A LOGICAL APPROACH TO ENGLISH CONDITIONAL SENTENCES
A LOGICAL APPROACH TO ENGLISH CONDITIONAL SENTENCES

Summary/Abstract: The present article describes theoretical issues of the English conditional sentences, including definitions and types, leading to concerns regarding teaching them. We argue that the concept of remoteness developed by Michael Lewis (1986) is much more suitable to describe conditionals, as well as it offers a more logical approach to tackle various less standard types, such as 'mixed', 'zero' or less frequent verb forms (e.g. continuous). A possible way to understand conditionals may start from a non-native speaker perspective, in our case Romanian or Hungarian, making students aware of the challenges represented by the English conditionals. We also offer a popular option to make students discover 'real-life' conditionals with the help of the entertainment industry, while the references contain major English, Romanian and Hungarian sources in the field.

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