Aspect Lecture 11

What is the meaning of aspect?  Aspect concerns the manner in which the verbal action is experienced or regarded.  The grammatical category of Aspect is indicated in the morphology of the verbs but it characterizes the whole sentence.  Aspect refers to how an event or action is to be viewed with respect to time, rather than to its actual location in time.

We can illustrate this using the following examples: We can illustrate this using the following examples:  [1] David fell in love on his eighteenth birthday.  [1] David fell in love on his eighteenth birthday. in the past, especially on his 18 th birthday  [2] David has fallen in love.  [2] David has fallen in love. in the past, but quite recently; PERFECTIVE ASPECT  [3] David is falling in love.  [3] David is falling in love. still in progress; PROGRESSIVE ASPECT

Therefore, this category is based on three functional oppositions of forms: perfect↔ non-perfect progressive↔non-progressive habitual ↔non-habitual

The semantic field of aspectuality can be classified as follows (Comrie 1976): Aspectuality PerfectNon-perfect PerfectiveImperfective HabitualContinuous Non-progressive Progressive Non-progressive Progressive

 Three of these aspectual meanings are expressed by means of the marked forms: perfect, progressive, habitual. The rest of the meanings are expressed by means of the unmarked form.  The aspectual meanings involve the semantic features of state/non-state, durative/non-durative, limitive/non-limitive.

The aspectual meanings can be defined in the following way: 1.1. Perfect → it makes an explicit reference to the relation between an implied resultant situation and a previous situation that brought about it Non-perfect → it locates the situation in time without referring to its relation to another situation.

The aspectual meanings can be defined in the following way: Perfective → it presents a situation as a single whole without distinction of the separate phases that make up the situation: He scored several goals last month Imperfective → it denotes a durative situation of non-state, referring to its internal temporal structure, i.e. the successive phases of which the situation consists.

Imperfective Habitual → a semantic subtype of the Imperfective, representing a situation as a characteristic feature of a whole period of time; with verbs of non-state it implies the successive occurrence of instances of the situation: He used to be a teacher in his youth. He used to send me postcards but not letters. He used to wear a moustache Continuous → a semantic subtype of the Imperfective; it represents a durative situation as non-habitual.

Continuous Non-progressive → a subtype of the Continuous; it represents a permanent situation of durative non-limitive nature: He is silly. He lives at 10 Vitosha St Progressive → a subtype of the Continuous; it represents a temporary situation of non-state as consisting of successive phases: He is decorating the room.

Aspect always includes tense  In [2] David has fallen in love and [3] David is falling in love above, the aspectual auxiliaries are in the present tense, but they could also be in the past tense:  In [2] David has fallen in love and [3] David is falling in love above, the aspectual auxiliaries are in the present tense, but they could also be in the past tense: David had fallen in love -- Perfective Aspect, Past Tense David was falling in love -- Progressive Aspect, Past Tense David was falling in love -- Progressive Aspect, Past Tense

The perfective auxiliary + verb + -ed, the progressive auxiliary + verb + -ing  While aspect always includes tense, tense can occur without aspect (David falls in love, David fell in love). Perfective Aspect Progressive Aspect Present Tense has fallen is falling Past Tense had fallen was falling

Aspectual verbs  Aspect can describe different properties of an action: its beginning, its incompletion and continuation, its repetitiveness, its incompletion, its termination, etc.  Apart from the 2 aspects grammaticalized in English, progressive aspect (incomplete, ongoing action) and perfective aspect (completed action in the past with present relevance)  Other aspects can be expressed by catenative verbs: - repeated action (He kept coming back), - the beginning of an action (She started writing / They began to eat / We should really get going), - or the end of an action (She stopped writing).