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verbal aspect
Related to earlier queries on aspect in classic studies...I am in the
process of completing my dissertation on "A semantic and pragmatic
model of lexical and grammatical aspect" (aka aktionsart and verbal
aspect). I present criteria for distinguishing tense from grammatical
aspect, and lexical from grammatical aspect, as well as criteria for
recognizing semantic meaning vs. the pragmatic implicatures associated
with a given form in a language. The initial chapters lay out the
theoretical groundwork, justifying the analysis from phenomena in a
variety of languages (including NT Greek). Chapters 5 and 6 apply the
analysis to English and NT Greek, respectively.
In the Greek chapter I address the analyses of Porter 1989
(who claims Greek forms are all aspect and not tense) and Fanning 1990
(who analyzes all forms as both tense and aspect, except the future,
which he says is strictly tense). I suggest that the SEMANTIC meaning
of the forms has both, but not both in all forms. Specifically I
claim that the present and aorist are 'tenseless', encoding imperfective and
perfective aspect, respectively. I suggest that the imperfect is a
past imperfective, the pluperfect a past perfective, and the perfect a
present perfective. The future I analyze as tense and not aspect.
Incidetntally, for e computanally inclined, the model
includes a (privative) feature analysis that builds up interpretation
of lexical and grammatical aspect and tense monotonically from the
contribution of the various elements. I'd be happy to send a copy of
any or all portions of the thesis, if anyone is interested.
(Defendable draft due to committee Oct. 3, so after that it should be
in pretty good shape--at least to get the degree...)
Mari Broman Olsen
Northwestern University
Department of Linguistics
2016 Sheridan Road
Evanston, IL 60208
molsen@astrid.ling.nwu.edu
molsen@babel.ling.nwu.edu