Cognitive Analysis Of The Semantics Of English Subjunctive Mood

English subjunctive mood has long been a controversial topic which has aroused hot debate among grammarians and learning difficulty for English learners. In order to help English learner grasp the meaning and use of subjunctive mood and facilitate teachers to explore new methods of teaching, this thesis studies the meaning and use of subjunctive mood. In the thesis, two research questions need to be answered:1. How to analyze subjunctive mood from the perspective of conceptual mapping theory?2. How can prototype theory be used in the cognitive analysis of subjunctive mood?This thesis talks about the meaning of subjunctive mood and shows its semantic essence. Moreover, its use in different types of clauses is listed and the pragmatic functions of subjunctive mood are discussed for accurate understanding of its use in different contexts.The conceptual mapping theory is an important theory in the history of cognitive linguistics and in the thesis, it is used to analyze the cognitive essence of subjunctive mood. Different types of subjunctive mood forms a correspondence with the tenses in time. The correspondence is realized by mapping from subjunctive mood as the source domain to tense as the target domain. The distance brought by the supposition of subjunctive mood is mapped to the forward-shift of tense in time.Prototype category theory is a linguistic theory which has a philosophical origin. In this thesis, it is used to analyze subjunctive mood in sentences of unreal conditions as a category. Sentences of unreal conditions that expressing a hypothesis or wish contrary to present reality can be an example of highest prototypicality and others having lower prototypicality are farther from the center of the category.The thesis gives a relatively comprehensive analysis of subjunctive mood aiming at eliminating strangeness in learning and providing a new perspective of pedagogical practice.