for it!"
As a negative imperative : "Don't do that!"
Expressing wishes: "Let's go team-name!"
In future tense: "You will behave yourself."

In particular languages

For more details on imperatives in the languages listed below, and in languages that are not listed, see the articles on the grammar of the specific languages.

Latin

Latin regular imperatives include:

infinitive	2nd person singular	2nd person plural
amāre	amā	amāte
monēre	monē	monēte
audīre	audī	audīte

The negative imperative is formed with the infinitive of the verb, preceded by the imperative of nōlle :

	negative imperative	positive imperative
2nd person singular	nōlī stāre	stā
2nd person plural	nōlīte stāre	stāte

For third-person imperatives, the subjunctive mood is used instead.
In Latin there is a peculiar tense in the imperative, which is the future tense that is used when you want the mandate to be fulfilled in the future. This tense is used mainly in laws, wills, precepts, etc. However, it is conjugated only with the third and second person singular and plural which carries as a gramme or ending -tō for the second and third person singular, -tōte for the second person plural and -ntō for the third person plural. On the other hand, in other languages of the world there is a distinctive imperative, which also has a future value, but with a previous meaning and this is the so-called past imperative that appears in the French and Greek languages as a point of reference. See Latin conjugation.
Sentence examples of the future imperative:Facito voluntatem patris mei. Numquam iuranto in falso. Ne occidito fratrem tuum. Facito quae dico vobis. Auditote quae dico vobis.

Germanic languages

English

English usually omits the subject pronoun in imperative sentences:

You work hard.
Work hard!

However, it is possible to include the you in imperative sentences for emphasis.

You do that buddy!

English imperatives are negated using don't This is a case of do-support as found in indicative clauses; however in the imperative it applies even in the case of the verb be :

You are not late.
Don't be late!

It is also possible to use do-support in affirmative imperatives, for emphasis or politeness: "Do be quiet!", "Do help yourself!".
The subject you may be included for emphasis in negated imperatives as well, following don't: "Don't you dare do that again!"

Dutch

A peculiar feature of Dutch is that it can form an imperative mood in the pluperfect tense. Its use is fairly common:

Had gebeld!
Was gekomen!

German

German verbs have a singular and a plural imperative. The singular imperative is equivalent to the bare stem or the bare stem + -e. The plural imperative is the same as the second-person plural of the present tense.

Sing! or: Singe! – said to one person: "Sing!"
Singt! – said to a group of persons: "Sing!"

In order to emphasize their addressee, German imperatives can be followed by the nominative personal pronouns du or ihr, respectively. For example: "Geh weg!" – "Geh du doch weg!".
German has T/V distinction, which means that the pronouns du and ihr are used chiefly towards persons with whom one is privately acquainted, which holds true for the corresponding imperatives. Otherwise, the social-distance pronoun Sie is used for both singular and plural. Since there exists no actual imperative corresponding to Sie, the form is paraphrased with the third-person plural of the present subjunctive followed by the pronoun:

Singen Sie! – said to one or more persons: "Sing!"
Seien Sie still! – said to one or more persons: "Be quiet!"

Occasionally, the infinitive may be used as a mild or polite imperative, in order to avoid directly addressing the person or to simplify the sentence's construction. Although sometimes used in spoken language, this form is most commonly used in general instructions and recipes. Examples include:

Nicht rauchen! – "No smoking!"
Pasta im Salzwasser sehr bissfest kochen und abtropfen lassen. - "Cook the pasta al dente and drain."
Bitte nicht berühren! - "Please do not touch!"

Like English, German features many constructions that express commands, wishes, etc. They are thus semantically related to imperatives without being imperatives grammatically:

Lasst uns singen!
Mögest du singen!
Du sollst singen!

Romance languages

French

Examples of regular imperatives in French are mange, mangez and mangeons, from manger – these are similar or identical to the corresponding present indicative forms, although there are some irregular imperatives that resemble the present subjunctives, such as sois, soyez and soyons, from être. A third person imperative can be formed using a subjunctive clause with the conjunction que, as in qu'ils mangent de la brioche.
French uses different word order for affirmative and negative imperative sentences:

Donne-le-leur.
Ne le leur donne pas.

The negative imperative has the same word order as the indicative. See for detail.
Like in English, imperative sentences often end with an exclamation mark, e.g. to emphasize an order.
In French there is a very distinctive imperative which is the imperative mood of preterite tense also called, expresses a given order with previous future value which must be executed or fulfilled in a future not immediate, as if it were an action to come, but earlier in relation to another that will also happen in the future. However, this type of imperative is peculiar to French which has only one purpose: to order that something be done before the date or time, therefore, this will always be accompanied by a circumstantial complement of time. However, this imperative is formed with the auxiliary verb of the avoir compound tenses and with the auxiliary verb être that is also used to form the tenses composed of the pronominal verbs and some of the intransitive verbs, this means that the structure of the verb imperative in its entirety is composed.Soyez levés demain avant huit heures. Ayez fini le travail avant qu'il fasse nuit. Aie écrit le livre demain. Soyez partis à midi. Ayons fini les devoirs à 6 h.
In English there is no equivalent grammatical structure to form this tense of the imperative mood; it is translated in imperative mood of present with previous value.

Spanish

In Spanish, imperatives for the familiar singular second person are usually identical to indicative forms for the singular third person. However, there are irregular verbs for which unique imperative forms for tú exist. vos usually takes the same forms as tú but unique forms exist for it as well. vosotros also takes unique forms for the imperative.
If an imperative takes a pronoun as an object, it is appended to the verb; for example, Dime. Pronouns can be stacked like they can in indicative clauses:

Me lo dices.
Dímelo.

Imperatives can be formed for usted, ustedes, and nosotros from the respective present subjunctive form. Negative imperatives for these pronouns are also formed this way, but are negated by no.

Portuguese

In Portuguese, affirmative imperatives for singular and plural second person derive from their respective present indicative conjugations, after having their final -s dropped. On the other hand, their negative imperatives are formed by their respective subjunctive forms, as well as both affirmative and negative imperatives for treatment pronouns and plural first person.
If a verb takes a pronoun, it should be appended to the verb:

Diz-me. Portugal/Brazil
Me diz. Brazil
Diz-mo.

Celtic languages

Welsh

In spoken Welsh most verbs can form two imperatives, both in the second person: one for singular and one for plural/polite singular. The singular imperative is formed by adding –a to the verbal-stem while the plural/polite form takes –wch: gwelwch 'see!'. In informal writing, the plural/polite form is often used to translate 'please' as in talwch yma ' pay here'.
In literary Welsh there are imperatives for all persons and numbers, except for the first-person singular. These must often be translated using phrases in English: gwelwn 'let us see'; gwelent 'let them see'; wele 'let him/her/it see'; gweler 'let it be seen, it is to be seen'. In the literary language the second person singular suffix –a is often not used: gwela, but gwêl ; tala, but tâl.
The five irregular Welsh verbs also have irregular imperative forms which also differ between the spoken and literary languages.

Irish

Irish has imperative forms in all three persons and both numbers, although the first person singular is most commonly found in the negative.

Indic Languages

Hindi-Urdu

In Hindi-Urdu the imperatives are conjugated by adding suffixes to the root verb. The negative and positive imperatives are not constructed differently in Hindustani. There are three negations that be used to form negative imperatives. They are:

Imperative negation - mat मत مت
Indicative negation - nahī̃ नहीं نہیں
Subjunctive negation - nā ना نا

Often to soften down the tone of the imperatives, the subjunctive and indicative negation are used to form negative imperatives. Imperatives can also be formed using subjunctives to give indirect commands to the third person and to formal second person. A peculiar feature of Hindi-Urdu is that it has imperatives in two tenses; present and the future tense. The present tense imperative gives command in the present and future imperative gives command for the future. Hindi-Urdu explicitly marks grammatical aspects and any verb can be put into the simple, habitual, perfective, and progressive aspects. Each aspect in turn can be conjugated into five different grammatical moods, the imperative mood being one of them.

Sanskrit

In Sanskrit, is used with the verb to form the imperative mood. To form the negative, or is placed before the verb in the imperative mood.

Bengali

Modern standard Bengali also has two tenses for the imperative: present and future. Like in Hindustani, the present imperative is used to give a command that is expected to be carried out immediately or very soon, while the future imperative is used to give a command that is expected to be carried out at some point in the future.
The exact morphology of the Bangla future imperative varies based on which class a verb falls into, and each level of honorific has its own present and future imperative forms.
Each verb's class also determines the vowel changes that happen in the stem of the verb as it is conjugated.
In many eastern dialects of Bengali, the present imperative uses the same suffix for the honorific as the present indicative, i.e. -এন /en/ instead of -উন /un/. However, the indicative is distinguished from the imperative in present tense for the very familiar in these dialects, with -অস /ôs/ and -ইস /is/ respectively, whereas the standard uses the latter for both.

Other Indo-European languages

Greek

Ancient Greek has imperative forms for present, aorist, and perfect tenses for the active, middle, and passive voices. Within these tenses, forms exist for second and third persons, for singular, dual, and plural subjects. Subjunctive forms with μή are used for negative imperatives in the aorist.

singular	2nd person	λεῖπε
singular	3rd person	λειπέτω
plural	2nd person	λείπετε
plural	3rd person	λειπόντων

In ancient Greek, the general order is expressed using the present imperative and the punctual order using the aorist imperative.

Russian

The commanding form in Russian language is formed from the base of the present tense. The most common form of the second person singular or plural. The form of the second person singular in the imperative mood is formed as follows:

A verb with a present stem ending in – j – the form of the second person singular of the imperative mood is equal to the base: читаj-у — читай, убираj-у — убирай, открываj-у — открывай, поj-у — пой.

Non-Indo-European languages

Finnish

In Finnish, there are two ways of forming a first-person plural imperative. A standard version exists, but it is typically replaced colloquially by the impersonal tense.
Forms also exist for second and third person. Only first person singular does not have an imperative.

Hebrew

In classical Hebrew, there is a form for positive imperative. It exists for singular and plural, masculine and feminine second-person. The imperative conjugations look like shortages of the future ones. However, in modern Hebrew, the future tense is often used in its place in colloquial speech, and the proper imperative form is considered formal or of higher register.
The negative imperative in those languages is more complicated. In modern Hebrew, for instance, it contains a synonym of the word "no", that is used only in negative imperative, and is followed by the future tense.

	Future Indicative	Imperative / Prohibitive
Affirmative	– תכתוב 'You will write'	– כתוב 'Write!'
Negative	– לא תכתוב 'You will not write'	– אל תכתוב 'Don't write!'

	Future Indicative	Imperative / Prohibitive
Affirmative	– תכתבי 'You will write'	– כתבי 'Write!'
Negative	– לא תכתבי 'You will not write'	– אל תכתבי 'Don't write!'

	Future Indicative	Imperative / Prohibitive
Affirmative	– תכתיב 'You will dictate'	– הכתב 'Dictate!'
Negative	– לא תכתיב 'You will not dictate'	– אל תכתיב 'Don't dictate!'

Japanese

Japanese uses separate verb forms as shown below.

Form	Indicative	Imperative / Prohibitive
Affirmative
Negative

Korean

Korean has six levels of honorific, all of which have their own imperative endings. Auxiliary verbs 않다 and 말다 are used for negative indicative and prohibitive, respectively.

Level	Indicative Affirmative	Imperative	Indicative Negative	Prohibitive
Hasipsio-style	가십니다	가십시오	가지 않으십니다	가지 마십시오
Haeyo-style	가세요	가세요	가지 않으세요	가지 마세요
Hao-style	가시오	가시오	가지 않으시오	가지 마시오
Hage-style	가네	가게	가지 않네	가지 말게
Hae-style	가	가	가지 않아	가지 마
Haera-style	간다	가라	가지 않는다	가지 마라

Mandarin

Standard Chinese uses different words of negation for the indicative and the prohibitive moods.

	Indicative	Imperative / Prohibitive
Affirmative	做	做
Negative	不做	别做

Turkish

For the imperative form, the second-person singular, Turkish uses the bare verb stem without the infinitive ending -mek/-mak. Other imperative forms use various suffixes. The second-person plural, which can also be used to express formality, uses the suffixes -in/-ın/-ün/-un. The second person double-plural, reserved for super formal contexts, uses the suffixes -iniz/-ınız/-ünüz/-unuz. Third-person singular uses -sin/-sın/-sün/-sun. Third-person plural uses -sinler/-sınlar/-sünler/-sunlar. First-person pronouns do not have imperative forms. All Turkish imperative suffixes change depending on the verb stem according to the rules of vowel harmony.

2nd-person	singular	İç
2nd-person	plural	İçin
2nd-person	double-plural	İçiniz
3rd-person	singular	İçsin
3rd-person	plural	İçsinler

Turkish also has a separate optative mood. Conjugations of the optative mood for the first-person pronouns are sometimes incorrectly said to be first-person imperatives. Conjugations of the optative mood for second and third-person pronouns exist, but are rarely used in practice.

1st-person	singular	içeyim
1st-person	plural	içelim
2nd person	singular	içesin
2nd person	plural	içesiniz
3rd person	singular	içe
3rd person	plural	içeler

Negative imperative forms are made in the same way, but using a negated verb as the base. For example, the second person singular imperative of içmemek is içme. Other Turkic languages construct imperative forms similarly to Turkish.