Aspect in Ancient Greek - Nijmegen Centre for Semantics

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128 Chapter 5. Aspect and performativity: the tragic aorist5.5 Performatives across languagesLet’s see which tense-aspect combination is chosen for performatives crosslinguistically,starting with English. Although this language does not have adistinction between perfective (=aoristic) and imperfective aspect, we can stillsee that performatives are special aspectually. We have already seen in section3.3.1 that non-stative predicates in the simple (=non-progressive) present tensedo not receive a literal interpretation, but are interpreted habitually. (151),for example, is interpreted as describing a habit rather than a single runningeventuality.(151) Lizet runs the Brabant half-marathon.There exist a few exceptions to this generalization, however. One of them is theclass of performatives. The sentences in (150) have non-stative predicates inthe simple present tense, but are nevertheless naturally interpreted as referringto a single eventuality. I don’t aim to explain this here, but I only want topoint at the exceptional status performatives have in English. Let’s now lookat performatives in languages that do have a distinction between perfectiveand imperfective aspect.Biblical Hebrew is an interesting language with regard to the relation betweenaspect and performatives, since aspect is grammaticalised (it has a distinctionbetween perfective and imperfective aspect, traditionally called perfectand imperfect, respectively), but tense is not (see, for example, Koschmieder1929:58-71). 4 The absence of tense in Hebrew makes it possible to investigatewhich aspect a language uses for performatives if there is no tense interference.And indeed, as we might expect, Hebrew uses perfective aspect (Koschmieder1930:354, Koschmieder 1945:22): 5(152) bēraktî ’ōtôbless.pfv.1sg he.acc“I (hereby) bless him” Biblical HebrewSlovene is a language with grammatical tense and aspect. It has a binarytense system: a form for past and a form for non-past tense. The combinationof non-past tense and perfective aspect usually gets a future interpretation, butit is also the form most often used in performatives. See (153) (from Greenberg2006):4 But see Joosten (2002), for example, for a different view on the verb forms in BiblicalHebrew.5 The transliteration is Rogland’s (2001:244).
5.5 Performatives across languages 129(153) prisežemswear.npst.pfv.1sg“I swear” SloveneThe situation in Polish and Russian is somewhat more complicated. LikeSlovene, both languages have a binary tense system (past vs. non-past) and aperfective-imperfective distinction. The use of perfective aspect in performatives,however, is restricted (in Russian even more so than in Polish). Perfectiveaspect is found in some performatives (as in (154) and (155)), but as a rule,imperfective aspect is used (as in (156) and (157)).(154) poproszę ǫ to szklankę.ask.npst.pfv.1sg for this glass“I ask for this glass.” Polish(155) poproshu vstatjask.npst.pfv.1sg stand-up.inf“I ask to stand up” Russian(156) dziękujethank.npst.ipfv.1sg“I thank” Polish(157) Ja blagodaruI.nom thank.npst.ipfv.1sg“I thank” RussianHow should we explain the fact that imperfective aspect is used in the majorityof cases, although perfective aspect would be more appropriate? Theexplanation probably runs along the following lines. In the majority of caseswhere reference is made to the present time, imperfective aspect (and non-pasttense) is used. For this reason, imperfective aspect (and non-past tense) is feltas the form for present time reference and is also used where it is aspectuallyinappropriate. Moreover, in the majority of cases where the form for perfectiveaspect and non-past tense is used, reference is made to the future time. Forthis reason, the form for perfective aspect and non-past tense is felt as a futuretense and is not easily used for present-time reference.The difference between Slovene on the one hand and Russian and Polishon the other hand may then be explained as follows (following a suggestion inKoschmieder 1930:354-355). Apart from a grammaticalised binary tense system,all three languages have a periphrastic future. Whereas Slovene, however,has a periphrastic future for both perfective and imperfective aspect, Russianand Polish have such a verb form only for imperfective aspect (since the formfor non-past tense and perfective aspect is already used with reference to fu-
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Aspect in Ancient GreekA semantic a
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viNick Asher, David Beaver, the lat
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Contentsix8 Conclusions and discuss
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2 Chapter 1. Introductiongroundbrea
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4 Chapter 1. Introduction(4) µετ
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6 Chapter 1. Introductionimperfecti
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1.3 Organisation of the thesis 9In
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Chapter 2The interpretations of aor
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2.3 Additional interpretations of t
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2.5 The challenge 21scriptions of h
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24 Chapter 3. Aspect in formal sema
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3.2 The perfective-imperfective dis
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3.3 Aspectual coercion 673.3.1 Aspe
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3.3 Aspectual coercion 69bials ((88
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3.3 Aspectual coercion 71the term c
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3.3 Aspectual coercion 73in the ext
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76 Chapter 4. An analysis of aorist
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178 Appendix A: The language of Com
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192 Appendix B: Examples spelled ou
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206 Appendix C: List of abbreviatio
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208 Appendix C: List of abbreviatio
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210 References(Eds.), Cross-linguis
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212 ReferencesGrice, P. (1975). Log
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214 ReferencesLemmon, E. J. (1962).
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216 Referencesvan der Sandt, R. (19
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218 References
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220 Samenvatting (Summary in Dutch)
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222 Samenvatting (Summary in Dutch)
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