imperative or subjunctive?

Question

In my Spanish class I have learnt that only the second person (s & pl) has distinct forms for the imperative, but the forms for all other persons are the same as for the subjunctive. Pragmatically, that's all I need to know to express myself, but from a linguistic point of view, I'm interested to find out if the fact is that _there is no imperative_ for other persons, but that we use a subjunctive expressing a desire or demand (I know that this is the case in Latin, in which the sole exception is a future 3rd person imperative). So when I say "_no hables_", am I using an imperative (that just happens to look like a subjunctive) or a (jussive) subjunctive?

Answer 1

Hi! Awesome question. I have often wondered the same...and in the case of your example, which is a command written in negative form, I would say that you could call hables a subjunctive because at the bottom of what you're trying to convey is the idea that it is necessary or required that you do not speak (subjunctive in English) - basically like there's an invisible subjunctive trigger that would go at the beginning of this command:

[Es imprescindible que] no hables. ---> No hables.

Just my two cents!

-Alissa