Hello friends, in our previous chapters, we extensively learnt all forms of present tense and past tense. Today, we will move into future – I mean into the future tense. We will know and learn Future Tense in this chapter. So, here we go.
Simple Future Tense
Future is uncertain and so is the future tense. However, if you feel there is a possibility of an action in the future (according to the subject of the sentence) – either probable or certain – we should use Simple Future Tense. See an example below.
I shall go to school.
The above sentence has an action – ‘go to school‘. However, the action has not occurred as yet. There is a probability of this action to happen. Hence, this is in future tense.
Syntax of this tense
Subject + SHALL / WILL + present form of Verb + ….
Negative Syntax - Subject + SHALL / WILL + NOT + present form of Verb + …
Interrogative Syntax – SHALL / WILL + Subject + present form of Verb + … ?
Contracted auxiliaries : Subject + ‘ll + present form of verb + ….
Note: The use of ‘Shall‘ is usually restricted to British English these days. Americans hardly use this.
Note1: ‘Shall‘ (the modal auxiliary verb) is used for 1st Persons nominative cases ‘I‘ and ‘WE‘. For all other persons, we use ‘WILL’.
Note2: If we use WILL with first persons ( I and WE), this will imply definiteness and/or willingness of the actions to be done by subject.
Note3: ‘Shall‘ can be used with second persons (YOU) to indicate – order, obligation & the like - in the future time period. (see examples below).
Examples:
- I shall not come to office today.
- You will not open this box.
- The guys will compete with one another.
- Stuart will finish his assignment next week.
- The police will investigate the matter.
All the above sentence are in simple future tense. They imply actions of the subjects which are going to / likely to happen in the future.
More examples (a bit offbeat)
- I will complete this project anyhow tomorrow. [ the subject shows definiteness of his action - complete]
- You shall not enter the room. [it actually means - you should not enter the room - an order you can say]
- He shall be rusticated from the college. [an oder it indicates - he will be rusticated and this is by order].
- I‘ll go with him. [it can be - I shall or I will- both are okay but actually it implies - I will go, showing willingness to go]
Uses of Simple Future Tense
To indicate an action which is likely or certain to happen in the future, we use Simple Future Tense.
- Rita will join us in a minute. [she has not joined us and hence, the action will occur in future - certainly or probably.]
- The President will deliver a speech shortly for his election campaign.
In a complex sentence (in present tense) which has a condition and one clause depends on the other, we should use simple future tense with the one which finishes the sentence or which is the primary clause (main clause).
- It it rains, I will not go to school. [two sentences (clauses) - one depends on the other & there is a condition]
- They will play the match if the captain keeps Stuart in the squad. [there is a condition in this complex sentence & the one which completes the sentence has a simple future tense.]
Trivia
For a sentence, mostly in spoken English, which is going to happen in near future and which is certain, we can do away with the syntax of future tense and use simple present only.
→ He comes tomorrow.
→ The program starts next week.
Even though the above two sentence clearly indicate actions in the future, (with the uses of future adverbs – tomorrow & next week), they are in simple present tense and the syntax of future tense ( subject + WILL/SHALL + …) is not used anymore here. These sentences confirm definiteness of the future actions of subject. Else, they should have been -
- He will come tomorrow.
- The program will start next week.
We can omit or make the usages of Will/Shall silent in these cases. Instead, we can just use simple present tense, the way I put there.
So, with this we are done with our chapter on simple future tense today. Hope the lessen makes things easy for you to understand one more tense in details. For any other concerns or questions, do let me know and I will try to address this. Do mention anything which is needed to add here or if there is any error on my part. Catch you in our next chapter. Happy learning. 
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