Verbal Aspect in Discourse (Pragmatics & Beyond)

VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

Pragmatics & Beyond New Series Editors: Jacob L. Mey (Odense University) Herman Parret (Belgian National Science Foundation, Universities of Louvain and Antwerp) Jef Verschueren (Belgian National Science Foundation, University of Antwerp) Editorial Address: Linguistics (GER) University of Antwerp (UIA) Universiteitsplein l B-2610 Wilrijk Belgium Editorial Board: Norbert Dittmar (Free University of Berlin) Bruce Fraser (Boston University) John Heritage (University of California at Los Angeles) David Holdcroft (University of Leeds) Catherine Kerbrat-Orecchioni (University of Lyon 2) Beatriz Lavandera (University of Buenos Aires) Marina Sbisà (University of Trieste) Emanuel A. Schegloff (University of California at Los Angeles) Paul O. Takahara (Kobe University) Sandra Thompson (University of California at Santa Barbara) Daniel Vanderveken (University of Quebec at Trois-Rivières) Teun A. van Dijk (University of Amsterdam)

5 Nils . Thelin(ed.) Verbal Aspect in Discourse

VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE Contributions to the Semantics of Time and Temporal Perspective in Slavic and Non-Slavic Languages

Edited and introduced by NILS B. THELIN University of Oldenburg

JOHN BENJAMINS PUBLISHING COMPANY AMSTERDAM/PHILADELPHIA 1990

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Verbal aspect in discourse / edited by Nils B. Thelin. p. cm. -- (Pragmatics & beyond, ISSN 0922-842X ; new ser. 5) Some papers first presented at the Third World Congress for Soviet and East European Studies in Washington, DC, 10/30-11/4/85. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Grammar, Comparative and general — Aspect - Congresses. 2. Grammar, Compara­ tive and general - Tense ~ Congresses. 3. Discourse analysis - Congresses. I. Thelin, Nils B. II. World Congress for Soviet and East European Studies (3rd : 1985 : Washington, D.C.) III. Series. PZ81.V37 1990 415-dc20 90-38712 ISBN 90 272 5012 X (Eur.)/l-55619-095-6 (US) (alk. paper) © Copyright 1990 - John Benjamins B.V. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other means, without written permission from the publisher.

Table of contents Preface Nils . Thelin List of Contributors

vii xvii

Introduction Verbal Aspect in Discourse: On the State of the Art Nils B. Thelin 1.

Developmental properties of aspect and tense On the Concept of Time: Prolegomena to A Theory of Aspect and Tense in Narrative Discourse Nils B. Thelin The Functional Evolution of Aspect in Russian Kyrii T. Holden Discourse Functions of Tense-Aspect in French: Dynamic Syn­ chrony Linda R. Waugh

2.

3

91 131

159

Ideo-pragmatic and conceptual-semantic correlates of aspect and the perspectival organisation of discourse Notes on the "Metaphysics" of Russian Aspect Boris Gasparov Verbal Aspect, Discourse Saliency, and the So-Called "Perfect of Result" in Modern Russian Catherine V. Chvany Discourse Analysis of Aorist and Imperfect in Bulgarian and French Jean-Pierre Desclés & Zlatka Guentchéva

191

213

237

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Vi

Narrative Context and Russian Aspect Grace E. Fielder Temporal and Semantic Factors Affecting Russian Aspect Choice in Questions Patricia R. Chaput Russian Aspect in Questions: Information and Invariance in Discourse Peter T. Merrill 3.

285

307

Aspect, case and discourse The Aspectual Case of Predicative Nouns in Lithuanian Texts Alan Timberlake On Finnish "Aspect" in Discourse Hannu Tommola

4.

263

325 349

Aspect in Russian literary discourse Aspect in Textual Deep Structure: On the Message Theme of Puskin's The Bronze Horseman André G.F. van Holk Narrative Description or Descriptive Narration: Problems of Aspectuality in Cechov Peter Alberg Jensen

367

383

Index of proper names

411

Index of languages

416

Index of topics

418

Preface This volume has its origin in the renewed interest in aspectology that since the 1970s has grown unceasingly, and recently — in the light of increasing insights in the universal temporal-semantic nature of aspectual distinctions — has broadened its attention from restrictedly event-defining functions of aspect on the sentence level towards its primary perspectival functions on the discourse/situation level, hereby — at least tendentially — trying to relate them to each other in ways that simulate consistently lan­ guage processing (encoding and decoding) on a more solid perceptual-con­ ceptual and pragmatic basis. In this general sense the orientation of its con­ tributions can be said to represent in many respects a further development of important ideas presented in the volume Tense-Aspect: Between Seman­ tics & Pragmatics (1982) and, in particular, its Editor Paul J. Hopper's (p. 16) explicitly deductive, discourse-based understanding of aspect (as distin­ guished from exclusive sentence-level approaches), conveyed most perti­ nently by his quotation of Dwight Bolinger's words: "...but a time comes for preludes, after a long series of deafening finales." I hope the present volume will show that this time has come. More specifically, the idea to prepare this volume originates in the panel Slavic Verbal Aspect in Discourse held at the Third World Congress for Soviet and East European Studies, Washington, DC, October 30 — November 4, 1985. The three papers read at this panel by Catherine V. Chvany, André G.F. van Holk and Peter Alberg Jensen are included here together with nine further papers contributed on an invitational basis, as well as one paper and an Introduction by the Editor. The predominance of Slavic, in particular Russian, material in the pre­ sent volume may be seen to compensate to some extent for the subordinate role that considerations of these languages have played in recent aspect theory formation in comparison with traditional aspectology (for a favoura­ ble exception, see the volume The Scope of Slavic Aspect, edited by Michael S. Flier and Alan Timberlake in 1985). Besides cross-linguistic con-

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siderations (including English), the languages analyzed specifically in the present volume are Russian, Bulgarian, Lithuanian, French and Finnish. The general picture of universal implications appears to be provided by the dominating orientation of the volume towards discourse/situation func­ tionality and its underlying cognitive-pragmatic conditions. This basic ten­ dency should not, naturally, be understood to imply any kind of theoretical conformity. On the contrary, it is to be hoped that the contributions included should reflect as objectively and representatively as possible aspectological research at its current stage of development with its diverse, sometimes conflicting, endeavours in the search for more solid empirical foundations. The Editor's Introduction should be seen, correspondingly, to repre­ sent merely one possible framework for a critical evaluation of contempo­ rary aspectology, leaving it to the reader whether to reject or supply it according to his own data and theoretical understanding. One of the crucial problems posited by the current development and paid much attention to in the Introduction is the situation of remaining contradictions between sen­ tence-based assumptions about aspect functions, on the one hand, and sin­ cerely conceived attempts to project these assumptions onto aspect func­ tions in discourse, on the other. It has been considered indispensible for the further development of aspectology towards a proper integration of dis­ course/situation conditions to dwell here at some length upon the essence of such — mainly verb (phrase) and interval semantic — assumptions of vari­ ous shapes in order to clarify thus their serious shortcomings. Introduced by chapter, the individual contributions are summarized below and, occasionally, briefly commented upon in regard to their implica­ tions in the extended perspective of further research. In CHAPTER 1. in different ways the relevance of developmental con­ ditions for the systemic, discourse-related understanding of aspect (and, to some extent, tense) is advocated. The Editor's contribution is an attempt to sketch the hypothetical genesis of time as general concept underlying the semantic evolution of the two distinct grammatical categories of aspect and tense as evidenced by their development in Indo-European. Kyrii T. Holden, inspired by recent proposals by Lakoff, Givón and Bybee, treats the diachrony of Russian aspect as a general issue of gram­ matical categorization, proposing an analysis of its functional evolution (in­ cluding discourse functions) as a process of metaphorical extension, more

PREFACE

iX

specifically as "gradual encoding of the non-prototypical functions of the original semantic classes of verbs for purposes no longer strictly denota­ tive." The latter development is thus viewed as a "movement away from the prototypical perception of events" which "appears to be part of a natural cognitive tendency to view reality from alternative perspectives, possibly for narrative purposes." From the dynamic viewpoint of synchronic variability, understood to be represented by 'classical' vs. 'avant-garde' uses and to affect in particular the opposition between Composed Past and Simple Past (whereas Imper­ fect is viewed as basically the same in both types of uses), Linda R. Waugh explores the functions of 'tense-aspect' in French fictional and journalistic discourse, paying special attention to beginnings and endings of texts. The general tendency is presented as an increasing contextualization of aspect usage. The choice between Simple Past and Composed Past no longer rep­ resents the distinction between narration and dialogue alone, but is impli­ cated rather in relating and contrasting, for example, opening to body of the text, cause to effect, general statement to exemplification of that state­ ment, body to closing. In CHAPTER 2., against the general background of its perspectival functions in discourse, aspect is treated from various, though ideo-pragmatically and conceptually-semantically interrelated, angles of observation. Boris Gasparov in his outspokenly perspectival treatment of Russian aspect has chosen a broader ideological-pragmatic basis thus linking it in part to the discussion of Cassirer's and Heidegger's views on time in Thelin (in this volume). The aspect opposition between the perfective and the imperfective is understood by Gasparov to represent basically "two oppo­ site modi of presentation of reality" ("two Weltanschauungen"), from which specific aspect meanings and discourse functions can be derived, namely the "event-modus" (presenting; the world as consisting of events) and the "existence-modus" (presenting the world as consisting of existential experiences), respectively. Catherine V. Chvany in her paper approaches Russian aspect and its correlation to the foreground/background distinction with the aid of a multi-factor 'Saliency Hierarchy' inspired by Hopper and Thompson's 'transitivity hypothesis.' Aspect — understood by her as verb (phrase)/situation semantic classes — is included here as just one scale of values among various parameters determining the degree of 'discourse saliency' ('foregroundability') of sentences. Observations of the contextual dependency of

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PREFACE

the foreground function of imperfective forms (in cases of the 'dramatic' present) and the background function of perfective forms (in cases of the perfect) are conceived as evidence of the insufficiency of sentence grammar treatments of aspect. Jeanne-Pierre Desclés and Zlatka Guentchéva in their discourse analysis of the aorist and imperfect in Bulgarian and French proceed from the distinction between static and dynamic situations, assuming that aspect, correspondingly, is based on the primitive concepts 'State,' on the one hand, and 'Process' and 'Event,' on the other. In order to formalize in a language-independent way this 'aspectual trichotomy' the authors propose a topological-figurative meta-language based on the concept of interval. Besides the current opposition between closure and non-closure there is introduced in the latter case the further opposition between 'bounded' and 'unbounded' intervals to capture the distinction between 'contingent' and 'permanent' (backgrounded) 'states.' Further evidence for the relevance of discourse motivation for aspec­ tual encoding is provided by Grace E. Fielder's treatment of the notorious 'general-factual' (cf. Forsyth's 'simple denotation') use of Russian imper­ fective forms to convey completed actions as distinguished from the corres­ ponding 'concrete-factual' use of perfective forms. Reflecting an inter­ mediate inductive-deductive stage of analysis, Fielder's observations are understood by her to refer to 'contextual factors' on the narrative level — of relevance for aspectual encoding, but distinct from 'overt aspectual parameters' (mainly in terms of closure) determining the choice of aspect on the competing propositional level. The crucial theoretical problem of 'simple denotation' expressed by Russian imperfective forms is treated also by Patricia R. Chaput in regard to past-tense yes-no questions. Proceeding from an advanced deductive understanding of aspect usage pointing to ultimate predictive rules, Chaput proposes as their basis three main factors: (a) situational temporal perspec­ tive, (b) presuppositions on the part of the speaker, and (c) lexico-semantic content of the predicate. Interpreted potentially as related to aspect-depen­ dent change-of-state conditions (cf. Introduction), (a) could, in a natural way, be developed further from Chaput's distinction Unitary vs. Habitual to encompass the discourse-perspectival distinction foreground/background (understood to apply also to dialogue), (b) would determine then on the pragmatic level the various aspect functions observed in questions in corre­ lation with the latter distinction and its event-defining, aspect-semantic veh-

PREFACE

Xi

lcle, and (), correspondingly, could be formalized consistently to explain, for example, why achievements are excepted from the general 'simple denotation' use (obviously, because their meanings of conclusivity or momentaneity entail their obligatory situational/perspectival feature of change-of-state/foreground and the corresponding aspect features of tem­ poral definiteness and totality, and thus preclude their backgrounding, unless embedded in superior iterative/habitual structures). The discourse of yes-no questions in Russian (including the issue of 'simple denotation') is also the object of investigation chosen by Peter Mer­ rill for his discussion of pragmatic-communicative conditions underlying aspect choice. Proceeding from an increasingly deductive (though in part still interpretive-inductive) stage of analysis (anticipating a consistent dis­ tinction between aspectual encoding and decoding), Merrill sees his task in exploring "how we compute... utterance values, and in particular, the types of contributions that aspect can make to utterance-level meaning." Accord­ ing to the author "the contribution of the marked (perfective) aspect" can be thought of as "an additional predication," whereas the imperfective "makes no identifiable contribution to utterance values." Unrelated so far to the broader system of predictive perspectival distinctions of situation/dis­ course (referred to implicitly as 'conventional contextual algorithms' from which are derived 'pragmatic' meanings such as simultaneity, sequentiality, durativity and iterativity), perfective forms are understood to elicit by way of inference the relevance of completion, whereas imperfective forms do not elicit such relevance. In CHAPTER 3. two papers provide evidence for a broader concept of aspect also in regard to the level of realization than was assumed by the traditional term 'verbal aspect' (used in the title of this volume rather by convention to assure unambiguous reference to the linguistic category). Already cases of 'paraphrastic' (e.g. adverbial) expressions of aspect allow for the assumption that aspect meanings appear as definitions of entire predications or propositions rather than verbal predicates alone. This assumption is in harmony with the hypothesis that aspect in a coherent way organizes propositions according to their temporal-perspectival status in discourse (cf. Introduction). Under these circumstances it is not surprising (cf. Chvany in this volume: Section 1.2) that aspectual distinctions can be expressed also by syntactic means such as case differentiation (to be distin­ guished principally from the non-perspectival, semantico-syntactic distinc­ tion of terminativity vs. non-terminativity, conceived of as 'aspectual' in some quarters; cf. Introduction).

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Alan Timberlake addresses the aspectual nature of the choice between the nominative and the instrumental case in Lithuanian predicative nouns. Nouns are assumed by the author to be lexico-semantically either descrip­ tive, if they merely predicate properties, or restrictive, if they predicate properties that a) change over time b) are contrasted with other possible properties c) hold over a time but are subject to cancellation at any time. On this basis, case in predicative nouns is supposed to be largely predicta­ ble, viz. in the first case — the nominative, in the second case — the instru­ mental. Deviations from this usage are understood to be due to contextual restrictivization and descriptivization, respectively, and "signal semantic values at other levels of the semantic structure of text — the level of perspective, the interclausal level, or the clausal level...." At the present inductive-deductive stage of analysis (reflecting to a greater extent decod­ ing than encoding) these levels are felt to "[superimpose] a new semantic value on the predicative relation" rather than to predict in a hierarchicalprocessual fashion the latter (and the corresponding case) without devia­ tions, as would be imaginable in the potential deductive (speaker-based) extension of the model — provided that nouns are either lexico-semanti­ cally neutral to aspect or, if not, are selected from the lexicon according to (and not contradicting) the superior temporal perspective under which they are to predicate (rather than modified aspectually by this). In the latter way one could think of, for example, the selection of adjectives expressing tem­ porary vs. permanent properties (e.g. sad vs. prudent). To which extent a corresponding distinction can be ascribed to the lexical semantics of nouns is an open question. If understood to be basically aspectually neutral, nouns in their predicative function would be specified aspectually by choice of case much in the same way as are, e.g., certain Russian adjectives by the choice between short and long forms expressing the basic aspectual distinc­ tion between temporal definiteness and indefiniteness (roughly foreground­ ing vs. backgrounding), respectively, of the underlying temporally neutral lexical property: Ivan holen 'Ivan is sick (for the time being)' vs. Ivan bol'noj 'Ivan is a sick person.' In Finnish, with both nouns and adjectives, this distinction is expressed by case, viz. by the general local vs. the nominative case: Ivan on lääkärinä Moskovassa 'Ivan is (working as) a doc­ tor in Moscow' vs. Ivan on lääkäri 'Ivan is a doctor'; Ivan on sairaana 'Ivan is sick (for the time being)' vs. Ivan on sairaas 'Ivan is sick' (aspectually neutral).

PREFACE

iii

Hannu Torninola discusses another example of case differentiation ful­ filling in part aspectual functions, namely the direct object opposition between the accusative and partitive case in Finnish. However, as shown by the author, aspect functions fulfilled by Finnish case are characterized by their interplay with other case functions contributing thus to a complicated picture of polysemy relations. The accusative can be said to express events with the 'perfective' meaning of completion ('totality') provided the sen­ tence is not negated and the object reference is specific and quantitatively definite (Tommola speaks of 'specific resultativity'), but thereby no distinc­ tion is made (as, e.g., in Russian) in regard to whether such events are tem­ porally definite (foregrounded) or temporally indefinite (backgrounded), as in cases of 'simple denotation,' iterativity and habituality. These conditions appear to indicate rather that the 'perfective' meaning is derived from the different, semantico-syntactic meaning of terminus, reinterpreted — in cases of temporal definiteness — as achieved terminus by way of contrast with the meaning of process towards a terminus expressed by the partitive. The partitive, however, can express unambiguously this temporally definite 'imperfective' meaning of process, i.e. on-going event, only in affirmative sentences if the object is a count noun. Under these circumstances it becomes evident that encoding and decoding of aspect in Finnish must rely to considerable extent on contextual redundancy. Considerations of dis­ course embedding are shown by Tommola to be relevant in particular when the choice between the accusative and the partitive is dependent on further specification/non-specification of change, but, on the other hand, the cor­ responding sensitivity to theme/rheme functions of the objects (rather than the changes) indicate that this case distinction is not primarily temporalreferential, i.e. not aspectual. Treating aspect as a universal system of conceptual-semantic distinc­ tions fulfilling basic functions of temporal perspective in situation/discourse ascribes to it a central role in textual representations of reality. It has been assumed (Thelin 1984b: 262; in this volume, Section: 4.10.3) that recent semantic research in the category of aspect and the thereby gained insights into its specific temporal character have enabled a better understanding not only of its perspectival functions but, consequently, also of the ways in which narrative texts are composed in a more principal sense. Manipula­ tions of temporal perspective thus appear to be constitutive of literary dis­ course and its historical development (see Introduction, Jensen and Thelin in this volume). We may expect, therefore, that poetic-narrative analyses of

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temporal perspective and, apparently, also its interrelations with so-called 'narrative perspective' (German 'Erzählperspektive'; represented by the point-of-view assigned to or oscillating between the narrator, on the one hand, and the characters, on the other), would attain a broader empirical basis by including linguistic hypotheses of aspect functions. It is to be hoped that the current development of aspectology will thus contribute substan­ tially to an integration of poetic and linguistic research, advocated by Tynjanov and Jakobson already in the twenties, but felt to be missing still to the extent that we often experience two different disciplines, talking their own languages in analyzing poetic texts. It would be encouraging, therefore, if the present volume, and in particular the two contributions in CHAPTER 4., could stimulate future research in text theory to bridge — at least in the central field of time semantics — the conceptual gap between poetic and linguistic functionality. An idea of the intricate problems involved in correlating poetic and lin­ guistic functions is provided by André G. F. van Hoik's overall model of lit­ erary composition and linguistic implementation, applied (programmatically) to aspect functions in Puskin's poem The Bronze Horseman. Based on a variety of case grammar, this model is understood to derive aspectual distinctions on the textual surface from textual deep structure in the form of elementary constructions (EC's), resulting in turn from decomposed thematic constructions (TC's). EC's thus combine permanent features of 'cultural content' with varying predicative features accounting for "the way sentences are linked in the expression of a particular plot line (understood here in the broad sense of 'history,' NBT)." The distinction between backgrounding and foregrounding (the latter also understood in a broader sense as usual) is conceived of as a function of the relation between nucleus and modifier of EC's, more specifically, as determined by the predomi­ nance of class or position markers, respectively. Applied to the broad (rather focal) concept of foregrounded event strings, the deep structure fea­ ture of 'durativity,' correspondingly, characterizes EC's in their function of mediating a broader poetic perspective of the message theme, allowing for both 'linear' and 'punctual' substrings (realized on the surface by imperfective and perfective forms, respectively). Peter Alberg Jensen from the outspoken viewpoint of the theoretician of literary texts approaches the category of aspect, conducted by the idea of its constitutive and, correspondingly, fundamental poetic-aesthetic role in narrative composition. This idea is corroborated and developed further by

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xv

Jensen's analysis of Cechov's prose and its programmatic-innovative man­ ipulations with temporal perspective ('aspectuality') as illustrated by three different stories, each deviating in its own way from the traditional pattern. Two of them are chosen as examples of 'aspectual extremes': the 'imperfec­ tive' one (representing absence of narrativity proper) and the 'perfective' one (representing hypertrophied narrativity) both turn out to entail lack of a conventional story line. A third story is shown to represent more typically Cechov's "new aspectual blend" characterized by a restricted significance of the perfective and a correspondingly heightened significance of the imper­ fective. Basing his poetic-functional analysis on the traditional privative understanding of aspect as one single linguistic-functional opposition, the author proposes its interpretation in terms of the distinction 'relational' vs. 'simple.' 'Relational' is the marked feature expressed by the perfective, 'simple' the unmarked feature of the imperfective (not differentiated in regard to the distinction between the temporally definite meaning of 'pro­ cess' and the temporally indefinite meaning of, for example, habituality). Perfective predicates are understood to present '"modifications' on the objective 'historical' level by discriminating and relating the 'acts,' whereas the imperfective predicates present a subjective view of life as continuing activity" (cf. in the latter case Gasparov's 'experiential' perspective).

Nils . Thelin Oldenburg/Uppsala 1988

List of contributors

Patricia R. Chaput Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures 301 Boylston Hall Harvard University Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 USA

Catherine V. Chvany Foreign Languages and Literatures Massachusetts Institute of Technology Room 14N311 Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139 USA Jean-Pierre Desclés and Zlatka Guentchéva UFR Linguistique Université Paris-7 Tour Centrale, 8e et 9e étage 2, Place Jussieu F-75251 Paris Cedex 05 France

Grace E. Fielder Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures 109 Cabell Hall University of Virginia Charlottesville, Virginia 22903-3196 USA

Boris Gasparov Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures University of California, Berkeley Berkeley, California 94720 USA Kyrii T. Holden Department of Slavic and East European Studies 450 Arts Building University of Alberta Edmonton Canada T6G 2E6 André G.F. van Hoik Slavic Institute University of Groningen Oude Kijk in 't Jatstraat 26 Postbus 716 NL-9700 AS Groningen The Netherlands Peter Alberg Jensen Department of Slavic and Baltic Languages University of Stockholm S-10691 Stockholm Sweden Peter T. Merrill Phillips Academy Andover, Massachusetts 01810 USA

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LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS

Nils B. Thelin (Editor) Askvägen 21 A S-75653 Uppsala Sweden

Hannu Tommola University of Tampere KKL PL 607 SF-33101 Tampere Finland

Alan Timberlake Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures University of California, Berkeley Berkeley, California 94720 USA

Linda R. Waugh Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics Morrill Hall Cornell University Ithaca, New York 14853-4701 USA

Introduction

Verbal aspect in discourse: on the state of the art Nils B. Thelin University of Oldenburg To Andrzej Boguslawski

Introduction 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17.

Preliminaries on the distinction between aspect semantics and verb (phrase) semantics The basic conceptual fallacy of Dowty's VP-semantic aspectology Influences of the VP-semantic approach on viewpoint aspectology 'The imperfective paradox' and other consequences of the confusion of aspect and terminativity The proper interdependence between situation/discourse and aspect semantics Towards a deductive situation/discourse-based analysis of aspect States as non-phasal situations and the aspectual distinction totality vs. partiality Truth conditions, intervals and possible worlds: treating the progressive as aspect par excellence Intervals, gaps and moments of time: towards the partiality understanding of the aspectual meaning of on-going process The problematic symbiosis of intervals, VP-semantics and aspect: one instructive example Language-specific conditions of aspectual polysemy vs. the traditional concept of markedness: a universal approach to situational-perspectival analysis 'Generic readings' and the short-comings of interval semantics: on the discourseperspectival status of iteratives and habituais Why Cooper's situation-semantics goes wrong, or, the case of the 'reportive' present The aspectual distinction ±TIME and the temporal-perspectival organisation of dis­ course: NARRATIO/foreground vs. DESCRIPTIO/background Aspect and 'theme-rheme' conditions The aspect-semantic basis for foreground sequencing Aspect and textual consistency: 'syntagmatic' ('immediate') and 'paradigmatic' ('mediate') coherence

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NILS B.THELIN

18. 'Paradigmatic' ('mediate') coherence and the differentiated concept of background 19. Aspect, focus, old and new information 20. Aspect and negation 21. From temporal-perspectival coherence to temporal-causal coherence, and the balance between NARRATIO and DESCRIPTIO 22. On the temporal status of the perfect in discourse 23. Narrative vs. conversational discourse Conclusions References

Introduction Where is aspectology heading today? At first glance the picture of its actual stage of development might appear rather confusing. This impression could be due in part to the tremendous accumulation of scholarly work that has taken place in recent years, expressing the renewed interest in this field of grammar. It certainly has to do also with the fact that this development has been characterized by highly disparate endeavours, in which considera­ tions not only of insights gained already by traditional aspectology but also of competing contemporary proposals have often been missing to a large extent in defining the own theoretical position. This situation is felt to moti­ vate the following attempt to present something like a structured survey of prevailing tendencies in modern aspectology. If it succeeds, it might hope­ fully serve as an intermediate, partial summing-up of some use for the orientation of future aspectological research. In view of the abounding liter­ ature, this account must by necessity be selective. It is to be hoped, how­ ever, that it will actualize quite a few questions of importance for our understanding of the category of aspect as an integrated part of grammar, more specifically as a universal phenomenon of temporal grammar, con­ ceivable in its entire functional range only when correlated to discoursepragmatic conditions and their underlying human strategies of perceptualconceptual analysis. With the latter statement the author takes a general stand to be specified throughout the following account. Rather than offer­ ing an accumulative review, this account — in order to enable some mean­ ingful mode of critical exposition and, above all, the revelation of decisive points of theoretical intersection — has chosen the rather well-defined point of evaluation established by the author's own aspectological under­ standing. This is certainly a daring restriction of the empirical scope but under the circumstances a feasible mode of procedure to provide at least

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

5

some conclusive statements amenable to falsification. Only the reader will be able to tell whether this choice can be said to have justified itself or not. The contradictory situation of research (to be explicated below) could be characterized in brief as follows: On the one hand, there has been con­ siderable progress in developing the componential understanding of aspect semantics; on the other hand, aspectology is still suffering from a predomi­ nant morpho-syntactic bias preventing it from asking important questions of a universal nature and, among other things, discovering languagespecific conditions of superficial polysemy (English simple forms are still understood by a majority of linguists to be aspectless!). On the one hand, there have been promising attempts to show the discourse-semantic founda­ tions of aspect (Grimes 1975, Kamp 1979, Hopper 1979a, Hopper and Thompson 1980); on the other hand, there have hardly been any attempts to explore more closely the conceptual-semantic correlation between the aspectual function of defining events, on the one side, and organizing dis­ course, on the other. On the one hand, aspect may be understood to be investigated as a function of discourse, but on the other hand such investi­ gations may still often be based on sentence-semantic assumptions about aspect in terms of verb (phrase) and interval semantics (Dowty 1986, Cooper 1986, Dorfmüller-Karpusa 1987). In a corresponding way, deduc­ tive principles of analysis, emanating from discourse motivation, are still usually contradicted by basically inductive modes of procedure. 1

Preliminaries on the distinction between aspect semantics and verb (phrase) semantics

Before starting the following critical survey of some recent develop­ ments in aspectology it seems well-founded to recall the meaning of the Latin word underlying the grammatical term 'aspect': aspectus (from aspicere), i.e. 'view' or 'point of view.' This is indeed no trivial statement, since it turns out that the apparently elementary condition pointed out hereby has been overlooked by a great deal of influential modern aspectology. Although empirical evidence for distinguishing between the aspectual meanings of TEMPORAL PERSPECTIVE, on the one hand, and the meanings of certain classes of verbs or corresponding TYPES OF SITUA­ TIONS (represented in fact not only by verb-semantic distinctions — in cer­ tain cases referred to as 'Aktionsarten/ but also by the latter's interdepen­ dence with semantico-syntactic (deep case) conditions dictated by such

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types of situations; cf., e.g., the distinction terminative:non-terminative; see Thelin 1978: 101; 1985: 191), on the other, was available a long time ago (cf. Agrell 1908), aspectology has until this day suffered seriously from the lasting confusion of these two, interrelated, but basically distinct phenomena. Also the most ambitious recent attempts to reconcile them (as, for example, Smith's 1983/1986 overall endpoint-thesis; cf. also Bennett 1981, Dry 1983, Lindstedt 1985, Chatterjee 1988) appear — notwithstand­ ing contributions to individual issues — to have ended up in an impasse of relative perspectivelessness, in particular, considering their qualifications for answering crucial questions about the temporal organisation of dis­ course. The above confusion has been implemented in Soviet and East-Euro­ pean aspectology by the broad and untransparent concept of 'aspectuality' (cf. Bondarko 1968) within the framework of the so-called 'terminativity theory.' In Anglo-Saxon aspectology this confusion has had a still stronger verb-semantic bias based on the classifications of the Aristotle-Ryle-KennyVendlerian tradition. In view of its remarkable impact on contemporary aspectological research it is imperative to scrutinize here at some length the latter practice in its various shapes (for a detailed criticism of the 'ter­ minativity theory,' see Thelin 1978: 85ff.; 1980a; 1980b). Now, what is properly speaking perspectival about Vendler's four clas­ ses states, activities, accomplishments and achievements (cf. Vendler 1957)? Not very much, actually. These classes rather represent non-perspectivized types of idealized situations dictated by reality (our perception and concep­ tion of reality; cf. Thelin 1985: 167, 191), or their corresponding linguistic expressions in terms of generalized verb-semantic and semantico-syntactic (deep case) patterns. If aspect proper (in particular, in the light of recent research in discourse structure) should be understood to represent mean­ ings of temporal perspective (cf. Thelin 1984a; 1985: 162; Chaput and Gasparov in this volume) what is temporal (in a non-tense sense) about the above-mentioned classes? Of course, time is involved here too, if not in a perspectival sense, since we are concerned with situations, and situations represent STATES and CHANGES OF STATES, which are (in definite or indefinite ways; see below) connected with time. However, far from repre­ senting aspectual distinctions, Vendler's four classes ('aspectual classes of verbs' according to Dowty 1979: 52; 1986: 37; Dry 1981; 'situation aspect'/ 'lexical aspect' according to Smith 1983/1986 and Timberlake 1985a, respec­ tively) are not even based on any consistent time-semantic interrelations.

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

7

'Accomplishments' (draw a circle) and 'achievements' (recognize, reach), on the one hand, differ from 'activities' (push a cart, swim), on the other, exclusively in the presence and absence, respectively, with actions/ events of the semantico-syntactic (deep case) feature of goal-orientation or the pragmatically/lexically motivated feature of natural (inherent) terminus. The difference between 'accomplishments' and 'achievements' appears to be a question rather of whether goal-oriented (or inherently terminusbound) actions/events are understood as simply goal-oriented (terminative/ telic/bounded) or, in addition, with a pragmatically based connotation of conclusivity or instantaneity. The non-terminative (atelic/non-bounded) meaning of 'activities' (e.g. swim) is cancelled by complements introducing goal-orientation or the intentional spatial delimitation of these 'activities' (e.g. swim to the other beach, swim a mile). As to 'states,' see Section 7 below. Since examples of the above classes are usually adduced in English simple forms (which in no way represent aspectual zero as would often appear to be assumed; cf. Dowty 1979: 134-135, 1986; Gabbay & Moravscik 1980: 73-74; Carlson 1981: 41; Givón 1982: 127ff. ; Cooper 1986; for a promising change of this tradition, see Smith 1983: 482, 492; 1986: 101, 103), one cannot preclude, however, that by way of tacit implication they often express also aspect proper. Under these circumstances the obvi­ ous POLYSEMIC aspectual nature (cf. Thelin 1986) of simple forms is neg­ lected and one is not aware that reference to them is made on one occasion as representing the aspect meanings of temporal definiteness (+TIME; cf. The­ lin 1978:17; 1984a; in this volume, where it is referred to as 'time-relatedness') and totality (+; cf. Thelin 1978: 31ff.), on another — temporal indefiniteness (-TIME; referred to below in this volume as 'non-time-reatedness') of various degrees, in particular in the form of 'simple statement' (cf. Forsyth's 'simple denotation'; 1970: 82-84; see also Grimes 1975: 65; Coni­ ne 1976: 113ff.; Swan 1977; Thelin 1978: 17, 30; 1984a; 1985: 173ff., 180; Fielder, Chaput, Merrill in this volume) but represented also by such mean­ ings as iterativity (cf. Kucera 1981: 181), habituality, genericity and 'eternal truth.' I will now sketch the fundamental inadequacy of the predominantly verb-semantic approach to the category of aspect as it has been developed by Dowty (1972, 1977, 7979, 1986) and others (see below) and become the canon for most aspectological work within 'truth conditional semantics.'

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2

The basic conceptual fallacy of Dowty's VP-semantic aspectology

As main criterion for the distinction between 'activities' and 'ac­ complishments' (or 'performance verbs' according to Kenny 1963), Dowty (1979: 133) applies Kenny's test: "Where 'A is 0ing' implies 'A has not 0 d ' I shall call the verb a 'performance verb'; where 'A is 0ing' implies rather 'A has 0 d ' I shall call the verb an 'activity verb.'" Dowty adduces the fol­ lowing examples: (1) (2) (3) (4)

John John John John

was drawing a circle. drew a circle. was pushing a cart. pushed a cart.

and says that draw a circle counts as an accomplishment verb phrase because (1) does not entail (2), while push a cart counts as an activity because (3) does seem to entail (4). On the basis of Kenny's test Dowty concludes that "the meaning of an accomplishment verb phrase invariably involves the coming about of a particular state of affairs." With reference (p. 73ff.) to von Wright's change-of-state-logic and the corresponding abstract verbs BECOME (or COME ABOUT) with Lakoff and McCawley, Dowty introduces his own 'aspectual' operator BECOME (pp. 71, 125). In other words, 'accomplishments' can be defined as "a change of state where the two states are of particular form. Namely, one of the states is the nega­ tion of the other" (p. 74ff.). However, this suggestion has one obvious defi­ ciency. It presupposes an over-all factitive-resultative reading of 'ac­ complishments' as in cases like 'drawing a circle,' 'kicking the door open,' 'driving the car into the garage,' but what about examples like (5) (6) (7)

John was defending his position. John was examining a mouse. Mary was telling John the latest news. ?

According to Kenny's/Dowty's test these would not be 'accomplishments,' but are they 'activities' in the same sense as 'push a cart?' In the latter cases we can 'derive' without problems (8) (9) (10)

John defended his position. John examined a mouse. Mary told John the latest news. ,

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

9

namely as expressions of a 'simple statement' (without definite temporal references), viz. that these actions actually took place, irrespectively of whether they were (successfully) carried out to their end or not. This tem­ porally indefinite aspect meaning (-TIME) of simple forms must be distin­ guished from the temporally definite aspect meaning (+TIME) of simple forms which present actions as unambiguously completed (cf. Thelin 1978: 98). This meaning of completion is rather a consequence of the further underlying aspect meaning of totality (+). Examples of the latter mean­ ing would be (11) (12) (13)

John defended his position with great success. John examined a mouse and then wrote a report. Mary told John the latest news in a few minutes.

The decisive thing is that when applying Kenny's test Dowty is not aware of the above distinction and in (2) he refers, in fact, to the 'perfec­ tive' or, rather, temporally definite and total aspect meaning (+TIME, +TOT), i.e. 'the coming into existence of a circle'), in (4), however, to the tempor­ ally indefinite aspect meaning (-TIME) of simple statement (that such an action actually took place). The examples constructed by Dowty (cf. also Dowty 1986: 39) simply lack the context necessary to make these distinc­ tions clear. The following examples illustrate how in a context of tempor­ ally definite and total aspectual meaning 'activities' like (4) change as it were into 'accomplishments': (14) (15)

John pushed a cart for a while and then sat down on the green. Mary swam for half an hour before she had breakfast.

In (14)-(15) the simple forms represent rather completed 'activities' which — while non-terminative — cannot, however, in any meaningful way be treated in terms of BECOME or changing states of which one is the negation of the other. We are, in fact, concerned here with a truly aspectual meaning, viz. +TIME, +TOT, that cannot adequately be described as inherent in either 'accomplishments' or 'activities.' This possibility to totalize 'ac­ tivities' with the aid of simple forms (perfective forms in Slavic) shows that aspect distinctions cannot primarily be understood as an expression of dif­ ferent verb classes or types of verb phrases, or, for that matter, of the pre­ sence or absence of an 'aspectual' operator BECOME.

10 3

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Influences of the VP-semantic approach on viewpoint aspectology

As an obvious influence of the above approach we may understand the assumption that "one must formulate a descriptive model in which lexical aspect and configurational aspect [cf. the distinction "situation aspect" vs. "viewpoint aspect" in Smith 1983/1986 and "temporal schemata" vs. "as­ pect" in Dry 1983; my remark, NBT] are expressed in terms of the same basic notions," namely that "only accomplishments and achievements are terminal, and only they can be perfective," expressed in a study by Timberlake (1985a: 35, 55; cf. also 44; see also Timberlake 1982: 317; 1985b). This understanding implies in fact that the traditional (cf. Hermann 1933: 477) "external perspective" ascribed to the 'perfective' (and equalled by Timberlake's (p. 36) suggestion that the event time is included in the narrative time) as distinguished from the traditional "internal perspective" ascribed to the 'imperfective' (equalled, correspondingly, by Timberlake's including the narrative time in the event time) necessarily presupposes terminative (telic) predicates as distinguished from non-terminative (atelic) ones. This condition does not appear to be justified, however, by any close conceptual-semantic interdependence between the two types of distinctions and would — for cases like (14) and (15) — demand an extension of the traditional concept of terminativity from representing 'presence of a spa­ tially or temporally definable terminus or goal' to representing 'presence of a general spatial and temporal delimitation' (cf. Timberlake's 1982 feature 'closure'). The latter consequence (indicated by Timberlake's view that the concept of telicity "is often assigned an interpretation that is too narrow to be useful here"; p. 51) would not be compatible with the processual appli­ cation of the 'imperfective' to spatially terminative (telic) predicates (unless one resorts — as both Dowty and Timberlake do — to intervals and 'possi­ ble worlds'; pp. 36, 44, 53, 56; see Section 8), since this application (not only in respect to the basic meaning of 'progressivity' but also in respect to the derived meaning of 'durativity'; see below) expresses the opposite of temporal delimitation (if this concept is supposed to have any sense com­ patible with its role for foreground succession in discourse; see below), whereas temporally "terminative" (in fact, atelic) predicates (cf. e.g. Rus­ sian delimitative pochodit' 'to walk for a while' and perdurative prožif 'to live through a definite amount of time') do not allow for processual 'imperfectivization' and express temporal delimitation obligatorily (cf. Thelin 1980a: 430ff.; 1980b: 177; Flier 1985).

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

11

To suggest that a predicate can be 'perfective' only if it is also termina­ tive would thus imply that the 'perfective' meaning could not be fully defined without including the terminative meaning (as was also assumed by the hypothesis of "achieved terminus" according to the 'terminativity theory'). But if the 'perfective' and 'imperfective' are assumed to represent the equipollent opposition of "external" vs. "internal" perspective (or their equivalences), we still have to explain why the 'imperfective' should not necessarily imply any terminativity, whereas the 'perfective' should. One could, of course, answer that the 'imperfective' as a consequence of its "in­ ternal" perspective can express 'just activities,' without reference to any terminus, the 'perfective' due to its "external perspective" — cannot. But this is no explanation really, since 'imperfective' predicates with terminus must refer to this terminus (without including it), and thus show that the presence/absence of the latter is not dependent on the kind of perspective. Furthermore, contrary to the common view ("activities are always imper­ fective"; Dry 1981: 234) any 'just activity' expressed by the 'imperfective' (in cases of 'actual background' functions (see below); cf. (16)) can in fact be expressed also by the 'perfective' (cf. (17)) without adding any 'ter­ minativity' except for precisely the temporal delimitation of this 'just activ­ ity' as an expression of the true aspectual meaning of the 'perfective' (for a favourable development in this respect, see Dry 1983: 23, 25), viz. the "ex­ ternal" or rather total perspective on an event (terminative or non-termina­ tive) as a precondition for its integration in the foreground of discourse; cf. : (16)

(17)

This morning John was playing tennis (when I left home). Russ.: Segodnja utrom Ivan igral(IPF) v tennis (kogda ja uexal(pF) iz domu). This morning John (got up early and) played tennis. (Then he had breakfast and left for the university.) Russ.: Segodnja utrom Ivan (vstal{vv) rano i) poigral{vv) v tennis. (Potom on pozavtrakal(PF) i uexal{v¥) v universitet.)

While Timberlake's analysis contains several observations of great value, for example, in regard to the distinction between 'accomplishments' and 'achievements' and the temporal characteristics of iteration and nega­ tion; pp. 47, 45), its main thesis apparently would amount to saying that the 'perfective' is terminative because it is 'perfective,' i.e. it would seem that the assumptions underlying such a fusion of terminativity and aspect in real­ ity are based on an implicit path of circular proof from the axiomatic point

12

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of departure "Given that a condition for the perfective in Russian is that the predicate have an inherent limit" (op.cit.: 36) via the extension of the latter referred to now as 'terminus' ("provided this notion is defined in a suffi­ ciently broad fashion"; p. 44) up to the conclusion that "the definition of terminus...is, in effect, a definition of the aorist perfective configuration" (op. cit.: 55). This judgement is strengthened by the modified adoption of Timberlake's analysis by Flier (1985: 53) in terms of "terminus accessibility," ascribed to 'accomplishments,' vs. "terminus inaccessibility," ascribed to admittedly atelic (cf. the reference to Kucera 1983: 177) predicates like those in (16)-(17) and to 'achievements.' This proposal is not only terminologically infelicitous (because the 'accessibility/non-accessibility' should refer here to access of the 'progressive viewpoint' to the interior of events rather than to their possible termini), but more seriously it suggests explicitly that there are termini in atelic predicates (although not accessi­ ble). But if terminus is not telos and not aspect, what is it then? Isn't it here just a question of the 'external' or, rather, total view expressed by such additional ('lexical') temporal meanings as the delimitative and perdurative (conveyed by the Russian prefixes po- and pro-, respectively)? Further­ more, grouping predicates with these meanings together with 'achieve­ ments' would obscure the fact that their obligatory total view (+) is of different origin: in cases of the latter it is typically due to the inherent, prag­ matically/lexically motivated meaning of instantaneous achievement of the terminus=telos (predicting the total view in cases of temporal definiteness; cf. recognize, find, reach, etc.), whereas in cases of the former it is due to the function of defining externally the duration of non-terminative=atelic events viewed as temporally definite (and under other conditions compati­ ble also with the 'internal' or, rather, partial view (-); see below), i.e. 'just activities' confined in reality by situational changes and in discourse by their corresponding integration in the chain of successive foreground events. From the point of view of psychological reality it appears problematic thus to motivate — as Timberlake suggests — any 'inherent limit' (or "ex­ pected final endpoint" as proposed in Smith 1983: 492ff.; cf. also 1986: 101) in 'just activities' such as in (16) and (17) and a corresponding terminative interpretation of cases like (17) in order to account for the use of the 'per­ fective' ('including' here, according to Smith, the endpoints, but in (16) only 'implying' them). After all, (16) and (17) represent an identical situa-

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

13

tion, only seen from two different temporal perspectives (the partial vs. total view or aspect, respectively; cf. the discussion in Section 13, p. 55). Against this background one has to ponder also the descriptive role for aspect semantics of intervals and its modalization through 'possible worlds' caused by hypotheses such as those underlying this kind of treatment, in particular the assumed descriptive adequacy of truth conditions applied to sentences (see further below). 4

'The imperfective paradox' and other consequences of the confusion of aspect and terminativity

It is symptomatic that Dowty's obvious confusion of functional levels, viz. basic situation semantics (with its change-of-state-conditions), on the one hand, and aspect semantics (as an expression of temporal perspective on such conditions), on the other, has had the notorious consequence that the only verb forms in English which are actually overtly marked for a specific aspect meaning, viz. the progressive forms, become the most seri­ ous problem for the theory: "the analysis of accomplishments in terms of BECOME-sentences was motivated (on the semantic side) by the need to capture such entailments (i.e. 'the coming about of a particular state of affairs'). Yet it is just this entailment that such a result-state comes about that fails when the accomplishment verb phrase appears in progressive tense. This is the 'imperfective paradox'" (1979: 133). Dowty goes on: "I regard the resolution of this paradox as an absolute sine qua non for the theory presented... of the distinction between activities and accomplish­ ments/achievements in terms of BECOME-sentences, since imperfective sentences would otherwise provide strong counterexamples to it... But con­ versely, I think that no analysis of the English progressive should be deemed satisfactory unless it can be shown to be compatible with some analysis or other of the verb classification, given the differing semantic effects that the progressive has on verbs of various classes" (p. 134). Dowty's dilemma can be described in more detail as follows: When dis­ cussing the truth conditions for the progressive in cases such as (1) he pro­ ceeds from his tacitly assumed 'perfective' or 'resultative' reading of the BECOME-sentence John draws a circle which he still treats as aspectually neutral in relation to (1). This evolves from his treatment of (2) the logical structure of which he understands as "the structure underlying John draws a circle, prefixed only by PAST" (p. 134). Without any aspect-semantic

14

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analysis whatsoever of simple forms he proposes now that (1) "consists of the logical structure of the tenseless sentence underlying John draws a cir­ cle, prefixed by a sentence operator PROG (for "progressive"), with this in turn prefixed by a sentence operator PAST." Faced with the fact that this treatment conflicts with traditional temporal logic according to which the truth condition is assumed to hold for moments (which would imply the coming about of a circle at every single moment of drawing), Dowty (pp. 137-138, 145ff.) sees the resolution of this 'imperfective paradox' first of all in "taking the notion of truth of an atomic sentence over an interval of time as basic." But since the progressive (even with 'accomplishments') in reality does not necessarily entail any final 'coming about' at all, he is forced to apply in addition the concept of 'possible worlds.' With further problems as consequence (see below) he attempts to motivate the latter also indepen­ dently of 'accomplishments' (p. 150ff.). Dowty's (p. 138ff.) appeal to interval semantics (for which he finds sup­ port in Bennett & Partee 1972 and Jespersen's concept of 'time-frame') and possible world semantics is a consequence thus of his inadequate, implicitly aspectual treatment of basic situational conditions in terms of change-ofstate with the operator BECOME, on the one hand, and his privative aspectual understanding of the progressive represented by the ad-hoc operator PROG presupposing the aspectual neutrality of simple forms, on the other. This becomes particularly clear from his reasoning about the compatibility of the prepositional phrases with in and for with 'accomplish­ ments' and 'activities,' respectively: "Whereas accomplishment verbs take adverbial prepositional phrases with in but only marginally take adverbials with for, activity verbs allow only the for-phrases." Dowty (pp. 56-57; cf. also 1986: 39) gives the following examples: (18) a. ? John painted a picture for an hour. b. John painted a picture in an hour. (19) a. John walked for an hour. b. (*) John walked in an hour. His comment is: "If John walked for an hour, then at any time during that hour it was true that John walked. But if John painted a picture for an hour, then it is not the case that he painted a picture at any time during that hour." In this comment aspect is used by Dowty himself in a way that reveals his basic fallacy: When referring to (19a) by saying "(it was true that) John

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

15

walked [at any time during that hour]" he is not aware that he realizes here the temporally indefinite (-TIME) meaning of 'simple statement' (because otherwise he would have said 'was walking'), whereas his reference to (18a) by saying "(it is not the case that) he painted (a picture at any time)" implies the 'perfective' or 'completive,' i.e. temporally definite (+TIME), total (+TOT) aspectual meaning (dictated by his factitive-resultative under­ standing of terminativity in terms of his concept of 'becoming,' which pre­ cludes the alternative idea of 'process towards a terminus,' expressed by progressive forms, to be falsified by him in this context; see below). Pro­ vided consistency and a corresponding temporally definite and total aspec­ tual reading also of (19a) (cf. (14)-(15)) we would, consequently, have to treat the adverbial phrase 'for an hour' as part of the semantico-syntactic structure dominated by these aspect features. Under these conditions it would indeed be necessary to formulate equal truth conditions also for (19a): 'it is not the case that John walked for an hour at any time during that hour' (for support of this analysis, see the treatment of the French passé simple as distinguished from the imparfait in Hoepelman and Rohrer 1980: esp. p. 104). As to (18a), we may assume now that 'durational' adverbs like 'for an hour' define basically non-terminative predicates and therefore should nor­ mally be expected to appear only in cases such as (19a) or in cases such as (18a), provided the latter have a non-terminative reading. This also appears to be the case, since Dowty's implicit 'perfective' interpretation does not allow here the coming into existence of a picture at any time. The 'margi­ nal' character of (18a) is due to its interpretation being dependent on a specification of its further aspectual context combined with the obligatory non-terminative reading as opposed to the terminative-resultative reading implicit in Dowty's falsification. Depending on the further context (18a) (as well as (19a)) can against this background be interpreted as an expression either of the temporally definite (+TIME) and total (+) aspectual meaning of (20) or the temporally indefinite (-TIME) aspectual meaning of 'simple statement' of (21): (20) (21)

John painted (a picture) for an hour and then went down to the café. John painted (a picture) for an hour, since he could not think of anything better to do.

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The 'processual' or, rather, partial (-; see below) aspectual mean­ ing expressed by the progressive would be equally natural in a correspond­ ing case of temporal definiteness where reference is made to the action not as delimited or totalized unit (as in (20)) but in regard to one of its explicitly or (like here) all its implicitly (potentially; cf. Thelin 1978: 33; 1985: 181ff.) relevant parts or phases: (22)

John was painting (a picture) for an hour in his studio. He may not have heard the telephone downstairs. When did you say you phoned?

In (20)-(22) the complement 'a picture' seems acceptable given the non-terminative reading expressed explicitly by (20') (21') (22')

John spent an hour painting a picture and then went down to the café. John spent an hour painting a picture, since he could not think of anything better to do. John was busy painting a picture for an hour in his studio. He may not have heard the telephone downstairs. When did you say you phoned?

It is interesting that the non-terminative reading of (20)-(22) which — irrespectively of the given temporal perspective (i.e. aspect meaning) — treats the action without consideration of its result must be made explicit in Swedish by means of a prepositional phrase localizing the action as it were 'at the object': (20") (21") (22")

John malade en timme pa en tavla (lit. 'at a picture') och gick sedan ned till kafét. John malade en timme pâ en tavla dà han inte hade nâgot bättre att göra. John höll pa i en timme och malade (= the paraphrastic Swedish 'progressive') pa en tavla i sin ateljé. Han kan ha undgatt att hora telefonen pa nedre botten. När sa du att du ringde?

As to (19a) its interpretation is dependent only on the aspectual con­ text, since 'walk' expresses here non-terminativity unambiguously. Whereas 'paint a picture' may have a non-terminative reading, 'walk a mile' apparently may not. That is why the non-terminative expression 'for an hour' appears to be incompatible with the latter:

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

(23)

17

* John walked a mile for an hour.

Conversely, the terminative expression 'in an hour' is compatible only with the terminative reading of 'paint a picture' as in (18b) but not with the non-terminative meaning expressed by 'walk' in (19b). It is perfectly well compatible, however, with the terminative 'walk a mile': (24)

John walked a mile in an hour.

That we are concerned here not with aspect proper (as suggested by, e.g., Verkuyl's 1972 treatment of corresponding conditions; cf. also Dowty 1986: 39ff.) appears to follow also from the (contextual) acceptability of the 'processual' variant of (24) in the latter's temporally definite reading: (25)

?John was walking a mile in an hour.

If the latter example (according to my informants) tends to receive an iterative reading, this would rather indicate that 'in an hour' conveys not only terminativity but in addition conclusivity, i.e. the obligatory achieve­ ment of a terminus. The latter meaning is not aspectual, i.e. perspectival, per se, but it entails the total aspectual view. Exactly as with 'achievement' verbs, the use of the progressive (imperfective forms in Slavic) would then be restricted here (compare Russian za cas 'in an hour') to cases where total events are presented as embedded in superior iterative/iterative-processual structures. That the distinction between 'in an hour' and 'for an hour' is not primarily aspectual is evident from the fact that 'for an hour' can appear with any aspect meaning. The above analysis indicates that the concept of 'aspectual classes of verbs' is misleading and should be replaced rather by an account of the perti­ nent linguistic facts in terms of fairly transparent semantico-syntactic (only in a derived sense verb-semantic) conditions distinct from the aspect oppositions of temporal perspective. It is true that Dowty (1979: 60-62; 1986: 39) is aware to some extent of the difficulties implicit in the distinction between 'activities' and 'ac­ complishments' as adopted by him from Kenny and Vendler, but instead of clarifying the fundamental semantico-syntactic nature of these difficulties (as reflected, for example, by conditions of complementation; cf. the criti­ cism in Pankhurst 1982: 185) and, above all, drawing the corresponding conclusions for the descriptive adequacy of his central concept of BECOME (which in reality represents an amalgamation of the semanticosyntactic (deep case) entity of an action with its terminus (goal), on the one

18

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hand, and the aspect-semantic feature of 'perfectivity' or, rather, total perspective, on the other, i.e. the hierarchically complex meaning of 'an action having achieved its terminus') he prefers to treat them as cases of "lexical ambiguity" and as "involving thorny problems of polysemy versus homophony." This misconception of Dowty's can be illustrated by his treat­ ment (1979: 71) of verb-particle constructions as indicating "unambiguously that an accomplishment is intended" (cf. also Brecht 1985: 14). Comparing thus clean the room vs. clean the room up, but hereby erroneously taking the particle to represent not only explicit terminativity but also a difference in aspect, he concludes: "so in a sense this particle is the closest thing Eng­ lish has to a marker of perfective aspect." If this were so, we would have problems to explain the perfectly normal appearance of this verb-particle construction with the aspectual-processual (-) meaning of the 'imperfective' progressive: (26) 5

John was cleaning the room up when the telephone rang.

The proper interdependence between situation/discourse and aspect semantics

The conditions discussed above do not motivate thus any operator BECOME on the linguistic level of aspectualization and its adequateness on the situation-semantic level is questionable if not given its generalization to the extent that it could also be replaced by the original concept of CHANGE-OF-STATE. However, Dowty's resort to interval semantics and possible world semantics is caused, as we have seen, by his exclusively terminative-resultative or conclusive, i.e. implicitly 'perfective' aspectual (+TIME, +) understanding of the concept 'become,' whereas the less specific concept of change seems more easily amenable also to the 'imperfective' aspectual (+TIME, -TOT) meaning of 'process,' i.e. as process of change. Such a processual understanding is certainly possible also in the case of 'become' if the latter concept is not restricted to its philosophical-situational use but considered with regard to aspectual differentiation proper. This has been illustrated by the suggestion made by Aqvist (1977) and Aqvist & Günthner (1978), viz. to postulate for such cases the meaning of 'gradual becoming.' However, their 'imperfective-progressive' operator 'BecomingMoreAndMore' suffers still from the same misconception as to the assumed aspectual nature of 'accomplishments' and implies, correspond-

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

19

ingly, a different treatment of the progressive in cases of 'activities' (namely, with the "simpler progressive operator" 'Being'). As indicated by the problem of psychological reality involved in the assertion of an eventual outcome of progressive 'accomplishments' (not solved really neither by Dowty's 'possible worlds' (see further below) nor by the concept of 'gradual becoming'; cf. 'John is writing x in such a way that it is becoming more and more the case that x is a letter'), this suggestion does not remove the blur­ red relationship between situation semantics and aspect semantics and, above all, it neglects the important fact that the condition whether a change is reported to take place or not is dependent exactly on the temporally perspectivaly i.e. aspect-semantic analysis of situational structure. This dependency should not be understood to be absolute, of course, since we have to assume that the analysis of reality in terms of situation-semantic structure by way of universal mechanisms of perception (see below) and conception (as well as conventional-pragmatic patterns of deduction) to a considerable extent automatizes temporal perspectivization, i.e. aspectualization. The decisive thing is, however, that this perspectivization is not pre­ dictable by reality but leaves space for individual viewpoints on various situ­ ations and their specific cause-effect relations and corresponding conditions of temporal-logical coherence, exercizing in this way an important influence on the situation-semantic analysis (for a close understanding see Merrill 1985a: 69; cf. also Bull 1960: 11-12, Gasparov in this volume). The system of aspect distinctions therefore must be understood as an instrument of analysis taking part already in the situation analysis in a process of constant feed-back between the latter and linguistic encoding. Smith (1983: 493-99; cf. also Smith 1986: 97ff.) has made the valuable suggestion that situation analysis can be understood as associations of actual situations with idealized situations. Correspondingly, she considers aspect choice to be a function of such 'standard' and 'non-standard' associa­ tions. This suggestion is compatible — as far as it goes — with the universal understanding sketched above, but receives within Smith's overall endpoint treatment of aspect as inherent in both (idealized) situation types and view­ points on the latter a restricted explication without the prerequisites assumed by her (p. 480) for a generalized, cross-linguistic treatment of the relationship between situation and aspect semantics. Under these condi­ tions the role of temporal-perspectival, i.e. truly aspectual, analysis as an integrated part of basic situational analysis is overlooked ("in English, viewpoint generally does not identify situation type"; p. 497).

20

NILS B. THELIN

Notwithstanding Smith's ambition recently (1986) to treat aspect from a more consistently deductive, speaker-based view (for similar proposals, see also Thelin 1978: 35, 69ff., 106ff., 1985: 156, 158, 160, 162ff., Hopper 1982b: 16, Timberlake 1982: 310, Parret 1985: 145ff.), by suggesting a uni­ versal approach to situation structure as based on human "perceptual and cognitive faculties" (p. 99; cf. also Thelin 1985: passim) and an explicitly viewpoint-based understanding of aspect (usually missing in modern aspectology; cf., however, DeLancey 1982, Wallace 1982, Timberlake 1985b), her remaining dependence on the traditional idea of verb-semantic aspectuality, and the resulting hypothesis of aspect semantics being based crucially on the "interaction" of 'situation aspect' and 'viewpoint aspect,' more spec­ ifically, that "In English viewpoint aspect is dependent on situation aspect" (p. 100), leads, after all, to a predominantly inductive view on aspect, restricting its functions to the domain of sentences ("I take aspect to be a property of sentences"; 1983: 480; "The contrast between perfective and imperfective viewpoint is one component of sentential aspect, and another component is the type of situation talked about"; 1986: 97; cf. also 104). One serious consequence of Smith's sentence-semantic restriction of aspect analysis and the corresponding assumption that her endpoint treat­ ment of verb classes/situations ('states' have no endpoints, whereas 'ac­ tivities,' 'accomplishments' and 'achievements' do have) tied to the view­ point distinction, i.e. the traditional Slavistic opposition 'perfective' (situa­ tion viewed as a whole) vs. 'imperfective' (situation viewed from the inside), would be sufficient to grasp the essence of aspect, is that sentence functions of aspect remain uncorrelated with discourse functions of aspect, in particular with the foreground/background distinction. Under these cir­ cumstances temporally indefinite background events like, for example, habituais — expressed by "perfective" simple forms — are also treated as aspectually 'perfective' (i.e. representing events viewed as a whole), although they do not express the sense of completion associated with tem­ porally definite 'perfective' events of succession in the foreground. The reason for this fact Smith (p. 103), consequently, wants to see in the endpoint characteristics of habituais: like states they are assumed to have no endpoints to be included by the total view. This 'solution' has to face the fact that habituais are typically expressed by 'imperfective' forms in Slavic and by the 'imperfective' imparfait in French. Aware of the latter fact, but not of the possibility of polysemy in language-specific, morphologically determined constellations of distinctive aspectual components (cf. Thelin

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

21

1986; see pp. 7,28,47,75ff.), Smith (1986: 99, 105-106, 110; cf. also 1983: 481) leaves the reader with the less convincing conclusion that habituais in Eng­ lish and French are expressions of two identical situations but with two dif­ ferent viewpoints, viz. the 'perfective' and 'imperfective,' respectively. The postulated distinction between situation aspect and viewpoint aspect is, in fact, not kept consistent throughout in Smith's treatment of habituais either (on p. 112 she refers to them also as 'viewpoints'). One of the preconditions for removing this problematic situation is to recognize, at last, the role of polysemy in language, more specifically that the French imparfait — precisely as Slavic imperfective forms — is a polysemie expression for the temporally definite (+TIME) and 'processual' or, rather, partial (-) aspect meaning (expressed by the English progres­ sive), on the one hand, and the temporally indefinite (-TIME) aspect mean­ ing (expressed, for example, by habituais, and conveyed in English by sim­ ple forms), on the other (in support of this analysis see Mourelatos 1981: 199). It should by now be evident that Smith's approach does not have at its disposal the theoretical instruments necessary for a truly universal treat­ ment of aspect as viewpoint, i.e. as a system of perceptually based concep­ tual-semantic distinctions for temporal-perspectival analysis of events (cf. Thelin in this volume) according to their broader pragmatic-situational con­ text and corresponding supra-sentential status in discourse. The proper integration of situation analysis and aspectual analysis is thus indispensible for our understanding of the temporal organisation of discourse, in particular, in regard to the foreground/background distinc­ tion. Aspect can be said to be dependent on situation only in the sense that its application is restricted by the primitive perceptual distinction between phasal and non-phasal situations, more specifically by non-phasality, reflected by pragmatic-lexical stativity, whereas, as we shall see below, the crucial feature of situation structure, namely CHANGE-OF-STATE, is dependent — in a true sense — on aspect. For example, what to someone appears to be a state-changing fore­ ground event, to someone else may appear to be just part of a process related directly to the foreground but not qualifying for a new state of affairs, or, it may even be viewed rather as a proper background condition only indirectly related to the foreground. Of course, different situation types, i.e. in a lexical or, rather, semantico-syntactic sense, can be said to appear in proper background too, but their temporal properties are deter­ mined then by the perspective of backgrounding, namely temporal indefi-

22

NILS . THELIN

niteness — which makes devices of definite temporal analysis such as 'inter­ vals' and 'endponts' (or totality and partiality, for that matter) irrelevant or (in cases of embedding; see below) of subordinate relevance. From these conditions it would thus follow that temporal perspectivization cannot be understood properly unless related to a broader pragmatic concept of situation structure in terms of states and changes of states (includ­ ing actual perception but also world knowledge and ideological positions), and that aspect (the semantic system of perceptual-conceptual distinctions structuring this temporal perspective), correspondingly, cannot be fully understood unless treated as a function of discourse organisation assigned only secondarily to individual propositions or sentences. 6

Towards a deductive situation/discourse-based analysis of aspect

The above understanding does not agree with Dowty's (1986) inductive and basically 'aspectless' (cf. pp. 48, 59) treatment of temporal organisation in discourse. Rather it gives strong support to Kamp's (1979; cf. also Hop­ per and Thompson 1980 and, within an interval-semantic framework, Dorfmüller-Karpusa 1987) essentially deductive idea of constructing dis­ course representations the task of which is to specify among other things precisely the temporal relations between sentences. Truth-conditional interpretations would apply here only secondarily and not to individual sen­ tences directly. With or without truth-conditional interpretations, this mode of procedure is capable of reflecting more properly the decisive role of aspectual distinctions in basic situation analysis and corresponding dis­ course construction, on the one hand, and of including the broader concept of pragmatic conditions (cf. Kamp, op.cit.: 407-9) as natural part of situa­ tion analysis, on the other. As distinguished from the idea of "taking the notion of truth of a sentence with respect to an interval of time as primi­ tive" (Dowty 1986: 44), Kamp's discourse representation is based on the idea of taking events as primitive. The latter idea is a more fruitful one (as we shall see), in particular if given an interpretation of events in terms of the fundamental perceptual distinction between motion and rest or, more explicitly, between phasal and non-phasal situations (not always implied by the traditional distinction between non-states and states; see below), under­ stood as basic, i.e. as not interchangeable by subsequent situationalperspectival analysis. Kamp's proposals — to my mind among the most stimulating in modern aspectology — create thus a conceptual framework

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

23

within which the temporal-perspectival organisation of discourse could be understood also as a speaker-based procedure of perceiving, conceiving and reporting events according to a) their inherent physical properties (±PHASAL), b) their temporal-causal relations to other events resulting from the integrated situational-perspectival analysis (represented by the situational distinctions ±CHANGE-OF-STATE, ±CHANGE-OFSTATE-EMBEDDED and ±CHANGE-OF-STATE-RELATED and realized, correspondingly, by the discourse-perspectival functions of foreground, contextual foreground, actual background and proper back­ ground; see below), and c) the perceptually and conceptually based semantic features for structuring the temporal-perspectival analysis of dis­ course for linguistic implementation (±TIME, ±TOT). This would appear to be at least one feasible way of answering hypothetically the important question raised by Kamp (p. 391ff.) as a natural consequence of his basically deduc­ tive, hierarchical-processual understanding of temporal structure in dis­ course: ...one of the distinctive features of the concepts of time and temporal order which underlies the formal developments of this paper is the thesis that the structure of time depends on the conceptual framework that is employed in the determination of the events which, according to the pre­ sent theory, form the basis of that structure. This seems to introduce into the notion of temporal structure an important subjective element. It is an interesting, but extremely difficult, question how much room the present conception nonetheless leaves for an objective component to the notion as well. Essentially this comes down to the question what conceptual schemes are possible: can we carve up the 'natural flow of things' in just any way we like — and thus extract from it any temporal structure you might wish; or are the conceptual frames accessible to us restricted by an intrinsic order of nature, or by an intrinsic order in the interactions between nature and mind?

It is to be regretted thus that when aspect finally is rediscovered as viewpoint (cf. Timberlake 1982, 1985b; Delancey 1982, Smith 1983/1986, Dry 1983), the scope of this insight is restricted by the influence of the last­ ing verb-semantic (semantico-syntactic) bias with difficulties to recognize the interrelations of sentential aspect and aspectual functions in discourse as consequence. Under these circumstances the temporal-perspectival nature of the distinction foreground/background (or figure/ground; cf. Wal­ lace 1982, Chvany 1985; see also Givón 1979: 131, 138) is not fully under­ stood and the role of this distinction for narrative discourse is even ques­ tioned (Flier and Timberlake 1985: 11):

24

NILS . THELIN ...the mechanisms for stating a correlation between aspect and narrative function is obscure, and the motivation for such a correlation, when one tries to make it explicit, is not obvious, to the point that, in our view, it is questionable whether the simple division of narrative functions into figure and ground is adequate for the description of narrative structure, and whether these notions — given that they are inherently atemporal, while narrative structure is primarily temporal — are even the correct ones for the description of narrative structure.

Dowty's (1986) sentence-based attempt to analyze temporal properties of discourse also remains heavily influenced by his verb-semantic or (now more explicitly) semantico-syntactic understanding of aspect accompanied by his failure to recognize the aspectual properties of English simple forms. His interval-definition of the progressive leads to the questionable assump­ tion that "any sentence with a progressive tense, no matter what the aspec­ tual class of its lexical verb, is a stative sentence" (see below). Under these conditions the whole enterprise boils down to a question what (secondary) effects the aspectual classes have on his ad-hoc sequencing rule. Aspect as temporal perspective, i.e. as a precondition not only for sequencing but also for the crucial discourse distinction between foreground and background (e.g. in cases of iteratives and habituais; cf. op.cit.: 57), remains entirely unexplainable in this kind of treatment. Hinrichs' (1986) attempt to formulate — in terms of reference points — an event structure construction rule according to Kamp's proposals is more promising, but suffers still from the lacking distinction between Aktionsarten and aspect proper (cf. e.g. his view that "events described in the progressive behave in exactly the same way as events that belong to the Aktionsarten of 'states' and 'activities'"; p. 69). Under these circumstances the temporal organisation of discourse to considerable extent remains dependent on inductive, sentence-semantic conditions and becomes a mat­ ter just of sequence and overlap vs. non-overlap. Although suffering still from the verb-semantic/situational (rather than perspectival) and, correspondingly, sentence-based understanding of aspect, Dry's (1981) analysis of the movement of narrative time — thanks to her considerations of change-of-state conditions (implying, as we have seen, in fact aspectual perspective) — offers quite a few pertinent observa­ tions, in particular in regard to implication of change between successive states (see below). However, since not aware of the interrelations of situa­ tion and aspect analysis, Dry (p. 240) from the fact that there is in such cases no overt expression of change draws the less convincing conclusion

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

25

that "such stative sentences also provide evidence that perfectivity is not the crucial factor in narrative time shift." Dry (1983) modifies this treatment along lines similar to those in Smith (1983), i.e. by making a distinction between verb-semantic/situational prop­ erties ("temporal schemata," p. 23ff.), on the one hand, and "the aspect of a sentence [as indicating] a particular way of viewing the temporal consti­ tuency of a situation [viz. referring] to the action... in its entirety... [or] by contrast... to the internal structure of the situation," on the other. Unfortu­ nately, this advantageous development is hampered by the same simplistic treatment of aspect semantics as with Smith, namely as a matter mainly of "reference to temporal points... usually the endpoints of situations" (p. 20). As a restricted explanation of the 'movement of narrative time' the 'perfective' inclusion of initial and final endpoints (cf. the concept of 'clo­ sure' in Timberlake 1982: 311) certainly could be equalled with the total view. However, if this feature is considered to constitute also the basis for the distinction between foreground and background (as suggested by Dry in a privative fashion, p. 48), we cannot avoid encountering difficulties. If background, accordingly, is seen to be "composed of those sentences that... do not refer to a single point (e.g. imperfectives, habituais, iteratives)," this would be a proper statement for habituais and iteratives (as expressions of temporal indefiniteness) but not for 'imperfectives,' since the latter accord­ ing to Dry include also the progressive (pp. 25ff., 29, 37). Under these conditions the temporally definite and partial meaning of aspectual process (conveyed by the progressive and based precisely on a reference to a point or, rather, to a part of an event projected onto a point of time; see below) remains unrelated to the temporally definite and total meaning of aspectual event and, in consequence, systematically undistinguishable from the temporally indefinite meanings of habituais, iteratives, etc. (leading to one undifferentiated concept of background). The outcome is considerable obscurity in regard to the aspect-semantic content and temporal-perspectival functions in discourse not only of the progressive but also the simple forms. Dry, consequently, adduces also examples in the simple past as representing 'imperfective/progressive' and ascribes to them "pro­ gressive aspect, not progressive tense, although progressive tense... would have the same aspectual value" (p. 25).. This is assumed to be the case in the last italicized sentence of:

26

NILS . THELIN

(27)

Now in summer the treeless streets were still bright and hot at seven. Planes gaining altitude from the airport ten miles south cut the thick, glaring sky... broken swings of painted steel play-gyms screeched beside the driveways.

The view that screeched could be replaced by were screeching without changing the aspect meaning is similar to the questionable idea of 'aspec­ tual competition' in Slavistic aspectology (suggesting arbitrary choice; for a critical discussion cf. Thelin 1978: 102-4 and Merrill 1985b: 145ff.) and neglects here the crucial distinction between temporally indefinite proper background and temporally definite actual background (related directly to state-changing foreground events). In (27) it would appear that we are con­ cerned rather with the proper background perspective presenting events (here iterative events) as both spatially and temporally indefinite (-TIME; compare the predominant use of plurals to denote locations and subjects; for a discussion of 'multiplicity' and aspect, cf. Timberlake 1982: 315ff.; Merrill 1985a; see further Section 12 below). In the following sentence (28)

He found trivial all that was meant to charm him and did not answer the glances which invited him to be bold.

Dry (p. 37) considers the which clause to be "imperfective/progressive in semantic aspect, although the form is that of simple past." Depending on the further context this could, in fact, be either a case of proper background perspective presenting events (viz. habitual or, rather, potential events originating from a characteristic behaviour or attitude) as temporally indefi­ nite (-TIME) and expressed by English simple forms, or — as indicated rather by Dry's perception of time movement in the two first events — a case of foreground perspective presenting these two events as spatially and temporally definite (+TIME) and total (+) and expressed likewise by sim­ ple forms (as a polysemic expression of both aspect meanings; see above). The which clause and its predicate invited would under these circumstances indeed represent a different situational-aspectual meaning, but apparently not one of ongoing event, as suggested by Dry, because the hypothetical alternative use of the progressive {were inviting) would be deviating. Rather we are concerned with a modal use of 'invite' (expressing desire) entailing the stative meaning characteristic of modals, and precluding thus the aspec­ tual meaning of process expressed by the progressive. Provided one can (in spite of the expressions of multiplicity) imagine here a definite succession of

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

27

events (in the general sense), inverted superficially by syntactic subordina­ tion (cf.: 'x intend charm' > 'y find trivial' > 'x invite' > 'y not answer'), 'invite' would then be an example of a state defined temporally by its embedding in (contextual delimitation/totalization by) foreground events (see above, p. 23, and below). According to the understanding indicated previously and supported by a consistent conceptual-deductive interpretation of Kamp's framework, we might assume that events representing 'mediate' SITUATIONAL STATES (i.e. 'proper background' in discourse) are implemented linguistically by temporally indefinite (-TIME) pragmatic-lexical states (reflecting non-phasal situations) or non-states (reflecting phasal situations) in the form of itera­ tives, habituais, generics etc.; in cases of 'immediate' SITUATIONAL STATES, viz. CHANGE-OF-STATE-RELATED SITUATIONAL STATES (i.e. 'actual background' directly related to 'foreground' in dis­ course, cf. Thelin 1984b: 266, 281; 1985: 181, 185ff.) and CHANGE-OFSTATE-EMBEDDED SITUATIONAL STATES (i.e. 'contextual fore­ ground,' cf. Thelin 1984b: 266, 285; see also Chvany 1985: 266) — by tem­ porally definite (+TIME) states or non-states. In the former case non-states appear as aspectual processes (-), in the latter — just as contextually aspectualized, viz. delimited/totalized events. States in both cases are aspectualized only externally-contextually: in the first case (of simultaneity) by implied change (temporarity), in the second case (of succession) by totalizing factual change realized by surrounding foreground events. CHANGES-OF-(SITUATIONAL-) STATES (i.e. 'foreground' in dis­ course) are normally represented only by temporally definite (+TIME) nonstates in the form of aspectual events (+; applying obligatorily to 'achieve­ ments' which, apparently, might be conceived of as 'mono-phasals') or by their implication (cf. Dry 1981) between old and new SITUATIONAL STATES (see below, p. 64). These assumptions could be formalized tenta­ tively by the following flow-chart for narrative encoding illustrated by cor­ responding English and Russian preterite examples (the present/future tense system, as well as the perfect tense-taxis system, considered in part in the decoding models below, could easily be built also into this model; cf. Section 22, 23; see Thelin forthcoming b, c):

28

NILS . THELIN

(29)

+PHASAL SITUATIONS-

+CHANGE-OF-STATE-

+CHANGE-OF-STATE-EMBEDDED-

+CHANGE-OF-STATE-EMBEDDED-

+CHANGE-OF-STATE-RELATED-

forenon-stative ground contexutal event foreground event

non-stative actual background event

non-stative proper background event

+CHANGE-OF-STATE-RELATED-

stative contextual foreground event

stative actual background event

stative proper backgr. event

I

I

I

I

I

I

I

+TIME +TOT 1

+TIME

+TIME -TOT 1

-TIME

+TIME

+TIME

-TIME

1

1

1

1

Prog/

Simple/

Simple/

Simple/

Simple/

!

11Simple/Simple/

1

1

1

1

1

PF

IPF

IPF

IPF

IPF

IPF

IPF

Ex.(a)

(b)

(c)

(d)

(e)

(0

(g)

(a)

Having finished breakfast, John kissed Mary and left for work. Pozavtrakav, Dion poceloval(PF) Meri i uexal (PF) na rabotu.

(b)

Having kissed Mary, John listened impatiently to her worries about the children and hurried away to work. Pocelovav Meri, Dion s neterpeniem slusal(IPF)  zaboty o detjax i pospesil(PF) na rabotu.

(c)

John was already finishing the morning paper when Mary came down for break­ fast. Dion uie docityval(IPF) utrennjuju gazetu, kogda Meri spustilas'(PF)zavtrakat'.

(d) John usually got up earlier than Mary. Dion obyčno vstaval(IPF) ran'se Meri. (e)

Mary poured herself a cup of coffee. First she didn't want to say anything. Then after all she asked John how he had slept. Meri nalila{vF) sebe casku kofe. Snacala ona ne xotela{i?F) nicego skazat'. Potom vse-taki sprosila(PF) Diona,  on spal(IPF).

(f)

John was lost in thought when Mary entered the study. Dion byl(IPF) pogruzen v svoi mysli, kogda Meri vosla(PF) v kabinet.

(g)

John and Mary had three children and a nice house. U Diona i Meri byloi(IPF) troe detej i prekrasnyj dom.

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

29

The above model is understood to reflect situational-perspectival analysis as an integrated feed-back (possibly, circuit-like; cf. Thelin 1985) procedure of encoding (thus allowing for STATE/CHANGE-OF-STATE and hierarchically lower situational distinctions to be dependent on aspec­ tual analysis). According to the degree of predictability determined by the equivalence of coherence in reality and discourse, respectively, this proce­ dure may probably be automatized to a considerable extent, allowing for a significant reduction of the analytical steps. This would hold to a still larger extent for corresponding procedures of decoding starting from a linguistic input differentiated by aspectual expres­ sions and, furthermore, relying heavily upon discourse coherence as an expression of the situational-perspectival analysis of reality accomplished already (and amenable to a secondary analysis or perhaps independent interpretation only to the extent that it leaves space for this by suppressing or omitting temporal-causal conditions, for example, by a general emphasis on DESCRIPTIO rather than on NARRATIO (see below). Situationalperspectival decoding, therefore, is not just performing the encoding proce­ dure in the reverse direction. There appears to be a parallelism though in the sense that both procedures are based on an equivalent hierarchy of con­ ceptual-semantic distinctions underlying the general strategy of asking only such questions and asking them only in such order that they warrant the shortest way to an adequate answer. Aspect>discourse>situation-analysis in English and Russian might be conceived of as proceeding according to the tentative models of decoding suggested in Figures (30) and (31). 7

States as non-phasal situations and the aspectual distinction totality vs. partiality

Genuine pragmatic-lexical states (know, love, exist, own etc.) are per se temporally indefinite and can, as indicated already above, be defined temporally only indirectly by state-changing events or their implication. In this respect Vendler's classification thus implies at least one important timesemantic distinction, viz. between states and non-states. This distinction (dependent in turn on the fundamental conceptual-semantic distinction between absence and presence, respectively, of VOLITIONAL CON­ TROL; cf. Thelin 1978: 94ff.; Smith 1983: 489; cf. also Flier 1985: 54ff.) is not aspectual in itself, however, but has consequences for aspectualization: states, having no internal phasal structure, cannot by themselves be defined

30

NILS . THELIN

(30)

English

,+PROG +TIME-

+STATE-_

+'Perfect / State'-

+ 'Perfect State'+Contextual foreground/ I totalizationActual background IMMEDIATE CHANGE-OFSTATERELATED SIT.STATE

(31)

IMMEDIATE CHANGE-OFSTATEEMBEDDED SIT.STATE

Russian

Actual background

Foreground

Proper background

IMMEDIATE CHANGE-OF STATERELATED SIT.STATE

CHANGE-OFSTATE

MEDIATE SIT. STATE

+PF-

/+TIME+'Perfect state'■

Actual background IMMEDIATE CHANGE-OF STATERELATED SIT. STATE

i

+Contextual foreground I totalization-

Foreground CHANGE-OFSTATE

IMMEDIATE CHANGE-OF STATEEMBEDDED SIT. STATE

Actual background

Proper background

IMMEDIATE CHANGE-OF STATERELATED SIT. STATE

MEDIATE SIT. STATE

as holding at specific points of time by references to their internal structure, whereas non-states (except for 'achievements' as 'mono-phasals') have such phasal structure and can be defined temporally by references to their inter­ nal phases or parts (cf. Thelin 1984a: 231; 1985: 183; in this volume). The partial aspectual meaning (-), suggested in Thelin 1978 (p. 31ff.) as counterpart to the traditional concept of total aspectual meaning (cf. Saus­ sure 1949: 161; S0rensen 1949:111-12; Dostál 1954: 15ff. ; Maslov 1959: 30712; Isacenko 1968: 348-50; Forsyth 1970: 8; Bondarko 1971: lOff.; Comrie 1976: 16; Thelin 1978: 31 ff.; Bach 1980; Smith 1983: 482, 492; 1986: 101, 103) within one equipollent aspect-semantic opposition (as opposed to the

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

31

traditional privative/markedness treatment of the latter meaning; cf. Brecht 1985: 11, 14, 18, 23, 33; for criticism see Thelin 1978: llOff., Townsend 1985: 286ff.), offers thus a simple solution of the notorious problem why statives in English usually do not take the progressive, namely because the progressive expresses the aspectual-processual meaning of partiality (-) and states cannot be analysed in terms of parts, i.e. cannot be 'frozen' in one specific phase of motion as non-states can (cf. also Thelin 1978: 92-97, 100; 1984a: 231; for independent evidence in favour of this explanation, see Boguslawski 1972: 232, Langacker 1982: 270, 285). Smith's (1986: 101) suggestion that states are characterized by not including any endpoints of their own reflects within an other framework the above observations. How­ ever, in view of the latter, her hypothesis that the progressive always implies endpoints (see above, pp. 12, 19), and that this condition would explain its incompatibility with states, becomes less convincing. Against the background of the above discussion of the necessary inte­ gration of situational and aspectual analysis it appears that Smith's term "non-standard association" as applied to English progressive statives gives a not fully adequate impression of the actual conceptual-semantic range of aspectual-perspectival operations, contradicting in fact her own observation (1983: 497; cf. also 1986: 98) that progressive statives "cannot be consid­ ered marginal." This is natural because they are an expression of the per­ fectly normal situational-aspectual analysis resulting in the temporal perspective of definiteness and partiality on events (in the general sense of the word) of direct relevance for (simultaneous with) the foreground. This perspective operates on phases typical of non-stative events. But it can, as progressive statives show, under certain conditions operate also on stative events. To interpret this circumstance so, as Smith (1983: 497ff.; 1986: 98) does, that an actual state is associated with an event (in the specific sense) situation type by treating it aspectually as an event, would apparently not be entirely correct, since one should then expect also the independent 'ex­ ternal' or total perspective to be possible — which it is not. So we still must be concerned with a stative event, but at the same time also with phasality. How is this apparent contradiction to be explained? My suggestion is the following: if we overlook cases where the underlying situation indeed involves features of non-stativity (with event-inherent phases and/or voli­ tional control; cf. Smith's 1983 examples (40a, b), e.g. (32) a. b.

They are being rude. He is being quiet. ),

32

NILS B.THELIN

progressive statives can be understood basically as expressing the aspectual meaning of temporal definiteness (+TIME) and partiality (-) operating now on stative events as single wholes, i.e. as parts or macrophases of broader processes of discourse development, with the latter often only tacitly implied as are processes in cases of the usual event-inherent applica­ tion of these aspect features (see below). This interpretation might be a reasonable explanation for the general feature of inferred dynamism of pro­ gressive statives specified as meanings of temporarity and changeability (cf. Smiths examples (36a,b), (37a-d) and (39a-d)), or intensity (cf. Smith's examples (38a-e), e.g. (33)

I am missing you dreadfully ;

for a more detailed discussion see Thelin forthc. a; cf. also Thelin 1978: 9297). A treatment in terms of totality vs. partiality has received support in subsequent interpretations of aspect related to the count vs. mass distinc­ tion (cf. Bach 1980, 1986; Hoepelman & Rohrer 1980; Carlson 1981; Mourelatos 1981; Langacker 1982; Wallace 1982). In his implicitly aspec­ tual analysis of 'events' and 'processes' Bach (1980: 28ff.) ascribes to them the features of count and mass terms, respectively, and specifies, corres­ pondingly, events as characterized by indivisibility, processes by additivity (for a similar view arrived at in another theoretical context, see also Hirtle 1967: 26ff.). Hoepelman & Rohrer (op.cit.: l0lff.), by applying the same distinction to an analysis of the French passé simple and imparfait, respec­ tively, arrive — within their interval-oriented framework — at the assump­ tion that the relationship between expression and interval is represented by either "total or partial functions" (see further below). Perceptual-conceptual support for the above aspect distinction is fur­ nished by Gestalt psychology and its hypothesis of perceptual objects in terms of 'parts' and 'wholes' (cf. Köhler 1929, Koffka 1935, Herrmann 1957: 24; Thelin 1985: 163; in this volume: Sections 2.5, 4.2) as well as Bergson's philosophy of time (see discussion in Thelin in this volume: Sec­ tion 5.). The equipollent partiality concept is in concord also with the componential or segmental understanding of perceptual-conceptual processing of motion (behaviour) in perception psychology (cf. Johansson 1950, 1964), psycholinguistics (cf. Miller & Johnson-Laird 1976: 85-89) and social psychology (cf. Newtson et al. 1978). The traditional concept of 'duration' (for a critical discussion of this concept as a "metrical parameter" distin-

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

33

guished from the "topological parameter of progressivity," see Timberlake 1982: 313-15) as well as Jespersen's 'time-frame'-theory and interval seman­ tics disguise this partial nature of the aspectual-processual meaning. The latter is reflected, however, in an original way in Vlach's (1981: 287) noninterval treatment of the progressive in terms of an operator STAT chang­ ing processes into states as an equivalent expression of their being frozen in one of their phases. A corresponding "stativizing" function is ascribed to the 'progressive' predicate ING by Langacker (1982: 281ff.). The generalized, interval-based stative interpretation of the progressive prop­ osed by Dowty (1986; see above) would, however, obscure the basic dis­ tinction of phasality (as a precondition for the application of the progres­ sive) and non-phasality (as a characteristic feature of states) as well as the corresponding distinctive temporal-perspectival functions of states and pro­ gressive non-states in discourse: whereas states (if not related directly to or embedded in the foreground) are typically temporally indefinite (-TIME) and in a natural way belong to the 'proper background,' progressive non-states (states only under certain conditions; see above) are typically temporally definite (+TIME) and belong usually to the 'actual background.' It is interesting that Dowty originally (1972: 132; cf. Thelin 1978: 61) had a pretty close understanding of the 'imperfective' aspect (represented by the progressive) as involving the concept of partiality, but as a conse­ quence of his truth-conditional analysis and the corresponding treatment of aspect semantics as a matter rather of 'temporal environment' isolated from the temporal structure of events themselves (see above) this concept was applied by him not to events associated (definitely) with time but to "a larger interval of time" for which the "atomic" event was assumed to be "possibly true" (for a parallel understanding of the progressive of a sen­ tence as "a partitive operation in the time domain," i.e. by relating the truth condition to "internal subperiods of the temporal range of the corres­ ponding simple sentence," see Carlson 1981: 44, 50-51). This treatment could at most be feasible for cases of potential partial reference to processes over a period of time (cf. (22)), but fails (as we shall see below) in normal cases of the aspectual-processual meaning where reference is made to an event by associating (definitely) with time just one single part of it as coin­ ciding with an exterior point of reference (without taking notice of its possi­ ble preceding and succeeding parts) as, e.g., in (34)

John was painting a picture when Mary entered the studio.

34

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The above support for the partiality hypothesis in regard to the aspectual-processual meaning strengthens, correspondingly, the traditional con­ cept of totality, viz. as its natural, equipollent counterpart. With the aid of the latter temporal-perspectival feature as underlying the 'perfective' (i.e. perfective forms in Slavic and the 'perfective' use of the polysemic simple forms in English) we can in fact explain some notorius problems of tem­ poral grammar. Since an event perceived and reported at the moment of speech for obvious conceptual-pragmatic reasons cannot as a rule be sub­ ject to a total survey, but only to the partial analysis, it is now understanda­ ble why Slavic perfective forms cannot express present events but tend to express totality in the future. It becomes equally understandable that Eng­ lish simple forms in the present cannot realize their 'perfective' meaning (+TIME, +) but only their temporally indefinite (-TIME) meaning of habituality, genericity etc. If the temporally definite (+TIME) and total (+) view is indeed realized by simple forms in the present this is always due to rather transparent operations of what may be termed temporal transposition (cf. Thelin 1982; 1985: 189; forthc. b), i.e. the point of evaluation (and in a fic­ tive way also the moment of speech with which it is supposed to be simul­ taneous) is transposed into the immediate future in order to make possible a total view of actually on-going events as a precondition for presenting them in sequence, as disappearing into the past. This basic operation of 'im­ mediate future transposition' holds for cases of the so-called 'reportive' and 'performative' uses of the simple present, but apparently is also embedded (as a general condition underlying present sequencing) in the strategy of transposing the superior point of evaluation (and fictively the superior moment of speech) into the past in cases of the so-called 'historical' (or 'dramatic') present. In Russian, perfective present forms in the sense of the 'reportive' and 'performative' are precluded by their future meaning, but they may in a corresponding way appear in the sense of 'historical pre­ sent,' although restricted usually to sequences of events embedded in habitual contexts (see further below). Imperfective forms may be used in all three cases expressing sequentiality by way of contextual totalization (cf. Chvany 1985: 258, 261; in this volume: Section 2.22 and 4; Gasparov in this volume). It is possible that the operation of 'immediate future transposi­ tion' is involved also in the English futurate progressive: 'John is leaving (soon).' Cases of more distant future expressed by the progressive appear rather to express a process of planning already going on: 'We are going to Greece this summer.'

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

8

35

Truth conditions, intervals and possible worlds: treating the progres­ sive as aspect par excellence

The influential concept of 'time interval' must now be scrutinized more closely to help us determine its descriptive adequacy in aspectology. First of all, this concept cannot be properly understood unless we are aware of the underlying assumption that semantics can be treated in a formal way in terms of truth conditions of sentences, more specifically that temporal meanings of sentences can be defined as the truth of decomposed or 'atomic,' i.e. 'timeless,' sentences related to time in its 'sentence-external' manifestations. This would appear reasonable in those cases where the truth of 'tenseless' sentences can be said to hold at specific times, i.e., moments or periods of time, defined by various deictic means among which are tense distinctions. However, proceeding from the tacit assumption (sup­ ported, apparently, by the traditional view behind terms like 'progressive tense') that aspect can be handled in the same way, truth conditional time semantics has now — and I believe that is where it goes wrong — neglected the specific perspectiva! and basically non-deictic (cf. Thelin 1978: 14) nature of aspect distinctions and tried to relate the truth of an 'atomic,' i.e. now 'aspectless' sentence to similar temporal conditions 'external' to the sentence and, what is particularly important, to its events (in a general sense). As we have seen from the different aspectual behaviour of states and non-states, respectively, aspectualization, i.e. temporal perspectivization, in reality is inconceivable, however, without manipulative access to the autonomous (also internal) temporal structure of events (in the previous general sense of states as well as non-states) as a precondition for their situ­ ational analysis and distribution in discourse (see below, p. 36). Proceeding from his general and most fruitful event-in-discourse-based approach to the concept of time, Kamp (1979: 382, 391-92, 401) arrives at a similar understanding in regard to the contrasts between the French passé simple and imparfait. "It does not seem possible to articulate those con­ trasts as differences in truth-conditions between sentences." In a still more specific way Timberlake (1982: 310) gives expression to a similar standpoint when saying that "a crucial property of aspect... is that it refers not only to an event per se but to some point of perspective on the temporal axis... the point of perspective will be termed the aspect locus...The progressive expresses minimally that the event includes the aspect locus as an interior point."

36

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Against this background it is encouraging to notice that in recent situa­ tion semantic work on time (cf. Cooper 1986: 23) "the role of truth-condi­ tions in the semantics is greatly de-emphasized." This 'de-emphasis' is cer­ tainly motivated by pragmatic considerations of situation structure but would to a large extent remain ad-hoc unless related consistently also — and in particular — to the functions of temporal perspective fulfilled by aspect distinctions. The latter condition could apparently be satisfied by sit­ uation semantics only provided its explicit revision of truth conditional assumptions regarding aspect (at least in their application to sentences). Without such revision (perhaps along lines such as those sketched above) there do not seem to be any decisive changes in the study of time semantics and its role in discourse. More specifically, there are not even (as we shall see below, p. 56ff.) any proper theoretical prerequisites for distinguishing aspect-semantic features from tense-semantic ones. Instead of treating aspect as representing an analysis of how events are related to time as a function of their own temporal-perspectival variability (cf. Thelin 1985: 183), truth conditional semantics usually assumes aspect to represent an analysis of how (per se temporally invariable) events are related to time as a function of event-external temporal-locational variabil­ ity (for an advantageous exception, see the 'non-topological,' i.e. externally 'non-topological,' process-based analysis of the progressive in Vlach 1981). That it is this very assumption that has constituted the basis for the influen­ tial practice of 'interval semantics' in aspectology during the last 20 years has not always been properly recognized and this is particularly remarkable against the background of traditional insights in aspect semantics as expres­ sed, for example, by Hockett (1958: 237) who says: "Tenses typically show different locations of an event in time... Aspects have to do, not with the location of an event in time, but with its temporal distribution or contour." This is consequently where the problems originate. Faced with the 'imperfective paradox' caused by the BECOME-treatment of 'accomplish­ ments,' Dowty (1979: 137ff.) concludes that there must be something wrong with earlier treatments of intervals in tense logic since they ascribe truth to an "'interval' sentence... just in case some one of its embedded atomic sen­ tences is true at all moments during that interval." Montague (1968) in suggesting a treatment of the progressive (which reflects indeed both the traditional 'durative' understanding of process and the idea that it implies reference to one specific time) considered "PROG 0 to be true at t just in case there exists an open interval I around t such that 0 is true at all times

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

37

t' within I." This point of departure for subsequent 'event-external' descrip­ tions of aspect seemed to work for 'activities' in the progressive but not for 'accomplishments' in Dowty's BECOME-treatment, since it allowed for the 'atomic' (alleged 'aspectless' but in reality 'perfectively' used; see above) sentence to be true at all moments during an interval. Part of the explana­ tion why this description fails is, according to Dowty, that it does not "take the idea of truth relative to an interval as primitive" (p. 145). The latter demand Dowty sees satisfied in Bennett and Partee's (1972) truth condition for the progressive which stipulates "that [PROG 0] is true at / iff there exists an interval I' such that I  , I is not a final subinterval of I', and 0 is true at I" However, it has to be supplemented with the concept of possi­ ble worlds in order to handle his BECOME-hypothesis — with further complications as a consequence: the treatment of PROG as a "mixed modal-temporal operator" and the subsidiary concepts of "inertia worlds" and "branching" (cf. also Tedeschi 1981) assumed to underly the 'processual' meaning of the progressive. That is, the truth conditions for PROG 0 must require the truth of 0 (i.e. BECOME Ψ) to hold for "all of some set of worlds... which are exactly like the given world up to the time in ques­ tion and in which the future course of events after this time develops in ways most compatible with the past course of events" (p. 148). At this point Dowty's analysis of the progressive — as a necessary con­ sequence of his persisting in the initial verb-semantic asumptions — BECOMEs a matter of advanced speculation: he ascribes to it modal mean­ ings which certainly may be inferred in one or another way from our knowl­ edge and hypotheses about the extralinguistic world but are not in any con­ sistent way considered by language. It is thus not a matter of aspect seman­ tics (or even of relevance for it) when Dowty (p. 150) in an attempt to moti­ vate his modal treatment independently of 'accomplishment' sentences adduces 'activity' sentences as (35) and (36) and maintains that they both share "the real entailment... that it was possible that John's activity con­ tinued beyond the time specified by the when-clause": (35) (36)

John was watching television when Bill entered the room. John was watching television when he fell asleep.

In fact, language does not consider the reality (perceived reality) hold­ ing after the moment Bill entered the room or John fell asleep. Nor does it consider for how long John had been watching television. He might have turned it on a moment ago. But since watching television is an activity that

38

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normally goes on for some time it is possible that John had been watching television at least for a while. However, this is irrelevant for the meaning of the progressive. Relevant is that there was an activity going on when some­ thing happened, but the observer/speaker has no access to (or does not pay attention to) its initial phase or further preceding phases. According to the perceptual strategy of partialization suggested here as underlying the aspectual-processual meaning of the progressive (see above) the observer thus refers to and defines temporally one single moment (i.e. conceptual-prag­ matic moment, since, strictly speaking, motion in order to be perceived presupposes more than one conceptual-perceptual phase; see Thelin in this vol. p. 101) of an action that is understood to be not the first one, but may be the last one, since the criterion of process implies just already going on, not necessarily continuing after the point of reference coinciding with and defining the action temporally (cf. Thelin 1978: 32). Therefore it is no con­ cern of aspect theory whether in (35) John immediately (or only after a while) stops watching television or goes on watching it together with Bill or in (36) more or less immediately stops watching television (which would be the normal understanding) or 'possibly' goes on watching it for some time (at least one moment) in a state of half-sleep. The latter possibility is in fact seen as a theoretical precondition for the non-final-moment/interval treat­ ment of the progressive adopted by Smith (1983: 487) in her discussion of an equivalent example. In order to sustain her basically correct understand­ ing that succession depends on the indication of 'endpoints' she has to con­ struct such an endpoint as 'inferred' "a moment later." A simpler solution (suggested by the partiality approach) is to regard the final moment of the process to be defined by (identical with) the single (conceptual-pragmatic) moment of the state-changing event exactly as states are (indeed, must be — since non-phasal) delimited temporally by 'endpoints' of surrounding events (see above; cf. Thelin in this volume). What this discussion shows is that the concept of 'time interval' as applied to aspect semantics by Montague (1968; cf. also Scott 1970) and Bennett and Partee (1972; cf. also Smith 1983: 482, 484; Dowty 1986: 54) by suggesting (explicitly or implicitly) a non-final time or subinterval, respectively, at which PROG 0 is true, is still under the influence of the traditional durative understanding of the progressive that cannot account for the normal interpretation of (36). Dowty (1979) modifies this under­ standing in so far that he treats this subinterval as final in the 'actual' world but non-final in some possible world. However, the problem remains: to

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

39

prove that there are — in the alleged sense — possible worlds involved in aspect meanings at all (see below, p. 55). If we suppose there are not, Dowty's 'closing' the subinterval at its end in the 'actual' world can be regarded as a first step taken by truth conditional aspectology away from the inadequate concept of duration as underlying the aspectual-processual meaning. On the other hand, by accepting Bennett and Partee's interval analysis Dowty still retains this concept in its basic assumption that the action referred to as true at an interval is true also at a larger interval including the former (restricted now to Dowty's 'actual' world preceding and including that subinterval). While Montague's anlysis still appears to allow for a moment-based treatment on a par with the concept of surround­ ing interval, Dowty (p. vii) concludes that "the analysis of the progressive leads to the major innovation of taking truth relative to an interval of time (rather than a moment of time) as the basic semantic definition." According to this hypothesis the primary use of the progressive would imply the truth of an action over a period of time, whereas its truth at a moment of time (if possible here at all) would be secondary and derivable only from a moment-interpretation of subintervals contradicting apparently the idea (Dowty op.cit.: 147) of these subintervals being 'actualized' together with some time preceding it (relevant, apparently, in the sense of a minimum of one preceding phase as precondition for visual perception of motion but probably not in the sense of pragmatic-semantic constituent of the aspectual-processual meaning; see above ) and thus questioning more principally the theoretical status of such constructs as subintervals (cf. Benthem 1980: 55ff.). These consequences cannot be reconciled with the psychological reality as evidenced by actual language usage which indicates rather the reverse, namely that the aspectual-processual meaning of the progressive is based on reference to a moment (conceptual-pragmatic moment; cf. Langacker's (1982: 281-82) characterization of his predicate ING as imposing "an internal perspective" by focusing "attention on a single... internal point relative to a process"; see below) of time on which an action is projected, i.e. to one of its phases (cf. (34)). According to the latter analysis, rather references to periods of time involving the aspectualprocessual meaning (often referred to as the 'durative' meaning as distin­ guished from the 'progressive' meaning; cf. e.g. Timberlake 1985a: 31) are secondary and derived, and so in a more natural way, namely from refer­ ences to a single moment to references to all potentially relevant moments over a period of time (cf. (22); see Thelin 1978: 33; 1985: 183). In this way

40

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we may avoid the problems inherent in previous treatments of the progres­ sive illustrated convincingly by Kucera (1981: 184-88). 9

Intervals, gaps and moments of time: towards the partiality under­ standing of the aspectual meaning of on-going process

It is symptomatic that it is precisely the empirically brittle concept of 'aspectual classes of verbs' (in different variants) and the problematic appli­ cation of the concept of 'time interval' (or 'extended periods'; cf. Carlson 1981: 40ff.) for describing the 'processual' meaning (often in combination with the concept of 'possible worlds') that have been taken as the very point of departure for sometimes rather elaborate attempts at truth-conditional formalizations of aspect inspired in part by model-theoretic semantics, especially Montague Grammar (cf., besides Dowty's works, Hoepelman 1974, 1978, 1981; Cresswell 1977; Aqvist 1977; Âqvist & Günthner 1978; Bach 1980; Gabbay & Moravscik 1980; Hoepelman & Rohrer 1980; Ben­ nett 1981; Carlson 1981). There have been certain improvements within this framework but its basic difficulties have not been removed. The proposals made by Gabbay and Moravscik (1980; cf. also Moravscik 1982) have the advantage that they are based to some extent on an analysis of verb phrases in terms of their autonomous (also event-internal) temporal properties. Their operator PROG "picks out...all intervals...of actual activity" and relates them "to the point of evaluation" (pp. 72, 74). This analysis, although it proceeds from the superior concept of interval, allows within it for a momentoriented treatment of the progressive (compatible also with cases of refer­ ence to all potentially relevant moments of a period of time; see above): "'he is walking' is true iff at the point of evaluation the agent in question is actually engaged in the act of walking" (p. 74). However, one problem caused by the remaining influence of the con­ cept of interval (reflecting in turn the durative understanding of the pro­ gressive) is that Gabbay and Moravscik's analysis of the temporal proper­ ties of VP's is based on their hypothesis of "the crucial feature of the possi­ bility of gaps" (p. 68). According to this hypothesis the explanation why English statives do not take the progressive (see above, p. 30ff.) is thus that "the progressive operates on periods of actual goings on, excluding gaps, or pauses. But since state VP's do not allow for gaps, the semantic structure needed for the application of the progressive is simply not there" (p. 67).

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

41

This explanation is perhaps not that far away from the truth but it appears to suggest not only the possible but also necessary presence of gaps within an interval for the progressive to operate. This should not be the case. Some actions referred to by the progressive may be said to take place with interruptions, others not, since they may indeed be carried out continu­ ously. But this is rather a matter of conventional-pragmatic conditions. The concept of 'gaps' thus appears to be a secondary phenomenon that can eas­ ily be derived from (explained by) the basic phasal nature of non-states (see above). The latter allow for partialization or interruptions, since motion can be 'frozen' in one of its phases for some time and then be continued again (see above), but states do not, since they have no such phases of motion that could be 'frozen' or interrupted. Another difficulty in Gabbay and Moravscik's treatment (as in most treatments of English aspect) is the privative understanding of the progres­ sive leaving the aspectual properties of simple forms without attention (see above). Instead the perfect is ascribed aspectual status (with the result that the perfect progressive represents two aspect meanings), while its deeper time-semantic relationship to tense remains unclear (for an analysis of the perfect rather in terms of taxis features operating on tense, cf. Thelin forthc. b; see Section 22 below). Let us consider further the modification of Montague's grammar suggested by Hoepelman and Rohrer (1980: 105) on the basis of their count-mass approach: "we no longer consider the denotations of expres­ sions (a,b) and (s,a) (for any a and b) to be total functions. For example: D ( a b ) is the set of total or partial functions from a to b; D (s,a) is the set of total or partial functions from I x J to a." In plain words, a tenseless (and aspectless) sentence like [John walk] can under these circumstances be said to be true in relation either to the total set of moments of an interval (e.g. 'John walked in the park for an hour (before he had lunch)') or to all its individual (potentially relevant) moments (e.g. 'John was walking in the park for an hour. (He cannot possibly have seen the postman.)'). This proposal is important, since it attempts to formalize on the general basis of the count-mass distinction (cf. also the pertinent discussion in Mourelatos 1981: 202ff., Wallace 1982: 212, 215, 218 and Langacker 1982: 271, 282, 289) the observation of partial functions in aspectual-temporal relations (made also by Dowty, Bach and Carlson; see above) in a way that allows for their equipollent status in relation to total functions (cf. Bach's distinc­ tion additivity vs. indivisibility referred to above). However, these aspectual

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functions as a consequence of truth-conditioning are still understood to define time as related to events, and not the other way around as would rather appear to be suggested by their temporal-perspectival nature. It might from purely formal considerations appear to be unimportant in which direction temporal projection is thought to take place as long as intervals are assumed to be involved, but not if they are not. If we thus suppose the essence of the aspectual-processual meaning to be based not on intervals but on moments, more specifically on references to one single moment (cf. 'John was walking in the park when it started to rain'; see above), then it becomes clear that the concept of 'atomic' sentences and, consequently, 'atomic' events underlying truth-conditional aspectualization is an abstrac­ tion that does not work any longer, namely because events in these cases must allow for their analysis in parts (phases) as a precondition for being aspectualized, i.e. related to time at a specific moment not defined by an interval. This condition is met, however, by Kamp's (1979: 384, 391) important thesis that "the structure of time depends on the conceptual framework that is employed in the determination of the events which... form the basis of that structure" and the central role he ascribes in his theory of events to "the transformation of event structures into instant structures." It is satis­ fied also by Langacker's (1982) localist ('space grammar') approach to aspect (cf. also Thelin in this volume) which takes as point of departure a fruitful time-semantic analysis of predicates in terms of trajectory conditions and a corresponding distinction between predicates involving change through time, and predicates not involving such change, in other words, between phasal and non-phasal predicates, respectively. The latter distinc­ tion is referred to in a similar way by Timberlake (1982: 313) as "topologi­ cal properties of the event." Provided a moment-interpretation of (sub)intervals, this condition is met also by Gabbay and Moravscik's (op.cit.: 72, 74) temporal analysis of the "semantic object assigned to a VP," furnishing, more specifically, the event-internal structure represented by "F b -elements," i.e. "all intervals [cf. also their "partial stages," p. 68] of activity" to be picked out and related to the point of evaluation by the operator PROG. This analysis could actually dispense with the concept of interval as underlying the aspectual meaning of the progressive if it were not for the secondary meaning of reference to all potentially relevant moments over a definite period of time (see above) assumed in this treatment — as in most others influenced by the traditional

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

43

idea of 'durativity' (cf. e.g. Steedman 1982: 138ff.) — to be the basic one (p.67). 10 The problematic symbiosis of intervals, VP-semantics and aspect: one instructive example Further attempts to develop the concept of time interval as underlying the semantic essence of aspect have not really contributed to any clarifica­ tion of the relationship between verb-semantic/semantico-syntactic condi­ tions, on the one hand, and temporal-perspectival, i.e. truly aspectual, con­ ditions on the other. On the contrary. Let us take one illuminating exam­ ple. Bennett (1981) proposes the distinction between open intervals and closed intervals and relates them to 'activities' and 'performances,' respec­ tively. Further he maintains (p. 14) that "BOTH performance verb phrases and activity verb phrases can be true of individuals at both open and closed intervals," using now 'performance' and 'activity' rather in an implicitly aspectual sense. In order to explain these conditions Bennett suggests first that the truth condition for the sentence (37)

Jones has left.

presupposes a closed past interval of time which "reflects the intuition that the present perfect tense always describes a performance; the perfect aspect indicates a completion." However, both the verb-semantic and the aspec­ tual interpretation of 'performance' suggested by Bennett is contradicted in this case by the present perfect progressive of 'activities'; cf.: (38)

Jones has been playing tennis for hours.

(These difficulties are actually due in part to the fact that the perfect (as pointed out also in Mourelatos 1981: 195) is no aspect, but represents the aspect-neutral category of taxis operating on tense; see Section 22 below; cf. Thelin forthc. b) In ascribing further (pp. 14-15) to the sentence (39)

Jones is leaving.

an open interval, Bennett believes that this treatment "reflects the intuition that the present progressive always describes an activity." This intuition is correct, provided the aspectual reading of 'activity' (i.e. the aspectual-processual meaning) but not the verb-semantic/semantico-syntactic reading of

44

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non-terminativity (atelicity), since the verb phrase 'leave' implies a ter­ minus to be achieved (i.e. it presupposes an intended change of the current state of affairs) usually considered to characterize 'performances' ('ac­ complishments'). This then in fact amounts to saying that the progressive always realizes the progressive. Against this background Bennett maintains that the above analysis is intended to suit not only "the performance verb phrase 'leave'" but also "an activity verb phrase," that is, he assumes implicitly, and correctly — at least in his intuitive way, that both terminative (telic) and non-terminative (atelic) verb phrases can appear with both aspect meanings. Having described the latter as a matter of distinctive intervals (see above), he pro­ poses now that the former are a matter of distinctive subintervals, viz. that 'activities' (i.e. non-terminative verb phrases) are characterized by closed subintervals, 'performances' (i.e. terminative verb phrases) — by open subintervals. This proposal, however, is not intuitively correct, since — based on the same aspectual misinterpretation of Kenny's test that caused Dowty's 'imperfective paradox' — it suggests a treatment of two semantically distinct linguistic phenomena, namely a temporal one and a non-tem­ poral one, with one single descriptive device: the temporal hypothesis of distinctive intervals. This analysis is doomed to encounter problems like (40)

Jones walked for an hour. (Then he had breakfast.)

Here 'walk' in Bennett's terminology represents an 'activity' in the sense of a non-terminative or atelic verb phrase but a 'performance' in the sense of aspect, i.e. the temporally definite and total meaning. So far it works. However, according to the proposed analysis 'activities' like 'walk' should generally be characterized by closed subintervals and be true of every such subinterval. But this does not seem to be the case. Firstly, there are not felt to be any subintervals here at all. Secondly, if there were, it would not be possible to say that 'Jones walked for an hour' at every subin­ terval of his walking. The problem cannot either be solved by suggesting that we are concerned rather with a 'performance' (i.e. terminative verb phrase; cf. discussion above, pp. 7-18) 'walk for an hour,' because this suggestion would presuppose semantico-syntactic equivalence with e.g. (41)

Jones walked to the station.

This in turn would cause us to face examples like (42) (43)

Jones was walking for an hour. Jones was walking to the station.

INTRODUCTION: VERBAL ASPECT IN DISCOURSE

45

where (besides the fact that in (42) there is present an explicitly closed interval although there should not according to the aspectual meaning) the hypothesis of open subintervals (in order to prevent that 'Jones walked for an hour' or 'Jones walked to the station' at every subinterval) cannot explain why one can say about (43) that Jones was heading for the station at every subinterval of his walking, but not that 'for an hour' was a corres­ ponding continuous goal of his walking. Besides, aspectual delimitation as in (40) is possible also without any explicit time interval: (44)

Jones slowly walked up and down the room. (Then he stop­ ped and looked out of the window.)

Furthermore, if 'activities' (i.e. non-terminative verb phrases) are understood to have closed subintervals (cf. p. 15: "every 'part' of an activity is a performance"), how can we handle the problem that they would appear to be present only within open intervals as in (42) and (43) but not within closed intervals as in (40) and (41), whereas something like it could perhaps be felt within a closed interval when the action is characterized in a way that retains the activity meaning of motion as in (44)? This problem does not really occur if we assume 'activities' or, rather, all non-states to have not any closed subintervals but neutral phases of motion. Operating upon these, aspect (according to Thelin 1978: 30-32; cf. also the pertinent observations in Johnson 1981: 154) defines then the temporal perspective on an event by associating with the point of evaluation along the time axis either one of its (conceptual-pragmatic; see above) phases, realizing thus the 'partial view,' or all its phases as constituting an entire movement delimited in the chain of other delimited events of the foreground of discourse (see above), realizing thus the 'total view' and suppressing (according to the context) the internal phasal structure of non-states. A good argument in support of the latter analysis can be found in Kamp's (1979: 404) discussion of events rep­ resented in discourse as instantaneous, but from another, 'objective' point of view, conceived rather as temporally extended. Langacker (1982: 269) also appears to have seized this very distinction in a pertinent way by the following suggestion: "When I say He walked ... I am most likely suggesting at least two simultaneous trajectories, one a repetitive reflexive trajectory with pulses of short duration, and the other a single-pulse affair of longer duration involving such phases as initiation, continuation toward goal, and cessation." Now we can understand better why 'achievements' or, rather, instantaneous/conclusive verb phrases (cf. Thelin 1980b) in English nor-

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mally do not take the progressive (at least not with the meaning of actual, non-iterated, process), namely because their conceptually-pragmatically momentaneous character does not allow for an analysis in phases (i.e. more than one phase) and, consequently, offers no structure for the partial aspec­ tual perspective to operate upon. What this discussion appears to indicate is thus that 'walk' in both (40) and (42) is an 'activity,' i.e. non-terminative verb phrase restricted by an interval of time ('for an hour') that does not determine the use of aspect or motivate any hypothesis of different subintervals in order to distinguish 'just activities' from temporally restricted 'activities.' Nor does the 'perfor­ mance,' i.e. terminative verb phrase 'walk to the station' call for any open subintervals to prevent the possibility of its truth at every subinterval because this 'possibility' is due to the preconceived aspectual (i.e. perfective-resultative) meaning of 'performance,' in respect to which the verbsemantic/semantico-syntactic meaning of 'performance' according to Ben­ nett's own analysis should in reality be neutral! 11 Language-specific conditions of aspectual polysemy vs. the traditional concept of markedness: a universal approach to situational-perspectival analysis The privative/markedness treatment of the processual-aspectual mean­ ing implied by the broad application of an operator PROG in temporal logic (see above) reflects in fact a traditional bias towards surface-mor­ phological conditions without the necessary prerequisites for a cross-lin­ guistic or universal understanding of aspect, i.e. in its conceptual-semantic essence (for a corresponding, restrictedly morpho-syntactic approach to aspect as typological issue, see Dahl 1985). If the concept of markedness is supposed to make any sense at all it should be based not only on superficial aspect markers but also on their functional relations to underlying semantic distinctions. Then one has to ask the question why the 'marked' meaning in English should be the aspectual-processual meaning (-) represented by the 'imperfective' progressive, whereas in Slavic according to the same tra­ dition the 'marked' aspect meaning is usually assumed to be the opposite meaning of aspectual event (+) represented by 'perfective' verb forms (cf. Forsyth 1970: 5-6, 14ff., 82; Comrie 1976: 21, 113; Bache 1985: 303; for a critical discussion see Thelin 1978: 110ff.; Kucera 1981).

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This peculiar state of affairs can be removed only if we pay regard to the elementary fact that languages in accord with the principle of economy to a large extent draw on polysemy (cf. Thelin 1986) and that superficial morphological neutralization (cf. Newton 1979: 166; for a corresponding understanding of 'ambiguity,' see Steedman 1982) is not equal with seman­ tic neutralization (see discussion below). The concept of markedness does not apply thus to aspect in regard to these relations but one could think of its application rather to conditions holding in discourse contexts (cf. Thelin 1978: 111; 1984a: 234ff.; 1984b: 270-274). The main difference between English and e.g. Russian in regard to the aspect category is — as indicated already above — just a question of morphological conventions ascribing in English the function of polysemy to the simple forms (as an expression of the two aspect meanings -TIME, on the one hand, and +TIME, +TOT, on the other), in Russian to the imperfective forms (as an expression of the two aspect meanings -TIME, on the one hand, and +TIME, -TOT, on the other; for a critical discussion of the concept of invariance in regard to Russian aspect and a corresponding differentiated view of the imperfective, see Timberlake 1982), whereas the 'progressive' in English and 'perfective' forms in Russian express unambiguously (at least regarding aspect) the meaning of aspectual process (+TIME, -TOT) and aspectual event (+TIME, +TOT), respec­ tively (for a processual interpretation of the iterative progressive in English, see Vlach 1981: 281, Thelin 1985: 184; see also below). Proceeding from the above discussion one could now think of the three propositions in (20)-(22) as derived from the basic, non-perspectivized phasal argument [John PAINT a picture], interpreted by the integrated situational-perspectival analysis of reality as, respectively, CHANGE-OFSTATE ('foreground'), 'mediate' SITUATIONAL STATE ('proper background') and 'immediate' CHANGE-OF-STATE-RELATED SITU­ ATIONAL STATE ('actual background'), and defined, accordingly, by the three aspectual predicates [+TIME, +TOT], [-TIME] and [+TIME, -TOT], respec­ tively (cf. above, pp. 23,27ff.). A consequence of this situational-perspecti­ val approach to aspect is the assumption (indicated already above) that its true semantic nature can be understood only if correlated to the temporal organisation of discourse. In this connection it is important to be aware of the fact — hitherto almost completely overlooked by aspectology (cf., how­ ever, Timberlake 1982: 318ff; Fielder 1985) — that in discourse aspectual predicates frequently appear embedded in hierarchically complex propositional structure (cf. Thelin 1984b: 282 ff.; 1985: 189, forthcoming c; and this

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volume, Appendix: Section 6). This condition can be illustrated by a simple example like (45)

John was always painting a picture (John used to be paint­ ing a picture) when Mary entered the studio.

Here the argument [John PAINT a picture] is defined first by the aspectual predicate [+TIME, -TOT] and then (exactly as the argument [+TIME, + [Mary ENTER the studio]]) by the hierachically higher predicate [-TIME], representing — in the form of the habitual meaning — the 'mediate' SITUATIONAL STATE /discourse context of 'proper background' in which the 'immediate' CHANGE-OF-STATE-RELATED SITUATIONAL STATE/ 'actual background' of 'John's painting a picture' (as well as the CHANGE-OF-STATE/ 'foreground' of 'Mary's entering the studio') is embedded: (46)

[-TIME

[+TIME, - [John PAINT a picture]]]

Faced with such cases, linguists, not recognizing their hierarchically complex structure, have questioned the aspectual nature not only of the habitual meaning but even of the progressive (cf. Vater 1980: 310)! 12 'Generic readings' and the short-comings of interval semantics: on the discourse-perspectival status of iteratives and habituais Against this background it is understandable that — as a consequence of the almost exclusively temporally definite understanding of aspect (dic­ tated in the first line by the sentence-oriented verb-semantic and intervalsemantic approaches) and the corresponding difficulties in recognizing that the temporal organisation of discourse in terms of the foreground/ background distinction (particularly well discernible in narrative discourse) is based precisely on the aspectual opposition between temporal definiteness (+TIME) and temporal indefiniteness (-TIME) — typical expressions of temporal indefiniteness and proper background such as habituais, iteratives, generics etc. have constituted a permanent problem to modern aspectology (cf., e.g., Dowty 1986:57). This problem has often been discussed in terms of 'universal' or 'generic' quantifiers or interpretations as opposed to 'existential' quantifiers or interpretations (cf. Dowty 1979: 84ff., 177ff.; Merrill 1985a) but never received any consistent temporal-perspectival explanation within restrictedly sentence-semantic aspectology. The underlying time-semantic distinc-

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tion between temporal definiteness (+TIME) and temporal indefiniteness (-TIME) has been reflected, however, in important observations as evi­ denced, for example, by Joos' (1964) distinction between temporary and generic aspect and Carlson's (1977) analysis in terms of 'stage-level' vs. 'ob­ ject-level' predications, respectively. The correlation between "bare" plur­ ality and 'generic' interpretations (observed by Carlson) has further been analyzed by Bennett (1981: 22-26) in terms of 'non-reportive' readings (this concept should not be confused with the concept of 'reportive' present dis­ cussed above; see also Section 13 below). While having no access to an explicit theory accounting for the conceptual-semantic relations between sentential aspect and temporal organisation of discourse, Bennett by his somewhat impressionistic criterion of 'non-reportive' meaning refers in fact to the function of DESCRIPTIO usually ascribed to temporally indefinite background structures of discourse as distinguished from NARRATIO ascribed to temporally definite foreground structures (cf. Thelin 1984b; see below). From his observation that adverbs of frequency entail "bare" plurality (and the 'non-reportive' reading) Bennett draws the intuitively correct con­ clusion that there is here "an intimate connection with aspect" (p. 24). A corresponding insight is implied by Armstrong's (1981) pertinent observa­ tion in regard to Ancient Greek, viz. that "adverbs of cardinal count take aorist, and of frequency count present stem verbs," all the more if we understand them as expressions of the temporally definite (+TIME) and total (+TOT) view of foreground events (the aorist) and the temporally indefinite view (-TIME) of background events (the polysemic present stem), respec­ tively (for a similar observation in regard to the French passé simple and imparfait, respectively, see Hoepelman and Rohrer 1980: l0lff.; see also Thelin in this volume, pp. 104-116). Also Mourelatos (1981: 196, 199) in his well-founded criticism of the restrictedly verb-semantic approach to aspect (in which he convincingly argues for a separate and fundamental aspectual distinction 'perfective': 'imperfective') points precisely to the aspectual nature of frequency: "One of the major functions that lies outside the Kenny-Vendler typology is the encoding of the patterns of frequency or habituation. This is characteristically true of the imperfective aspect." Kucera (1981) in his clarifying treatment of Czech iteratives arrives at an analysis in terms of 'quantified states.' This 'stative' interpretation (suggested, as a matter of fact, also by Vendler for habituais; cf. also Dowty 1986: 57) is apparently derived implicitly from their discourse functions of

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proper background conditions (remaining outside his overt argumentation but reflected by his establishing their distant-past denotation). Further­ more, he is well aware of their temporal indefiniteness as shown by his ref­ erence to Kopecny's (1962) corresponding concept of 'non-actuality' and by his examples illustrating that "their usage is ungrammatical in any sentence in which the predication is supposed to be taking place at a specific point in time" (p. 180). Attempts to treat temporal structure within the framework of Reichen­ bach's aspectless analysis, either in terms of sentential temporal reference (cf. Smith 1978: 69ff.) or,'extended temporal reference' (intended for dis­ course; cf. Smith 1980: 360; cf. also Steedman 1982) have failed to account for the aspect-semantic and discourse-perspectival nature of habituais (for a criticism of Reichenbach's lacking attention to temporal indefiniteness, see Thelin 1978: 41). The difficulty in integrating in a consistent way the mean­ ings of iterativity and habituality into sentence-semantic theories of aspect has been illustrated in particular by the ambivalent treatment in Smith 1986 discussed above. Another temporally definite approach to iteratives (multiplicity) in terms of 'subevents' and 'macroevents' is suggested in Timberlake 1982 (315ff.). The choice of aspect is seen to be determined by the distinction 'closed' vs. 'open' with such events (cf. Smith 1983, Dry 1983; for a discus­ sion of 'bounding' and iteration in terms of embedding, see Jackendoff 1983: 246ff.; cf. also Desclés and Guentchéva in this volume). If the sube­ vents are open (in cases of iterated aspectual process, understood to be obligatorily expressed by the Slavic 'imperfective') or closed (in cases of iterated aspectual event), then the aspect is dependent on whether the macroevent is closed or open. If closed, the 'perfective' is used, if open — the 'imperfective.' Seizing now on the concept of interval, Timberlake suggests that the macroevent is open when "the subevents are distributed over a large temporal interval" (cf. the concept of 'vague interval' in Kasher and Manor 1980: 322; see also Partee 1984: 276), closed when "the subevents occur in a delimited temporal interval and form a collective unit." The con­ cept of 'delimited interval' can indeed (like totality) explain the fact that 'perfective' iteratives are possible only when integrated in foreground suc­ cession, but not if understood as an opposite to the concept of 'large inter­ val,' since iterations over a large interval (where is the borderline to be drawn?) can equally well be expressed by the 'perfective,' and in a deli­ mited (in the sense of restricted timespan) interval by the 'imperfective,'

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namely given their foreground and background function in discourse, respectively. Compare Timberlake's Russian examples: (47)

(48)

Vmeste trizdy ?prorvalis'(PF)lproryvalis'(vv) iz okruzenija letom sorok pervogo goda. 'Together they three times broke out of encirclement in the summer or forty one.' 17 oktjabrja on dvazdy preodolel{v¥)ltpreodeleval{wv) Dnepr vplav'. Twice on the seventeenth of October he conquered the Dnepr by swimming.'

The perfective form marked as "? = marginal/infrequent" in (47) and the imperfective form marked as "† = acceptable, not preferred/frequent" in (48) would therefore in a broader, unambiguous context of foreground and background, respectively, be completely normal. Such contexts can easily be produced. That temporal expressions tend to be broader and vag­ uer in cases of background and more specific in cases of foreground is not a matter of intervals of different sizes but a consequence precisely of whether events are backgrounded or foregrounded. If the temporal expressions of iterativity refer unambiguously to background conditions a change of imperfective forms to perfective is consequently excluded. (For a further distinction between 'bounded' and 'unbounded' intervals more apt to grasp the discourse-perspectival distinction discussed, see Desclés and Guentchéva in this volume.) Merrill (1985a) in his important study of quantification and aspect in Russian has arrived exactly at this critical point and appears to be rather close to penetrating the discourse-perspectival dependency of iteration. Referring to cases where the 'perfective' is possible, as "restricted itera­ tion," and to those where it is not, as 'unrestricted iteration," he frankly admits that "what, precisely, the restriction is is unclear." However, by questioning, at least tendentially, the temporally definite concept of inter­ val (and the aspectual relevance of subevents) he is in a position to broaden his understanding of "restriction," namely as referring also to "the way that the number of repetitions of the iterated event is stated" (p. 66). This view is based on Merrill's useful distinction between multiplicity in verbal argu­ ments, referred by him to the predicational level, and multiplicity referred by him to the propositional level. Concluding his analysis, he says:

52

NILS . THELIN ...aspect is highly dependent on propositional level multiplicity. The differ­ ence in effect of propositional level and predicational level multiplicity is manifested most clearly when universal quantification of participants (pre­ dicational level) is contrasted with universal quantification of temporal occasions (propositional level). In the first case, the multiplicity can be treated as a "single event," and manipulated (that is, presented in either aspect) according to narrative needs... In the second, the multiplicity can­ not be treated as a unit and must be presented in the imperfective.

This statement is very illuminating as evidence of where also scrupul­ ous investigations of aspect — if not based on considerations of temporalperspectival organisation in discourse — have to face a palpable limit of their explanatory scope. The necessarily inductive mode of analysis (caused by the still underlying — although modified — exclusive assumptions of temporal definiteness in aspect) treats, as we can see, "narrative needs" rather as subsidiary conditions (cf. also Fielder in this volume). In a consis­ tently deductive (speaker/narrator-based) model, however, precisely these 'needs' will determine the aspectual functions of predicates. Merrill's dis­ tinction between propositions and predications is useful as far as it emerges as a necessity from the inductive view, but his 'universal quantification' on the propositional level remains systematically unrelated to 'universal quan­ tification' on the predicational level. Representing rather temporal indefiniteness (dictated by backgrounding), 'universal quantification on the prop­ ositional level' precludes, as a matter of fact, "manipulation" on the predi­ cational level, and, conversely, "manipulation" or, rather, single-event-rep­ resentation of multiplicity (in regard not only to participants but also to temporal occasions) would, correspondingly, be possible only provided the same propositional level does not presuppose 'universal quantification' but instead temporal definiteness and totality (dictated by foregrounding). Now, since the temporal perspective in discourse according to the above understanding of integrated situation-aspect analysis is part of what is pre­ dicated about arguments (which amounts to saying that there should be no aspectless predications either; for a different view, see Bache 1985: 128ff., 146), a consistently deductive account for aspect assignment could basically dispense with the predication/proposition distinction, unless the concept of proposition is used to imply discourse perspective and the concept of pred­ ication the distinctive perspective of embedded events and there is no neu­ tralization between them so there can be a choice on semantic grounds for their morphological implementation (see below).

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Considerations of discourse conditions have in a coresponding way led to a modification (cf. Thelin 1985: 183ff.) of my previous assumption in regard to Slavic (Thelin 1978: 35, 68) that the feature of iterativity (+ITER), included in the system of aspect-semantic components, may combine with temporal definiteness (+TIME) and totality (+) on the same hierarchical level with imperfective forms as result. If we overlook cases of foregroundunification (where I consider iterativity proper to be cancelled or, at least, subordinated; cf. Gasparov in this volume), iterativity is always an expres­ sion of backgrounding and, accordingly, temporal indefiniteness (-TIME). One might perhaps think that the previous assumption would still be valid in cases of embedding, i.e. when applied to structures referred to above as 'subevents' dominated by temporal idefiniteness/iterativity, but I am not so sure. It is rather my impression that superior iterativity neutralizes the dis­ tinction between the total and partial view (i.e. aspectual event and aspec­ tual process, respectively) as specifications of temporal definiteness. That might be the reason why iteration apparently makes reference to events in process difficult, although this would not necessarily follow from Timberlake's (1982: 315; cf. also Hopper 1982b: 11) non-closed analysis of the 'subevents' in an example like: (49)

On dvazdy dokazyval{IPF) obstojatel'no, cto on zertva slucaja. Twice he proved (tried to prove) in detail that he was the victim of circumstance.'

The conative meaning correctly observed by Timberlake in this exam­ ple (cf. also Fielder in this volume) seems rather to be a connotation of the general meaning of temporally indefinite 'simple statement' independent here of iteration (cf. dokazyval, no ne dokazal(PF) 'he tried to prove but didn't'). The meaning of process suggested by the adverbial obstojatel'no 'in detail' is neutralized or, at least, suppressed here. If we try to make explicit the reference to an event in process by a when clause with a 'perfective' predicate (and a corresponding use of the English progressive in the main clause), cf. (50)

?On dvazdy dokazyval(IPF) svoju nevinovnost', kogda ego vdrug prervali{vv) vozglasy. ?'Twice he was proving his innocence when he was suddenly interrupted by interjections.',

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we have to state that iterativity makes such reference sound odd in both languages. That it is difficult under these circumstances to refer simulta­ neously to more than one event in process, i.e. as representing 'actual background' (related directly to foreground), must have to do with the dominating function of 'proper background' and temporal indefiniteness expressed by iteration. This appears to be confirmed by the fact that in Rus­ sian an alternative syntactic construction, allowing for reference to both events in a natural way, will require that this reference (in cases of single events expressed by the 'perfective') presents them as belonging to the 'proper background,' i.e. with the 'imperfective': (51)

On dvazdy dokazyval{\v¥) svoju nevinovnost', no kazdyj raz ego vdrug preryvali(IPF)vozglasy. 'Twice he proved (tried to prove) his innocence, but both times he was suddenly interrupted by interjections.'

These difficulties in retaining the total/partial distinction when embed­ ded in temporal indefiniteness/iterativity do not appear to hold for embed­ ding in temporal indefiniteness/habituality (see above (45)). This might be an indication of a different conceptual-semantic status of habituais, involv­ ing, apparently, along with temporal indefiniteness, also a superior feature of modality (cf. Thelin 1978: 35; a corresponding view has been expressed subsequently in M0nnesland 1984: 73), perhaps potentiality, allowing for a clearer hierarchical demarcation between superior temporal indefiniteness and inferior temporal definiteness. This my understanding that the total/ partial distinction is not object to any conceptual-semantic neutralization in cases of superior habitual meaning would explain the fact that in Slavic lan­ guages like Czech and Slovene (as distinguished from, for example, Russian and Polish) there is no morphological neutralization either, i.e. the use of the 'perfective' can express unambiguously the total view of embedded events (see below, p. 123ff.). My above remarks on iterativity/habituality are tentative and should be understood rather as pointing to some ques­ tions of interest for future research. 13 Why Cooper's situation-semantics goes wrong, or, the case of the 'reportive' present It is symptomatic that Cooper (1986: 22-23) through a rather pragmatic discussion of 'histories' (defined by him as "sets of states of affairs") in

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terms of gaps, partial information and the connector next arrives at the per se sound conclusion that "histories represent ways of viewing certain facts about the world," but in doing so fails to see precisely the connection of this condition with the crucial role of aspect semantics for the perspectival organi­ sation of discourse. He even formulates this condition in a way that would make it suit perfectly well as argument for my above discussion of the examples (16) and (17) (see. pp. 11-13): "We might have two histories which might be embeddable in precisely the same complete worlds (and therefore not distinguishable in terms of truth-conditions using complete informa­ tion) and yet one of these histories might be appropriately described by a discourse including next and the other not." Let us illustrate with one representative example how also recent situa­ tion semantics — under these conditions — may go wrong. On the basis of Barwise and Perry's (1981, 1983) concepts of space-time locations and, in particular, discourse location, Cooper (op.cit.) proposes an anlysis of the 'reportive' sense of simple present tense in English (discussed also above), His suggestion is that "this might be a case where we can exploit the fact that the semantics uses space-time locations (as opposed to just time-loca­ tions, such as points or intervals of time). The main idea will be that the reportive sense of the present tense not only requires that things be happen­ ing now but also here, namely at the discourse location." Although the instruments of discourse location and event location should be capable of treating aspectual distinctions by proper references also to the internal structure of events, we shall see that Cooper's applica­ tion of them is still unfavourably influenced by the interval-semantic and verb-semantic bias of truth-conditional aspectology. The central aim of his analysis is "to give a unified treatment of the simple present for stative and non-stative verbs but to let semantic proper­ ties of the verbs determine whether one gets a reportive reading or not" (p. 26). For this purpose he proposes that the semantics of the present tense is "that the connection to the present tense verb is identical with the discourse location." He says further that this connection represents not only the time of speech but also the place of speech. Then he proceeds to asking "what kind of commitment does this semantics for a sentence containing a stative make to the event location." His answer is that "statives are independent of space" — a general claim that he derives from the "semantic properties of stative verbs... in terms of structural constraints." Already this first postu­ late for his locational time-semantic hypothesis appears to be contradicted

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by linguistic facts: the 'constraint' referred to may hold for emotional states like love (his example is John loves Mary) but not for other verbs usually referred to as typical states, e.g. be, exist, see, etc. (cf. John is in the kitchen, These animals do not exist in other parts of the world, I see her from here, etc.). What is more important, however, he goes on to ascribing to both statives and activities the property of 'temporal ill-foundedness,' i.e. the subinterval property inherited from truth-conditional aspectology (cf. also Dowty 1986: 42-44). This suggestion is incompatible with the well-founded assumption (see above) that states are non-phasal and thus cannot be partialized, or totalized (by their own). More consistently than Cooper's prop­ osal of space-independency (with statives) and non-space-independency (with activities) this assumption can explain why states and activities (or, rather, non-states) behave differently in simple present forms: since they are non-phasal, states are typically temporally indefinite (see above, pp. 29ff., 33) and are therefore expressed naturally by simple present forms as typical expressions of the aspectual feature of temporal indefiniteness (since basically incompatible with the temporally definite, total view; see above, pp. 27, 31), whereas non-states, since they are phasal, are typically temporally definable, but because of the aspectual restriction of simple pre­ sent forms consequently can appear with them only as expressions of tem­ poral indefiniteness, i.e. habituality, genericity, etc. Therefore, the very first meaning of Cooper's contextless example John runs that should occur to one's mind according to this analysis (but is ignored in Cooper's treatment) is the habitual one (e.g. John runs a couple of miles every day). However, Cooper is aware only of the 'reportive' sense and suggests for it the following analysis: "because of the 'temporal ill-foun­ dedness...' the discourse location could be one of the temporally smaller locations within the location of the total running event and therefore the use of the present tense does not require that the whole event take place within the time of utterance." As we shall see, rather the opposite should be the case. Therefore, the natural question that now occurs promptly to the reader is: since this could be said also about activities in the present pro­ gressive, how can we under these conditions explain the distinction between the simple present and the present progressive? Shouldn't our theory account for precisely the difference between non-habitual John runs and John is running as two distinct aspectual meanings, more specifically, with the superior aspectual meaning of temporal definiteness in common?

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Cooper's explanation in regard to the 'reportive' meaning, viz. that the "immediacy and presence associated with the use of the simple present with activities" is due to their property of space-dependency ("the location of the discourse has to be where the running is taking place") would logically hold to the same extent also for the present progressive as long as there is no systematic account for the simple present to behave differently. This is the critical point where the aspectual zero-treatment of simple forms prac­ ticed by truth-conditional semantics reveals itself most overtly. Of course, Cooper could say that he is not concerned with aspect (in his understand­ ing). Indeed, he treats the 'reportive' as a matter of 'tense,' but the fact is that he does so because his instruments for time-semantic analysis do not permit him to penetrate its aspectual nature. Therefore, there remain serious obscurities (as those mentioned above) and further questions to be answered. One of these questions, and a very revealing one, is asked by Cooper himself: "There is also a sense of inchoativity which is associated with activities in the simple present. Hence John runs tends to mean John begins to run. I have no explanation for this fact." This fact can easily be accounted for if we understand the simple pre­ sent forms to express aspect, i.e. not only temporal indefiniteness (-TIME), but under certain conditions also temporal definiteness (+TIME) specified further and, decisively, by totality (+), namely provided in the latter case the operation of temporal transposition suggested above (p. 34). As witnes­ sed by, for example, Slavic languages, the inchoative meaning is one typical expression of aspectual totality — a fact that is perfectly well in harmony with its underlying function in discourse, namely to signalize state-changing foreground events. We still have to pay attention to Cooper's suggestion that the 'reportive' use of simple present forms should imply obligatorily that "the loca­ tion of the discourse has to be where the running is taking place." If this is indeed so — and I believe Cooper's observation is intuitively correct — there must be a systematic difference of some kind between the 'reportive' simple present and the present progressive that has to be accounted for in a consistent way within our aspectual treatment. The explanation is rather straightforward in its conceptual-pragmatic essence: one can report ongoing events more easily by inference, i.e. without witnessing them continuously, namely by supposing that there has been no change (cf. Mary is working in the garden. At least she was five minutes ago.), whereas state-changing events, as in cases of the 'reportive,' cannot normally be inferred or pre-

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dicted (at least not in any definite way), but have to be witnessed in order to be reported. They may under circumstances be assumed, however, with the aid of indirect evidence, predictable patterns of behaviour, scenarios or schedules. In such cases the discourse and event locations do not have to coincide. The sports reporter could probably go on reporting a football game disturbed by mist, inferring certain non-witnessed events from witnes­ sed ones, and, similarly, the course of events somewhere else might be 're­ ported' step-for-step by someone checking a chronologically fixed scenario against the watch. Further evidence for the failure of situation semantics when based on assumptions of sentence-based truth conditional aspectology is furnished by Cooper's treatment of 'accomplishments.' According to him these "have the opposite property to statives and activities: they are temporally wellfounded." This "structural constraint" is no more and no less than Dowty's 'imperfective paradox' (see above; cf. also Dowty 1986: 42) adopted to the concept of location. The consequence is the same, viz. that the underlying interval understanding of verb-semantic or, rather, semantico-syntactic conditions (conceived of as aspectual) by necessity obscures the truly aspec­ tual distinctions. Under these circumstances it remains systematically unclear, for example, how Cooper (p. 29), in defining 'accomplishments,' as example can adduce the sentence John builds the house and then (in con­ tradiction to previous practice) call it an 'achievement.' What is it that 'turns' the unambiguous 'accomplishment' 'build a house' into an 'achieve­ ment' (that is no traditional 'achievement,' since it allows for the actual pro­ gressive John is building the house) when used in the simple present, if not aspect, more specifically the total view? Cooper's thesis is that "a simple semantics for the present tense interacts with the structural constraints to produce radically different effects on the relationship between discourse location and event location." Accordingly, he has to construct a locational difference between 'reportive' 'activities' like John runs and reportive 'accomplishments' ("achieve­ ments") like John builds the house. This difference — that lacks any empir­ ical support — is supposed to explain why the latter sentence sounds "very odd." In reality, there are no systematic differences between these two sen­ tences in regard to locational properties and they are equivalent in respect not only to tense but also to aspect. In their temporally definite (+TIME) reading they are both the result of temporal transposition (see above) and the total view (+). The fact that the isolated sentence John builds the

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house may indeed sound odd is merely a matter of conventional-pragmatic conditions. Given the proper context this oddity will disappear entirely. Building a normal house is understood conventionally to take some time. Building a house of cards or sand, however, can more easily be conceived of as temporally restricted events, and would, correspondingly, suit the 're­ portive' use of the simple present better (cf. the discussion in Hinrichs 1986: 66) — as, for example, in the following simultaneous comment on a garden party game (including also John runs): (52)

John quickly builds the house (of cards), with some diffi­ culty blows the balloon up, bursts it and runs to the win­ ning-post.

Against this background it does not appear motivated to postulate dis­ tinct "structural constraints" for different building events or for building events, on the one hand, and running events, on the other, at least not in the sense suggested by Cooper's treatment, claiming their constitutive rele­ vance for tense (and, implicitly, aspect) semantics. On this frail theoretical basis Cooper draws far-going conclusions with­ out anchorage in linguistic reality: "English is quite exotic in having the reportive sense of the simple present. In most other languages (even such closely related languages as German and Swedish) the simple present behaves much more like the progressive behaves in English." To arrive at this opinion one has to neglect the crucial fact that in Swedish and German there is no choice, since these languages have got one single present tense form expressing the aspectual meanings of both English simple forms (i.e. either -TIME or +TIME, +TOT) and the English present progressive (i.e. +TIME, -TOT). There exist paraphrastic expressions, but they usually express exactly the aspectual-processual meaning of the English progressive (cf. (22")). Under these conditions of obvious polysemy it really makes no sense to speak of different behaviours in regard to the 'reportive,' so much the more as there are no restrictions whatsoever on present forms of non-states in Swedish and German in respect to their 'reportive' use. Furthermore, if the assumed operation of 'immediate future transposi­ tion' as underlying the 'reportive' is indeed a prerequisite also for the 'his­ torical' (or 'dramatic') present, as suggested above (p. 34), then one would rather expect all languages with the latter use to have also the former use, provided that the present forms can express the aspectual features of temporal definiteness (+TIME) and totality (+) with present meaning by

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their own (cf. the restriction in Slavic due to the future meaning referred to above, p. 34; it should be noticed, however, that in Czech at least semelfac­ tive verbs — by necessity expressing aspectual totality — appear to be excepted from this restriction: the reportive use of Czech padnouti 'fall' has thus — although in a different approach to aspect semantics — been paid attention to by Chatterjee 1988: 59ff.) or by way of contextual totalization (see Section 6 above). This hypothesis requires, naturally, a closer typological investigation, but already with access to the data presented in Dahl (1985: 72; cf. also 81) we may assume that the 'reportive present' expressed by the 'perfective' is not "exotic" at all. It is encountered in at least 12 languages among which are Persian, Estonian, Finnish, Hungarian and Japanese. However, as long as typological studies are based mainly on morphological (or morphosyntactic) criteria without any closer analysis of distinct aspect-semantic com­ ponents underlying what is usually termed the 'perfective' and 'imperfec­ tive' (and thus without prerequisites for discovering language-specific con­ ditions of polysemy; English, for example, is not included in Dahl's table of languages representing the 'perfective': 'imperfective' opposition), such data may serve only as indicating certain tendencies. Since we cannot exclude, therefore, that languages may express the 'reportive present' (and its inherent aspectual features of temporal definiteness and totality) also with forms traditionally referred to as 'imperfective' (for example, in cases of contextual totalization; compare the corresponding — otherwise anomal­ ous — temporally definite present use of 'imperfectivized' conclusive verbs in Bulgarian; Thelin 1982) or treated outside this opposition (as English simple forms), the number of languages with the 'reportive' present will probably be much greater. 14 The aspectual distinction ±TIME and the temporal-perspectival organisa­ tion of discourse: NARRATIO/foreground vs. DESCRIPTIO/ background The descriptive adequacy of the aspectual distinction between tem­ poral definiteness and temporal indefiniteness (i.e. the binary opposition ±TIME suggested in Thelin 1978 and referred to as "time-relatedness" vs. "non-time-relatedness" in the more detailed treatment below in this vol­ ume), illustrated by the above discussion of iteratives and habituais, has been corroborated more generally, as we shall see, by recent — and not so

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recent — research in discourse (cf. Thelin 1984a, 1984b, 1985: 180ff.). By suggesting a distinction between the 'narrative' system of temporally-causally coherent dynamic motives, on the one hand, and the 'descrip­ tive' system of non-coherent static motives, on the other, already Tomasevskij (1928: 134ff., 194ff.) extended implicitly the meaning of tem­ poral differentiation from the possibility of a distinctive definite temporal order to the possibility of no such order, i.e. of temporal indefiniteness. In this way he can be said to have anticipated the aspectual distinction ±TIME as expressing the basic conceptual-semantic differentiation of events into tem­ porally definite foreground events (NARRATIO) and temporally indefi­ nite background events (DESCRIPTION respectively (compare Weinrich's 1971 distinction between 'erzählte Welt' and 'besprochene Welt'; see further Thelin in this volume, p. 116). This understanding has found sup­ port in an important analysis of the distinction between narration and description in terms of temporal reference by Stempel (1973; cf. also Zolotova 1975, 1982; see Thelin 1984b: 266ff.). The relationship between aspect and compositional structure had been observed also by Vinogradov (1936: 135ff.) who ascribed to Russian perfec­ tive forms a high degree of "narrative dynamism," to imperfective forms — a function of "creating a spatial perspective in narration" and "sketching in free contours the background of the past" (for a development of this idea, see Forsyth 1970: 10). Seizing on Labov and Waletzky (1967), Grimes (1975: 258) made the pertinent observation of aspectual expressions being involved in the distinction between "background information" and "time oriented information." Kamp (1979: 403) in regard to French made a dis­ tinction between "the main course of action of a story" (expressed by the passé simple) and "the setting in which the action is taking place" (expres­ sed by the imparfait). Hopper (1979a) suggested a corresponding opposi­ tion between "actual story line" (foregrounded events) and "supportive material" (backgrounded events). The latter's basically aspectual-temporal understanding of this opposition was also made explicit: "Because the sequentially constraint is lifted, background clauses may be located at any point of the time axis or indeed may not be located on the time axis at all" (cf. also Thelin 1978: 30, 1984a: 227, Chvany 1980). A stimulating 'theory of grounding' has been suggested by Chvany (1985; in this volume) in order to determine which factors, ordered in a "Saliency Hierarchy" (cf. Wallace 1982: 211ff.; see also Hopper & Thompson 1980), will predict, respectively, the foreground and background

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function of sentences. One of these factors is the opposition definiteness:indefiniteness (cf. also Leinonen 1982, Wallace op.cit.: 212) applied to events and situations (cf. also Chvany 1983: 75). 15 Aspect and 'theme-rheme' conditions The systematic relationship between aspect functions and so-called theme-rheme conditions has been illustrated by Birkenmaier (1978, 1981) and Salnikov (1980; cf. also Rassudova 1968: 11, Forsyth 1970: 88ff.) in regard to Russian. The correlation between imperfective aspect forms (in their temporally indefinite use) and the thematic function of the verb (par­ ticularly prominent in conversational discourse) has, consequently, been explained by Birkenmaier (1981: 105) so that "actions which are part of the context and thus belong to the self-evidently given are not temporally localized any more." This thematic function has been observed also by Dry (1983: 32-35) who refers to it as 'anaphoric reference' (compare the corres­ ponding discourse function of elaboration expressed by the 'appositive mode' in Inuktitut as treated in Kalmár 1982: 55; see further below, Section 18). Without penetrating entirely the temporal-perspectival mechanisms implied by her observations, more specifically the underlying conceptualsemantic system of aspect distinctions, Dry still gives an intuitively correct picture of what is at stake; cf. her examples (53) a. John gave Mary an apple b. and she sat down to take a bite.  She took the bite deliberately, savoring the taste. (54) a. John gave Mary an apple. b. She sat down  and took a bite. d. She took it deliberately, savoring the taste. Her comment is: as distinguished from (53c), (54d) "is anaphoric and does not move time — (54c) having communicated, through past time and perfective aspect, that a bite was taken. Thus (54d) is reduced to the status of a comment or description." In a corresponding way Kamp (1979: 401-2) stated that the French passé simple "gives new information" and "pushes the action forward." This does not, of course, imply that background may not convey new information; as can be seen from (54d), it certainly may. The decisive thing is that when new information is conveyed by background

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it is not part of foreground movement. Correlated thus with the distinction background:foreground, the distinction 'theme:rheme' apparently should be reviewed and distinguished more clearly from the distinction 'old:new information' (see Section 19 below). The thematic function is just one of the various functions fulfilled by temporally indefinite textual structures within the over-all concept of background. 16 The aspect-semantic basis for foreground sequencing The view that the 'perfective' (or the 'aorist') moves narrative time for­ wards was observed, as we have seen, in early works on narrative discourse. Related to events in time the corresponding observation has usually been focussed on their appearance in succession (cf. Galton 1976: 11, Kamp: 1979: 403) or sequence (Forsyth 1970: 9, 65; Bondarko 1971: 13, Maslov 1973, Givón 1982, Hopper 1982b, Timberlake 1982). What exactly makes the 'perfective' fulfill this function has not been well understood until lin­ guists turned their attention to the system of distinctive semantic compo­ nents underlying language-specific expressions of aspect. Timberlake (1982: 313), consequently, sees a connection between this function and the exterior aspect locus (i.e. viewpoint) and the corresponding meaning of 'closure' understood by him to be expressed by the 'perfective.' This first approximation of a proper account was developed further by Hopper (1982b: 6; cf. also Hopper 1979b: 58) who made this connection more evi­ dent by saying that "an event [i.e. foreground event, NBT] must be bounded at its inception and conclusion in order for its limit in respect to adjacent events to be maintained without overlap and hence without ambiguity." Proceeding rather from the conceptual-semantic feature of totality (+) as underlying the 'perfective' (and relatable in a more trans­ parent way to the processual meaning understood as partiality, i.e. -, than 'closure' is to 'non-closure' which according to Timberlake and Hop­ per's privative understanding would apply also to temporally indefinite events like iteratives; see above), one could in fact maintain that the central discourse function of 'nextualization' is based precisely on the total view, viz. as "a precondition for the delimitation [of events] and their (rapid) replacement by subsequent events in the story line" (Thelin 1984b: 265).

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Aspect and textual consistency: 'syntagmatic' (immediate') and 'paradigmatic' ('mediate') coherence

Understood as an expression of temporal perspective integrated with situation analysis (see above) and, consequently, reflecting — in discourse — interpretations of temporal-causal conditions of reality, aspect should naturally be one prominent carrier of textual coherence. Accordingly, one might even assume that the perceptual-conceptual instrument of aspect is involved when one observer/speaker relates segments of reality to each other as coherent which to another observer/speaker would not necessarily appear to be so. Without access to a corresponding deductive theory of aspect it is understandable that traditional text linguistics (except for mostly marginal remarks; cf., e.g., Weinrich 1971: 171, Grimes 1975: 232-4, 258, van Dijk 1981: 24; see also Beaugrande and Dressier 1981: 69) never made any serious attempts to account for what precisely makes aspect fulfill this role of 'textualizer.' Against the background of the system of aspect distinctions proposed above one might, very provisionally, think of this role as based on the func­ tion of discerning CHANGES-OF-(SITUATIONAL-)STATES. Statechanging, aspectual events can under these conditions be seen as originat­ ing and resulting in 'immediate' (foreground and actual background, more precisely, foreground-embedded and foreground-related, respectively) SITUATIONAL STATES as well as 'mediate' (proper background) SITU­ ATIONAL STATES. STATES are preconditions for CHANGES not only in the elementary perceptual sense that CHANGES otherwise would not be discernible, but also in the more important conceptual sense that STATES are usually interpreted to 'motivate' (in a broad sense) CHANGES or, con­ versely, the latter tend to be derived from preceding STATES on rational grounds. The function of 'nextualization' would imply then that statechanging events are subjected to delimitation (+) in time not only in order to give place for succeeding events but also to establish a directly foreground-related (often implicit) resulting STATE ('new situation' = actual background) 'motivating' these next events. Relations of 'motiva­ tion' between events and 'immediate' STATES may be said to represent a basically 'syntagmatic' kind of coherence characterized by temporal definiteness, whereas relations of 'motivation' between events and 'immediate' STATES, on the one hand, and 'mediate' STATES, on the other, would represent a basically 'paradigmatic' kind of coherence characterized by tern-

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poral indefiniteness. (In fact, 'immediate' actual background STATES, while temporally definite, occupy an intermediate position of double orien­ tation; see below). This is, of course, a very rough first approximation serv­ ing rather to enable a few considerations. 'Syntagmatic' (or, 'immediate') coherence appears thus to be rather transparent in its essence based as it is on the 'natural' course of foreground events (including its foregroundembedded, plot-retarding states/non-phasals and non-states/phasals) as well as its simultaneous setting of corresponding actual background states/nonphasals and non-states/phasals (temporally defined by the foreground), whereas 'paradigmatic' ('mediate') coherence appears to be based on con­ ditions of considerable complexity and abstractness constituting the broad concept of 'mediate' SITUATIONAL STATES or proper background (cf. in this connection the concept of 'non-eventive modality' suggested by Wal­ lace 1982: 204, 209, 218). 18

'Paradigmatic' ('mediate') coherence and the differentiated concept of background

The latter complexity of proper background is not surprising really in view of the feature of temporal indefiniteness (accompanied often, but not systematically, by spatial indefiniteness) when suggested for the paradigma­ tic axis as representing 'mediate' coherence conditions of different hierar­ chy. A corresponding understanding has been reflected by the treatment of temporal indefiniteness of events (here in the general sense) as expressing either increasing degrees of their abstraction or (in cases of tense-indepen­ dency) total removal from the time-axis (cf. Thelin 1978: 30-31, 65ff., 1984a: 227ff., 1985: 175ff.). Kucera (1981: 185) made a similar proposal in regard to the English simple present by stating that its basic meaning "is the designation of a state without any temporal limitations. It is for this reason that the nonprogressive present often designates atemporality, that is a proposition which, within the limits of human experience, is either truly timeless (The earth revolves around the sun ) or one which is viewed as having no definite temporal boundaries (Jimmy speaks with a Southern accent)." The non-processual use of Slavic imperfective forms was charac­ terized in a corresponding way by Boguslawski (1981:37) as "a typical coop­ eration of semantic factors proper and of what constitutes the domain of pragmatics." On the basis of such assumptions one could thus imagine that the paradigmatic axis comprises a large range of data from situation/dis-

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course to general world knowledge. On different levels of this axis we would, among other things, have to localize the various paradigms of criteria involved in the analysis and evaluation of reality/discourse under the temporally indefinite perspective and represented by such (still rather loosely conceptualized and, correspondingly, interrelated) modes of pre­ sentation as 1) 2) 3) 4) 5) 6)

simple statement or denotation, elaboration, defocalization, thematization multiplication (bounded iteration) classification (generic presentation) modalization (habitual/potential, potential, conditional, irreal etc. pre­ sentation) negation universalization ('gnomic'/'eternal truth' presentation).

The above hierarchically differentiated understanding of the concept of background gives special relief to the findings presented in Kalmár's (1982) pioneering analysis of verb modes in Inuktitut narrative. Future research will probably develop and modify the distinctive features suggested by Kalmár's analysis (he frankly admits that there are "doubtful cases"), but the decisive thing is that attention has been directed here to important phenomena of discourse organisation previously not observed, or observed in isolation from a proper systematic context. (In this connec­ tion compare the various functions subsumed under the so-called 'imparfait pittoresque' in French discussed by Waugh in this volume; see also Desclés and Guentchéva in this volume.) Whereas the Inuktitut so-called main mode typically expresses the foreground (representing, according to Kalmár, a) essential information b) development and c) event focus), there is an interesting differentiation of background structures (in a broad sense) by means of three further modes, viz. the relative, the appositive and the participial mode. The relative mode (Kalmár's 'background' characterized by the feature of non-essential information) appears to express not only such typical, tem­ porally indefinite background functions as those of causation, condition and doubt, but also temporally definite background functions of simultaneity with the foreground, referred to above as 'actual background.' Further­ more, and this is very interesting, the relative 'background' mode is assumed by Kalmár to express also development. This view seems to con-

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tradict the traditional understanding of background and would, con­ sequently, imply something like 'non-essential development.' However, a closer look at clauses in the relative mode reveals that they often represent a background function similar to that of thematization observed in Slavic use of the 'imperfective' (see above), namely by referring to developments, predictable from the foreground events, as non-localized temporally. Kal­ mar is not aware of this general principle but is not far away from revealing it. Discussing two "doubtful cases" — one in the relative mode (cf.55c), another in the appositive mode (cf. 55b), Kalmár (p. 58ff.) contrary to their formally established status of non-essential information would himself 'apriori' evaluate their information as essential; cf. the following fragment of Kalmár's example (the interpretations of the modes in brackets are mine, NBT): (55) a. b.  d. e. f.

The foolish raven married a goose (main mode = fore­ ground) In fact he married two (appositive mode = background/ elaboration) The geese would journey to their land-öf-no-winter (relative mode = background/setting) The big raven was asked to stay at home (main mode = fore­ ground) It was too far for him (relative mode = background/motiva­ tion) considering how tired he could get (appositive mode = background/elaboration)

The two examples indeed convey new information, but in evaluating it as essential, Kalmár apparently underestimates their primary background functions of setting and elaboration (cf. Dry's example (54) above), respec­ tively. The important thing, however, is that he suggests an explanation that (although not called for by 55c) may claim validity in regard to the gen­ eral background functions of thematization (present in the meaning of elab­ oration expressed by the appositive mode in (55b) and in the meaning of 'scheduled events' in other cases of the relative mode available in the further text not quoted here): "the difference between the Inuit speaker's classification and our own, if any, may be due to cultural differences in gauging the 'unpredictability' and hence the importance as new information of such events..."

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19 Aspect, focus, old and new information Defocalization of events as background function and expressed, accordingly, with imperfective forms, has been evidenced by Rassudova (1968: 37ff.) in regard to Russian. Kalmár's analysis of the Inuktitut parti­ cipial mode as non-event-focus or, more specifically, participant focus, is a neat parallel allowing for its integration into a broader, differentiated con­ cept of background (for similar observations, see Hopper 1979b, Hopper and Thompson 1980; cf. also Wallace 1982: 211). For a discussion (with further references) of focus and emphasis in Philippine languages in terms of observer roles (simultaneous with situational and grammatical roles), see Pike (1964/1974: 287, 296ff., 300). Aspectual defocalization and thematization in the above sense (see Section 15) of events as functions of temporal indefiniteness and, accord­ ingly, proper backgrounding, should, however, be distinguished from the hierarchically superior, focal function of the aspect-independent distinction between old and new information operating also on temporally definite (foreground and actual background) events (cf. a corresponding discussion in Gasparov 1979: 120, Givón 1982: 138-140) and expressed typically by syntactic means including distinctive word order (cf. Thelin 1984a: 229ff.); compare the following Russian examples: (56)

(57)

Kogda Natasa pisala(IPF) pis'mo, kto-to postucal(PF) v dver'. When Natasa was writing the letter, someone knocked on the door. Kogda postucali(PF) v dver', Natasa pisala{IPF) pis'mo. When they knocked on the door, Natasa was writing a let­ ter.

In (56) defocalization, i.e. in terms of old information, pertains to the actual background, in (57) — to the foreground. For examples of 'relative defocalization/ rather than proper backgrounding, of one of two successive foreground events, see Chvany in this volume (Section 1.1.3; cf. also a cor­ responding function expressed by the Bulgarian conjunction kato in Desclés and Guentchéva's example (23) in this volume). In addition to aspectual and syntactic distinctions, intonation may still complicate this picture of multi-level focal functions and create thus an intricate system of (in part compensatory) interrelations, constituting a substantial challenge to future work (for some recent developments in this field of research, involving such

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concepts as time, dynamicity, scope and hierarchies of salience, cf. Keijsper 1985, Hajicová & Sgall 1987). 20

Aspect and negation

The problematic correlation between negation (mentioned above as one possible criterion of paradigmatic conditions of coherence) and the pre­ ferential use of Slavic imperfective forms observed in aspectological litera­ ture has become less puzzling in the light of discourse analysis. The rele­ vance of negation scope for foreground vs. background functions in terms of temporal definiteness and temporal indefiniteness, respectively, has been illustrated in Thelin (1985: 174ff.; for supporting observations, cf. Forsyth 1970: 103, 110, 112; Galton 1976: 66ff.). The basic idea can be sum­ marized so that a superior negation presents the fact that an event did not take place, a subordinate negation presents an event that did not take place I was not taking place (when it was expected to), i.e. in the first case as a proper background condition (expressed by Slavic imperfective forms in their temporally indefinite use), in the second as a foreground/actual background event (expressed by Slavic perfective forms or — in cases of actual background — imperfective forms in their processual use). Without penetrating the correlation with discourse, Timberlake (1985a: 45) has characterized the effect of negation (and iteration) on 'achievements' in a way that intuitively harmonizes precisely with their background function, namely by suggesting "operators that, in effect, create new predicates that are specifically stative." More attention to narrative conditions is paid by Merrill (1985b) in his careful analysis of aspect and negation. While still influenced by the exclusive temporally definite understanding of aspect as evaluation (reflected by his idea of continuity; see below), Merrill — ques­ tioning with right the traditional concept of "aspectual competition" — introduces additional discourse criteria for explaining the choice between negated 'perfectives' and 'imperfectives': "If the narrative 'moves on' after the evaluation in question, the perfective is used and represents the termi­ nation in our interest in the named situation. If the narration remains in a descriptive mode, the imperfective is used and indicates our continuing interest." Interrelations of aspect and negation (also with regard to modal­ ity as, for example, in cases of the imperative; cf. Bogustawski 1985, Kucera 1985, Chaput 1985, Thelin in this volume) is a field of research that deserves much more attention.

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21 From temporal-perspectival coherence to temporal-causal coherence, and the balance between NARRATIO and DESCRIPTIO Returning now to the concept of 'motivation' (underlying my tentative remarks on coherence), it should — as already indicated above — be understood in a 'broad' sense; 'broad' not just in order to cover any possi­ ble relation between state and change, but rather to reflect the apparent condition that background states tend to 'motivate' by way of accumulation. That is, the 'motivation' for a change often becomes clear only in view of a complex structure of interrelated, possibly hierarchically distinctive states, including also the relation between mediate/proper background and immediate/actual background states. Changes, i.e. foreground events, also tend — at least in narrative discourse — to appear in serial complexity, pro­ vided they are all 'motivated' by the background and individually by each other. This would allow us thus to posit at least three levels of discourse, characterized by distinctive temporal perspectives, viz. proper background, actual background and foreground. Refining now the preliminary distinc­ tion made above between 'syntagmatic' ('immediate') and 'paradigmatic' ('mediate') kinds of coherence, we could say that accumulation (in the first two cases) and sequencing (in the third case) represent intra-level connec­ tions of (partial) 'motivation,' resulting in temporal-perspectival coherence signalized on each level by aspectual homogeneity. Connections of 'motiva­ tion' between these levels complete the properly textualizing, superior function of temporal-causal coherence represented by transitions between DESCRIPTIO and NARRATIO and signalized by aspectual heterogeneity. These connections ascribe to actual background (rep­ resented, as we shall see below, not only by normal non-states/phasals and states/non-phasals, but also by 'perfect states') an intermediate position relating it to foreground by means of temporally definite coordination, more specifically simultaneity (or actual relevance of 'perfect states'), and to background by means of temporally indefinite relations. This might be one feasible way towards explicating in part the correla­ tions between aspect and coherence not considered in Reid's (1970) con­ cept of 'linkage,' but reflected — at least to some extent — by Weinrich's (1971: 164-72) account for 'transitions' within and between "foreground tenses" and "background tenses," respectively, while treating only internal transitions as indicating 'textual consistency.' Different types of coherence relations (without attention to temporal perspective, though) have been

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analyzed with much insight by Hobbs (1985) within a framework of a knowledge-based theory of discourse interpretation. Perception of coherence in narrative discourse can be influenced by infringing the conventional balance between NARRATIO and DESCRIPTIO. Within certain limits this may lead not to perception of incoherence but rather to a certain tension or oscillation between the two types of pre­ sentation forcing the reader to look for new criteria of coherence and in part revise his understanding of what is important for the narrative to be a narrative. The well-known tendency in modern novel-writing has, accord­ ingly, been characterized by Genette (1968: 13) as an "invasion du récit pal­ le discours." Pomorska (1976) has shown convincingly how already the innovative element of Cechov's narrative prose was based on his "abandon­ ing the representation of 'events,' that is the usage of perceivable, discrete units, and replacing them by 'non-events' or units unmarked in the percep­ tion of the reader." In view of the aspectual implementation of this kind of 'narrative inversion' (cf. Thelin 1984b) it is thus not only in a metaphorical sense that Jensen (1984; see also in this volume) has characterized Öechov's main mode of literary design as "imperfective narration." The intimate correlation between situation analysis and temporalperspectival analysis and the latter's corresponding importance for coher­ ence advocated above is evidenced by the role played by aspect also in rather special fictional-narrative manipulations, for example, when intended to suggest the incoherent perception of reality through the eyes of a child (cf. Björling 1981, Thelin 1984a). 22 On the temporal status of the perfect in discourse A problem related to Weinrich's distinction "foreground tenses" vs. "background tenses" is the temporal-perspectival status of the perfect sys­ tem in discourse. The French pluperfect according to Weinrich is a "background tense." In a similar way Dry (1981: 234) maintains that sen­ tences like 'The train had slowed down' and 'The moon had risen' "are not on a timeline, because they have main verbs in the past perfect and refer­ ence times in the fictional past." This is the traditional view supported as it were by the fact that the pluperfect does not move the plot. However, this view is based on the questionable treatment of the pluperfect as a past-ofthe-past tense, emphasizing its reference to time before the past. Now, this reference is usually left undetermined (notwithstanding that we may be

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concerned with a temporally definite situation, as in the above examples; in the present perfect it even must be so), and further we have to face the fact that the pluperfect can be differentiated aspectually. The perfective pluper­ fect (or preterite in a pluperfect use) in Slavic would thus contradict its sim­ ple correlation to background. By treating perfect meanings rather as the category of taxis operating on the category of tense in a hierarchically complex predicate structure (cf. Thelin forthc. b), more specifically, as ANTERIORITY of a subordinate event (in the general sense of state or non-state) defining a superior state (the basically stative meaning of the perfect can be assumed on solid empir­ ical grounds; it may suffice to mention here the cross-linguistic tendency towards possessive/existential participial expressions), one would rather give conceptual-semantic priority to the meaning of 'prevailing (resulting) state,' suggesting thereby an explanation for the omission or anomaly of definite past points of reference. The notorious problem why the present perfect normally does not take such references can then be solved in a rather straightforward way as a consequence of this superior state coincid­ ing with the primary, and, in the present exclusive point of orientation, namely the moment of speech, and receiving thus an absolute conceptualsemantic predominance not allowing for a temporal specification of the sub­ ordinate, anterior event. This situation of competition between the present and the past does not occur in cases of the past (or future) perfect. Returning now to conditions of discourse, more specifically narrative discourse, the pluperfect can be understood as expressing a state of either 'mediate' or 'immediate' (see above) relevance of an anterior event for the foreground. Such states of 'mediate' relevance are presented under the temporal perspective of temporal indefiniteness (-TIME), of 'immediate' relevance under the perspective of temporal definiteness (+TIME), referring them in the first case to proper background, in the second case to actual background. The latter concept is thus motivated, as we see, not only by events going on simultaneously with foreground events but also by 'perfect states' of actual relevance for it. The circumstance that 'perfect states' can express actual relevance under the temporally definite perspectives of total­ ity (+) or partiality (-), otherwise normally incompatible with the sta­ tive meaning, is dependent of course on the presence of embedded anterior events carrying these perspectival functions (embedded states would not be able to) and conveying to the superior state (and the perfect structure as a whole) the feature of temporal definiteness. The Slavic perfective pluper-

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feet (as well as the English 'simple' pluperfect in its temporally definite use, as in Dry's examples above) would then in a natural way express the actual relevance for the foregound of an anterior event seen in its entirety (cf. Thelin 1984a: 233, 1984b: 284; 1985: 181), the English pluperfect progres­ sive (had been singing) — of an anterior event seen in process. Under these circumstances there is no need really to treat perfective pluperfects as "de­ partures from the norm," involving "some literary device" as suggested by Chvany (1985: 262ff., 268; in this volume: Section 2.2.4, 4). This is a stan­ dard use of the pluperfect also in narrative fragments of conversational dis­ course. The hypothesis of actual background function/actual relevance for the foreground proposed above is supported, as a matter of fact, by Chvany's (p. 263) own pertinent observation of "rather high" saliency with perfective pluperfects. The latter fact remains a contradiction (reflected by the expression "Backgrounded Perfectives") as long as the concept of background is not understood to constitute a complex conceptual-semantic hierarchy of temporal-perspectival distinctions (cf. Section 18 above; see also Waugh in this volume). 23 Narrative vs. conversational discourse The special time-referential status of the present perfect as analyzed above can equally explain why the use of the present perfect progressive (has been singing) would express an anterior event in process by referring rather potentially to all its parts (enabling, by the way, also its processualiterative use: cf. Dowty's example 'John has been finding crabgrass in his yard for six weeks; Dowty 1979: 81; cf. discussion in Thelin 1985: 184ff.) than to one single part defined by a definite moment of time. Basing this treatment of the present perfect on its superior meaning of 'prevailing state' as holding in the present, i.e. simultaneously with the moment of speech, gives this complex tense-taxis structure its specific time-semantic status of 'retrospective present' (cf. Jespersen 1935: 269) rather than 'past of rele­ vance for or oriented towards the present' (as often maintained) and, in doing so, relates it in a natural way to the other 'directly' moment-ofspeech-based temporal meanings characterizing conversational discourse rather than narrative discourse, i.e. present tense and, apparently, also future meaning. That the future meaning is no symmetric counterpart to the meaning of past tense has not been any secret to linguists (cf., e.g., Benveniste 1965). In view of its conceptual-semantic closeness to the pre-

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sent meaning one might perhaps (in interpreting modal connotations as superior states holding in the present) even see it — at least to some extent — as a counterpart rather to the present perfect, viz. as a 'prospective pre­ sent.' This issue deserves further exploration. In this connection one appar­ ently would have to consider the mechanism of 'immediate future transpos­ ition' discussed above (pp. 34, 57, 59ff.), on the one hand, and the phenom­ enon of 'inclusive' present/present perfect (I have known him for two years, Je le connais depuis deux ans), on the other (cf. Jespersen 1935: 271ff.; Thelin 1978: 51-54). Conversational discourse certainly appears also as dialogues embedded in narrative discourse, in the same way as conversational discourse may contain fragments of narration (cf. Waugh in this volume). The differences in aspect functions according to the different communicative needs dictated by narrative and conversational discourse, respectively, are an important field of future research. Very promising observations in this respect have been made by Rafferty (1982) in her analysis of Indonesian. Interaction of aspect and modality has, thus, been pointed out by her (p. 79) as one specific feature of conversational discourse. Another interesting condition is the conversational use of the Indonesian 'perfective' the function of which according to Rafferty (p. 74) "is not primarily to create sequences... but is rather to point out, or call attention to, the actions that the speaker regards as the most important at that moment" (for a corresponding discus­ sion of 'current relevance,' cf. Inoue 1979). This function can be compared with the use of the perfective present perfect (or preterite in the present perfect use) in Slavic as distinguished from the corresponding imperfective use. The latter simply states the fact that an action has taken place (al­ though there is certainly some 'mediate' relevance for the actual situation; after all it is a present perfect), whereas the former expresses an 'im­ mediate,' definite relevance (concrete result or consequence) of the past action for the moment of speech (rather than the completion as such; com­ pare the example (7a-c) in Merrill in this volume); cf. Russian (58)

(59)

Ja procital(PF) etu knigu. Mogu tebe vernut' . T have finished ('read through') this book. I can give it back to you.' Ja cital(PIF) etu knigu. Ona mne nravitsja. T have read this book. I like it.'

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Conclusions The critical survey of modem aspect theory formation presented above has chosen as epistemological basis a dynamic and integrative view of the interrelations between semantics, discourse and world/situation knowledge, treating them as reflecting complex cognitive operations in text-construc­ tion and text-reception. In order to simulate processes correlating world/sit­ uation data with utterances in concrete speech acts, the linguist apparently has to make some empirically testable assumptions about human strategies for reception, memorization and actualization of such data. With some probability this task may be served by models of hierarchically ordered dependencies, perhaps in the form of a circuit-feedback system with a 'real world' generator as input (cf. Thelin 1985). By including into such deduc­ tive models hypotheses about man's perception and conception of reality, linguistic theory will thus be in a better position to answer demands not only for descriptive but also for truly explanatory, i.e. predictive adequacy of analysis, as well. This is, indeed, a prerequisite for linguistic analysis to reflect in a consistent way procedures of both textual encoding and textual decoding. It appears well-founded, therefore, to assume that aspect seman­ tics by being processually related to world/situation structures or, rather, world/situation-interpreting structures, can be understood in a more gen­ eral and more insightful way than this would have been the case in axioma­ tic models of language. This assumption is corroborated by the crucial role ascribed to aspect in the above hypothesis of integrated situational-perspectival analysis, giving further conceptual-pragmatic support to the contem­ porary orientation of aspectology from sentence-based analyses towards discourse/situation-based analyses. If this assumption is correct, aspect is by necessity a universal concep­ tual-semantic category subject to typological or language-specific variations mainly in regard to its morphosyntactic shape and extent of linguistic for­ malization (paradigmatization). Aspect-semantic differences between lan­ guages would under these circumstances be conceivable only in the sense of rather superficial functional conditions, viz. as different preferences in regard to strategies of redundancy, with language-specific morphosyntactic constellations of polysemy as consequence (cf. Thelin 1985: 190, 1986). As evidenced by the predominant aspectual-zero-treatment of English simple forms, future attention to language-specific conditions of polysemy appears to be one important prerequisite for further progress in aspecto-

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logy. Indeed, without it not only distinct aspect-semantic components but also the time-semantic components of aspect, tense and taxis in many cases would remain indiscernable from each other. Within the over-all system of time-semantic distinctions we may assume that aspect is hierarchically superior to tense (the latter being dependent on the aspectual distinction ±TIME), whereas taxis is subordinate to tense, since operating on the latter, for example, as + ANTERIORITY in the system of perfect meanings. The hierarchical-componential structure of time-semantics can be understood to reflect conceptual procedures of choices based on binary features rather than values of multi-dimensional scales (cf. Thelin 1985: 155). By asking questions about the conceptual-semantic correlations between the event-defining and discourse-organizing functions of aspect, aspectology has rediscovered its proper object of research: the semantics of temporal perspective. On this basis the verb (phrase) semantic and intervalsemantic practice in aspectology is losing empirical ground. Temporalperspectival distinctions may still be understood to be based on an analysis of time in terms of moments (conceptual-pragmatic moments). The 'deemphasis' of sentence-based truth-conditions in aspectology remains infer­ tile without due consideration of these developments. The application of truth-conditions to aspect beyond the sentence (according to Kamp's prop­ osal) against this background requires further exploration. However, the general view underlying (and strengthened by) the above observations is close to Jackendoff s (1978) understanding of semantics as "fundamentally a psychological rather than logical discipline..." In accord with recent developments towards cognitive-procedural models of linguistic functions, this view should be understood, more specifically, as related to a pragmati­ cally based theory of cognition as anticipated in many important respects by Charles S. Peirce's epochal semiotic thought (for an empirical confronta­ tion of the aspect theory underlying the above observations with basic dis­ tinctions in Peirce's theory of signs, see Thelin forthcoming c). According to the above criticism, further developments of situation semantics will be of importance for aspectology only to the extent that they consider the crucial role of temporal-perspectival analysis as integrated part of situational analysis. In this connection there has been evidence for mak­ ing a distinction between the aspect-dependent concepts of SITUA­ TIONAL STATE and CHANGE-OF-(SITUATIONAL-)STATE, on the one hand, and the aspect-independent concepts of pragmatic-lexical states and non-states as reflecting the basic perceptual distinction between NON-

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PHASAL and PHASAL SITUATIONS, on the other. Future aspectological research based on situation/discourse semantics — in paying due attention also to the specific conditions distinguishing nar­ rative and conversational discourse — will probably refine the traditional temporal-perspectival distinction between foreground and background. In particular backgrounding has been shown to require further differentiation. The concept of actual background has been proposed to capture the tem­ porally definite perspective of events simultaneous with (or of actual rele­ vance for) foreground events. The concept of proper background has been suggested as a first approximation to include various textual functions of events under the temporally indefinite perspective. Within the latter concept new possibilities have been created for a proper treatment of iterativity and habituality. In this framework interrela­ tions of aspect and modality (actualized, for example, by the habitual meaning) represent an important object of future research. Understood as superior states, modal meanings point to the crucial phenomenon of con­ ceptual-semantic (and textual) embedding allowing for the hierarchical con­ stellation of distinctive aspect meanings. As dependent on discourseperspectives of different scope, aspect choice in cases of negation appears to have come closer to a satisfactory explanation. Conceived as universal instrument for temporal-perspectival analysis taking part in situation analysis and expressing thus interpretations of basic temporal-causal relations, aspect, naturally, must be a prominent carrier of textual coherence. Future investigations of conditions of coherence (for example, in terms of 'focus,' 'salience,' ' theme:rheme,' 'old and new infor­ mation') cannot apparently disregard aspect functions in discourse. Finally, in view of the central role for the temporal-perspectival organi­ sation of discourse played by aspect, we may assume that its underlying sys­ tem of distinctions constitute the very basis also for important innovative developments in narrative prose. In agreement with the integrative view of linguistics and poetics advocated by Tynjanov and Jakobson (1928) we may thus understand considerations of aspect semantics to be indispensable for poetic research exploring the aesthetics of perspectival manipulations and their role for changes of narrative conventions (cf. Thelin 1984b: 273ff.).

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"Universalni funkcii na temporalnost i aspektualnost i bălgarskite t.n. 'defektivni' glagoli ot tipa napisvam." Die slawischen Sprachen 1.108-118.

1984a. "Coherence, perspective and aspectual specification in Slavonic narrative discourse." Aspect Bound, ed. by de Groot . & H. Torninola, 225-238. Dordrecht. 1984b. "Komposition, Perspektive und Verbalaspekt in Puskins Prosa: Entwurf einer poetisch-linguistischen Methode." Signs of Friendship: To Honour A.G.F, van Hoik, ed. by Baak J.J. van, 257-293. Amsterdam. 1985.

"Kognitiv-pragmatische Korrelate semantischer Strukturen in einem Zirkel­ modell für prozessuelle Sprachanalyse: Der Aspektspezifizierung im Slawis­ chen zugrunde liegende Hierarchien und Komponenten." Zeitschrift für Slawistik 30.153-199.

1986.

"Linguistic typology, universal grammar, and the Slavic verb." Proceedings of the Second Bulgaro-Scandinavian Symposium, Kungälv, 9-15 August, 1982 (= Uppsala Slavic Papers, 13:1), 205-228. Uppsala.

forthc. a. "On the concept of time: prolegomena to a theory of aspect and tense in narrative discourse" (shortened version). To appear in Waugh L.R. & S. Rudy (eds.), New Vistas in Grammar: Invariance and Variation. Amster­ dam. forthc. b. "Aspect, tence or taxis? — The perfect meaning reconsidered." To appear in Grochowski M. & D. Weiss (eds.), Festschrift zu Ehren von Professor Andrzej Boguslawski. forthc.  "Perception, conception and linguistic reproduction of events and time: the category of verbal aspect in the light of Charles Sanders Peirce's theory of signs." To appear in Keiner, Kenneth L. (ed.), Proceedings of Charles S. Peirce Sesquicentennial International Congress, 5-10 September, 1989, Har­ vard University. Timberlake, A. 1982. "Invariance and the syntax of Russian aspect." In Hopper (ed.), 305-331. 1985a. "The temporal schemata of Russian predicates." In Flier & Brecht (eds.), 35-57. 1985b. "Reichenbach and Russian aspect." In Flier & Timberlake (eds.), 153-168. Tomasevskij, B. 1928. Teorija literatury. 4. ed. Moskva-Leningrad. Townsend, Ch. E. 1985. "Can aspect stand prosperity?" In Flier & Timberlake (eds.), 286-295. njanov, J. & R. Jakobson 1928. "Problemy izucenija literatury i jazyka." Novyj lef 12.36-37.

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Vater, H. 1980. Review of Comrie 1976. Studies in Language 4.308-312. Vendler, Z. 1957. "Verbs and Times." The Philosophical Review LXVI, 143-60. Verkuyl, H.J. 1972. On the Compositional Nature of the Aspects. Dordrecht. Vinogradov, V.V. 1936. "Stil' 'Pikovoj damy'." Puskin: Vremennik puskinskoj komissii 2.74-147. Moskva-Leningrad. Vlach, F. 1981. "The semantics of the progressive." In Tedeschi & Zaenen (eds.), 271-292. Wallace, S. 1982. "Figure and ground: the interrelationship of linguistic categories." In Hop­ per (ed.), 201-223. Weinrich, H. 1971. Tempus: besprochene und erzählte Welt. 2. ed. Berlin. Zolotova, G.A. 1975. "Aspekty izucenija kategorii glagol'nogo vremeni." Izvestija Akademii Nauk SSSR, Serija literatury i jazyka, torn 34, No. 3, 248-258. 1982.

Kommunikativnye aspekty russkogo sintaksisa. Moskva.

1. Developmental properties of aspect and tense

On the concept of time: Prolegomena to a theory of aspect and tense in narrative discourse1 Nils . Thelin University of Oldenburg

Wo Sonne und Mond nicht lediglich ihrem physis­ chen Sein und ihren physischen Wirkungen nach bet­ rachtet, wo sie nicht nur um ihres Glanzes willen oder als Erzeuger von Licht und Wärme, von Feuchtigkeit und Regen, verehrt, sondern statt dessen als die bes­ tändigen Maße der Zeit genommen werden, an denen der Lauf und die Regel des Gesamtgeschehens abgelesen wird — da stehen wir an der Schwelle einer prinzipiell veränderten und vertieften geistigen Ansicht.Von der Rythmik und Periodik, die schon in allem unmittelbaren Dasein und Leben fühlbar ist, erhebt sich jetzt der Gedanke zur Idee der Zeitordnung als einer universellen, alles Sein und Werden beherrschenden Schicksalsordnung. Erst in dieser Fassung als Schicksal wird die mythische Zeit zu einer wahrhaft kosmischen Potenz — zu einer Macht, die nicht nur den Menschen, sondern die auch die Dämonen und Götter bindet, weil nur in ihr und kraft ihrer unverbrüchlichen Maße und Normen alles Leben und Wirken der Menschen und selbst der Göt­ ter möglich ist. Ernst Cassirer (1925: 142)

1

Time, eternity, and the distinction definite: indefinite

The theoretical issue of temporal structure in a broader sense has a long tradition in the study of language and literature. In his Poetics (Ch. 20, 1457a) Aristotle ascribed to the verb a function of "temporal determina­ tion" which is missing in the noun (by indicating present, future or past

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time). The German term Zeitwort, denoting the grammatical category of verbs, reflects the same old insight. Treatments of the concept of time in ancient philosophy likewise con­ vey observations of interest for our understanding of the meaning of time as an essential poetic-linguistic problem. By excluding past and future from the meaning of eternity (though not yet speaking of 'eternal present'; cf. Ricoeur 1983: 46; see below), Plato (Timaeus: 37c), for example, established in a sense a first approximation of the distinction so crucial to modern aspectology, viz. the one between timerelatedness and non-time-relatedness of reported events (cf. Thelin 1978: 3031, 65-66; 1984b, 1985: 173ff.; forthcoming a). The subsequent theological discussion of eternity and time as two dif­ ferent forms of existence, i.e. the life of God, the Creator, and of man, the creature, respectively, develops further the Platonic distinction by paying more attention to the psychical activities of man involved in perception and conception of time. Consequently, according to Gregory of Nyssa (quoted here in the interpretation suggested by Callahan 1960: 61), ...the nature that is self-sufficient, eternal, and all-embracing is not in place or in time, but is before and above these. This nature is not mea­ sured by ages, nor does it run along with time, but is firmly fixed in itself and is not divided into past and future. For past and future are affections proper to created beings, and refer to the memory and anticipation of the life that is divided by time.

Thus the merit of Callahan's is to have pointed out that the position taken by Gregory of Nyssa indeed mediates between the Neoplatonic con­ cept of time as a divine principle of soul (Plotinus) and the psychological understanding developed by St. Augustine in his well-known discussion of time as an important complement to the traditional metaphysical view (see below). The conceptual-linguistic relevance of the religious distinction between time and non-time as an expression of the two kinds of being represented by man and God, respectively, is evidenced e.g. by the Sanscrit perfect in the hymns of the Vedas. As shown by Renou (1925), the Vedic perfect (though situating events in the past) was reserved for the Gods, for princi­ pal parts of the narration to mark their general and solemn character. The same author points, correspondingly, to the special treatment given the desinences of the perfect in Panini, relating them rather to nominal suffixes.

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It is to Kristeva's (1969: 273ff.) credit that she has shown the universal significance of such historical facts by bringing them into a logical connec­ tion with the non-time-related use of the imparfait in French and thus giving support to the idea that the organisation of temporal perspective in narra­ tive discourse is based on an aspectual distinction, namely the one between time-relatedness and non-time-relatedness (cf. Thelin 1984a: 226ff.; 1984b: 264ff.;1985: 185). There exist, as we shall see, different degrees of abstraction subsumed under the general concept of non-time-relatedness (cf. also Thelin forthc. a), but Kristeva is perfectly right in stating that her "hors-temps" or "fautemps," marked by the imparfait ...n'est pas un temps narratif. Il ne raconte aucune histoire ni se réfère à aucun fait représentable, même si 'le récit' semble mimer des faits... Si tout temps est un temps de récit, le fautemps n'est pas un temps: il aban­ donne le récit et ses modalités au présent, à l'aoriste, au futur... Sans pré­ ciser le temps et le lieu d'action, cet imparfait du 'je' hors-jeu, hors-temps, fautemps le désigne comme non localisable et non temporel.

Against this background it becomes evident that linguistic theories of aspect and tense have paid relatively little attention to the development of the concept of time itself, proceeding usually from the tacit assumption that its basic meaning is more or less self-evident. The true temporal essence of aspect, for example, has until today been obscured as a rule by the strong influence of superficial morphological oppositions and by its confusion with verb semantics (e.g. in the spirit of the Aristotle-Ryle-Kenny-Vendlerian tradition, accepted in most Anglo-Saxon aspectology; cf. Thelin 1985: 173) or related semantico-syntactic conditions (as in the case of the so-called teorija predeVnosti 'terminativity theory/ persisting in most Soviet aspecto­ logy; cf. Thelin 1984c: 227). In reality, explorations of the historical origin of the aspect category (cf. Thelin 1978: 15ff.) indicates rather that the distinction implicit in the possibility of relating events concretely to the time axis, or conversely, abstracting or even completely removing them from it (in the former case tense distinctions are still possible, in the latter — usually not; cf. Thelin 1984b: 227; forthcoming a) is of fundamental conceptual-semantic nature and can be traced back to the very process involved in the rise of aspect, viz. changing (under the influence of the growing tense distinctions; cf. Paul 1937: § 190) an original more general definite/indefinite character of the verb (corresponding to the one with nouns; cf. Thelin 1978: 15ff., 19) to a

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specific definiteness/indefiniteness related to time (see below). The above understanding is in accord with Rundgren's (1959: 89, 91, 307) idea of "pure" vs. "localized" or "temporalized" aspect in his analysis of the conditions in Semitic, with Koschmieder's (1929, 1934: 13ff., 228ff.) definition of aspect as an expression of "Verzeitlichung der Verbaldetermi­ nation" and with Menges' (1968: 128) similar understanding of the aspec­ tual oppositions in Ural-Altaic. Furthermore, conditions of definiteness/ indefinitenss with objects (cf. Kramsky 1972) have been shown by Chvany (1983: 75ff.) to be generalizable and applicable also to processes and situa­ tions. She demonstrates thus the relevance of their specification as to time and space (in terms of "Saliency/Non-Saliency") for their relation to such basic discourse oppositions as background:foreground and theme:rheme. The ancient insight of man's fundamental ability to concretize or abstract 'reality' in relation to time has not, however, with rare exceptions, been reflected in a more systematic way in modern theories of aspect and tense. Our suggestion (supported by certain evidence from Indo-European as well as non-Indo-European languages) to consider the opposition ±TIME(-RELATEDNESS) as the basic conceptual-semantic opposition in the uni­ versal system of temporal distinctions, conditioned thus the first attempt at a consistent hierarchical-componential analysis of aspect capable of bridg­ ing this very gap in the tradition of temporal studies (cf. Thelin 1978, 1985: 173ff.). There certainly have been, in the past, various non-systematic observa­ tions of the non-time-related use of Slavic imperfective aspect forms with the so-called 'generalized-factual' meaning as distinguished from the invariant 'concrete-factual' meaning of perfective aspect forms (cf. Rassudova 1968). Bondarko's (1967, 1971: l0ff., 31ff.) feature "±1ocalization in time" and Maslov's (1973: 82) explicitly universal understanding of the distinction discussed were important, but mostly overlooked, steps on the rough road towards a proper understanding of the essence of aspect seman­ tics. However, Bondarko's distinction occupied a rather subordinate status in his system of oppositions and could not be brought into a hierarchicallogical relationship either with a likely diachronic process of aspect development (like the one indicated above and further described below) or with the system-inherent distinction ±TOTALITY (±TOT), which specifies further, in fact, precisely the given type of time-relatedness in cases of the feature +TIME (i.e. as total vs. partial reference to events associated with the time axis; see below). Maslov, on the other hand, was unaware of the true

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temporal quality involved in the distinction 'generalized-factual': 'concretefactual.' The same condition holds, indeed, for both Forsyth (1970: 5-6) and Comrie (1976: 113). Pettersson's (1972) suggestion to interpret Bondarko's opposition as equivalent to his own opposition "±Activity" was due to his confusing basic aspect semantics with verb semantics and had the inevitable consequence that his opposition "±Time" became inconsistent not only with the facts it was supposed to explain (see the criticism in Thelin 1978: 57ff.), but also with the basic insights into the mechanisms of man's perceiving 'reality' in relation to time gained within the empirical framework sketched above and further developed below. Before we are in a position to formulate adequate linguistic or poeticlinguistic models accounting for the functions of aspect and tense in narra­ tive discourse, we believe it is necessary thus to explore first more incisively the concept of time proper and its ontological status. This will also be the main concern of this paper. 2

In the footsteps of St. Augustine

Quid est enim tempus? St. Augustine's (Confessiones XI, 14, 17) classi­ cal question was accompanied by a first comment as humble as it was frank: "If nobody asks me I know; if someone puts the question and I have to explain, I do not know any more." Judging by most modern theories con­ cerning functions of time in grammar, we linguists apparently can still profit from the open-minded attitude and clear path of reasoning demonstrated by St. Augustine (and referred to below in its essential parts on the basis of the elegant exposition offered by Ricoeur 1983: 19ff.). 2.1 The physical and psychical ontology of time Opposing the famous skeptical argument that 'time does not exist' (viz. because 'future is not yet, past is no more, and present does not remain'), St. Augustine questions how something can be measured that does not exist: "Yet, Lord, we perceive the intervals of time; we compare them with each other, and we call some longer, some shorter. We measure further how much one time is shorter than another" (76, 21). But by what means (quo pacto; 75, 18) does one actually measure time? Searching for an answer to this crucial question, St. Augustine works his way through a long chain of observations and statements. To begin with he observes that it is

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only about past and future that we can say that they are long or short. Thus he concludes that present has no extension. He then goes on to modify the absolute understanding of time demonstrated by the skeptical view above, considering time rather as a quality assigned to events reported as existing "future things" and "past things." "If the future things and past things exist," he continues his discussion, "I want to know where they exist" (18, 23). Proceeding from the idea that past and future represent the activities of narration and prevision, respec­ tively, St. Augustine now takes a decisive step towards the psychological dimension of time by correlating these activities with the functions of mem­ ory and expectation, respectively. By assigning to both of them existence in mind, he is now in a position to corroborate his preliminary assumption that "past things" and "future things" exist, and to situate them in the mind in the form of images. Consequently, on this psychological level he not only solves — in his way — the ontological dispute about time, but also removes, at least at first glance, the previously stated opposition (extension:nonextension) between past and future, on the one hand, and present, on the other: "... my childhood, which is no more, is in past time, which is no more; but its image... I retain in present time because it is still in memory" (18, 23). Formulating thus his 'three-time-theory' (including 'present of the past,' 'present of the present,' 'present of the future'), St. Augustine, in fact, gives expression to the idea of the hierarchically superior status of the psychical activities underlying ('present' in) all enunciations (irrespective of their reference to past, actual or future conditions), i.e. the permanent psychological present, or, in other words, the moment of speech as the obligatory primary point of reference (=point of departure) for expressing all kinds of temporal order (cf. Thelin 1978: 37ff., 41ff.; forthcoming a). His '(present of the) present' is, consequently, understood as vision or attention, i.e. the psychological presence of actual perception as distin­ guished from memory and expectation in cases of '(present of the) past' and '(present of the) future,' respectively. 2.2 Time as measure: mental extension , motion and duration The careful reader cannot have overlooked the fact that St. Augustine — in spite of the development of his argumentation towards a psychological dimension of the concept of time — at this point is still far from answering

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the introductory question by what means time can be measured. Nor have we any explanation for the circumstance that 'present' according to his first observation has no extension, whereas his superior 'psychological present' does appear to have it. Turning directly to the question of measurement, St. Augustine (2131) states that time is measured "as it passes." But what passes is "present" and "present" has no extension. Now, since time can be measured, it must still have extension, but extension of what? The solution of the contradic­ tion must be then that extension of time is an extension of mind (distendo animi). This idea of St. Augustine's that time and its extension is a function of man's perceptual-conceptual analysis of 'reality' — however useful its underlying general assumption may be — appears, so far, to proceed from the same absolute and unrelated use of the concept of time as demonstrated above in the skeptical argument for the non-existence of time. One is enti­ tled thus to ask: is it, after all, time that is measured in the first place, or, is it not rather something else that is measured with the aid of time? Could not extension be understood as a feature inherent in this 'something else' perceived and measured, or at least, as correlated to its specific nature? The concept of time as measure had, as a matter of fact, already been related by Aristotle in his Physics (11.219b2, 12.221al) to motion, without being identified with it. The concept of extension had an interesting prehis­ tory, too. According to the Stoic view, represented by Chrysippus (cf. Cal­ lahan, op.cit.: 63), time was understood more precisely as "an extension (diastema) that accompanies the motion of the universe." Gregory of Nyssa (ibid: 60) combined a similar understanding with the concept of measure by referring to time "as an extension accompanying or running along with the universe of becoming and as being, in addition, the measure of all motion in the universe." It is an irony of fate that St. Augustine arrived at his psychological reductionist solution of "distendo animi" immediately after an incisive dis­ cussion of time and motion which he abandoned just a few steps from the discovery of the essence of their relationship, prematurely confessing his failure (cf. Ricoeur, op. cit.: 32ff.). In fact, he had argued most convincingly for an understanding of time as related not only to the movements of celes­ tial bodies (because he did not preclude that their velocity could be vari­ able), but to movements of any bodies whatever. Liberating thus the con­ cept of time from its compulsory association with regularly repeated move­ ments, he was, potentially, in a position to give it the generalized status of

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a flexible psychological instrument for comparing all kinds of motion, namely in regard to their duration: "The motion of a body is one thing, what helps us measure its duration is another; who would now not under­ stand which of them deserves to be called time?" Still St. Augustine failed to recognize what this "what" is. He had previously asked the question "whether it is the motion (motus) itself that is the day, or the duration (mora) within which it is accomplished, or both" (23, 30). Later he even stated that in order to distinguish the moment where an interval of time begins and where it ends, it is necessary to "mark" (notare) the place from which a moving body departs and where it arrives, since otherwise we can­ not say "in how long a time, from one point to another, the movement of the body or its parts has been accomplished" (24, 31). 2.3 The remaining discord between St. Augustine's ''mental extension" and cognitive-pragmatic (aspectual) conditions of time Ricoeur (op.cit.: 33, 40) has correctly pointed to the difficulty arising from St. Augustine's basically fruitful spatial view, on the one hand, and his situating time as extension exclusively in the mind (see above), on the other. This difficulty, as well as the general vacillation between his psychological postulate and his observations about 'reality' (as the one mentioned at the end of the preceding section), causing thus his irresolu­ tion, goes back to his defective initial argumentation: 'if time can be mea­ sured, it must exist; now, time can be measured only in past and future, not in present; past and future thus have extension, present not; if we hold that present is time, too, it must have extension; this extension then exists in the mind for present as well as past and future.' Consequently, the asymmetry between extension and measurement on one level is not really solved but replaced by symmetry on another level, i.e. it cannot be accounted for by any consequent correlation of psychological time (as being generally exten­ sible and measurable) and 'real' time (as being only in part extensible and measurable). Ignoring thus the inability of his abstract psychological model to explain systematically the (linguistic) use of time, more specifically the reason why 'real' present indeed cannot be used for extension or measure­ ment (at least in cases of time-relatedness), St.Augustine, in fact, retires before an aspectual obstacle, namely the distinction ± and the natural, pragmatically and perceptually based, incompatibility of the conceptual-

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semantic feature, in reality conditioning measurement, viz. + (total ref­ erence to or survey of an action reported as related to time; see below) with the present, i.e. with a moment of speech coinciding with the action reported. In the latter case only - (partial reference to an action reported as being related to time) is possible, i.e. the action can be referred to only in respect to that specific part or phase of it that coincides with the moment of speech. For understandable reasons an action reported as going on simultaneously with the moment of speech is not surveyable in its total­ ity and cannot be 'extended' or measured either. This is why the total aspectual meaning of Slavic perfective verb forms in the present is incompatible with actual present meaning (and rather transposed to denote future meaning; for a parallel in Kathlamet, see Silverstein 1974: 94) or why simple forms in English cannot appear in the pre­ sent in their time-related total aspectual use, but only in their various nontime-related uses: 'eternal,' 'gnomic,' 'generic,' 'habitual' etc. The actual present meaning can thus as a rule be expressed only by imperfective and 'continuous' forms, respectively, conveying precisely the aspectual meaning of partial or phasal reference. The 'reportive' and 'performative' use of English simple forms in the present tense is due to a specific mechanism of transposition, representing actual events as total (indeed, an 'aoristic' use) and having them thus immediately vanish into the past as a prerequisite for their sequentialization (cf. Thelin 1982; forthcoming a; Introduction: Sec­ tion 7 and 13). Simple forms of English verbs, denoting genuine states, can express time-relatedness also in the present, but not totality, since states are not analyzable in terms of parts (phases) or totality (see Section 2.5). 2.4 Aspectual delimitation and time as relative measure Thus unconscious of crucial interrelations between perceptual-concep­ tual and pragmatic constituents of the semantics of time, St. Augustine must face certain contradictions not explained by his restricted model (fur­ nished in the first place to prove the existence of time, viz. as mental exten­ sion), but potentially handled within his general psychological understand­ ing and correct observations of temporal functions. That is why he fails to see that, generalizing the concept of time from being exclusively a measure of duration based on regular motion to being a measure for all kinds of motion, he introduces instead of the concept of time as absolute measure the more abstract concept of time as relative measure. Whilst not penetrai-

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ing the latter's mode of functioning, St. Augustine remains captivated by the cosmological idea of some necessary standard measure, but since he would not recognize absolute constancy with physical movements, his generalized concept of time brings him into a seeming dilemma. This diffi­ culty is connected with his inability to realize that the procedure correctly observed by him, viz. that time is distinguished by 'marking' the initial and final point of a movement (the duration of which is measured; see above), implies an operation that is of a more fundamental, namely an aspectually delimiting character (expressed by the feature + referred to above) and can take place without a subsequent comparison between different deli­ mited movements (actions) in regard to their duration. It is important to state that aspectual delimitation is a relational mechanism conditioning the perception and conception of temporal order between movements (actions) as well as their preceding/resulting states (see Section 4.4), and as such offers a natural point of departure for a compari­ son also in respect of their relative temporal extension. If regularly repeated physical movements did play a decisive role for the development of the con­ cept of time (and on this point there seems to be general agreement), then it cannot have been in the sense of an absolute standard (as it would have been in St. Augustine's mind) because the development and refinements of instruments for measuring such constancy has continued to the present day, but precisely in the sense of relative extensions in time. This fundamental relational mechanism is evidenced, as a matter of fact, by the scale of lingustic expressions for time units according to the corresponding relative range of temporal extensions (day, month, year). Implicitly St. Augustine gives support to this relative understanding of time by assuming, hypothetically, changes in the velocity of movements serving as temporal standards (23, 30). He even maintains that motion may stop, time — not, and asks whether we do not, in fact, measure stops as well as movements (24, 31; see Section 2.5). 2.5 Time as duration of motion between states, and the aspectual distinction ± TOTALITY

Unable to incorporate his keen observations about 'reality' within his reductionist model of "distentio animi," St. Augustine never arrives at an integrated, consistent theory of time. With critical distance and accumu­ lated knowledge it is our privilege to approach the problem of time as

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treated by him and to explore where he went wrong. All the relevant fac­ tors involved in the concept of time seem to be there (motion, extension, points, delimitation, velocity, constancy/variability, duration, measure, comparison), but their mutual hierarchical dependency remains unclear in the shadow of St. Augustine's thesis of three times and its idea of mental extension as isolated analytic instrument. Therefore they cannot, so far, constitute any systematic device for deriving (explaining) the meaning of time. Quid est enim tempus? Now, by using and organizing the factors already present in St. Augustine's discussion we could, indeed, formulate at least a tentative definition of time that can serve as a feasible point of departure for a subsequent more comprehensive analysis: time is a measure of the variable extension, i.e. duration, of a movement between two points according to its velocity. Related to extensions in a world in motion, points should be under­ stood now as states (old and new states, i.e. states preceding movements and states resulting from them, respectively). The concept of state is further related to perceptual as well as to pragmatic conditions. The concept of pragmatic states, e.g. the intended result achieved by a movement (action), should, we suggest, be distinguished from the concept oí perceptual state. A pragmatic state is always also a perceptual state but not the other way around. The fact that we can thus judge the velocity of a movement also between two (pragmatic) states is conditioned by the perceptual strategy of segmentizing motion into intermediate (perceptual) states or phases (cf. Bergson 1911: 18, 32, 171-72, 288, 317-18, 323; Johansson 1950,1964; Miller & Johnson-Laird 1976: 83ff.; Newtson et al. 1978; Thelin 1984a: 231, 1985: 163ff.; Introduction: pp. 33,38). This important condition has, as indicated above (see Section 2.3; cf. further Section 4.4 and 4.7-4.9, 5), direct bearing upon the aspectual opposition ±TOT(ALITY) and gives empirical support to our equipollent interpretation of the feature - as underlying the meaning of 'process,' viz. as 'partiality' or, in other words, reference to one or more parts or phases of the movement (action) reported as related to time (cf. Thelin 1978: 32ff., 110ff., 1980a: 432ff., forthcoming a). We have pointed to the interesting fact that the use of the partitive case with objects in Fin­ nish may convey precisely the same processual meaning of the verbal action as expressed by English 'continuous' forms or Slavic imperfective forms in their time-related use (Thelin 1978: 31; cf. Tommola in this volume).

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True (pragmatic) states do not, however, possess any internal structure that can be segmentized or partialized. Hence the simple explanation why true stative verbs in English do not as a rule take 'continuous' forms, viz. because the latter express 'process' exactly by means of partial reference (-). However, states can be measured (St. Augustine's observation in respect to 'stops' is correct), but only in terms of surrounding movements, i.e. as the extension between the final point of the preceding movement and the initial point of the subsequent one. In a corresponding way states (lack­ ing extension and phases of their own which would allow for their direct association with time) can be related indirectly to time when reported as being defined by surrounding time-related movements (actions/events) or as potentially changeable by such (future) movements. The missing partial­ ity with states is thus a consequence rather of their inability to be totalized by their own. 2 3

The perceptual-conceptual hierarchy of matter, space, and time: localist prerequisites for a theory of aspect and tense

Proceeding from the view that linguistic theory somehow must account for the fact that the semantic complex of time and its various linguistic shapes and poetic uses cannot be understood in a deeper integrative way without our paying attention to how time is perceived and conceived by man in a context of action (interaction) and linguistic reproduction of action, we would like to suggest now a rather concrete localist approach to this con­ cept and the preconditions for its development. The idea of deriving tem­ poral meanings from spatial ones is not new, of course, and appears to be justified by, among other things, the fundamental perspectival function they have in common, and the higher degree of abstraction represented by the former. Further, it is well-known that temporal meanings in the form of aspectual features in many languages are (or have been) conveyed by local (prepositional or adverbial) expressions (cf. Middle English he waes on huntunge; German er war am Jagen, dabei sein etwas zu tun; French être en train de faire; English to be in process, motion, at work, etc.). Tense mean­ ings are often expressed by verbs of locomotion, and so on. The general direction of evolution from the concrete concepts of space and motion to the more abstract concept of time could thus at least be symbolized by, for example, the Latin development *movimentum (moveo "move") → momentum ("movement changing state" → "moment").

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In its basic features the meaning of time as the general concept under­ lying the semantics of the two distinct temporal categories — aspect and tense — and their development could, according to our understanding, be formulated thus in the form of its hierarchical relations to matter and space: The concepts of matter and space exist in a relation of mutual depen­ dency. The concept of space presupposes the existence of matter and beings perceiving this matter. Equally, the concept of matter presupposes the idea of extension in space. Perceived space is confined in its extension by perceived matter. The extension of matter itself or the space between various instances of matter ('things') is conceived of as distances between its/their ultimate or closest boundaries (points), respectively. Being the fundamental perceptual device for relative ('subjective') spatial perspec­ tive, the concept of distance has been generalized and submitted to con­ ventional, so-called absolute ('objective') measurement in terms of length. Matter has two forms of existence in space: rest and motion. At rest the distances between things in space are constant, in motion — changing. Motion causes new distances (new configurations of things) and — after its returning to rest — new states. Motion implies thus change of states. Time is the concept of distance between old and new states, i.e. the duration of a movement until it has changed an old state into a new one. The duration of a movement is in inverse proportion to its velocity if related to a given distance: the faster the movement between two states, the shorter its duration and the conceived distance between the two states. Time is, in other words, an abstraction and further development of the concept of extension from bearing upon constant distances in a world at rest, i.e. as a means of measuring them in terms of relations within world states (the spatial dimension: length), to bearing upon variable distances in a world in motion depending on the velocity of this motion, i.e. as a means of measuring them in terms of relations between world states (the temporal dimension: duration). Being the fundamental perceptual device for relative ('subjective') temporal perspective, the concept of distance, i.e. duration, has been generalized and submitted to conventional, so-called absolute ('objective') measurement in terms of chronological time. The cognitive-pragmatic understanding of the basic semantics of time evidenced above (cf. also the fruitful concept of "actor-oriented temporalization" and "aspectualizaton" in Parrei 1985: 145ff.) is supported, as a mat­ ter of fact, by developments in modern physics. The revolutionary implica­ tions of Einstein's theory of relativity and, in particular, quantum mechanics (cf. Davies 1980) no longer allow for a concept of absolute time, but tend rather to stress the desicive role of the observer's (experimenter's) standpoint, assigning thus not only to perceptual psychology but also, in fact, to linguistic semantics a special relevance in the further study of time

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as a concept of relative measure characterizing to a certain extent all descriptions of 'reality,' be it the 'objective' world of science or the 'subjec­ tive' world of everyday life and poetics. 4

The development of temporal distinctions

How is the above basic understanding of time as relative measure of duration to be brought into a logical and genetic relationship with the lin­ guistic categories of aspect and tense? 4.1 Primitive features of time: concreteness, cyclicity, delimitation To begin with, it appears reasonable to assume that the concept of time originally developed related to observations and reports of concrete events and actions taking place in more or less definite locations with definite agents and definite goals or experiencers, as well. Duration was the funda­ mental dimension of time conditioned primarily by the 24 hour cycle of day and night. Indications of longer durations (in terms of days and nights, for example, how long time the hunters had been away from home) must have been prior to the localization of smaller durations or 'points' along the line of extension of e.g. one day (cf. Benthem 1980: 39). This follows from the elementary condition that partial indications in regard to the cycle could be made only if the latter existed already as a concept of confined (surveyable) entirety. The further partialization or specification of temporal cycles must, naturally, have been related to an increasing complexity in perceptual-con­ ceptual and linguistic structure. It would seem appropriate to posit then that temporal references origi­ nated in indications of durations, i.e. in measurements of events and actions (and, indirectly, states) reported as taking place (holding) in con­ crete, definite situations, expressing what we have referred to above (in regard to a later stage of development; see below) as the aspectual feature 'time-relatedness' (+TIME). Since measurement of time presupposes the delimitation of the dura­ tion ascribed to events and actions reported, we can further assume that primitive temporal indications were characterized by the prototype of what we have referred to above as the aspectual feature 'totality' (+), as well.

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4.2 Pre-aspectual perspectiv al differentiation in terms of wholes and parts, and the conceptual distinction of past and present time Under the circumstances indicated above, original temporal references (in this fundamental pre-aspectual sense) applied to definite events and actions only in past time, since totality is incompatible with present (i.e. actual) time (cf. also Morin 1942: 172), and the concept of future time, has, apparently, to be considered as a later development (transposing the pre­ sent meaning into the future by means of modality; cf. Thelin 1978: 25ff.). Now, there is strong evidence, for example, from Indo-European languages (ibidem 15ff.) that the conceptual and linguistic distinction past:present developed later than the aspectual distinctions. In Greek the remaining basic compatibility of the aorist with all times (except for the indicative that cannot express present meaning; see below) and, in particular, the function of the imperfect as a secondary variation of the present stem expressing the same aspect meaning in the past are such pieces of evidence. It seems justified thus to posit that the aspectual meanings, underlying e.g. the Greek aorist and present stem, respectively, had existed prior to tense meanings. Under these conditions one could think of aspect in its ori­ gin as a feature not yet associated specifically with the meaning of motion (events/actions) and time but representing rather a more general distinction holding for man's perspective on reality, viz. in terms of rather definite pat­ terns of wholes and parts (in harmony with Gestalt psychology; cf. Thelin 1985: 163). This perspectival analysis would then have applied to events/ actions and objects, as well (cf. the above-mentioned use of the partitive case in Finnish objects as an expression of the partial or 'processual' aspect meaning). The total view of events and actions as the primary, 'pure' aspectual meaning underlying primitive measurements of duration (and reflected later by e.g. the Greek aorist or Slavic perfective forms) referred then to these events and actions (at least if definite) as past (only later as future) not due to any 'tense' distinction (because it did not yet exist as such; see below), but as a consequence of this total pre-aspectual view itself. The compatibility of the Greek aorist not only with past (and future) meaning but also with present meaning is just a seeming contradiction, since this latter compatibility is valid only for the superior (modal) structures of the semantico-syntactically complex aorist forms represented by the subjunc­ tive, the optative, the imperative, and the infinitive, whereas the subordinate

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(embedded) actions characterized by the total aspectual (truly aoristic) meaning could not be referred to as actually taking place in the present, i.e. simultaneously with the moment of speech. This important fact is evidenced by the non-complex indicative, which could refer only to past (and future) actions, but also by the participle which denoted normally preceding actions in respect to the main action. 4.3 The pre-aspectual concept of totality: from temporal quantification to temporal qualification Proceeding from the above understanding that indications of duration in terms of natural cycles developed from entire cycles to smaller, delimited parts of cycles, we can imagine now how actions viewed in their totality could be localized along the temporal line and defined successively by such small parts of this line (or regular events firmly associated with it) that the superior meaning of totality as delimited extension, i.e. duration in time, was replaced first by a more general total perspective on actions and then through the successive process of temporaHzation (see Section 1 and 4.5) by the derived meaning of total association with time, applying also to nondurational actions and changing thus the essential function of this feature from having been one of temporal quantification to being one of temporal qualification. Not the extension of an action along the time axis but its (perspectival) relation to it thus became the essential conceptual feature of aspectual totality as it developed, prompted by the contrast exercized by the futher conceptual possibility of qualifying actions also as being in pro­ cess by assigning to them a partial relation to the time axis, i.e. by associat­ ing them with it in only one of their parts or phases (see below). The meaning of totality has often been referred to in aspectology as 'punctuality.' The latter has even been regarded as the aspectual essence of the Slavic perfective forms (Dahl 1974). This understanding is not only incompatible with the hypothetical development sketched above, it is also incorrect. Exactly like Slavic perfective forms (cf. Thelin 1978: 33ff.), the Greek aorist could express totality irrespective of whether this totality was defined by its references as punctual or durational (delimitedly extensional): ebasileuse could mean "he became a king," but ebasileuse pentëkonta etē meant "he ruled for 50 years" (cf. the corresponding observa­ tions of Modern Greek and French in Seiler 1969: 124).

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4.4 The pre-aspectual concept of partiality: the essence of (processuality' Just as total indications with regard to the natural temporal cycles must have preceded partial ones, we may assume that total references to events and actions preceded the partial references underlying the 'processual' meaning (see above). This seems reasonable from the above-mentioned condition that the concept of parts is conditioned by the concept of wholes, and the corresponding dependency on a total perspective exhibited by the partial perspective as prototype for the aspectual feature -. Actions can thus be described in their totality if referred to a past (or future) point or segment of the time axis. Such 'points' of reference can be defined by other 'total' actions, simultaneous with or surrounding the given action, and by preceding or simultaneous states or processes as well. In other words, 'total' actions can be defined by processes, i.e. partial references, but must not be. 'Partial' actions, however, must normally be defined by 'total' actions or other points of reference allowing for a similar "confined glimpse" (Thelin 1978: 31) into their internal structure as the essence of 'processuality' (expressed by the Greek present stem, Slavic imperfective forms in their time-related use, and 'continuous' forms in English). Tradi­ tional expressions like 'progressivity,' 'durativity' (since duration, in fact, implies delimitation, i.e. totality) obscure this important condition. The circumstances referred to here are reflected by the roles fulfilled by 'total' and 'partial' events or actions in narrative discourse: 'total' actions, constituting the plot, could theoretically dispense with 'partial' actions, constituting the actual background (cf. Thelin 1984b: 226; 1985: 181, 184, 185ff.), although this is practically never the case. Narration is normally not conceivable, however, without totality, delimiting events and actions from each other and making possible in this way their succession and the progression of the story (see further Section 4.10.3 for a discussion of the superior distinction between these time-related features, i.e. + and -, implicit directly or indirectly (in the latter case) in foreground/ narratio, and the feature of non-time-relatedness implicit in proper background/descriptio).

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4.5 The distribution of pre-aspectual perspective, the rise of the past:present distinction, and the temporalization as genesis of aspect proper The only perspective applicable to actions in present time, i.e. referred to as simultaneous with the moment of speech, was — as indicated above — the partial one. Since the total perspective was restricted first to actions in past time (compare the tendency of past tense marking redundancy with the 'perfective' discussed in Holden in this volume: Section 2.3), we may assume that this perspectival distribution was the factor which also concep­ tually conditioned the rise of the temporal distinction pastipresent (and later the development of the linguistic tense category). Having initially released this process, the pre-aspect meanings — as a general (spatial) perspectival distinction in terms of wholes and parts — were then themselves influenced by the growing concept of temporality and successively associated more firmly with the concept conditioning time, i.e. motion and its manifesta­ tions as events and actions. This was, in our understanding, how the tem­ poralization of the original 'pure' aspect or, rather, pre-aspect meanings arose and led, as a first consequence, to the proper aspect distinction ±, specifying events and actions in respect of the character of their relation to time (see above). 4.6 From pre-aspectual definiteness: indefiniteness to the superior aspectual distinction time-relatedness:non-time-relatedness

(±TIME)

Even before the temporalization the general perspectival distinction, which applied to actions as well as objects by referring to them as definite (concrete) patterns of wholes and parts, had probably undergone a process of generalization, abstracting from reality as instanced by directly perceiva­ ble actions and objects and allowing for references to them as indefinite pat­ terns in terms of experientially derived general conditions and classes. With regard to events and actions this feature of indefiniteness had presumably developed as a consequence of a growing conceptual distinction between their uniqueness and non-uniqueness, respectively. Thus the temporaliza­ tion probably implied that the distinction definiteness:indefiniteness linked uniqueness of an action to the idea of a concrete or individual situation defined by specific references, associating the action with a definite segment of the time axis (i.e. the conceptual-semantic feature of time-relatedness: +TIME), and linked non-uniqueness of an action to the idea of general valid-

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ity holding by force of e.g. its repeatability, habituality or potentiality, and defined by lack of specific references, dissociating it from the time-axis (i.e. the conceptual-semantic feature of non-time-relatedness: -TIME). Complet­ ing thus the system of basic aspectual distinctions, the opposition ±TIME was to occupy its superior hierarchical position, being specified further — in cases of +TIME — by the subordinate distinction ± in regard to the given type of time-relatedness. Thus, in distinction to our hypothesis in Thelin (1978: 18ff.), the above analysis gives conceptual-genetic priority to the more concrete opposition ± as compared with the resulting system-inherent superiority of the opposition ±TIME. 4.7 The rise of tense distinctions Let us return now to the rise of tense distinctions, conditioned first by the pre-aspectual distinctions and then contributing in turn to their temporalization. In accord with the idea that a conceptual and linguistic distinc­ tion appears either as a consequence oí further specification ('totality gener­ ates partiality') or, conversely, as a consequence of generalization ('definiteness generates indefiniteness') of original features, we may assume that the pre-tense distinction past:present developed as a further specification, starting from the concept of past time as marked by the primary pre-aspect feature of totality. This is to be understood in such a way that the pre-aspectually conditioned appearance of the temporal concept of 'past' was a pre­ requisite of contrast for present (i.e. moment of speech) to become also the temporal concept of 'present' ('past generates present'). The temporal con­ cept of present as defined in contrast with past was now associated with the primary pre-aspectual feature applying to present, viz. partiality, as opposed to the feature of totality associated with the past (cf. Tommola in this volume). 4.8 The hypothetical development of temporal distinctions: summary of its conceptual-genetic stages (conceived as a process of increasing complex­ ity with considerable overlap) I.

The concept of time as instrument for measurement of duration 1. Conceptual features a. Basic features: definiteness, the general perspectival distinction

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in terms of wholes (pre-aspectual totality) and parts (pre-aspectual partiality), motion b. Motion-oriented features: cycles, extension, delimitation 2. Developments a. The pre-aspectual totality perspective, applied to motion, gives rise to the past time perspective as the conceptually marked feature of temporal order b. The pre-aspectual totality perspective as the conceptual instru­ ment for delimiting extension in terms of cycles or parts of cycles, i.e. for temporal quantification, becomes successively the instru­ ment for a more general total perspective on motion. II. The concept of time as instrument for pre-aspectual perspectival dif­ ferentiation 1. Conceptual features (applied to motion): definiteness, the preaspectual totality perspective, the pre-tense past perspective 2. Developments a. In accord with the general perspectival distinction in terms of wholes and parts, motion-related pre-aspectual totality is followed by its equipollent opposite partiality as an expression of the growing concept of a 'processual' perspective b. The definite perspectival differentiation of motion (in terms of pre-aspectual totality:partiality) is balanced by the further possibil­ ity of indefinite references to motion  The pre-aspectual concepts of totality and partiality, correlated to past and present motion, respectively, give rise to the conceptual pre-tense distinction past:present. III. The concept of time as complex instrument for two interrelated but distinct modes of perspectival differentiation: temporal quality (or "contour"; cf. Hockett 1958: 237), i.e. aspect, and temporal order, i.e. tense 1. Conceptual features (distinctions): definiteness:indefiniteness, preaspectual totality.-partiality, pre-tense past:present 2. Developments a. Correlated with the pre-tense perspectival distinction past:present, the pre-aspectual distinction totality.-partiality is associated more firmly with time as a medium for its perspectival differentia­ tion of motion, i.e. events and actions, not regarding their order

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along the time axis (as in the former case), but regarding their rela­ tion to the time axis itself, viz. their temporal quality (as opposed to primitive temporal quantity) b. The distinction definiteness:indefiniteness, accordingly, as a consequence of the temporalizaron, now applies to the relation of events and actions to the time axis, viz. by superimposing on the distinction, defining the specific character of this relation (in terms of totality:partiality), the more general perspectival distinction whether events and actions are defined by such specific relations to time, or whether they are not (i.e. time-relatedness vs. non-timerelatedness)  Along with the development of aspect proper, the pre-tense concept of temporal order in terms of past:present becomes succes­ sively the conceptual distinction underlying tense proper. Tense dis­ tinctions are to occupy then in the hierarchical over-all system of time semantics a position subordinate to aspect distinctions since dependent on the latter: thus higher degrees of non-time-relatedness preclude tense differentiation completely, and time-related­ ness, specified as totality, predicts the inappropriateness of (actual) present meaning. (For a discussion of the conceptual-semantic status of the category of taxis in relation to aspect and tense, see Thelin forthcoming a). 4.9 The Indo-European trichotomy

aorist-present-imperfect

The state of affairs resulting from the temporalization, i.e. the two aspect meanings totality and partiality correlated to the two tense meanings past and present, respectively, characterizes in Indo-European a stage of development represented basically by the aorist-present dichotomy. The genesis of the imperfect was a natural step to assure primarily (see below) the expression of partiality ('processuality,' i.e. -) in past time also. Its past time 'partner' — the aorist — as a consequence partly of the temporali­ zation, partly of its new role as opposite to the restrictedly past-time-related imperfect, henceforth was to lose successively its basically tense-indepen­ dent status (holding for Vedic Sanscrit, for Greek only in a restricted sense) and become an aspect-tense expression usually associated exclusively with past time (as in Slavic).

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Before partiality (represented by the present) had assumed its role as direct, equipollent counterpart of aspectual totality (represented by the aorist) we may in fact postulate the existence of an earlier, transitional stage with a privative opposition totality mon-totality (or closure: non-clo­ sure) distinguishing only delimited (totalized) objects or activities (i.e. 'events'), on the one hand, from non-delimited (partialized) objects or activities (i.e. 'processes') and per se non-delimitable (non-totalizable and, consequently, non-partializable) objects or non-activities (i.e. 'states'), on the other. Correlated with different lexical-semantic classes of verbs (which may be understood as original Aktionsarten), this distinction through the increasing temporalization became such a dominating structuring factor in the verb system that it could lead to its thorough polarization. In this situa­ tion there were at least two possible solutions at hand: to develop lexicalderivational means for the differentiation of those verbs which were ambiguous, or — the more economic solution — to apply grammatical means for this differentiation; or, finally, to combine these two modes of procedure. The grammatical solution was offered by the primary carrier of temporalization/tensification — the aorist-present opposition. The lexical-deri­ vational solution (augmentation, prefixation, infixation, certain types of suffixation) should turn out to be convenient too, however, when the rise of tense distinctions made it necessary to express unambiguously both aspect and tense. Instead of relying exclusively on the new grammatical solution implicit in the complication of the aspect-tense system through the imper­ fect, Slavic languages developed the instrument of prefixation/suffixation as a basic means of expressing aspect and could later (with few exceptions) dispense totally with the aorist-imperfect distinction and manage with one single preterite form opposed to present. Prefixation, however, is a complex expression of lexical (local, tem­ poral, modal) and semantico-syntactic (telic/terminative, conclusive) mean­ ings. Its function of expressing aspect in Slavic must therefore be under­ stood as a task accomodated to its other functions. The aspect meaning of totality is conveyed thus unambiguously by prefixes only in those cases where it is predicted by the meaning of conclusivity or instantaneity; in other cases the grammatical-derivational instrument of 'imperfectivizing' suffixation cancels the totalizing effect of the prefix, revealing its purely for­ mal aspectual function (cf. Thelin 1980b: 181).

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With the increasing temporalizaron and the corresponding rise of tense distinctions the present category as an over-all expression of undif­ ferentiated non-totality (non-closure) was subjected to a restructuring in terms of the growing distinction ±TIME. The time-related meaning of p r o ­ cess' was detached from the per se non-time-relatable meaning of 'state' (and non-time-related meanings like iterativity, habituality etc.) and received its independent, well-defined aspectual status as the time-related equipollent opposite to totality (corresponding to its original spatialperspectival function), i.e. as the feature of partiality incompatible with sta­ tive meaning. Given this hypothetical development, it seems possible to understand more exactly in which sense the development of aspect in Slavic can be said to have been related to a process creating new expressions of the stative meaning (cf. Holden in this volume) or to verbal pairs of statives/'duratives' and non-statives/non-'duratives' ('causative,' 'inchoative,' 'punctual' etc.), respectively (cf. Kurylowicz 1929). If statives/'duratives' in certain cases can be understood as derived from non-stative/non-'durative' stems, this need not imply that this process played the role of impetus for the rise of aspect. It appears rather to have been the other way around, viz. that at an early stage of temporalization (i.e. development towards temporal qualification', cf. Section 4.3, 4.5, 4.7) pre-aspectual totality was the very factor that led first to the privative distinction between totality (closure) and non-totality (non-closure) and, in turn, provoked the derivation of specific forms for the unitary stative/'durative' meaning. This does not preclude, of course, that corresponding verbal pairs of Indo-European origin (e.g. kosnoti-kasati, nesti-nositi) were involved in the development of aspect proper. The hypothesis of their role for the development of the aorist-present distinction appears to be well-founded, but we would maintain that this role was made possible only through the reinterpretation of their marked actional mean­ ings as e.g. the semelfactive (in kosngti) or the definite meaning of motion verbs (as in nesti)3 in terms of the superior pre-aspectual meaning of tem­ porally qualifying totality represented by the aorist (cf. Thelin 1986: 132). As distinguished from languages which were to differentiate systemati­ cally expressions of processual present meaning and non-processual (i.e. stative/non-time-related) present meaning (as e.g. English), Slavic lan­ guages preserved the original present as a polysemie expression for these meanings (see further Appendix).

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The above interpretation would imply that the privative distinction clo­ sure vs. non-closure (cf. Timberlake 1982, Desclés & Guentchéva in this volume) may have played a definite role in the development of aspect. How­ ever, in its general application to intervals it does not explain the meaning of 'process' in a way that can be related to psychological mechanisms of per­ ception (as the aspectual-semantic feature of partiality appears to do), nor does it account for the crucial distinction ±TIME. These difficulties cannot really be removed by postulating two different oppositions: one privative, viz. closure:non-closure, and one equipollent, viz. closure: 'openness' (cf. Fielder in this volume), because they partly overlap and do not express any logical-hierarchical relationship between time-relatedness and non-timerelatedness, on the one hand, and the relevance/irrelevance of closure: 'openness' predicted by the former and the latter, respectively, on the other. According to our analysis the concepts of 'event,' 'process' and 'state' cannot be understood as semantic primitives underlying aspect either. 4.10 The universal aspect distinction

±TIME

Our above-mentioned hypothesis of the distinction definiteness.indefiniteness and its reinterpretation in respect of events and actions as a conse­ quence of the temporalization, viz. as time-relatedness (+TIME) and nontime-relatedness (-TIME), respectively (cf. also Thelin 1978: 19ff., 30ff.), should now be integrated further into the conceptual-genetic hypothesis of time semantics sketched so far. Without the latter distinction the universal phenomenon of aspect and its origin would remain a mystery. 4.10.1 The mechanism of temporal abstraction It is interesting to note that Plotinus (Ennead III.7.1.20), referring to Plato's understanding of time as "an image of eternity," points to the possi­ bility of describing the relation between them also by proceeding the other way, i.e. from time to eternity. Regarding eternity as the "archetype," Plotinus thus gives implicit support to an analysis that treats non-timerelatedness (-TIME) as an abstraction of primary time-relatedness (+TIME). This condition is reflected by the circumstance that the most abstract mean­ ings of non-time-relatedness refer rather to 'all times' (as in cases of e.g. 'et­ ernal truths,' gnomes, etc.), whereas less abstract meanings (as the

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'generic,' habitual, and 'simple denotative' meanings) may be differentiated in regard to tense. In the former case we have spoken of a complete removal from the time axis, in the latter case of different degrees of abstraction from it (see Section 1; cf. Thelin 1978: 30-31, 65-66; 1984a: 227; forthcoming a). 4.10.2 Excursus on St. Augustine, Ricœur, and the hierarchization of time It is certainly no coincidence that Ricœur (op.cit.: 41ff.) in his impor­ tant analysis of St. Augustine's treatment of eternity and its implications for the concept of time, independently comes to a similar conclusion, ascribing thus to meditation on eternity a function of contrast {"idée-limite qui con­ traint à penser à la fois le temps et Vautre du temps" ; compare our opposition ±TIME), intensifying "l'expérience même de la distentio au plan existentiel" (our feature +TIME) and causing it at the same time to approach eternity and "donc à se hiérarchiser intérieurement, à l' encontre de la fascination par la représentation d'un temps rectilinéaire." Ricœur, certainly, comes to his conclusion from his analysis of the specific conditions holding for the distinction between St. Augustine's con­ cepts of the eternal Word of God {Verbum) and the temporal voice of man {vox), and assigning to the Word as instruction an internalized function, mediating between them; but his further generalization of these conditions is in harmony with our above-mentioned universal understanding of the dis­ tinction ±TIME and its constitutive role in narrative discourse: "Pérégrination et narration sont fondées dans une approximation de l'éternité par le temps, laquelle, loin d'abolir la différence, ne cesse de la creuser" (p. 52). The intensification of temporal experience achieved by the contrast of eternity and time (representing the features -TIME and +TIME, respectively), is understood by Ricœur as leading to an internal hierarchization of time (i.e. our feature +TIME, and not -TIME), since he sees it in opposition to the specific concept of eternity. This difference between our analyses is just seeming and disappears, naturally, if we (in view of a more general linguis­ tic-poetic application) prefer to see eternity just as one of the possible meanings representing non-time-relatedness (-TIME), if also the most abstract one. Under these circumstances we can thus establish a pretty good equivalence between our "different degrees of abstraction from the time axis" (Thelin 1978: 65) and Ricœur 's (p. 51) "hiérarchie de niveaux de temporalisation, selon que cette expérience s'éloigne ou se rapproche de son pôle d'éternité."

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4.10.3

±TIME,

strategies of narration, and the enriched temporality

It is remarkable, but not really surprising, given this background, how Ricœur's analysis, proceeding from St. Augustine's meditations on time and eternity, and our conceptual-semantic analysis of aspect, have arrived then at such a close understanding of time and the character of its constitu­ tive role in narrative discourse. It is thus symptomatic that both analyses lead to a similar generalization, connecting the temporal (basic aspectual) distinctions discovered with corresponding different strategies of narration. This circumstance is evidenced thus by our perspectival interpretation of the innovative element in Öechov's prose, viz. in terms of the relations of interplay holding between foreground and background structures or nar­ ratio and descriptio, respectively (cf. Thelin 1984a: 230, 1984b: 271ff., Jen­ sen in this volume). Proceeding from Pomorska's (1976) observation that this innovation is based on "abandoning the representation of 'events,' that is, the usage of perceivable, discrete units, and replacing them by 'nonevents' or units unmarked in the perception of the reader," we thus suggested for these two modes of narration the application of our concep­ tual-semantic aspect features time-relatedness and non-time-relatedness, respectively. Proposing for Cechov's type of prose the term 'narrative inversion,' we characterized the effect of replacing narratio (+TIME) with descriptio (-TIME) as an increasing tension (or oscillation) between them, assigning to conventional descriptive (background) structures a "dynamicpregnant perspective" (the intermediate role of time-related 'actual background' requires further exploration; cf. Introduction: Section 21, Jen­ sen in this volume). The above analysis is thus parallelled by Ricœur's generalizing conclusion: "S'il est vrai que la pente majeure de la théorie mod­ erne du récit... est de ' dechronologiser' le récit, la lutte contre la représenta­ tion linéaire du temps n'a pas nécessairement pour seule issue de 'logiciser' le récit, mais bien d'en approfondir la temporalité" (author's emphasis). 5

Modem aspectology and the concept of time with Bergson, Cassirer and Heidegger To conclude a parallel between the above distinction -TIME and +TIME

and Bergson's (1889, cf. also 1922: 54ff.) concepts of "temps reel (or "durée-qualité"), on the one hand, and "temps... materialise, devenu quantité par un developpement dans l'espace," on the other, would not be

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satisfactory. Such a conclusion might follow from an undifferentiated aspec­ tual analysis of the Slavic 'imperfective,' collapsing its time-related 'proces­ suale meaning with its non-time-related meanings (e.g. habituality) under the macro-concept of "life as quality, i.e. time as it is immediately given to our mind" (cf. Jensen in this volume) inspired by Bergson's former con­ cept. Bergson's "durée-qualité" cannot thus be considered equivalent to the aspectual concept of backgrounding non-time-relatedness (which does not preclude, of course, that the distinctive aspect meanings of the 'imperfec­ tive' may cooperate in one compound concept on a more abstract poetic level). In Bergson this concept rather implies the basic notion of permanent and indivisible continuity (cf. also Bergson 1911: 32), and as such is always constitutive of reality (motion) and also mind (cf. Morin 1942: 170). In dis­ tinction to our abstract conceptual-semantic feature of non-time-related­ ness (genetically derived from time-relatedness; see above), Bergson's "durée-qualité" expresses a rather concrete hypothesis of the ontological reality underlying mental processes and their external objects of perception (compare: "temps réel"), namely as permanent change. Therefore, while lacking completely the abstract concept of aspectual non-time-relatedness, Bergson's time theory proceeds instead — in the shape of "durée-qualité" — from what can be called rather an intuitive prototype of the concrete con­ cept of aspectual time-relatedness (+TIME) and derives from it the corres­ ponding intellectual interpretation of the mobile and indivisible reality by means of localistic (stationary) perceptual strategies, reflected by our aspect features of totalization (+) and partialization (»). Understood in this way, Bergson's philosophy of time thus gives important support to our above-mentioned Gestalt-psychological analysis of the essential percep­ tual mechanism underlying the equipollent aspectual opposition ±, i.e. as an expression of total (delimiting) references in cases of state-changing events and partial (phasal) references in cases of on-going processes, respectively; cf. Bergson (1911): The mechanistic instinct of the mind is stronger than reason, stronger than immediate experience. The metaphysician that we each carry uncon­ sciously within us... has its fixed requirements, its ready-made explana­ tions, its irreducible propositions: all unite in denying concrete duration. Change must be reducible to an arrangement or rearrangement of parts (p. 18) The real whole might well be, we conceive, an indivisible continuity. The system we cut out within it would, properly speaking, not then be parts at all; they would be partial views of the whole... (p. 32)

118

NILS . THELIN ... of becoming we perceive only states, of duration only instants... (p. 288) ... The primal function of perception is precisely to grasp a series of elementary changes under the form of a quality or of a simple state, by work of condensation (p. 317).

It should be evident that Bergson's references to the 'whole' and to 'parts' pertain here to the whole of continuity and to segmentation (of the whole) in a more general sense, respectively, covering in the latter case both totalizing (delimiting) and partializing (phasalizing) references, i.e. + and -, respectively. The interesting thing is that Bergson, by speaking of "partial views" (rather than 'parts'), not only gives expression to his deep understanding of the mechanisms of perception, but also supports the case for drawing on these mechanisms for a linguistic theory of verbal aspect. Understood thus as a matter of system-inherent hierarchization, Bergson's distinction between intuitive time and intellectual (materialized, spatialized) time is, as we have seen, in accord with the aspect model suggested above, and can be regarded as a system based, in fact, on timerelatedness (i.e. +TIME) and its further localistic specification (i.e. in terms of the opposition ±). However, if understood also as a hypothesis of the conceptual-genetic development, Bergson's distinction would conflict in this respect with the traditional assumption shared by our analysis, namely that temporal meanings have developed from spatial ones. Accordingly, the further process of temporal abstraction leading to the distinction ±TIME was not accounted for in Bergson's work. It was reflected, however, in fertile ways in Neo-Kantian and phenomenological (existen­ tialist) philosophy. Proceeding from Kant's "analogies of experience" (but also with refer­ ences back to Leibniz' monadic understanding of time) Cassirer (1923: 170ff.,1925: 177-78, 1929: 189, 191, 197) suggested thus his mythological and abstract-ideological concepts of time, respectively, as distinguished from immediate perception of time: "Die Kategorie der Ursache und Wirkung ist es, die die bloße Anschauung des Nacheinander zum Gedanken einer einheitlichen Zeitordnung des Geschehens umprägt. Der einfache Unterschied der einzelnen Zeitstellen muß erst in den Begriff einer wechselseitigen dynamischen Abhängigkeit zwischen ihnen umgebildet, die Zeit als reine Anschauungsform muß mit der Funktion des kausalen Urteilens durchsetzt werden, bevor dieser Gedanke sich entwickeln und sich befestigen kann, bevor das unmittelbare Zeitgefühl in den systematischen Begriff der Zeit als einer Bedingung und als eines Inhalts der Erkenntnis übergeht" (1923: 170).

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Within his superior concept of existentiality Heidegger (1927) repre­ sents a pronouncedly integrative view of the relations between concrete forms of time, on the one hand, and abstract forms of time, on the other. Cassirer (1929: 189, 219) does not deny existential properties of time but explains that his concern starts at the very point "an dem sich der Übergang von dieser 'existenziellen' Zeitlichkeit zur Zeit-Form vollzieht." In respect of the basic validity of temporal abstraction, however, Heidegger's views do not appear to differ essentially from those of Cassirer's (compare also the introductory quotation of this paper) when the former says that "Nur eigentliche Zeitlichkeit, die zugleich endlich ist, macht so etwas wie Schick­ sal, d.h. eigentliche Geschichtlichkeit möglich" (op.cit.: 385). However, there is a difference insofar as Heidegger (420ff.) regards the exclusively now-oriented concept of time as secondary and vulgar and treats temporal abstraction rather as an inherent function of one, already existing, static system, whereas Cassirer sees it rather as a function of change from one sys­ tem to another: "Wo die Philosophie zuerst diese Frage erhebt, wo sie statt nach dem Grund der Wirklichkeit, nach dem Sinn und Grund der Wahrheit fragt — da scheint damit mit einem Male jedes Band zwischen Sein und Zeit zerschnitten zu werden. Das wahrhafte Sein wird jetzt als ein zeitloses Sein entdeckt... Mit diesem Begriff des zeitlosen Seins, als dem Korrelat der zeitlosen Wahrheit, vollzieht sich die Losreißung des "Logos" vom Mythos, — die Mündigkeitserklärung des reinen Denkens gegenüber den mythischen Schicksalsmächten" (1929: 191).

This dynamic, conceptual-genetic view of Cassirer's creates a natural link to processual approaches to the synchrony of time semantics. It is remarkable that he (1923: 171) even referred implicitly to the rise of the aspectual meanings of totality and partiality ("vollendet" "unvollendet," "dauernd, " "vorübergehend") in terms of "temporal 'forms'" or "temporal 'Aktionsarten'" as an intermediary stage of development between immediate perception of time and the "pure relational concept of time as abstract concept of order." It is equally interesting to note that he, actually, based his first stage of immediate perception of time on his pre-tense dis­ tinction "now:not-now" (cf. also Parret 1985: 141-46), whereas we (Section 4.2, 4.5, 4.7), although ascribing to our corresponding distinction past .pre­ sent a subsequent role of influence on the rise of aspect proper, consider these pre-tense meanings to be a secondary stage provoked by the primary stage of pre-aspect (or 'pure' aspect) meanings.

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Concluding remarks The limited purpose of this paper has been to demonstrate how linguis­ tic theories of aspect and tense — in particular, if they aim to account for their functions in discourse — apparently require a broader empirical basis for their hypotheses, and, correspondingly, an understanding of time as a complex hierarchy of semantic components comprising both categories and expressing the interrelations of their specific perceptual-conceptual and pragmatic features. By deriving both aspect and tense — in a conceptual-genetic sense — from the same primitive concept of time, we are in a better position to understand not only their mutual hierarchical structure, evidenced by syn­ chronic dependency conditions, but also their different development, namely as two distinct kinds of temporal perspective on reality. As such the relevance of the two categories and the proper semantic analysis of them for our understanding of the organisation of narrative discourse becomes particularly clear. Whereas tense semantics is considered here only in its basic features by way of correlating and contrasting it with aspect semantics (for a more elaborate analysis of tense as well as the relationship between tense and taxis, see Thelin 1978: 37ff. and Thelin forthcoming a, respectively), the con­ ceptual-semantic system of aspect features is — in view of its more decisive bearing upon the organisation of narrative discourse — treated more exten­ sively and related to pertinent conditions mainly in Indo-European and foremost Slavic languages (see also Appendix). Our theoretical under­ standing of aspect and tense semantics, argued in this paper by way of priority from a pronouncedly universal, cognitive-pragmatic point of view, is substantiated by concrete analyses of Slavic narrative discourse (Thelin 1984a, b; cf. also 1985: 180ff., 185ff.), referred to here rather by force of their general implications (see further the Introduction to this volume).

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APPENDIX: Indo-European expressions of the aspect feature -TIME 1.

The present and the injunctive

Now, which means of expression have been at languages' disposal in cases of the aspect fea­ ture -TIME? In the Indo-European trichotomy aorist-present-imperfect the aorist-imperfect pair was pre-occupied basically with its function of specifying further the feature +TIME in the past (see Section 4.9). The only form left was the present, and it had, indeed, certain qualifications for this task. As distinct from the aorist, the basic aspectual meaning of which (+TIME, +TOT) provoked the restricted range of its temporal use (see Section 4.2, 4.9), the present represented an aspectual meaning (+TIME, -TOT), compatible with all temporal levels. Obviously it was therefore in a better position also to conserve (along with the explicit meanings of time-relatedness and partiality; see Section 4.7) the earlier meaning of basic time-independency shared by them both before the temporalization. That is, it could -as a function of polysemy- express not only time-relatedness, but non-time-relatedness, as well. This condition is witnessed by, for example, the 'general' or 'timeless' present in Greek {he kheir ten kheira nizei "one hand washes the other," ho anthröpos thnêtos estin "man is mortal") but is well-known also from Slavic and many other languages (compare the above remark on the simple present in English, Section 2.3). The interesting thing is, however, that there is some evidence that this natural use of the present was at least 'disturbed' by the temporalization and the specific aspect and tense mean­ ings it assigned to this category. It would not be surprising then if languages in this situation looked for means to express non-time-relatedness unambiguously. This could thus have been the very background for the rise of the Indo-European injunctive, which, neutralizing not only tense and mood (as usually maintained) but to some extent also aspect (viz. the time-related distinc­ tion ±TOT), expressed precisely the generalized aspectual meaning of non-time-relatedness (-TIME). As distinct from the less abstract non-time-related meaning of the perfect, still situat­ ing events in the past (see above, Section 1), the Vedic injunctive, e.g., fulfilled its aspectual role not only in such typical cases of timeless use as descriptions of ritual conditions, but also in cases of prohibition. The latter circumstance is worth mentioning, since there is a parallel in Slavic where negated imperatives and other verbal constructions (for example, with the predica­ tive neVzja in Russian) appear with imperfective aspect forms exactly in their non-time-related use, viz. if expressing prohibition related to a negation scope superior to the prohibited action itself. This is not surprising, really, since truly prohibited actions cannot logically be referred to as localized in time, exactly as actions which have never taken place cannot (i.e. if it is not the case that their not-taking-place is represented as an event, for example, when the action was expected to take place in a definite situation, but did not, or took place but did not succeed, because then the negation scope is restricted to a subordinate time-related structure requiring totality and, correspondingly, perfective forms; Thelin 1985: 174ff., 178ff.). 2.

The injunctive and Kiparsky's thesis of conjunction reduction

There is still another case of injunctive use which reveals most clearly its closeness to the original and in part still pertinent character of timelessness or aspectual non-time-relatedness in the present category. Thanks to Paul Kiparsky's (1968) convincing syntactic analysis of the socalled historical present in Indo-European we know thus that this use of the present obviously is due to the same redundancy-restricting mechanism of conjunction reduction as evidenced by the injunctive, in e.g. Vedic Sanscrit and still in Homeric Greek. In conjoined structures it rep-

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resented thus 'zero'-forms of the verb, alternating with forms expressing explicitly aspect, tense and mood. Kiparsky (p. 39) brings the following example from the Iliad (2. 106-7): Atreus de thnêiskön elipen (aor. 2) poluarni Thuestëi, autar ho aute Thuesf Agamemnoni leipe (injunctive) phorēnai "Atreus dying left (the scepter) to Thyestes of the rich flocks, and Thyestes in turn left it to Agamemnon to carry." That this syntactic function of conjunction reduction, allowing for a 'simple denotation' of actions defined already aspectually-temporally by the context, more specifically by aorist forms, and thus neutralizing their underlying time-relatedness and totality, in later Greek (and, though subjected to a reinterpretation, in Modern Greek, as well; cf. Seiler 1969: 133) was taken over exactly by the present (and by analogy also by the imperfect) is understandable only if we are also aware of the aspect-semantic feature of non-time-relatedness evidenced by the other, previ­ ously mentioned, uses of the injunctive, and above all, those independent non-time-related uses of the present which originate precisely in its own former neutral status in regard to aspect and tense. This important aspectual condition was expressed by the feature -TIME, coexisting in the present category after the temporalization in a relation of polysemy with the features +TIME and -TOT, representing the time-related partial or 'processual' meaning. 3.

Theme-rheme conditions

The unmarked (in particular, non-time-related) character of the injunctive and its depen­ dence on contextual conditions links it, by the way, in a natural fashion with a phenomenon in Slavic, until recently not understood fully in its time-semantic essence. This is the systematic cor­ relation of aspect functions and theme-rheme conditions (cf. Thelin 1985: 181). The use oí imper­ fective aspect forms in those cases where the verb fulfills the function of theme (especially fre­ quent in conversational discourse) has been accounted for by Birkenmaier (1981: 105) as result­ ing from the fact "daß Handlungen, die als Teil des Kontextes zum selbstverständlich Gegebenem gehören, zeitlich nicht mehr lokalisiert sind. " This connection between the non-time-related (-TIME) use of imperfective aspect forms and the thematic discourse function can be illustrated by the following Russian example (from Rassudova 1968: 110): (Vy ne vozrazaete, esli ja otkroju okno? — ) Otkryvajte (imperfective imperative), otkryvajtel " (You don't mind if I open the window? — No, do please) open (it), open (it)!" 4.

The imperfect

The analogical use of the imperfect as an expression of the non-time-relatedness of the Indo-European present stem was not restricted by cases of the neutralizing conjunction reduc­ tion (see above, Appendix: Section 2; cf. Kiparsky, op. cit.: 40). The imperfect also became the natural expression for independent non-time-relatedness in past time in cases of iterative and habitual meanings beside its primary aspectual function of denoting time-relatedness and par­ tiality (+TIME, -TOT, i.e. 'processuality'). This use of the imperfect is illustrated by the following examples from Greek and Bulga­ rian: Hoiper prosthen prosekynoun (imperfect) Orontan , kai tote prosekynësan (aor. 1) "Those who earlier used to prostrate themselves before O. did so now, too." Cetirimata prijateli se sàbiracha (imperfective Imperfect) obiknoveno sabota vecer... Doktor Petkov i R. Kostov idvacha (imperfective Imperfect) s zenite si "The four friends usually met on Saturday evenings. Doktor Petkov and R. Kostov came with their wives." For further Bulgarian examples see Stankov (1969: 98ff.).

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The interesting situation is that a language like Bulgarian has both the aorist:imperfect dis­ tinction and the paradigmatic dichotomy of perfective vs. imperfective aspect forms. With cer­ tain exceptions (cf. Thelin 1978: 55ff.) the imperfect appears regularly with imperfective aspect forms (as in the example above), whereas the aorist beside the more frequent perfective forms can appear more freely with imperfective forms, too (see below). 5.

The aorist

Furthermore it should be noticed that in Indo-European not only the present but to some extent also the aorist preserved its previous feature of time-independency. As indicated above (Appendix: Section 1), the preconditions for this continued function had been more favourable for the present, probably because of the compatibility of its new, explicitly 'processual' (+TIME, -TOT) aspect meaning with all temporal levels, whereas the aspect meaning of the temporalized aorist (+TIME, +TOT) tended to restrict it to the past. There are certain linguistic facts, however, that make it plausible to assume that the preaspect meaning of totality, ascribed here to the aorist, in the period before the temporalization (see above, Section 4.2, 4.3, 4.5) could be combined not only with the feature of definiteness (re­ flected after the temporalization by the normal time-related meaning), but also to some extent with indefiniteness, reflected after the temporalization by cases of non-time-related meaning, or, at least, a certain degree of it. This meaning we would see, for example, in the use of augmentless aorist forms in Vedic (cf. Renou 1952: 369) or Homeric Greek (cf. Kiparsky, op.cit.: 39) where they appear to have conveyed the sense of simple denotation or statement. This condition is parallelled in Bulgarian by imperfective (prefixless) forms of the aorist which express events, surveyable in their totality and characterized by a certain temporal concretion, but simply stated as having taken place and not situated in their totality in a definite sequence of events along the time axis (as in cases of narrative progression, where perfective aorist forms would have been required; cf. Stankov 1969: 73; Thelin 1978: 56ff.; Desclés & Guentchéva in this volume). The degree of non-time-relatedness expressed by Bulgarian imperfective aorist forms and still characterized by a rather concrete temporal context, should be compared with the more general non-time-related meaning of the Bulgarian imperfective perfect (cf. Stankov, op.cit.: 66): Ti chodi (imperfective aorist) li v Plovdiv? "Did you go to Plovdiv?" vs. Ti chodil li si (imperfective perfect) v Plovdiv? "Have you (ever) been to Plovdiv?" In a system where the main narrative function is taken over by the new 'non-injunctive' his­ torical present, it is possible that the use of aorist forms (in spite of temporal integration) may convey an impression of staticity (as observed by Seiler 1969: 13, in respect of Modern Greek). This meaning is perhaps a secondary phenomenon, caused by the contrast to the greater narra­ tive dynamicity achieved by the reinterpreted historical present, but — as we have seen — it is not alien to the historically founded 'simple denotative' use of the aorist. 6.

Proverbs and gnomes

There is another instructive case where the aorist can be said to represent a seemingly paradoxical (cf. Armstrong 1981: 10) combination of totality (though temporally non-integ­ rated) and indefineteness or non-time-relatedness, viz. in gnomes and proverbs. Compare the following Greek examples: Oudeis eploutësen (aor. 1) takheös, dikaios on "No one, who is hon­ est, becomes rich all of a sudden," Rekhten de te nêpios egnô (aor. 2) "A fait accompli even a fool understands." That non-time-relatedness is involved here somehow is understandable from the general validity of these linguistic expressions and evidenced by the more frequent use of non-time-

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related present for corresponding purposes (see above, Appendix: Section 1). Why then aorist? Kiparsky (op.cit.: 39) referred to the observation that aorist forms in Homeric Greek could dispense with their augments in narrative but not in gnomes and proverbs and suggested his use­ ful thesis of conjunction reduction as an explanation of this circumstance, i.e., gnomes and proverbs "owe their stable augment to their isolated position in discourse." This is obviously the case, but is it the whole truth? As correctly pointed out by Kiparsky himself, this explanation does not tell us why aorist is used. Furthermore, it proceeds from the tacit assumption that the semantic function of the augmented aorist forms would be identical in narrative (when present there) and in gnomes and proverbs. It could, conversely, be the case that its obligatory presence with the latter is due precisely to its specific semantic function here and that we are concerned instead with an instance of superficial (morphological) neutralization, i.e. polysemy. This seems the more probable as the fundamentally different discourse functions, i.e. narratio and descrip­ tio, respectively, assign in the former case foreground and time-relatedness to the aorist forms, in the latter case — background and non-time-relatedness (see above, Section 4.10.3; cf. Genette 1966/1981). So, why aorist and not present? Our explanation is that, using not the non-time-related present but the aorist in its augmented form one could refer to an action as being associated in its totality with time, although conceived of here not as part of a temporal sequence but as a concretely-instructive instance of a superior general proposition (the proper gnomic or proverbal function), rep­ resented by a non-time-related structure. The latter is inferred from the former's non-integra­ tion — Kiparsky's "isolated position" — in discourse, and assigns to the subordinate timerelated and total event a sense of general applicability (for a discussion of aspectual embedding, see Thelin 1985: 189ff., forthcoming b; cf. also Introduction: Section 11). The above interpretation appears to be supported by the fact that precisely in gnomes and proverbs Slavic languages exhibit a deviating non-future (see above, Section 2.3) use of perfec­ tive present forms expressing the superior gnomic/proverbal meaning of non-time-relatedness (by means of the present) and the subordinate (embedded) time-related and total event as con­ cretely-instructive instance (by means of the perfective aspect form). Compare the following Russian proverb: Cto napisano peroni, ne vyrubis" (perfective present) toporom "What is writ­ ten with a pen you do not erase with an axe." The same interpretation would apply to (and thus explain) the notorious, seemingly contradictory, use of perfective aspect forms in habitual expressions of, e.g., Czech (cf. Thelin 1978:27ff., forthcoming b). Our assumption of a hierarchically complex structure in these cases of aorist or non-future perfective present forms with a superior meaning of general validity or potentiality is supported by their semantico-syntactic closeness to another conversational use of the same Russian forms to express superior modality. The latter can be time-related as well as non-time-related: Vy ne skazete (perfective present), gde nachoditsja vokzal? "Can you (lit.: you don't) tell (me) where the railway station is?," Po lieu ne pojmes' (perfective present), skol'ko ej let "From her face one can't work out (lit.: you don't understand) how old she is" (cf. Rassudova 1968: 96ff.).

NOTES 1.

The present study is the complete and updated version of my paper presented originally at The First International Roman Jakobson Conference, New York, October 10-13,1985, to appear (in a shortened version) in Linda R. Waugh and Stephen Rudy, eds., New Vis­ tas in Grammar: Invariance and Variation. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins.

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I wish to express my gratitude to Flora Klein-Andreu, Paul J. Hopper and John S. Robertson for their constructive comments. 2.

See the discussion with Flora Klein-Andreu following upon my New York paper and reproduced in the volume referred to in Note 1.

3.

Only the later process of extensive prefixation would remove the totality interpretation of definite simplex verbs of motion, leaving intact, however, their basic feature of timerelatedness (Thelin 1985: 181).

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Seiler, H. 1969. "Zur Problematik des Verbalaspekts." Cahiers Ferdinand de Saussure 26.119-35. Silverstein, M. 1974. "Dialectal developments in Chinookan tense-aspect systems: An areal-historical analysis." Internationaljournal of American Linguistics (Memoir 29), Vol. 40, Nr. 4, Part 2.45-99. Stankov, V. 1969. Bâlgarskite glagolni vremena. Sofija. Thelin, N.B. 1978. Towards a Theory of Aspect, Tense and Actionality in Slavic (= Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis. Studia Slavica Upsaliensia 18). Uppsala. 1980a. "Aspekt und Aktionalität im Russischen." Die Welt der Slaven 25:2.428-40. 1980b. "Die aktionale Semantik der Verbalpräfigierung im Russischen und Bul­ garischen im Lichte einer komponentialen Aspekttheorie. Zur Revision des Begriffes 'Aktionsarten'." Scando-Slavica 26.175-90. 1982.

"Universaini funkcii na temporalnost i aspektualnost i bâlgarskite t.n. 'defektivni' glagoli ot tipa napisvam." Die slawischen Sprachen 1.108-118.

1984a. "Coherence, perspective and aspectual specification in Slavonic narrative discourse." Aspect Bound, ed. by C. de Groot and H. Tommola, 225-38. Dordrecht. 1984b. "Komposition, Perspektive und Verbalsaspekt in Puskins Prosa: Entwurf einer poetisch-linguistischen Methode." Signs of Friendship — To Honour A.G.F. van Holk, ed. by J.J. van Baak, 257-93. Amsterdam. 1984c. "K tipologii glagol'noj prefiksacii i  semantiki v slavjanskich jazykach." Revue des études slaves LVI:2.225-38. 1985.

"Kognitiv-pragmatische Korrelate semantischer Strukturen in einem Zirkel­ modell für prozessuelle Sprachanalyse: Der Aspektspezifizierung im Slawis­ chen zugrunde liegende Hierarchien und Komponenten." Zeitschrift für Slawistik 30:2.153-99.

1986.

"Statik, semantischer Reduktionismus und die Beziehung Inhalt-Form in der diachronischen Grammatik des Slawischen: Wege aus dem Dilemma der traditionellen Aspektforschung." Linguistische Arbeitsberichte 54/55. 124-37.

forthcoming a. "Aspect, tense or taxis? — The perfect meaning reconsidered." To appear in M. Grochowski & D. Weiss (eds.), Festschrift zu Ehren von Pro­ fessor Andrzej Boguslawski.

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forthcoming b. "Perception, conception and linguistic reproduction of events and time: the category of verbal aspect in the light of Charles Sanders Peirce's theory of signs." To appear in K.L. Keiner (ed.), Proceedings of Charles S. Peirce Sesquicentennial International Congress, 5-10 September, 1989, Har­ vard University. Timberlake, A. 1982. "Invariance and the syntax of Russian aspect." Tense-Aspect: Between Semantics & Pragmatics, ed. by Hopper P.J., 305-331. Amsterdam.

The functional evolution of aspect in Russian Kyrii T. H o l d e n University of Alberta

0

Introduction

The grammatical category of aspect, once almost the exclusive domain of Slavic linguistics, has, in approximately the last two decades, become increasingly subject to scrutiny by scholars interested in its manifestations in other language families. While initially this interest was typically embodied in a direct transfer of the traditional Slavic representation of the category into descriptions of other languages, it gradually became evident that a broader theoretical view of aspect was required. The first step in breaking with the more traditional approaches was to view it not simply in terms of the Perfective/Imperfective opposition typified by the Russian verb, but to see the latter as only one pair in a whole set of possible aspectualities, actionalities, or Aktionsarten, as they are variously called — lexicosemantic codings of the spacial/temporal contours of events perceived in reality (see Majewicz 1982). Further examination of the kinds of pairings encoded in various genetic groupings of languages have partially confirmed, however, the earlier predisposition to endow the Perfective/Imperfective opposition special status — it is one of the most commonly encountered of potential aspectual pairings (Bybee 1985; Dahl 1985). Lost for some time from some of the traditional approaches, probably because of the disfavor it incurred in Structuralist and Generativist circles, was the notion of "subjectivity" as a parameter in grammatical categories — something the very labels "aspect" or Russian "vid" 'view' imply (see Hermann 1927; Van Wijk 1929). The recognition of the semantic complex­ ity of not just aspect but other grammatical categories, and subsequent investigations into the nature of this complexity have confirmed the essen-

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tial correctness of earlier approaches which attached considerable impor­ tance to their coding of non-denotative information (Bache 1985; DeLancey 1982, Givón 1984). That is, a given lexical item, in our particular case a verb stem with its incorporated aspectual marker, may, independent of con­ text, have an identifiable real-world referential meaning. When combined with other morphemes at the propositional level, such meanings may be more strictly delimited or amplified through interaction with one another. Finally, verbal aspect can develop a variety of discourse meanings as a result of its functioning in contexts broader than that of the simple sen­ tence, or through the natural metaphorical extension of its usage into new but semantically related contexts. Current linguistic theory is also witnessing a significant retreat from the strict Structuralist dichotomy of synchrony and diachrony, and a return to the earlier position of seeking a better understanding of grammatical categories through examination of their behavior when subject to the stress of change in time, space, and relation to other linguistically relevant categories. The above advances are particularly relevant to the study of Russian Aspect (capitalized form for the language-specific embodiment). The past century has seen an almost continuous concern with establishing the invariant meanings of the Perfective and Imperfective on the bases of: 1) rather limited synchronic descriptions of the language; 2) a conception of aspect as being semantically limited to the realm of strictly referential meaning. Historical investigations were also similarly constrained, with the result that we seem no closer to an adequate definition of the Aspects today than we were a century ago. On the other hand, recognition of the complex and dynamic nature of the meaning of categories such as aspect does not warrant, in my opinion, the opposite kind of total capitulation — that, for example, the "constant flux" of Slavic Aspect indicates its "possible indefinability," or that Slavic "has no generalized aspect system at all, just X number of subcategories too full of holes and contradiction to be called a system" (Chatterjee 1982:343). G. Lakoff s Categories and Cognitive Models (1982), T. Givón's Syntax (1984) and J. Bybee's Morphology (1985), three books related in func­ tional-typological perspective but differing in certain teleological detail, offer significant empirically-based proposals for a fresh examination of the semantics of Russian Aspect. They not only recognize that the meaning of such categories is an amalgam of lexical, propositional, and discourse fea-

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tures, but that these realms are interrelated, as are contiguous grammatical categories. In so doing they follow in the footsteps of Galton, who, in his 1976 work on The Main Functions of the Slavic Verbal Aspect, made a strong case for precisely such interacting functions. The main advantage of the previous three works is that they incorporate suggestions of mechanisms which would help explain the transition of meaning and expression of such categories. Of particular interest to this article will be the gradual extension of the expression of Russian Aspect from initially highly-lexicalized forms to the current derivational pairing, which, in turn, will be shown to be con­ nected with the evolution of certain discourse functions of the category. The use of historical observation as a methodology for tackling these problems is motivated by several considerations. In the study of the kinds of meanings/functions typical of aspectual categories in a universal sense, [r]elations among these very specific functions can be studied [...] by studying the diachronic extension of a marker from one function to another. If we understand the nature of a relation of similarity between specific grammatical functions, then we are closer to understanding the nature of grammatical meaning. (Bybee 1985: 195-196, emphasis added)

Put somewhat differently, it is, in the case of semantically complex categories such as aspect, easier to specify the exact nature of this complex­ ity by following its growth from simpler beginnings. In this way we can directly track the acquisition of new semantic parameters and can avoid the circularity of artificially imposing predetermined semantic limits on a cate­ gory. The corresponding synchronic methodology, such as that recently published by Bache (1985) in addressing very similar problems, is consider­ ably more difficult, since it must devise and employ techniques for disen­ tangling the product of centuries, sometimes millennia, of linguistic evolu­ tion. Even the most successful of these, such as looking for "minimal pairs" or "contrasts" in highly controlled contexts, or psycholinguistic investiga­ tions with consideration of all relevant variables, frequently require subjec­ tive interpretation of results by the investigator — rendering them more or less convincing. 1

Grammatical categories

As a first step in tracing the evolution of Russian Aspect it will be necessary to establish some criteria for determining when a category is to be

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called "grammatical," and if grammatical, whether "inflectional" or "deri­ vational." While at this point in time there is no universally accepted set of such conditions, there have nonetheless been a number of recent proposals drawn from typological examinations of various language families which are aimed at formally characterizing these intuitive notions. The necessity of listing such properties in examining the development of discourse meanings in Russian Aspect stems from two separate observations. Frequently, in seeking to distinguish between what is grammatically "pure" Aspect in Slavic, what is lexical Aktionsart or aspectuality, or, on the other hand, what is derivational aspect or what is inflectional, a preconceived notion of the meaning of the marked member of the opposition (let us say, 'comple­ tion') is invoked. This definition is then used to exclude a priori other aspectualities from the general binary oppositional system (such as delimitatives prefixed in po-), as well as other metaphorically derived meanings, both of which may display all but a few of the semantic features of the more "core" members of the category (see Lakoff 1982 and Givón 1984 for a further discussion of "fuzzy-edged" categories and their "pro­ totypical" members). Secondly, grammatical categories come into existence through the gradual extension of the domain of a marker to eventually include essentially all relevant lexical items in the appropriate class, and it is precisely this encompassing of ever-increasing numbers of lexical items, with concomitant modification of meaning, which provides the analogical basis for the "jump" from lexical and propositional meaning to discourse function. Of the properties of grammatical categories most relevant to the issues being discussed here, the following are worthy of special emphasis: 1) the majority of lexical items in the appropriate word class must be marked for the category 2) the coding of the category must be relatively consistent (i.e., there should be a restricted number of markers of the category) 3) the meaning of the category should be consistent, distinct from that of the root, generally more abstract, usually oppositional in nature, and often relating the word within larger structures (see Givón 1984:19; Bybee 1985:137-138; Anderson 1985:162-165) 4) the meaning is frequently complex, involving a number of different semantic dimensions which overlap to form a prototypical "central" meaning of the category, but with "fuzzy" edges where fewer dimen-

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sions overlap, or where the intersection is with parameters characteris­ tic of other related categories. Grammatical categories are traditionally further subclassified as either derivational or inflectional. In fact, in the broadest semantic sense, the expression of such categories in a given language may be found anywhere along a continuum from syntactic through inflectional, derivational or lexi­ cal encoding (Bybee 1985). Just as the above characterization of grammati­ cal categories allows for degrees of grammaticalization in accord with the extent of adherence to the individual conditions, so too is the distinction between an inflectional or derivational category neither discrete nor unidimensional. Among those properties thought to distinguish the two subclasses, Bybee (1985) cites the following as being of particular impor­ tance: 1) inflections are more generally applicable or more productive among lexical items of the appropriate class; derivational morphemes are more likely to be lexically restricted, less productive, or non-obligato­ ry; 2) inflectional meaning is more abstract, relational, predictable, and of "medium" relevance to the semantics of the stem; derivational mean­ ing is more material, idiosyncratic, and of "higher" relevance to the semantics of the stem; 3) inflectional morphemes are usually bound, with less allomorphy; derivational morphemes are also bound, but normally more "fused" to the root in accord with their higher semantic relevance; they show greater allomorphy along with more likelihood of infixation and lexicalization. The semantic "relevance" spoken of above is a measure of the degree to which the semantic content of one element directly affects or modifies the semantic content of another. This saliency, in Bybee's opinion, is both cross-linguistically (cognitively) as well as culturally determined (Bybee 1985:13). From a cognitive perspective, the order aspect > tense > mood reflects a hierarchy of relevance of these categories to verbal stems, which, in turn, should be mirrored in the linear order of attachment of such mor­ phemes to a stem, their degree of fusion, and perhaps, their order of child­ hood and diachronic acquisition. With these conditions in mind let us now review some of the literature

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on the origins of Russian Aspect. Because many of the claims dealing with earlier stages of aspectual development in Common Slavic and Indo-Euro­ pean are based on speculative reconstructions, the exact chronologies of the various proposed phases of growth are only approximate and not of immediate concern. There is, however, general acceptance of the phases themselves, and it is the systematic semantic-functional relation between them which is of primary interest here. 2

Historical evolution of Russian aspect

2.1 IE Aspectualities Various attempts have been made at attributing an Indo-European ori­ gin to the Slavic version of the category of Aspect (Milewski 1939, Meillet 1922, Ul'yanov 1895). Nevertheless, most investigators seem to agree that while its cognitive basis may have been inherited from IE, along with some degree of morphological coding, the bulk of development into a formal, oppositional category, adhering to the conditions set out earlier, took place on Balto-Slavic territory. In IE it seems likely that certain lexical classes of verbs were marked for particular aspectualities such as 'definiteness' or 'indefiniteness' in verbs of motion, 'stativity,' 'causality,' 'inchoativity,' and perhaps 'punctuality' in other verbs (Van Wijk 1929, Kurylowicz 1929). E.g., (examples cited in their later attested Old Church Slavonic (OCS) form, with morphological marking in bold type, length or reduction of vow­ els not indicated): nes-ti/nos-i-ti bud-e-ti sed-ë-ti toc-i-ti sta(n)-ti

'carry' (def./indef.) 'watch' (stative) 'sit' (stative) 'sharpen' (causative) 'get up' (inchoative, punctual)

As seen in the above examples, this marking was in the form of suffixa­ tion, infixation, or apophony of root vowels, and was largely redundant in that it was, with perhaps the exception of the verbs of motion, not opposi­ tional in nature. Instead it coded the inherent prototypical aspectuality or diathesis of the corresponding event in reality (Stepanov 1976, 1978). On Bybee's continuum of encoding: lexical - derivational - inflectional - syn­ tactic, both the expression as well as meanings of the aspectualities would

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dictate that they are very close to the lexical pole of the spectrum. Further support for this contention is found in the observation that the vowel apophony reconstructed for certain verb classes in IE is paralleled by simi­ lar gradation in nouns of the same root, indicating a close cognitive associa­ tion in very ancient times between noun and verb morphology (e.g., from later OCS, vod-i-ti/ves-ti 'to lead' (indet./det.), but voe-vod-a (lit.) 'troop leader'). Because such marking was largely a redundant repetition of root semantics, with the exception of the rudimentary pairing of verbs of motion, the generalization usually claimed for this initial stage of develop­ ment is that there existed the pre-conditions for the cognitive pairing of events as definite vs. indefinite, embedded in turn in the broader concepts of the transitivity, telicity, or diathesis of the proposition as a whole (cf. Thelin 1978: 19 for further discussion of the historical significance of the feature definite/indefinite). The most that this minimal system could do at the syn­ tactic level would be to free certain verbs from the necessity of being accompanied by adverbs expressing the same aspectuality as the stem. At the discourse level modal verbs or auxiliaries, and other inflections or deri­ vations independent of aspect, would by necessity have had to carry the weight of the more subjective meanings associated with narrative exposi­ tion. 2.2 Early Slavic Pairing The most plausible proposal for further development is that in either late IE or early Common Balto-Slavic (CS) the rudimentary pairings of IE were extended on a limited basis to certain causatives, punctuals, and inchoatives, creating stative-like partners for each. Some evidence for the IE origins of this pairing, which Kurylowicz views as the pivotal point in the evolution of Slavic Aspect, is to be found in the striking similarity between Slavic and Vedic suffixal formations relating these aspectualities (Kury­ lowicz 1932). Later this pairing became much less productive in the Slavic languages than in the Baltic branch (Stepanov 1976; Borodic 1953). Exam­ ples are: bud-ĕ-ti/boud-i-ti sed-ĕ-ti/se(n)d-ti dvig-a-ti/dvig-nö-ti nos-i-ti/nes-ti

'be awake'(state)/'awaken'(caus.) 'sit'(state)/'sit down'(inchoat.) 'move'(state or activ.)/'move'(inchoat.) 'carry'(indef./def. )

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Other aspectualities (i.e., semelfactives, evolutives, iteratives, etc.) may also have become increasingly marked with their own suffixes, although still in a non-oppositional manner like the earlier causatives and inchoatives ( see Maslov 1958 from Stang 1942). The establishment of these early oppositions to code telic and atelic variants of the same root already exemplifies what Givón and others before him see as the major underlying principle in grammatical change: metaphorical extension — changes in the prototypical meaning of a category by the analogical process of extending membership to "similar" but previ­ ously excluded items. It also illustrates a second equally potent force in his­ torical morphology: iconicity, or the tendency for similar meaning to be coded in similar form (see our earlier property 2) of grammatical categories. States were typically coded by long grade vowels in IE, either in the root of the verb or in its suffix (Dobrev 1982), e.g., nos-i-ti, vod-i-ti, im-ë-ti, etc. We can speculate that, based on analogy from the 'non-goaldirected/goal-directed' verbs of motion to the 'state-after-change/changeof-state' (inchoative), 'state-after-change/cause of state' (causative), or 'state-leading-up-to/abrupt change-of-state' (punctual), the latter pairs evolved by metaphorical extension from the first, adopting at the same time through the iconicity principle the long -é- or -a- suffix of true statives. E.g., lez-a-ti/*le(n)g-ti 'lie'/'lie down'; stoj-a-ti/*sta(n)-ti 'stand'/'stand up'; etc. Clearly non-prototypical but semantically closely associated verbal con­ cepts are being developed in the new members of the opposition. Signific­ antly it is a new "state" perspective of each event which has been encoded — a perspective which in discourse would serve to shift emphasis away from the activity and its patient or benefactor back to the agent. This same media diathesis was also occurring in the intransitivization of reflexive verbs and the adjectivalization of the present passive participle (cf. Havránek 1963 in Kurz 1963). 2.3 Rise of the stative

IMPERFECT

Late CS and early OCS saw several supposedly independent develop­ ments contribute dramatically to the further crystallization of Aspect as a formal category. First of all the stative suffix, already implicated in some rudimentary pairings in IE and CS, began to extend its domain in conjunc­ tion with the generalization of the "sigma" of the sigmatic aorist as the past tense marker (Vaillant 1939; Ul'janov op.cit.). That is, as Borodic explains

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in some detail (75-76), the stative verbs in -ë- and -a- began to form sigma­ tic aorists through the addition of the suffix -x-, e.g., sëd-ë-x-u 'I sat.' If K0lln ((1958) in Maslov 1958:281) is correct in contending that the earliest OCS documents already showed a kind of complementary distribution between the root and sigmatic aorists {root aorists being formed from intransitive verbs, sigmatic aorists from transitives), then this extension of the aorist suffix to statives can be seen as the simple spread of a more prom­ inent marker through analogy. That this ~x- should subsequently be reinter­ preted as a past tense marker is perfectly in accord with the findings of Dahl (1985:189), who has observed a strong cross-linguistic tendency for the past tense to be marked only for Imperfectiive (atelic, intransitive) stems, while the more transitive, telic Perfective stems are more often redundantly past and require no such marking. As the combination of stern-formant -ĕ- or -aplus the new past tense marker -x- became more prevalent, it was accom­ modated by other verb roots of "close-to-stative" aspectuality (i.e., denom­ inal processes and indeterminate verbs of motion such as vërovati, nositi). Reanalysis of the boundary between the stem and the suffix yielded the revised inflectional/derivational unit *ë-x-/*a-x- (where * indicates this boundary), which could then be attached to existing stem-formant suffixes (e.g., ver-ova*a-x-u T believed'), and paired with the sigmatic aorist to con­ trast stative/durative versus non-stative/non-durative aspects of the same action. With the establishment of this model, original statives acquired a kind of "double" stative marker, which was again reanalysed as the even­ tual IMPERFECT morpheme -ëa-/-aa: i.e., sëd-ĕ*a-x-u > sĕd*ëa-x-u 'I sat/ was sitting.' It should be noted that a principled explanation for this repeated fusion of aspectuality morphemes with the stem is offered in Bybee (1985) — of all derivational/inflectional morphemes in verb mor­ phology, those expressing aspectual concepts are of greatest relevance to the semantics of the stem. Despite this early growth of pairing, early OCS still retained a strong connection between the inherent aspectuality of the root and its inflec­ tional/derivational capabilities. Very fev/ so-called definite or telic verbs could yet be marked for the IMPERFECT; they remained the primary fod­ der of the AORIST, while, on the other hand, the indefinite atelics were rarely AORIST. If we take as referential "coding points" those verb classes proposed by Vendler (1967), namely states, activities, accomplishments, and achievements, then by late OCS the pairing process in the past tense came to include virtually all aspectualities on the telicity scale. In particular,

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accomplishments and achievements, which to this point had, because of their prototypical telicity, resisted stative interpretation, now gave rise to new atelic counterparts: e.g., krest-i* yielded krest-i*aa-x-u > krest*aa-x-u 'I baptized (iter.)/I was baptizing.' Additional stimulus for these new pair­ ings came from a second major development on the aspectual front, the independently awakening process of verb prefixation. 2.4 Broadening the base: prefixation A whole new wave of verbs entered the lexicon with prefixes which duplicated prepositions and originally coded spadai, then later, by normal extension, temporal concepts. Prefixation created certain new aspectualities, or contributed to the lexical inventories of already existing classes (Potebnja 1941; Van Wijk 1929). According to Dostál (1954, cited in Maslov 1958:28-29), the probable order of appearance of these new prefixed aspectualities was: resultatives (in po-, u-, izu-, vy-, etc.); inceptives (in za-, po-, etc.); perduratives (pro-); and perhaps lastly the resultative-iteratives, which were hybrid formations employing resultative prefixes combined with existent iterative (suffixal) morphology (e.g., izu-nos-i-ti, 'to carry out'). Especially in those cases when the prefixed verb form was minimally different in spaciai Aktionsart from the unprefixed atelic original, the two verbs could be paired cognitively along much the same lines as the other existing pairs (e.g., povelëti/velëti, 'to command'). Where prefixes were semantically more loaded, the verbs of motion led the further development by providing a ready model for pairing: the indeterminate verb stem could be prefixed with the same morpheme as the determinate, and both included in the stem pairing which was sweeping the verbal lexicon. With the emergence of increased pairing of previously lexically restricted aspectualities, new meanings also began to evolve within specific verb pairs, and the cognitive generalizations made across all pairs to get an overall "category meaning" was correspondingly adjusted. The meanings were "metaphorical" in the sense that, for example, the newly suffixed IMPERFECT of accomplishment or achievement verbs could not mean pure 'state' as in the original lexical statives. Instead they came as close as they could semantically. If one of the logical implications of the pure sta­ tives is that they have duration in time, then, when applied to the instan­ taneous achievements such as 'to recognize,' one of the few possible com­ promise meanings would be 'iteration.' For accomplishments such as 'to

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baptize,' the resolution would be the meaning of 'activity leading up to the point of culmination.' Prefixation complemented this process by providing telic counterparts for the state and activity end of the Vendlerian scale. Striking primarily the activity verbs, these new lexical items required categorization in the achievement and accomplishment classes. Further pre­ fixation of the statives again transformed them into these same telic groups. Their most "natural" inflection would be the AORIST, but they also pro­ vided a mass of new fuel for the growing aspectual opposition in the past tense, requiring that they be paired with IMPERFECTS, most of which retained the derivational prefix, adding only the new inflectional suffix, e.g., prilet-a-ti/prilet-e-ti, 'to arrive (flying).' Others were not lexically modified to the extent that the unprefixed source verb stem differed greatly in meaning from the new prefixed form: in such cases the non-prefixed pair was found primarily in the IMPERFECT past tense, while its prefixed couterpart was usually AORIST, e.g., zuvati/vu(z)-zuvati, 'to call.' 2.5 Discourse functions of the A ORIS

T/IMPERFECT

The question which might legitimately arise at this point is: why is this pairing of verbs in the past tense developing? Two possible responses come to mind. The first resides in the structural properties of the linguistic system before the above changes took place. In IE the aspectualities, as mentioned earlier, were largely redundantly coded, in that the suffixes simply repeated what was already known from the prototypical perception of the event itself. The bifurcation of aspectualities into the IMPERFECT and AORIST was obviously incurred for purposes of coding non-prototypical views of events — the AORIST as an unusual manifestation of states and to a lesser extent processes', the IMPERFECT as a marked version of achievements and accomplishments. This pairing could develop metaphorically within any of the fundamental realms of semantics (lexical, propositional or dis­ course). We have already discussed above some of the lexical changes wrought in the newly-derived forms, but they were also capable of connot­ ing new discourse information — the interaction between speaker and hearer, their shared experiences, and notions such as topic, focus, salience, etc. Primary among these in the OCS period would seem to be the function of distinguishing between main-line foregrounded and backgrounded events in narrative discourse, or, perhaps equivalently, the establishment of cause and effect relationships between them (the first position is taken by Von-

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drák (1915), the latter by Galton (1976): ...the imperfectivum in narrative corresponds best to secondary events, it describes general characteristics, behavior etc. (answering the question: "What was?"); the aorist, on the other hand, is used to express main events (answering the question: "What happened?") (Vondrák 1915:5-6, translation KTH); [in] O.C.S. John VI, 45: v"sëk" bo slysavyi ot'ca moego ... pridet" k" m'nĕ, 'every man therefore that hath heard of the Father ... cometh unto me,' ... [t]he primary meaning here again is that of an event subsequent to an antecedent one and in fact, in the speakers' opinion, connected with it by a link of necessity (Galton 1976:79). The AORIST was the natural candidate for metaphorical extension to the role of the "sequencing" form in this new functional realm, because one of its logical implications, especially in the causative/telic verbs with which it was primarily associated, was that such events had reached their goal in space. But if such events had achieved a spacial goal, then they could also be pinpointed in time. Hence the association of the AORIST with sequenc­ ing or foregrounding. The same kind of argumentation would attribute a backgrounding, or non-sequencing function to the IMPERFECT, which was normally associated with atelic verbs. OCS texts show just the begin­ nings of the "sequencing" role of the AORIST, since the participles still had a strong hold on this function: "...the participles always lay special emphasis on ... the chronological relationship of one event to another..." (Bunina 1959:113, translation KTH). Similarly the "progressive" role of the IMPERFECT was only secondary. But the foregrounding/backgrounding distinction seems already well-established in these two forms: The choice of forms depends on the particular function of the event: is it one of the major facts in the communication [aorist], or is it included only as a supplementary fact which characterizes the circumstances under which the main events of a given episode occurred [imperfect]...(Bunina 1959:119, translation KTH). 2.6 Rudimentary Perfective/Imperfective and Hybrid Semantics With the fusion of stem-formant vowel and the stem itself in the palatalization of verb stems such as 'he baptized' (krestaase < krest-i-aase), and the growing variety of stem modifications in the pairing of prefixed verbs, the possibility of disentangling lexical (root) aspectuality from the

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meaning of the derived stem, on the one hand, and from the inflectional meaning of the IMPERFECT and AORIST, on the other, became more difficult. If we call these new stems rudimentary imperfectives and perfectives, then it can be seen that, by the time of Old Russian (OR), when the process was more or less complete, a further hybridization of the OCS pre­ terite system had occurred. The original IE aspectualities, previously divided into IMPERFECT/AORIST inflections in Slavic, are now split on the basis of two separate derivational stems for each inflected form. The late OCS and early OR preterite tense-aspect system typologically looks surprisingly like that of present-day English. It would be tempting to identify the Slavic IMPERFECT with the English PROGRESSIVE (with the exception of its usage in stative verbs) as the marked aspect, the AORIST with the similar English SIMPLE forms, and the PERFECT in both languages as a kind of intermediate category somewhere between Aspect and Tense. When we examine the discourse functions of these forms, however, we see that the parallel is far from complete. To begin with the IMPERFECT did not necessarily signal an action in progress at a par­ ticular reference point in time, as does the English PROGRESSIVE. Sec­ ondly, cross-pollenization of the perfective/imperfective opposition with the IMPERFECT/AORIST, both of which had very similar coding functions, created unique blends of meaning, even though the IMPERFECT was still much more frequently formed from imperfective than perfective stems, while the AORIST was predominantly perfective. Perfective-based IMPER­ FECTS were capable of stative, iterative, durative, backgrounding and sequential functions. Most textual examples of such forms show one of two general combinations of these features (Notes: (") is used to transcribe the back jer or hard sign; (') for the front jer or soft sign; e the front nasal; ó the back nasal; examples are from Kuznecov (1959) and Van Schooneveld (1959), translations either from Van Schooneveld or those of the author; source abbreviations: Pov. vr. l — Povest' vremennyx let (Laurentian redaction); Igor' — Slovo o polku Igoreve ): 1) descriptive backgrounded events, sometimes sequenced, but usually iterated with sufficient regularity to be characteristic of a given situation; Povest' vr. 1. 86, 19-21. Po vsja nedëlja ustavi ... pir tvoriti.... Byvase mnozstvo ot" mjas", ot skota i ot zvëriny, bjase po izobil'ju ot vsego. Egda ze pocï'p'jaxufsja, nac'njaxuf roptati na knjaz'. [He] decided ... to hold a feast every Sunday. There was plenty of meat, from cattle and from game; there was an abundance of everything.

144

KYRIL T. HOLDEN When they had drunk sufficiently, they began to grumble against the prince.

2) descriptive backgrounded events, durative, or stative results of ear­ lier completed events, especially after negated verbs Pov. vr. 1.14, 8-12. ...i primucisa dulëby, suscaja slovĕny, i nasil'e tvorjaxu zenam" dulĕb'skim": asce poëxati ob"riny, ne dadjase v"prjaci konja ni vola, no veljase v"prjaci 3 li, 4 li, 5 li zen" v telëgy i povesti ob"rëna ... ... and they oppressed the Duleby, who were Slavs, and they used force on the Duleb women: when an Avar needed to drive somewhere, he did not have a horse harnessed, but ordered 3, 4, or 5 women harnessed to a cart to draw the Avar. The imperfedtive-brdsed AORIST, statistically even more infrequent than the perfective-based IMPERFECT, gave rise to similar kinds of mean­ ing: sequenced actions, each of which could be of limited duration, progres­ sive or iterative, but this time generally foregrounded. E. g., Igor' 70. Bisa sja d'n', bisa sja drugyi, tretijago d'ne k" polud'niju padosja stjazi Igorevi. They fought for a day, they fought another day, and on the third day towards noon, the standards of Igor fell. Pov. vr. 1.127, 26-28. ...bĕ bo kupec', rodom toropecanin", i pomysli byti mnix", i razdaja imĕn'e svoe trebujuscim i manastyrem", i ide  velikomu Anton'ju v peceru, moljasja emu, daby i stvoril" cernorizcem". I prijat" i Antonij. ... for he was a merchant, a native of Toropec, and decided to become a monk, and he distributed his possessions to the needy and the monasteries, and he went to the great Anthony in the cave, begging him to make him a monk; and Anthony accepted him. Xozenie Daniila 1, 6-8. I blagodatiju Božieju doxodix" svjatago grada Ierusalima i videx" svjataja mesta, obxodìx" vsju zemlju galilejskuju... And by God's grace I reached the holy city of Jerusalem and saw the holy places, and visited the whole Galilean land ... 2.7 Spread of the Pf./lmpf

into the PRESENT

and PERFECT

The aspectual distinction of stems became crystallized with its separa­ tion from exclusive association with the PAST tense and evolution into other morphological domains: the PRESENT, the PERFECT and the par­ ticipial forms. Already in early OCS and continuing into OR we find confu­ sions in the usage of both stems in the PRESENT with either present or future meaning. Cf.,

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Sav. kn. Luke VIII, 13: ...ize v" casĕ vĕrujut" i v" case napasti otstupjat" '...which for a while believe, and in time of temptation fall away' (pf., as opposed to impf, in Zog., Mar., Ass., and Ostr.); Sav. kn., John XIV, 24: ne ljubjai mene sloves" moix" ne s"bljudet" 'he that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings'( pf. again as opposed to impf. in the other texts — both examples from Galton 1976:105); Mar., Matthew XX, 23: ... kr'sceniem" im"ze az" kr'scajusja (imp., vs. pf. kr"scjusja in Zog.) 'with the baptism that I am baptized with.'

In fact temporal reference of the verb was often contextually predicted by other syntactic devices: John XIII, 6-9: [Peter]: ty li moi umyesi nozë ... [Jesus]: eže az" tvorju ty ne vësi , razumeesi po six" '[Peter]: dost thou wash my feet? ...[Jesus]: what I do thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter.'

The imperfective stem was nevertheless used less in the future function than the perfective, and when so employed (often with determinate verbs of motion), usually had a closer connection with the present reference point in time: e.g., Mt. VIII, 19: ucitelju, idu po tebë ĕmiože koliž'do idesi 'master, I [will] fol­ low (lit. 'go after ') thee whithersoever thou goest.'

We may hypothesize that the reason for this preference for the perfec­ tive stem in future functions originated in its foregrounding and sequencing functions in the PAST tense AORIST. In the PRESENT too it was the nat­ ural candidate for encoding situations requiring the modality of high degree assurance of the completion and sequencing of upcoming events, specifi­ cally those involving the affective modification of the patient, or cause and effect relationships between clauses: e.g., John XIV, 3: i  pridö i poimö vy " sebĕ 'and I will come again and receive you unto myself ; Mk.IX, 37: iže asce edino takovyx" otrocçt" priimet" v" ime moe mç priemtet", i iže asce mene priemlet" ne mene priemlet" n" pos"lav"saago me 'whosoever shall receive one of such children in my name receiveth me: and whosoever shall receive me, receiveth not me, but him that sent me.'

The imperfective-based PRESENT, on the other hand, with its stativelike suffix or an original stative root, was much more poorly suited for such functions (unless the root itself was highly definite, as in certain verbs of motion). Its association with durative, background contexts in the PAST made it a better candidate for the "on-going process," general truths, or

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iterative meanings which encompassed the "NOW" reference point in time. At most its extension into the future was limited to contexts where the dis­ tance into the future was either not very great, or the initiation of the event was felt to be closely connected to the PRESENT (cf. earlier example). Even for the "atemporal" readings of the PRESENT, for which both stems could be used, one senses a preference for the imperfective to render single habitual events, generic, or universally valid truths, the perfective for the sequenced, predictive, consequential events: Lk. V, 37-38: i nik"toze ne v"livaat" vina nova v" mxy vef'xy aste li ze ni prosadit" vino novoe mĕxy i to proleet" se 'and no man putteth new wine into old bottles; else the new wine will burst the bottles, and be spilled'', John XI, 9: aste k"to xodit" v" d'nĕ ne pof"knet" se, jako svët" mira vidit" 'if any man walk in the day, he stumbleth not, because he seeth the light of this world.'

The split into perfective and imperfective stems also affected the PER­ FECT, generating s"bral" jest" 'has gathered' versus s"biral" jest" 'has been gathering/has gathered (iter.).' The first of these forms, with its perfective base, retained the more normal meaning of the perfect (probably because of the semantic compatibility of the stem and its affix) — an action com­ pleted in the past but with some lasting effect or result at the reference time, often characterizing the subject of the verb in a kind of media diath­ esis (Kukuskina 1978:57; Prokopovic 1982:40). The newly-derived imperfective-based member of the pair, however, required a semantic resolution of the conflict between the stative or processai meaning of the stem, with the completive meaning of the PERFECT /-participle. Its compromise meaning was one of a protracted, sometimes developing action in the past, with some effect on the reference point, e.g., resal" jest" 'has been decid­ ing,' or a series of completed actions in the past, again with some current relevance: e.g., bival" jest" 'has beaten,' or krescal" jest" 'has baptized.' Particularly noteworthy here was the behavior of the mass of new prefixed verbs. As was indicated earlier, they were highly telic in nature and now fit well into the "completion" aspectuality of the perfective-based PER­ FECTS, as opposed to the "development" or "iteration-completion" nuance of the unprefixed imperfective-based PERFECTS. The major com­ ponent of meaning of the PERFECT in both instances, however, was the subjective concept of the "relevance" of the events to the reference time. Galton and Van Schooneveld both describe this discourse function as one of "lifting" an event out of narrative context or the temporal sequencing of

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narration (Galton 1976:188; Van Schooneveld 1959: 94). In so doing, the PERFECT usually establishes the causal conditions for the main-line events expressed by the AORIST. These conditions are also quite different from the background events encoded by the IMPERFECT. Foreground and background events are those that are directly observed, but relegated to different planes of prominence. They are both part of the temporal narra­ tive sequence. PERFECT forms are incorporated into narrative ( and more frequently into dialogue in the early Slavic texts) not because of their specific location in the sequence of events, but because of their "impact" on these actions. A single example suffices to illustrate this function: Pov. vr. 1. 60, 16-17: Idĕte opjat', jako ot'ci nasi sego ne prijali sut' 'Go back, for our fathers have not accepted this.'

2.8 Demise of the IMPERFECT,

AORIST, and PERFECT

The IMPERFECTIVE/PERFECTIVE opposition as it stands today in Contemporary Standard Russian (CSR) did not bloom fully until the PER­ FECT /-participle took over as the regular marker of the past tense from the older "sigma" of the AORIST and IMPERFECT. Up to the XIV and XV centuries in OR the PERFECT underwent a series of evolutionary changes involving the loss of the auxiliary verb, beginning with the third person and gradually extending to the second and first. Concomitantly, the AORIST and IMPERFECT began to be increasingly confused with this auxiliary-less PERFECT in their sequencing/foregrounding functions. By XVI century Russian the AORIST and IMPERFECT had deteriorated in frequency to such an extent that they were largely restricted to "bookish" style (Prokopovic 1982:43; Nikiforov 1952:183), while by the XVII century they had essentially been totally replaced by the old PERFECT /-participle forms, now morphologically reanalysed as the single PAST morpheme, with the verb stem differentiated in terms of the PERFECTIVE/IMPERFECTIVE opposition. This loss of the PERFECT and its evolution into the simple PAST tense is, in some senses, the reverse of what occurred in the extension of IE stativity into the Slavic verbal aspect, and is paralleled in the histories of other IE languages (cf. the loss of the PERFECT in French and other Romance languages (Dahl 1985:139)). While stativity was redun­ dantly marked in IE, but selected as an alternative way of viewing other non-stative events, along with its iconic marker, "perfectness" proceeded in

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the opposite direction. The highly telic resultative verbs in Slavic could also be redundantly (insofar as the objective coding of real events) marked in the past tense with the PERFECT inflection. Verbs, for example, like 'to see something,' and 'to build a house,' would naturally imply lasting perfect­ like effects when put in the past tense, without the necessity of special inflection. Conversely, non-resultatives like 'to sit' and 'to walk' would be much less likely to be viewed in this manner. Nevertheless, there initially were sufficient semantically intermediary verbs which could be concep­ tualized in either manner to justify the development and preservation of the PERFECT category for a considerable length of time. Later, however, when virtually all verbs came to have telic (AORIST) counterparts, a categorization very closely related to resultativity, the PERFECT inflection became even more redundant than it was originally, at least in that part of its meaning which reflected the "completion" of events. The other facet of its meaning, the "lasting effect at some subsequent reference point in time," was simply one of the possible logical implications of a completed telic event, and the special coding of this particular subjective nuance, or its converse, was lost to the differentiation of stems in terms of the new PERFECTIVE/IMPERFECTIVE opposition. Where Givón speaks of metaphorical extension as a potent force in language evolution, here we have what appears to be an equally legitimate oft-noted tendency, the elimination of excessive redundancy, working in the opposite direction to rid the language of one of two competing categories, and again based on their implicational content. The puzzling side of this development, however, is that, as mentioned earlier, the PER­ FECT was essentially a discourse-oriented inflection. It was replaced by forms which now not only had to operate on two levels of coding, propositional and discourse, but did so with some difficulty since the implicational nature of many verbs was such that the perfect meaning was not immediately apparent. This was especially true of verbs from the atelic end of the lexicon, where lasting results were certainly not to be found, even if the verb had been perfectivized. The resolution has been an increased dependence on contextual cues such as the adverb uže 'already,' used with either aspectual form, or even broader appeals to the shared knowledge of the speaker-hearer: e.g., [Devocki] vdrug zametili, cto v trave ... cto-to prygaet .... [Oni] podosli blize i uvideli gnoma .... Konec ego borody zastrjal v sceli dereva .... '[The girls] suddenly caught sight of something jumping up and down in the

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grass.... As they approached, the saw that it was a gnome.... The tip of his beard had got stuck (lit. 'got stuck') in the crack of a log' (Brat'ja Grimm, Beljanocka i Rozocka).

Only a relatively minor development — an attempt from the XV to XVIII centuries to extend the productivity of the iterative -yva- suffix in the past tense, especially for remote past habitual actions (Nikiforov 1952; Mayo 1985: 10-11) — distinguished the aspectual system of Russian of that period from CSR. Yet even during the short period of its productivity, this suffix triggered a series of metaphorical changes in meaning from 'remote habitual' to modal variants of 'strongly asserted habitual' or 'strong denial' (when used with negation). An example of the last from one of the grammoty of the XVII century is: ... a k " Moskvĕ i v" inye gorody s" tovary i bez" tovarov" ne êzzivali... '... but to Moscow and to other cities with or without goods [we] did not travel...'

3

Summary

Summarizing the evolution of the discourse meanings of Russian Aspect chosen for attention in this article, it can be seen that several critical stages must be distinguished: each involving changes in the morphologization of the category; each involving the initiation and resolution of semantic conflicts between new and existing forms. At every stage we can observe confirmation of many of the proposals presented at the outset for the general structure and evolution of grammati­ cal categories. Among the most important of these is that, semantically speaking, categories are not totally discrete in the Platonic sense, nor are they uni-dimensional. Instead they tend to be multi-dimensional, fuzzyedged, admitting a continuum of values across dimensions both inter- as well as intra-categorially. The intersection of the most characteristic fuzzyedged features/dimensions would be the space occupied by the most pro­ totypical members of the category, while the areas of lesser overlap provide a spectrum of decreased likelihood of membership in the category. I.e., they can be measured for their "degree of prototypicality" (Givón 1984:15). A corollary of this view of grammatical categories and their membership is that the complex meaning of a category is more closely associated with the semantics of certain lexical items than with others, or exhibits a greater degree of "relevance" to particular stems or roots (Bybee 1985). Con-

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sequently such lexemes (in our case verbs) will tend to reflect this relevance through greater fusion of the categorial (in our case aspectual) marker with the stem, and conversely. The greatest degree of fusion will be found when the grammatical category is an immediate reflection of our normal percep­ tion of real-world events. That is, certain events in reality may be automati­ cally perceived as being punctual or dynamic, others as stative or non­ dynamic, and lexicalized as simple roots without being morphologically marked for these aspectualities (e.g., knock, see, etc.). The continuum from lexical through derivational through inflectional, and finally through syntactic expression of grammatical categories recognizes varying degrees of relevance of the semantics of a category to the semantics of events them­ selves. Two continua are therefore proposed: one marking the multi-dimen­ sional semantic scale identifying categorial centers and relating categories to one another; the other involving the formal expression of the semantic relationship between the root of a word and the meaning of the grammati­ cal category. Prototypical centers of categories as well as the means of their expression may shift along these continua, although there seem to be pre­ ferred "coding points" on each scale which themselves might be hierarchi­ cally organized with respect to one another. The category of aspect in any particular language may be said to draw its prototypical meaning from a variety of aspectualities such as: prospec­ tive, ingressive, iterative, habitual, durative, absorptive, attenuative, ter­ minative, progressive, imperfective, perfective, convertive, completive, resultative, conative, etc. (Majewicz 1982:59; Forsyth 1970: 20-31). These classes are, of course, semantically complex in themselves, representing lin­ guistically common generalizations (or intersections in the above Givonian sense) based upon more primitive parameters such as: (1) transitivity/telicity — the goal-directedness of an action (Hopper and Thompson 1980); (2) quantity — the "amount" of an event, either in terms of duration or number of iterations; (3) phase — the internal constituency of the event (i.e., begin­ ning, middle, end); (4) distribution — the relative positioning of an event with respect to reference points in time or space; (5) status — the speaker's impression of the reality or truth value of the event; and perhaps others involving empathy and other modalities (see Dem'jankov 1983). These parameters, it will be noted, are gradable in terms of abstractness, if abstractness is taken to mean disassociation from reality. The first three are generally readily observable objective properties, while the

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remainder are increasingly subjective and even culturally conditioned. They reflect, in part, the major functional realms which can be systemati­ cally coded by grammatical categories: lexical, propositional, and discourse (Givón 1984:30). Many of the basic cognitive/philosophical classifications of verbs as states, activities, accomplishments, achievements etc. (Vendler 1967; Mourelatos 1978), are predicated on the earlier, more objective semantic parameters. Such classifications are, in effect, proposals for a pos­ sible set of preferred coding points in the initial stages of aspectualization of a language. The process of grammaticalization of a category such as aspect is precisely the movement in the direction of increased abstraction from lex­ ical meaning to more impressionistic discourse realms no longer associated with the simple denotation of events in reality. This movement away from the prototypical perception of events appears to be part of a natural cognitive tendency to view reality from alter­ native perspectives, possibly for narrative purposes. In terms of coding this means, first of all, that contextual features can be encoded into the verb, thus freeing it from environmental dependency; secondly, it means that morphological markers of one category of aspectuality may be superim­ posed on roots or stems with which they are not characteristically found, to generate non-prototypical readings. Seen by some to be based on one of the major principles underlying grammatical change, such processes have been labelled metaphorical extension, as defined earlier. Subsumed in this pro­ cess, as in all analogy, is the principle of iconicity: the coding of similar meaning with similar form. Just as these two forces were critical in the his­ tory of phonetic writing where, through the Rebus principle, they freed writing from a one-to-one relationship with the semantics of the word, so too they have operated here in freeing the aspectual markers from encoding only the prototypical aspectuality of real-world events. 4

Conclusions

Russian Aspect has travelled far from its original sources in IE. In trac­ ing the course of its evolution we have sought to do three things: to examine in some detail exactly how such morphological categories change in time and thereby substantiate some of the theoretical proposals which seek to account for these changes; to provide better insights through this examination of what precisely the category of Aspect is in Russian; to verify the natural metaphorical or analogical relationship between the cognitive

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lexico-semantic classification of verbs, and the later pragmatic discourse functions of categories such as Aspect. Early in this article it was stated that a great variety of definitions of the PERFECTIVE and IMPERFECTIVE has been proposed, with none finding universal acceptance. I believe that the primary reason for this confusion is the failure to recognize the different functional levels into which this category has evolved. Russian Aspect began with the coding of the lexical-semantic level in IE. As the pairing of new semantic classes of verbs increased, the prototypical "center" of the aspectual opposition continually shifted, not only along the original dimen­ sion of telicity, but, by logical extension, into the new pragmatic dimension of discourse sequencing, foregrounding and backgrounding, a semantic level associated with information shared by the speaker/hearer. In the course of this development, the evolving category came into conflict with existing ones, resulting in dramatic reversals in markedness in some, the total elimination of others (cf. the collision with the PERFECT), or the deflection of Aspect into yet other dimensions such as modality (as in the incompatibility of the PERFECTIVE with the PRESENT, the "conative" use of the aspects, the use of the aspects for modal purposes in negation and imperatives, etc.). Any definition of Russian Aspect which ignores these distinct functions will necessarily run into the kinds of problems typi­ cally encountered in the literature. That is, it is not uncommon to find aspect functioning on one level seemingly contradicting its normal function on another. The IMPERFEC­ TIVE, for example, at the lowest level of coding the speaker's perception of real-world events will generally be associated with incomplete/non-resultative/atelic events. At a somewhat more abstract, pragmatic level, it codes background/non-focussed/non-topical information. The PERFECTIVE has essentially the opposite functions. When the need arises to encode a complete/resultative/telic event as non-sequenced, background information, a sacrifice by one of the two aspectual forms in one of its functions is clearly called for. In such cases of "general-factual" propositions, the more abstract discourse function of the IMPERFECTIVE wins, while its objec­ tive properties are jettisoned. E.g., On citai (IMPERF.) Annu Kareninu, 'He read (completed, non-topical, background) Anna Karenina.' Similar conflicts arise in the use of the PERFECTIVE for exemplary iterative actions. E.g., (Forsyth (1970:189) quoting Zoscenko: Svjatocnaja istorija): A staruska ... xodit vokrug stola i pal'cem svecki gasit (IMPERF.). Poslujnit (PERF.) palec i gasit. 'And the old woman ... was walking around the

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table putting out (iterative) the candles with her finger. (She) licks (itera­ tive, sequenced) her finger and out goes the candle.' Again the sacrifice is at the expense of the real-world single completed action reading, and in favor of the discourse function of sequencing. Such examples are usually accompanied by riders to the effect that they are stylistically charged or col­ loquial, and therefore somehow outside the "normal" usage of the aspects. But we have seen that such conflicts arose and were resolved in similar ways from the very inception of the category of Aspect in Slavic, whether the morphological marking was that of the AORIST versus IMPERFECT, or the PERFECTIVE versus IMPERFECTIVE. Acceptance of the idea that grammatical categories function on different levels renders such exam­ ples not only harmless, but even expected. The evidence from the historical evolution of the category suggests that the extension of verb pairing was always triggered by non-prototypical perception of events, and that such new perspectives were almost immediately associated with a shift to addi­ tional modal or discourse functions. Leinonen (1982), DeLancey (1982), and others have recently pro­ ceeded in the right direction by recognizing a distinction between the more concrete, real-world function of Aspect, and more pragmatic functions — Leinonen labels them "inner" and "outer" aspect or "viewpoint." Our diachronic analysis, based on a functional-typological approach to morphol­ ogy, would seem to indicate that the distinction is correct in general terms, but fails to sufficiently relate these levels in a natural way, nor does it pro­ vide fine enough a mesh for the almost continuous gradation of meanings possible through application of the principles of metaphorical extension and iconicity. Certainly this causes a considerable degree of "fuzziness," "slipperiness" or "flux," whichever terms strikes one's fancy, regarding the meaning(s) of the Russian aspectual forms, but the strict limitations that we have observed in Slavic on the kinds of metaphorical or analogical exten­ sion possible in going from level to level makes the whole process far from haphazard, and does not warrant "discounting ... the hope of some predic­ tive/explanatory modelling for aspect (or grammar in general)" (Chatterjee 1982:338). Finally, the evidence from Russian would appear to suggest that not only do such grammatical categories evolve in the direction of increas­ ingly abstract, subjective, and pragmatic meanings in an orderly way, but that the coding of the latter discourse concepts takes precedence over the earlier "inner" lexical dimensions when conflicts arise in language. This casts some doubt on Givón's (32) claim that it is impossible to characterize

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discourse functions without reference to propositional-semantic informa­ tion, and the latter without lexical-semantic meaning. Similarly it raises some questions on the veracity of portions of the "Transitivity Hypothesis" of Hopper and Thompson (1980), which seek to assign the prototypical semantic features of the verb a preeminent role in the determination of its discourse function. Instead the development of the binary category of Aspect in Russian can in general be seen to be the gradual encoding of the non-prototypical functions of the original semantic classes of verbs for pur­ poses no longer strictly denotative.

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156 1984.

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Kölln, H. 1958. "Die Entstehung des slavischen Verbalaspektes." Translated and reprinted in Maslov (ed.), 280-286. Kukuskina, O. V. 1978. "Iz istorii vida russkogo glagola." Vestnik moskovskogo filologija, No.l, 51-61.

un-ta. Serija

Kurylowicz, J. 1929. "Pochodzenie slowiañskich aspektów czasownikowych." Translated and reprinted in Maslov (ed.), 258-264. Kuznecov, P. S. 1959. Ocerki istoriceskoj morfologii russkogo jazyka. Moscow: Izd. AN SSSR. Lakoff, G. 1982. Categories and Cognitive Models. Berkeley: Berkeley Cognitive Science Report No.2. Leinonen, M. 1982. Russian Aspect, "Temporal'naja lokalizacija" and Definiteness/Indefiniteness. Helsinki: Neuvostoliittoin§tituutti. Majewicz, A. F. 1982. "Understanding Aspect." Lingua Posnaniensis XXIV, 29-61. Maslov, Ju. S. 1958. Rol' tak nazyvaemoj perfektivizacii i imperfektivizacii v processe vozniknovenija slavjanskogo glagoVnogo vida. Moskow: Izd. AN SSSR. Maslov, Ju. S. (ed.) 1962. Voprosy glagoVnogo vida. Moskva. Mayo P. J. 1985. The Morphology of Aspect in Seventeenth Century Russian. Columbus: Slavica Publishers. Meillet, A. 1922. "Des innovations du verbe slave." Revue des Études Slaves 2, 38-46. Meillet, A. 1924. Le slave commun. Paris: Libraire ancienne honore Champion. Milewski, T. 1939. " genezie aspektów slowiañskich." Rocznik slawistyczny 15, 1-13. Mourelatos, A. 1978. "Events, Processes, and States." Linguistics and Philosophy 2, 415-434.

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Nernec, I. 1958. "Genese slovanského systému vidového." Translated and reprinted in Maslov (ed.), 265-275. Nikiforov, S.D. 1952. Glagol, ego kategorii i formy v russkoj pis'mennosti vtoroj poloviny XVI veka. Moscow. Potebnja, A. A. 1941. Iz zapisok po russkoj grammatike, T. IV. Moscow/Leningrad: Izd. AN SSSR. Rispoli, M. and L. Bloom 1985. "Incomplete and Continuing: Theoretical Issues in the Acquisition of Tense and Aspect." Journal of Child Language 12, 471-474. Shopen, T. (ed.) 1985. Language Typology and Syntactic Description. Vol. III. Grammatical Categories and the Lexicon. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Stang, . S. 1942. Das slavische und baltische Verbum. Oslo: Jacob Dybwad. Steedman, M. J. 1977. "Verbs, Time, and Modality." Cognitive Science 1, 216-234. Stepanov, Ju. S. 1976. "Vid, zalog, perexodnost' (Balto-slavjanskaja problema. I.)." Izvestija ANSSSR, Serija literatury ijazyka 35, No.5, 408-420. Thelin, N.B. 1978. Towards a Theory of Aspect, Tense and Actionality in Slavic. Uppsala: Almqvist and Wiksell. Timberlake, A. 1982. "Invariance and the Syntax of Russian Aspect." In Hopper (ed.), 305-331. Urjanov, G. K. 1895. Znacenija glagol'nyx osnov v litovskoslavjanskom jazyke. T. II. Warsaw. Vaillant, A. 1939. Manuel du vieux slave, I. Paris: Institut d'Études Slaves. Van Schooneveld, C. H. 1959. A Semantic Analysis of the Old Russian Finite Preterite System. 'SGravenhage: Mouton and Co. Van Wijk, N. 1929. "Sur l'origine des aspects du verbe slave." Translated and reprinted in Maslov (ed.), 238-257.

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Vendier, Z. 1967. Linguistics in Philosophy. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Vondrák, V. 1915. Drevnecerkovnoslavjanskij sintaksis. Kazan'. Webber, B. L. 1978. "On Deriving Aspectual Sense." Cognitive Science 2, 385-390.

Discourse functions of tense-aspect in French: dynamic synchrony1 Linda R. Waugh Cornell University

Introduction Recent approaches to language remind us that, far from being a static, monolithic, abstract entity, language is rather dynamic. It exists for and arises out of the process of communication and as such is based in the prag­ matics of the communication situation; it rests on the discourses and texts by which we communicate with each other; and it encodes variability as speakers, addressees, contexts, and situations change. Moreover, it is con­ stantly in flux: at any given moment, it contains the results of past changes and harbingers of future ones. Particular phonological, morphological, semantic, syntactic, and discourse elements may be on the one hand oldfashioned, conservative, and cliché, or on the other hand newfangled, innovative, and creative. The result is a system which evidences dynamic synchrony. 2 While much of this is known, it has not affected — as much as it should — recent discourse-pragmatic approaches. And yet, there is every reason to think that discourse functions are subject to the same dynamic variability as are other areas of language: they can change over time and space and they can evidence the synchronic counterpart of change, namely variability. The following is an attempt to provide evidence for just such variability in the discourse functions of three past tense-aspects (T-A's) of French: the imperfect (Imp), the compound past (CP), and the simple past (SP). It is the claim of this paper that the uses of these three T-A's are to be differen­ tiated into two general types. The first are those which are more traditional and conservative; they conform to the strictures of the French academy as

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well as to principles set down in pedagogical grammars and guides to good usage (e.g., Grevisse 1969). The second are those which are untraditional and newfashioned; their presence has not been recognized by the academy or traditional grammarians, except insofar as they are looked on as curiosities, are referred to as exceptional or puzzling, and are deemed to be merely stylistically marked and even at times of doubtful grammaticality.3 The first usage I will call "classical," a term which deliberately recalls 17th century French literary trends, for it was during that century that this type of usage became established, such that from the 18th century to the present it has remained with only minor changes. It is the usage which is associated with belles lettres, with historical treatises, and with much story­ telling in general (when written). The second usage, which I will call "avant-garde," is a typically 20th century phenomenon, although seeds of it may be found in earlier centuries (especially the 19th). However, it can be said that it is not until the 20th century that there are texts in which avantgarde usage plays a significant or even the dominant role. Indeed, for the most part, texts can be categorized as to whether they show a dominance of either classical or avant-garde usage, although there are texts, in particular in the 20th century, in which one can find both types of usage intermixed. SP has not been a spoken form in modern French since at least the end of the 17th century (and perhaps earlier); in other words, during the time period which is our focus of attention, it is only a written form — and only occurs in some written genres (Waugh 1987b). The corpus used for this study incorporates two of the genre-types in which SP, as well as CP and Imp, typically occur: (1) fiction, whether good literature or more popular novels and stories; and (2) journalistic writing, whether of newspapers or newsmagazines. In most cases, it incorporates third person narrative, since, as others have pointed out (see, e.g., Boyer 1985), autobiographical accounts often can show signficant differences in both the classical and the avant-garde usage of these three T-A's. The focus on discourse functions, rather than on more referential meanings of these T-A's, is in accordance with the finding (reported in Waugh 1987b) that for SP discourse functions are more numerous than, and take precedence over, referential meanings. This is generally also true for CP and Imp. This is not to deny that referential meanings exist, but to assert that they are secondary in the use of these T-A's. Thus, a referential (propositional, logical) approach — e. g., that of Comrie 1976, Guenther et ai 1978, Vet 1980, Kamp & Rohrer 1983, de Both-Diez 1985, Vet & Molen-

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dijk 1986 — can account for only a small percentage of the uses of SP, whereas a discourse-oriented approach can explain the majority of its uses. Classical usage Basic discourse functions In classical usage, the basic discourse functions of Imp, SP, and CP can be described in the following manner. 4 Imp is the predominant T-A of such usage, in the sense that it is the most frequent5 and is found throughout a text, whether in the narrative section, in commentary, or in dialogue. In many ways, it could be said that it is the unmarked (Waugh 1982) T-A par excellence. In their turn, CP and SP can be generally differentiated in terms of types of enunciation (Benveniste 1966 and Simonin-Grumbach 1975, 1977; cf. Weinrich 1973). SP is typically used in the narrative sections of these texts, while in its turn CP is used in two ways. The first type of use is for dialogue (quoted speech), when it is presented as direct discourse. (Since SP does not occur in the spoken language, this could be said to stem from attempts to reproduce as realistically as possible, the putative speech of the characters of a story.6) The second occurs when the author, abandon­ ing his or her role as narrator, addresses the reader directly in order to offer explanation or commentary or further discuss the events being recounted. 7 When CP is used, the narrator no longer narrates and either lets the charac­ ter speak or speaks him or herself directly to the reader. For its part, Imp is neutral: it can occur in both types of enunciation. The contrast between the SP and Imp in narration (or, to a certain extent, CP 8 and Imp in dialogue) can be described very simplistically in dis­ course-functional terms as figure vs. ground. 9 Generally speaking, SP defines a figure and Imp the ground; thus SP often is associated with the foreground of a narrative and Imp with the background. The former recounts the major events of a narrative, those things which are in focus at a given moment in the text, those events which are foregrounded, and the latter is used for description, states of affairs, minor events, and so forth. This is not to deny that there may be degrees/levels of grounding or to say that there are no reversals of this general tendency, 10 but to claim that this schema serves well as a general characterization of classical usage. Since there have been many studies which have shown this usage in belles lettres in particular (Weinrich 1973, Adam 1976a, 1976b, Reid 1977,

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1979), I will only give a few typical — and less literary — examples here. In (1), SP is used for the narrative, while CP occurs in dialogue. (1)

from Georges Simenon, Maigret a peur, p. 14.11 Maigret FROTTA une allumette, TIRA à petites bouffées sur sa pipe. -j'AI FAIT une partie de mes études avec Julien Chabot, ENONCA-t-il calmement. Plusieurs fois, jadis, J'AI ETE l'hôte de sa maison de la rue Clemenceau. 'Maigret STRUCK a match, TOOK small puffs on his pipe. -I DID part of my studies with Julien Chabot, he SAID clamly. Several times, some time ago, I WAS a guest in his house on Clemenceau St.'

In example (2), a newsmagazine article reprinted in its entirety, SP and I m p are used in the figure/ground relation; C P occurs in a parenthetical aside, to inform the reader of the reason why the journalist is not providing information which would seem to be called for. (2)

LA BROCHE DE SARAH

Sarah Bernhardt collectionnait les admirateurs. L'un d'entre eux, par­ ticulièrement généreux, COMMANDA chez le joaillier Boucheron une broche nœud, en acier repercé garni de brillants. L'actrice la PERDIT et s'en DESOLA tant que l'amoureux (l'on ne peut toujours pas révéler son nom, il A EXIGE le secret à tout jamais), FIT refaire une broche jumelle. Entretemps, l'habilleuse de Sarah Bernhardt retrouvait le bijou dans sa loge. Frédéric Boucheron, fon­ dateur en 1858 de la bijouterie qui porte toujours son nom, DECIDA de con­ server la seconde broche pour sa collection personnelle. (L'Express, 2/13-19/84). 'SARAH'S BROOCH

Sarah Bernhardt collected admirers. One of them, who was particularly generous, ORDERED at the Boucheron jewelers a brooch in the form of a knot, of pierced steel studded with brilliants. The actress LOST it and WAS SO UPSET by that that her lover (they still can't reveal, his name, he INSISTED on its remaining a secret forever), HAD a duplicate brooch made. Meanwhile, Sarah Bernhardt's wardrobe woman found the piece in her dressing room. Frédéric Boucheron, the founder in 1858 of the jewelry store which still carries his name, DECIDED to keep the second brooch for his private collection.' Such a relationship between the three past T-A's is characteristic of 18th and 19th century works of fiction, historical narrative, biography, and so forth, and much of 20th century writing of this type. Journalistic usage of the 19th century — once it loses its sense of eye-witness account or personal statement by the author and becomes a third person/impersonal account — also complies with this type, as do many stories or parts of stories in 20th century journalistic prose. Indeed, the conformity of much of literary, his­ torical, and jouralistic prose to this same model is striking.

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Imparfait pittoresque It should be added that although the classical usage of these three TA's has not changed in a basic way since the 18th century, during this time period Imp has expanded its terrain (Imbs 1960, Saunders 1969) in various ways, which may in fact be themselves harbingers of the changes to come. On the one hand, free indirect style {style indirect libre), which is typically associated with Imp (and pluperfect, conditional, conditional perfect), began to be used with greater frequency. As with classical usage, the gram­ matical literature is filled with examples; the following is from Simenon. (3)

Georges Simenon, Maigret a peur, p. 14. ...Maigret se DEMANDA ce qu'il faisait là. Peut-être s'était-il assoupi un moment dans le compartiment surchauffé? '...Maigret WONDERED what he was doing there. Had he perhaps dozed off in the overheated compartment?'

The second new type of usage concerns the imparfait pittoresque. Often described as a stylistic device, it basically means that Imp occurs in contexts where one expects SP; "the Imperfect Indicative in modern French is increasingly adopting a preterite role, loose but none the less real, accepted and appreciated by the reader" (Saunders 1969:161). In some cases, SP is expected because the action is complete at a certain moment. The Imp in the fourth sentence of (2) above (retrouvait, 'found') is an example of this: a complete action which would normally be in SP. This is particularly interesting, since it could not be explained by those approaches to aspectual usage (e.g., Comrie 1976) which claim that Imp is used for actions which are incomplete and SP for complete ones. In terms of dis­ course functions, one could say that, given the point of the story, the find­ ing of the brooch is secondary; what is primary is the making of the first brooch, the losing of it, the actress being so upset that another brooch was made, the making of a duplicate brooch, and the decision by Boucheron to keep it (it is about to be sold at an auction). Hence the use of Imp found as against SP's ORDERED, LOST, WAS UPSET, HAD, and DECIDED. It is just such exam­ ples which show that a discourse approach to the function of aspectual oppositions is necessary. The typical imparfait pittoresque is, however, different from this one: it concerns the use of Imp to relate an action which is crucial to the develop­ ment of the narrative and thus would normally be found in SP. It occurs, for example, with verba dicendi, with verbs such as naître, mourir, sortir,

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entrer, and, especially in modern texts, with many different types of verbs. Again, the grammatical literature is filled with examples; the following are further ones. (4)

from Guy de Maupassant, "Les Bijoux." Comme elle avait été à l'Opéra, une nuit d'hiver, elle RENTRA toute fris­ sonnante de froid. Le lendemain elle toussait. Huit jours plus tard elle mourait d'une fluxion de poitrine. Lantin FAILLIT la suivre dans la tombe. Son désespoir FUT si terrible que ses cheveux DEVINRENT blancs en un mois.... [...] Six mois plus tard il se remariait. Sa seconde femme était très honnéte, mais d'un caractère difficile. Elle le FIT beaucoup souffrir. A s she had gone to the Opera one winter night, she RETURNED HOME completely shivering with cold. The next day she was coughing. A week later she died of pneumonia. Lantin ALMOST followed her into the tomb. His despair WAS SO terrible that his hair BECAME white in a month... [...] Six months later he got married again. His second wife was very upright, but difficult in character. She MADE him suffer a lot.'

(5)

from Simenon, Maigret a peur, p. 13. Tout à coup Maigret ROUGIT, furieux contre lui-même, car il venait de répondre docilement, comme il le faisait jadis avec les gens du genre de son interlocuteur, "les gens du château." -Curieux, n'est-ce pas? ironisait l'autre. 'Suddenly Maigret BLUSHED, angry with himself, for he had just answered obediently, just as he once used to do with people like his interlocutor, "people from the chateau." -Curious, isn't it? the other said ironiquely.'

These encroachments of Imp into the domain of SP provide a good bridge to avant-garde usage. Avant-garde usage Introduction If we look at 20th century writing — especially journalistic usage and less tradition-bound literary usage — we find that, while there are many examples of this sort, there are also uses which simply do not fit this description. CP can be used for narration and can even, at times, be the main narrative T-A (Wilmet 1976); CP and SP can alternate without there being a switch from narrative either to dialogue or to authorial interven­ tion; and SP tends to be found much less than in classic usage — in fact, in

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many cases it is isolated and often occurs alone. And lastly — although we won't be able to go into this here — the historical present plays a much more important role (see Monville-Burston and Waugh 1990). These new avant-garde uses are far from being the illogical and unre­ gulated mixture they have sometimes been described to be (Cohen 1956, Harmer 1965, Saunders 1969). They have a logic, but it is different from the one which underlies classical usage. The three T-A's are no longer sepa­ rated in more or less straightforward and global fashion into figure vs. ground within the narrative, nor narrative vs. dialogue and authorial inter­ vention. Nor are they typically differentiated by the other referential types of usage which have been described in the grammatical literature but which are in the minority: namely CP for more recent events, SP for more remote ones; CP for the exploits of a living person, SP for those of a dead person; CP for a past event with current relevance, SP for a past event with no cur­ rent relevance. 12 Again, it is discourse functions which predominate, but their logic is quite different. Avant-garde usage is much more oriented toward the immediate con­ text in which it occurs and the relation of this context to the text as a whole. That is, these uses are much more locally contextualized. This localization evidences a great deal of variation as the context varies. This being so, it will not be possible for us to explore the full variety of the contextualization. Rather, we will focus here on only one manifestation of this variety, namely the use of the three T-A's to mark off various steps in the develop­ ment of the text. As we will see, a given T-A — and the switch from that TA to a different one — can be used to relate in a particular way one part of the text to another. In order to show this, we will focus on examples in which a given T-A either begins or ends a text (or a section of a text), but is either preceded or followed by other T-A's. That is, the given T-A is iso­ lated from the surrounding text by the fact that it does not recur. This will allow us to differentiate its discourse function in these contexts as against its usage elsewhere. The beginnings and endings of texts are places which — as has often been said in discourse/textual analysis — are crucial in that they orient the reader into or out of the main body of the text, or from one part of the text to another. And, as we shall see, these are places where we find characteristic differences between the three T-A's. 13

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Beginning of texts Compound Past At the beginning of a text, CP is orientational. It introduces the main character, gives an important event — such as the one which starts the whole process to be talked about or the one which motivates going ahead with the story to follow — or provides a brief synopsis of that important event. It is thus a scene- or stage-setter; it orients the reader, gives the reader some information, and gets the story going. In such cases, SP (and/ or historical present) and Imp are used to recount the story itself. The first example comes from journalistic usage: (6)

Un mort et trois blessés dans une collision [entire article] Lundi matin, vers 4 h 45, une voiture conduite par M. Jean-Marie Chagourin, 23 ans, soudeur, domicilié au lieu-dit "Les Rethures," à Vimory, près de Montargis où il se rendait,14 A brusquement QUITTE la route à hauteur de "La Gacherie" à Gien pour aller percuter un arbre. Le véhicule FUT RENVOYÉ au milieu de la chaussée et une automobile qui le suivait VINT s'éc­ raser sur lui. Elle était conduite par M. François Maugard, 26 ans, élève inspecteur, habitant La Peyrousse-Fossat (Haute Garonne) qui avait à son bord Mlle Marie-Louise de Prado, 28 ans, élève inspecteur, 2, rue des Lilas, à Toulouse et Didier Galigne, 28 ans, élève inspecteur, 49, rue des Cigognes, à Ramonville-Saint-Ange (Haute Garonne). Au cours de la collision, M. Chagourin A ETE TUE et les trois autres BLES­ SES.

'One dead and three hurt in a collision Monday morning, about 4:45 a.m., a car driven by Mr. Jean-Marie Chagourin, 23 years old, a welder, residing at the place called "Les Rethures," at Vimory, near Montargis where he was going, suddenly LEFT the road oppo­ site "La Gacherie" at Gien and crashed into a tree. The vehicle WAS THROWN BACK into the middle of the roadway and a car which was following it CAME and smashed against it. The car was driven by Mr. François Maugard, 26 years old, student inspector, living at La Peyrousse-Fossat (Haute Garonne) who had with him Miss Marie-Louise de Prado, 28 years old, student inspector, 2 rue des Lilas, Toulouse and Didier Galigne, 28 years old, student inspector, 49 rue des Cigognes, Ramonville-Saint-Ange (Haute Garonne). In the collision, Mr. Chagourin WAS KILLED and the three others HURT.' It should be noted here that after the use of CP, which describes the action which set in motion the rest of the story, the journalist goes over to SP com­ bined with Imp to give the rest of the story. The article ends with CP; I will have more to say about that later. The next example is more complex. In the newspaper Le Matin, on page one are given short abstracts of the major articles, which themselves

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are found later in the newspaper. Notice here that both the abstract on page one and the sub-title and the first lines of the article on page 20 are in C P and that these give the major point of the article: the invention of an artifi­ cial heart which was presented the day before and which was funded by an A r a b organization. After this introduction, both in t h e abstract and in t h e article itself, the next lines are in the present or t h e recent past (venir de) construction, and the journalist returns later to various past T-A's. (7)

AUJOURD'HUI [short abstracts of major articles] MÉDECINE: LE CŒUR ARTIFICIEL FRANCO-SAOUDIEN. Le docteur Didier Lapeyre

A PRESENTE hier le cœur artificiel qu'il A INVENTE, ESSAYE avec succès pendant cinq jours sur une génisse de trois mois. Le programme qui lui A PERMIS de voir le jour est dirigé par Artificial Heart System International, organisme dont les capitaux sont aux deux tiers arabes. PAGE 20 On page 20: [first few lines of an almost page-long article] CŒUR ARTIFICIEL: LE PROJET FRANCO-SAOUDIEN

Un Modèle original, mis au point par le docteur Lapeyre àl'Aérospatiale, avec un financement conjoint franco-saoudien, A ETE TESTE avec succès sur une génisse de trois mois "Monobloc, intégré, aussi semblable que possible au coeur humain": c'est ainsi que le docteur Didier Lapeyre A PRESENTE, hier, à Paris, le coeur artificiel dont il est l'inventeur. L'appareil vient d'être essayé avec succès pen­ dant cinq jours sur une génisse de trois mois. ... [Marie-Ange d'Adler,Le Matin, 2/20/85] 'TODAY MEDECIN: THE FRENCH-SAUDiAN ARTIFICIAL HEART. Doctor Didier Lapeyre

PRESENTED yesterday the artificial heart that he INVENTED and TRIED success­ fully for 5 days on a 3 month old heifer. The program which ENABLED it to be developed is directed by Artificial Heart System International, two thirds of the funding of which is Arab. ARTIFICIAL HEART: THE FRENCH-SAUDIAN PROJECT.

A new model, developed by Dr. Lapeyre at Aérospatiale, with joint French-Soudian funding, HAS BEEN TESTED successfully on a3 month old heifer. "A Monobloc, integrated, as close as possible to the human heart": this is how Dr. Didier Lapeyre PRESENTED, yesterday, in Paris, the artificial heart of which he is the inventor. The machine has just been successfully tried for 5 days on a 3 month old heifer...' In t h e next example, C P is used in the headline to give t h e major event which is the raison d'être of t h e article: a plane crash. B u t , it should also be noted that when t h e crash itself is recounted in the first few lines of the arti­ cle, I m p is used. This is, in fact, another example of an imparfait pittores­ que: the event is o n e which should b e the focus of attention, the major

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event of t h e story. Indeed, Imp's before this o n e seem t o b e leading u p t o this dramatic m o m e n t , especially given t h e headline. B u t t h e journalist does n o t use C P (or SP) h e r e ; rather, she reserves it for t h e difficulty experienced by t h e rescue efforts. (8)

BILBAO, 9 H 15...LE CRASH

Un Boeing 727 des lignes espagnoles S'EST ÉCRASE hier matin sur le mont Oiz, en Pays basque espagnol. Aucun des passagers-dont un ancien ministre de Franco et l'actuel ministre bolivien du Travail-n'A SURVECU [opening of long article] Il était un peu plus de 9 h 15 du matin lorsque le pilote de l'avion Boeing 727 Aqueduc de Ségovie, qui effectuait le vol régulier Madrid-Bilbao, réalisait le dernier contact par radio pour signaler qu'il se préparait à réaliser la man­ oeuvre d'approche en vue d'effectuer son atterrissage sur l'aéroport interna­ tional de Sondica. Quelques minutes plus tard, le Boeing 727 de la compagnie espagnole Iberia percutait l'émetteur de la télévision basque, situé sur le som­ met de la montagne Oiz, avant de s'écraser dans un ravin. Sur les lieux du sinistre, les images dantesques et difficiles à supporter se succédaient avec des débris de l'avion sur plus de quatre kilomètres.... ...les opérations de secours SE SONT DEROULEES avec beaucoup de dif­ ficultés.... [Gorka Landaburu, Le Matin, 2/20/85] BILBAO, 9:15 A.M....THE CRASH

A Spanish airlines Boeing 727 CRASHED yesterday morning on Mount Oiz in the Basque country of Spain. None of the passengers -including a former minister under Franco and the current Bolivian Labor minister - [HAS] SURVIVED. It was a little past 9:15 a.m. when the pilot of the Boeing 727 plane Aqueduct of Segovia, which did the regular Madrid-Bilbao flight, made the last radio contact, reporting that it was preparing to carry out the approach maneuvre in order to execute its landing at the international airport of Son­ dica. A few minutes later, the Boeing 727 of the Spanish airline Iberia smashed into the Basque television transmitter, situated on the summit of Mount Oiz, before crashing into a ravine. At the scene of the disaster, Dantesque images, difficult to bear, followed one another with the debris of the plane strewn over more than 4 kilomet­ ers.... .. .the rescue operations TOOK PLACE with a lot of difficulty...

T h e reason for this seemingly strange use of I m p and C P is that t h e particu­ lar event being talked about is both news and n o t news, both t h e point of the article a n d n o t t h e point. T h e plane crash took place in t h e morning (9:15 a . m . ) of t h e day before, but t o o late t o b e in Le Matin, a morning newspaper. Since some, at least, of t h e readers of Le Matin could b e assumed t o read an evening newspaper or to listen to evening news pro­ grams, t h e crash would not b e news to them. O n t h e other hand, this is the

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first instance of its being recorded in Le Matin and for those who don't read other newspapers or listen to news broadcasts, it is "new" news. This creates an ambiguous situation. Hence, the headline announces the crash in CP; it is a major event and possibly a new one for the reader. In addition, it is the event which leads to the major points of the story. But the body of the article uses the first CP not for the crash, but for the difficulty experi­ enced by the rescue efforts. In some sense, this is the real "new" news, since it is part of the ongoing story of the aftermath of the crash.15 The following article also gives a typical example of CP for setting the scene and Imp and SP for the events themselves. Just as in example (6) above, the article ends with CP. What is particularly interesting here is the ironic tone and basically humorous writing of the journalist — this is by no means a typical 'fait divers' (miscellaneous news item): (9)

Une oreille déchirée pour le gérant de la discothèque [the majority of the arti­ cle] A cause de décibels, la fréquentation des discothèques est, paraît-il, déconseillée pour la bonne santé de l'ouie. Pas au point néanmoins d'en perdre une oreille! C'est pourtant la douloureuse mésaventure qui EST ARRIVÉE dans la nuit de mercredi jeudi, vers 3 h 30, à M. Le Gallic, gérant du Moulin de Saint-Ay, mordu par un client à l'oreille droite, laquelle A ETE en partie ARRACHÉE.

Michel Poueyou n'avait-il pas mangé à sa faim au dîner? En tout cas, il avait bu jusqu'à plus soif, puisque ce client cannibale se trouvait dans un état d'ébriété avancé lorsqu'il S'EN EST PRIS à l'organe auditif de son adversaire. A l'origine: une querelle provoquée par les vapeurs d'alcool. Alain le Gallic, le malheureux, y PRÊTA une oreille attentive. C'est alors que Michel Poueyou, 44 ans, qui habite 3, résidence Clos-du-Moulin à Saint-Jean-déBraye, SE PRECIPITA sur lui et DECIDA mordicus de s'en prendre à son pavillon droit. Avec détermination puisque le malheureux A EU l'oreille en grande par­ tie décollée et A DU être transporté au C.H.R.O.... {La République du Centre, 3/2/84) 'A torn ear for the manager of a discotheque Because of the decibels, going often to discotheques is, it seems, not recommended for the well-being of one's hearing. Not, however, to the point of losing one's ear! Yet, this is the painful misadventure which HAPPENED early Thursday morning, about 3:30 a.m. to Mr. Le Gallic, manager of the Moulin de Saint-Ay, whose right ear, bitten by a customer, WAS partly TORN OFF. Hadn't Michel Poueyou eaten his fill at dinner? In any case, he had drunk his fill, since this cannibal customer was in a state of advanced drunkenness when he WENT FOR the auditory organ of his adversary. It all started with a row provoked by the alcohol fumes. The unlucky Alain le Gallic TURNED an attentive ear to it. It was at that moment that

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LINDA R. WAUGH Michel Poueyou, 44 years old, who lives at 3, Clos-du-Moulin residence at Saint-Jean-de-Braye, LUNGED at him and DECIDED to sink his teeth into le Gallic's right auricle. With determination, since the unlucky fellow HAD his ear almost taken off and HAD TO BE transported to the C.H.R.O. [Hospital]...'

Such type of usage can also be found in literature. The following excerpt comes from the opening lines of Proust: (10) Marcel Proust, A la recherche du temps perdu, Du côté de chez Swann, pre­ mière partie: Combray, opening lines] Longtemps, je ME suis COUCHE de bonne heure. Parfois, à peine ma bougie éteinte, mes yeux se fermaient si vite que je n'avais pas le temps de me dire: "Je m'endors." Et, une demi-heure après, la pensée qu'il était temps de chercher le sommeil m'éveillait 'For a long time I USED TO GO TO BED early. Sometimes, when I had put out my candle, my eyes would close so quickly that I had not even time to say to myself: 'I'm going to sleep." And half an hour later the thought that it was time to go to sleep would awaken me....' [translation of . . S. Moncrieff]

and this one from Malraux:16 (11) André Malraux, Antimémoires [opening lines] 1965 au large de la Crète Je me suIs EVADE, en 1940, avec le futur aumônier du Vercors. Nous nous RETROUVAMES peu de temps après l'évasion, dans le village de la Drôme dont il était curé, et où il donnait aux Israélites, à tour de bras, des certificats de baptêmes de toutes dates.... Ii EST MORT aux Glières.

Réfléchir sur la vie — sur la vie en face de la mort — sans doute n'est-ce guère qu'approfondir son interrogation... '1965, Off Crete. In 1940 I ESCAPED with the future chaplain of the Vercors. We MET AGAIN shortly afterward in the little town in the Drome where he was parish priest and where he used to hand out baptismal certificates wholesale to Jews....[several lines with SP's and Imp's, and with presents and CP's in quoted dialogue] He DIED on the slopes of Glières. To reflect upon life — life in relation to death — is perhaps no more than to intensify one's questioning....'

Simple Past SP is quite different from CP in its discourse effects; it plunges the reader into the text with little or no orientation. It is much more of an attention-getter, it seeks to surprise the reader and at the same time to

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pique his or her curiosity. As such, it is often accompaned by syntactic, lex­ ical, and even orthographic devices which serve to underline the sense of surprise and attention-getting. The following are both from journalistic prose. (12) LE CHARME DE Lou [opening of a short article] Ce ne FUT pas un concert. Plutôt un pèlérinage au délectable parfum de nostalgie dans une étroite communion entre la musique et l'endroit... (Jac­ ques Camus, La République du Centre, 2/20/84) 'LOU'S CHARM

It WAS not a concert. Rather a pilgrimage with the delightful flavor of nostalgia in the intimate communion between the music and the place...' (13) Portrait en pied [first sentences of a long article] Frederic Pottecher FUT et reste, un peu, à la justice ce que Roger Couderc FUT et reste au rugby. Pendant trente ans, il A SUIVI la cour avec une passion généreuse et charnelle. A la radio d'abord, à la télévision ensuite, il A RENDU compte de tous les grands procès depuis la Libération....(Jean-Marc Théolleyre, Le Monde, 2/18/84) 'Full-length portrait Frederic Pottecher WAS and remains, somewhat for the law what Roger Couderc WAS and is for rugby. For thirty years, he FOLLOWED the courts with a generous and carnal passion. First on the radio, then on television, he REPORTED on all the major trials since the Liberation....'

Imperfect As for Imp, there is much more variety in its usage. Here, as elsewhere, we will find that it is basically the neutral (the unmarked) of the three T-A's. As such, it usually sets the background for the important events, which will be recounted in either SP or CP. There are some cases of imparfait pittoresque in texts with avant-garde usage. In example (8), as said earlier, one major piece of news which might be known by readers is given in CP in the headline; Imp is then used to begin the recounting of the story and for the same piece of news. In the following, Imp is used for what is not so important, what is not the motivating factor for the story (but rather background in order to understand the motivating factor). But it is also an imparfait pittoresque since it occurs for an action where one would have expected SP or CP. (14) CHOMAGE: ON CORRIGE LES VARIATIONS La base du calcul des corrections des variations saisonnières A ETE MODIFIEE. Mais le gouvernement ne gagne pas au change, [opening lines of article]

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LINDA R. WAUGH Samedi dernier, le Matin annonçait pour janvier 43 000 demandeurs d'emplois supplémentaires. Il avait raison. C'était l'écart entre le chiffre annoncé (en données corrigées des variations saisonnières ou CVS) pour décembre 1984 (2 400 800) le 14 janvier dernier, et celui pour janvier (2 443 500), rendu public le 15 février. Mais le Matin avait également tort! En réalité, l'écart n'était que de 37 200, car les bases du calcul... [., Le Matin, 2/20/85) 'UNEMPLOYMENT: THE VARIATIONS ARE CORRECTED

The basis of the calculation for correction of seasonal variations HAS BEEN MOD­ IFIED. But the government does not gain anything from the change. Last Saturday, Le Matin announced for January 43,000 applicants for additional jobs. Le Matin was right. This was the difference between the number announced (in figures corrected for seasonal variations or CSV) for December 1984 (2,400,800) on last January 14, and that for January (2,433,500) made public on February 15. But Le Matin was also wrong! In reality, the difference was only 37,200, because the basis for the calculation...'

The next example is particularly interesting because it contains the same verb présenter which is also found in example 7 above; in that article it occurred in CP in the abstract, the subheadline, and the first sentence of the article. Here, we have the same verb; but it occurs in Imp in both the summary on page one and the headline page 21. The article begins first with a present and then with CP. (15) AUJOURD'HUI RACISME: "TOUCHE PAS A MON POTE," CA MARCHE. L'association sos racisme

présentait, hier, ses propositions. Beaucoup de monde au rendez-vous. Ber­ nard-Henri Lévy rend hommage àI""arrogance tranquille et gaie" de ces jeunes qui défient l'existence de Le Pen et de son parti. PAGE 21 page 21: "TOUCHE PAS A MON POTE, ON EST NOMBREUX"

L'association "sos racisme" présentait hier ses propositions. Il y avait du monde au rendez-vous, [part of article] Coluche, hilare, lunettes teintées et cheveux gominés, a tous les projec­ teurs sous le nez....sos racisme, les organisateurs de Convergences 84 et du mouvement Touche pas à mon pote, ONT LANCE hier à Paris quatre grandes initiatives contre le racisme.... [F.J., Le Matin, 2/20/85] TODAY

RACISM: "DONT TOUCH MY PAL," IT WORKS. The association sos racism pre­

sented yesterday its proposals. Lots of people at the meeting. Bernard-Henri Lévy pays tribute to the "calm and cheerful arrogance" of these young people PAGE 21. who defy the existence of Le Pen and his party. "DON'T TOUCH MY PAL, THERE ARE MANY OF US"

The association "sos racism" presented yesterday its proposals. There were lots of people at the meeting.

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Coluche, full of mirth, with his tinted glasses and plastered down hair, has all the spotlights on him....sos racism, the organizers of Convergences 84 and of the movement Don't touch my pal, LAUNCHED yesterday in Paris four major initiatives against racism...'

The major question is: what is the difference between these two uses of présenter? If we examine not only the sentences containing the two verbs but also the entire articles, they are quite different in their tone and their point. In the earlier example, the point is that the artificial heart was pre­ sented to a press conference; the focus is on the heart itself; the article con­ tinues with a description of the heart, and is accompanied by both a diag­ ram and a photograph of it. In the text at issue here, the sentence with pré­ senter is followed by a description of the various people who are involved with the "SOS Racism" organization. So, it's not the proposals which are in focus or even their presentation, but rather the existence of this organiza­ tion and of the involvement of many different people. Indeed, the article starts with a description of Coluche (one of the presenters) and his sense of humor (a picture of him is also included). Later, when the launching of the proposals at this meeting is described, CP is used (LAUNCHED); however, we are never given a full description of the proposals themselves. They are in a certain sense only the pretext for this article, which is concerned with describing in a very sympathetic way Coluche and his colleagues (as is the comment by Bernard-Henri Lévy, alluded to in the abstract on page one). Summary When CP begins a text, it provides orientation and a presentation of something of importance for the understanding of the theme of the text. When SP begins a text, it is not orientational at all or only minimally so, and in some cases is disorientational. It thus provides an element of surprise and acts as an attention-getter and entices the reader to read further in order to find out what the article is really about. When Imp begins a text, it is most often quite neutral in function: it simply provides information which will be a background for what follows. Stylistically, such uses of Imp can become marked, if in fact they occur in contexts where one could have expected CP or SP (the imparfait pittoresque).

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Ending of texts Compound Past The uses of these three T-A's for the ending/closing of a text (or a por­ tion of a text) are parallel to those for beginning/opening; however, there are systematic differences due to the difference in the context. CP generally provides information which helps to complete the story. It follows directly from the previous text and finishes off the scene. We have already seen var­ ious examples of this use above: 6, 9, 11 (in which CP closes a scene, not the text in general). In the following, we have another text which is opened and closed with CP. 17 (16) "TU QUOQUE, FILI" [beginning and end of article]

C'EST ARRIVE un jour. Un jour d'octobre 1982, alors que Jean avait cin­ quante ans, trois enfants, une femme et la vie devant lui. Il était inspecteur de police... Et puis, à l'issue d'une enquête qui DUT être aussi longue que douloureuse, Jean DECOUVRIT ses tendances homosexuelles. Cela se PASSA mal. Et le couple se SEPARA....

...Pendant ce temps, le fils A GRANDI. Il ressemble au père. Au commissariat, l'inspectrice A officiellement DEMANDE le divorce. [J.-P. D., Le Matin, 2/20/ 85] '"YOU TOO, SON"

It HAPPENED one day. One day in October 1982, when Jean was 50 years old, and had three children, a wife, and life ahead of him. He was a police inspector... And then, at the end of an investigation which WAS equally long and painful, Jean DISCOVERED his homosexual tendencies. Things WENT badly. And the couple SEPARATED.... [several paragraphs in SP and Imp, with other T-A's in quoted dialogue] ... During this time, the son GREW UP. He looks like his father. At the police station, the [wife] inspector HAS officially ASKED FOR a divorce.'

Simple Past SP is quite different from CP in this usage. Again it acts as an atten­ tion-getter. But here, it may be used to reveal something which makes the reader go back and reread the entire article in a new light, as in the follow­ ing example, where all of a sudden crucial information about the culpability of Marty and Tillon (who had been mentioned before) is divulged.

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(17) Contre les anciens de la guerre d'Espagne [end of a long article] .... Ayant lui-même participé à la guerre d'Espagne et à la lutte contre les nazis, il se savait en danger, à moins de trouver d'autres coupables. Ce FURENT Marty et surtout Tillon. (Christian Jelen, L'Express, 1/6-12/84). 'Against the veterans of the Spanish Civil War ... Having himself participated in the Spanish Civil War and in the fight against the Nazis, he knew he was in danger, unless he found other guilty par­ ties. They WERE Marty and above all Tillon.'

In other cases, SP may provide a pithy summary of the article, like a wrapup: (18) Jean-Marie le Pen, Dieu, et l'école [end of a medium length article] ... Ainsi PARLA, pendant près de deux heures, saint Jean-Marie Bouche d'Or chantre des "Français d'abord," qui appelle au "réveil" de ses concitoyens "contre les forces de mort et d'obscurantisme" parce qu'il souhaite que sa France demeure un "pays missionné." (A. R., Le Monde, 4/27/84). 'Jean-Marie le Pen, God and school .... Thus SPAKE, for almost two hours, Saint Jean-Marie Golden Mouth, can­ tor of the "French first," who calls on his fellow citizens to be "awakened against the forces of death and obscurantism" because he wishes his France to stay a "country with a mission".'

Or it may mark, in a succinct way, the result of what came before: (19) Une affaire réglée: la pollution du Rhin. ... Le traité de 1976 A ETE RATIFIE à Paris le 7 octobre dernier par la Chambre des députés et le 9 novembre par le Sénat. Il prévoit que 3 millions de tonnes de déchets salins par an doivent, à terme, être injectés dans le sous-sol alsa­ cien,... Une lourde hypothèque A ainsi ETE LEVEE. La décrispation dans les relations entre les deux pays FUT immédiatement perceptible. (R.T.S., Le Monde, 2/5-6/84). 'The pollution of the Rhine: the problem is settled. ... The treaty of 1976 WAS RATIFIED in Paris last October 7 by the House of Representatives and on November 9 by the Senate. It stipulates that 3 million tons of saline wastes a year will in due time be injected into the Alsatian sub soil....And thus a heavy encumbrance HAS BEEN REMOVED. The thaw in the cool relations between the two countries WAS immediately perceptible.' This use of SP to close a text may even go so far as to override the gen­ eral tendency not to include SP in quoted material: (20) Le Carmen des polders ... Pour se remettre, Maruschka Detmers enchaîne avec Huster et "Le Faucon," un polar gros calibre: "48 heures. Trois plans. Le temps de me faire descendre. Ce FUT rafraîchissant." (Yves Stavaridès, L'Express, 1/6-12/84)

176

LINDA R. WAUGH 'The Carmen from the polders ... In order to recover, Maruschka Detmers carries on with Huster and "The Falcon," a whodunit of heavy calibre: "48 hours. Three shots. The time to get bumped off. It WAS refreshing.'"

What is common to all the uses is that generally SP tends to send the reader back to the article once more, since it provides new information, or summarizes it in a pithy way, or it may proffer the lesson to be learned from what was said before, or give the moral of the text. Such a conclusion is often a way of condensing the action down to a succinct phrase (MonvilleBurston et Waugh 1985, Waugh and Monville-Burston 1986). Moreover, SP may serve to mark not the end of a text but the end (and/or beginning) of a section or of a description. In example (#21), the beginning of the text is given by CP, while the beginning and end of the section concerning the interview are in SP (ce FIT d'abord 'it WAS first' and il n'y EUT pas de "mise à mort" 'there WAS no killing'): (21) MSR LUSTIGER A "L'HEURE DE VERITE" SUR ANTENNE 2

Le cardinal mène le jeu Premier prélat à s'aventurer dans l'arène politique pour subir, sur Antenne 2, le lundi de Pâques, le feu roulant des questions de François-Henri de Virieu, Albert du Roy et Alain Duhamel (A 2) et Philippe Tesson (Le quotidien de Paris), le cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger A RAPPELE d'emblée qu'en espagnol "l'heure de vérité" désigne la rencontre décisive du taureau avec son bour­ reau. Il n'y A pas EU de mise à mort, pourtant. Malgré sa fatigue, consécutive aux offices de la semaine sainte, malgré un début d'extinction de voix, l'ar­ chevêque de Paris A RESISTE avec opiniâtreté à ceux qui voulaient le mettre à la question. Et ce FUT d'abord à Alain Duhamel de planter ses banderilles à propos du sujet que tout le monde attendait: la querelle scolaire... [...] ... Non seulement il n'y EUT pas de "mise à mort" mais, en retournant leurs questions à ses interlocuteurs, approfondies and décortiquées pour en montrer toute la complexité, c'était en fait le cardinal qui menait le jeu. (Alain Woodrow, Le Monde, 4/25/84). 'Msgr. Lustiger at "The Moment of Truth" on Channel 2 The Cardinal Takes the Lead The first prelate to venture into the political arena in order to undergo, on Channel 2, Easter Monday, the rapid-fire of questions of François-Henri de Virieu, Albert du Roy, and Alain Duhamel (Ch. 2) and Philippe Tesson (le Quotidien de Paris), his Eminence Jean-Marie Lustiger REMINDED them straight off that in Spanish "the moment of truth" designates the decisive encounter of the bull with his executioner. There WAS no killing, however. Despite his fatigue, following the Holy Week services, in spite of the beginning of a loss of voice, the archbishop of Paris

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stubbornly RESISTED those who wanted to put him on the spot. And first it WAS Alain Duhamel's turn to thrust his banderillas concerning the subject that everybody was waiting for: the dispute about the schools....[Body of the inter­ view: the main questions posed and the answers given] ... Not only WAS there no killing, but, in turning round on his interlocuters their own questions, after having elaborated and dissected them in order to show all of their complexity, it was in fact the Cardinal who was in charge.'

Similarly, in Proust, SP is used at the beginning of a paragraph to close a long discussion of his attempt to get his mother to kiss him good night (see also Saunders' remarks (1969:157)). (22) Proust,  la recherche du temps perdu, Du côté de chez Swann Ma mère ne VINT pas... 'MotherDIDN't.'

Imperfect As for Imp's which end texts, they are like Imp's used at the beginning of texts and elsewhere. In some cases, they are used to denote a situation which is assumed to continue after the text has ended. One knows that life goes on as before. Or they may simply provide yet another piece of infor­ mation which is not necessarily very interesting in itself but helps to fill in the details of the scene. Or, since in news reporting the point of the article is given in the headline and perhaps the first few sentences, the article may finish with an Imp which gives the background or some subsidiary informa­ tion important to that point. That is the case in the following example: (23) M. FRANCISCO FERNANDEZ ORDONEZ

Une étonnante longévité politique De notre correspondant Madrid. — Secrétaire d'Etat à l'époque de Franco, ministre à deux reprises du gouvernement centriste de M. Suarez, ministre, aujourd'hui, avec les socialistes...cet économiste de profession accède à ce qui FUT toujours sa vérit­ able aspiration: le ministère des affaires étrangères. Sa carrière politique avait commencé en 1969... ...Les socialistes l'intégreront effectivement sur leurs listes électorales et lui confieront, après leur victoire, la présidence de la Banque extérieure, dont le capital est aux deux tiers public. Ce n'était pas suffisant, toutefois, pour ce professionnel de la politique qui ne cachait pas qu'il aspirait à de plus hautes fonctions. [Th. M., Le Monde, 7/4-10/85]

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LINDA R. WAUGH ' M r . FRANCISCO FERNANDEZ ORDONEZ

An astonishing political longevity From our correspondant. Madrid. — Secretary of State under Franco, twice minister in the centrist gov­ ernment of Mr. Suarez, today, minister with the socialists...this economist by profession reaches what WAS always his true aspiration: Minister of Foreign Affairs. His political career had begun in 1969... [three paragraphs on the history of Ordonez, recounted in SP with Imp's and CP; then a last paragraph in the historical present and historical future, ending with:] The socialists will in fact integrate him into their electoral lists and will, after their victory, entrust him with the presidency of the foreign Bank, the capital of which is two-thirds public. This wasn't sufficient, however, for this political professional who did not hide the fact that he aspired to higher duties.'

What is common to all the uses with Imp is that, on the one hand, they tend to be more neutral than SP or CP and to be similar to the way Imp is used when in the body of a text. Imp does not always give a true closing to the text; rather, the text simply ends. Thus, just as for the beginning of texts, Imp is the unmarked of the three T-A's and least apt to take on any special interpretation. In fact, as said above, Imp in these avant-garde uses is essentially the same as Imp in classical uses: the difference between them lies rather in what values are attached to CP and SP. Summary When Imp ends a text — just as when it begins a text — it is used to give background information, description, minor events, or states of affairs which are assumed to continue after the story has ended. When CP ends a text, it gives the event which wraps up the story. One has a sense of a logi­ cal or chronological sequence in which CP gives the last major or important event of the scene being depicted. The story reaches its resolution, which resolution comes directly from what went before. SP for its part gives a crisp and succinct concluding sentence; this sentence may sometimes simply end the story (#20) and other times be used to highlight that ending: by divulging crucial information (#17), by giving a resume of the article (#18; here as well there is ironic commentary on the part of the journalist), by giving the result of what came before (#19), by repeating what was said earlier (#21), or by denying the expectation built up before (#22). (In­ terestingly, as against the association of SP in classical usage with events,

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here SP does not necessarily give an event at all.) Contrary to CP, SP often sends the reader back to the text in order to fully comprehend the sentence in which it is used: it creates a sharp contrast between that sentence and what came before. Conclusion The main difference between classical and avant-garde uses lies in the opposition and contrast between CP and SP. This is not to deny the impor­ tance of the imparfait pittoresque; but I cannot agree with Saunders who claims that "the general spread of the Imperfect tense is the most recent and significant feature of the process of change operating throughout the French language" (1969:156). It is perhaps the harbinger of the changes to come in CP and SP; but it still remains true that Imp is basically the same in both types of uses. The more radical differences obtain with CP and SP. For the purposes of exposition here, we have focused on their usage in two important contexts: the beginnings and endings of texts (or sections of texts). However, the use of CP or SP can also define, for example, other relations within a text. SP may be associated with one major event of a text, the other events being recounted in CP (or historical present). Moreover, there can be various logical connections between the two (MonvilleBurston et Waugh 1985, Waugh and Monville-Burston 1986). Two verbs in the same or contiguous sentences may form a coherent logical progression, such as cause (CP) to effect (SP), point of departure (CP) to result (SP). In other cases, the switch from CP to SP marks a particular moment when the reasoning is advanced by a new element in the argumentation or a change of perspective, shows the opposition between two points or two facts in an argumentation, or indicates the logical transition from general statement to an explanation for, proof of, or particular example of that general state­ ment. In still others, the switch from CP to SP is accompanied by a narrow­ ing of the focus onto one very particular aspect of the situation described. The impression created is comparable to the "zooming-in" of filmmakers. These could be exemplified by the logical uses just mentioned, but there is a further important variant of this: the passage from the exposition of a theme given by CP to its development in all its details and specifications (as in examples 6 and 9 above). As said earlier, what is important in avant-garde usage — as against classical usage — is that specific characteristics of the text become impor-

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tant. While types of usage are contexualized, in the sense that their function cannot be explained except by taking account of how they interact in dis­ course — and while both rely for the most part on discourse-functional con­ siderations — the avant-garde uses are more specialized and thus more var­ ied than their classical counterparts. From the imparfait pittoresque to the juxtaposed uses of CP and SP, including the beginnings and endings we have seen, the interpretation of each of the T-A's relies much more closely on their interrelation with their context. While for centuries the competi­ tion between them resulted in a global and easily manipulable distinction according to enunciation type, that solution is now being counterbalanced by a much richer and more subtle one, in which the T-A and its context are in a delicate and reciprocal relationship with each other. That is, there is greater local contextualization — a deeper insertion into the context — in the sense that an adequate understanding of any one use depends crucially on how it relates to surrounding context. The switch from SP to CP (or vice versa) no longer signals that there is a change from narration to dialogue or narration to authorial intervention. Rather it is implicated in the relation and contrast between the constituents at that level: relation and contrast of opening to body of the article, of cause to effect, of general statement to exemplification of that statement, of body to closing, and so forth. This is not the only example of such contextualization in modern French: there are many others. The subjunctive is so highly context-sensi­ tive (Waugh 1979) that it typically must be used in a subordinate clause and its interpretation is in many cases dictated by particularities of the context in which it occurs. In pre-position of the adjective to the noun, the lexical meaning of the noun is already assumed to be established in the context. In terms of discourse functions, this means that the adjective may be preposed later in a text where earlier it was postposed, because its identity is already established (Waugh 1976a, 1977). Likewise, the preposition dans (vs. en) is only used with an object which is specified in some way (e.g., through a determiner): the given, determined object is necessarily separated from the more general set associated with the lexical item in abstracto. Thus, there is a deictically presupposed lexical context which is narrowed in some way in order to define the given object (Waugh 1976b). A similar type of contex­ tualization has been proposed for nouveau (vs. neuf) (Howden 1979). Indeed, it seems to be a general fact of the evolution of French that it is becoming more and more turned in on itself: the interpretation of various grammatical and lexical categories is more tightly bound to and dependent

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on the context in which they are found. There is a kind of "Pygmalion" syn­ drome here: first the context is created, and then it is used for the definition of the very forms which help to build that context. Hence, in this case, the closer relation between a given T-A and its context — especially the local discourse context. This greater local contextualization means that there is greater diver­ sity of interpretation, since each usage depends crucially on how it relates to specifics of the given context. This does not, however, impede the recog­ nition of the general meaning which binds together all of the uses of CP and SP, whether classical or avant-garde. In the case of CP, what is particularly at issue is the continuing viability of the present auxiliary (Waugh 1987a). In other words, while present tense may prototypically refer to present time, there are many different 'presents': of the author, of the narrator, of the reader, of the characters, and of the unfolding of the narrative itself. Thus, in classical usage, the use of CP for authorial (or narratorial) inter­ vention relates it to the present time of the author (or narrator) as well as to the metatextual present of the unfolding of the narrative. In avant-garde usage, CP functions to either start or end the narrative and signals to the reader where he or she is in the narrative: again a reference to that metatextual present. The difference between the two is that the possibilities afforded by the metatextual present are expanded in avant-garde usage. The semantic nature of SP is quite different (Monville-Burston et Waugh 1985, Waugh and Monville-Burston 1986, Waugh 1987b). It signals that there is detachment (dissociation or separation) of a dimensionalized entity (delimited unit) within some universe: the unit which is detached from its context possesses precise dimensions which define it. In classical usage, this usually results in SP being used for those events which are fore­ grounded in a text. In avant-garde usage, SP at either the beginning or end­ ing of texts is generally used in brief, succinct sentences which serve to draw attention to the sentence as a whole, and which typically are separated from either what follows or what precedes because they are surprising or because they are related to it in a special way. Again we see that the possibilities inherent in detachment and dimensionalization are given greater contextual diversification in avant-garde as against classical usage. While the avant-garde uses are further extensions of the possibilities inherent in classical usage, in terms of discourse functions they are quite different and even competitive: e.g., if SP begins a text in avant-garde usage, then it is generally not used for the narrative line and some other T-

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A is. The coexistence of both types of usage in one text is an uneasy one, although there are examples of texts which have both (especially journalis­ tic ones). Such extensions of older meanings, such competition at a given synchronic state, such uneasy coexistence of the older and newer — all of these are typical examples of dynamic synchrony.

NOTES 1.

Parts of this paper were previously presented at the Stanford Humanities Center (I wish to thank the Center for its support during the beginning stages of this work), New York State Council on Linguistics Annual Meeting 1986, and the Convegno Internazionale, Roman Jakobson: Linguistica e Poetica held in Rome 1986. An abridged version of this paper is published in the Proceedings of the Convegno (Waugh 1987c). I would like to thank Ronald Breiger, Jonathan Dewald, Elizabeth Eisenstein, Paolo Fabbri, Paul Hop­ per, Stephen Mailloux, Harriet Ritvo, Nicolas Ruwet and Sandra Thompson for com­ ments they gave me on earlier versions of this paper.

2.

The term is from Jakobson — see e.g., Jakobson 1953a, 1953b and Jakobson and Waugh 1979.

3.

They have, however, been alluded to in recent linguistic work: see, e.g., Cohen 1956, Imbs 1960, Harmer 1965, Saunders 1969, Zezula 1969, Galet 1974, 1977, Wilmet 1976, Simonin 1984, Boyer 1985, Monville-Burston et Waugh 1985, Waugh and MonvilleBurston 1986.

4.

The reader will notice a certain simplification of both classical and avant-garde uses: only basic (neutral, prototypical) uses are described here, with the exception of the imparfait pittoresque in the next subsection; and this basic usage is drawn in a schematic way. This is for purposes of exposition, in order to heighten the differences.

5.

In a short story by Camus, for example, the ratio of Imp to SP is 2:1 (Reid 1977, 1979). The frequency of CP is effected by factors such as amount of dialogue, to which we will return later.

6.

It must, however, be added that SP can be found in dialogue, especially (but not exclu­ sively) in 18th century works.

7.

I am omitting here the often cited difference between CP for more recent/currently rele­ vant events and SP for more remote/ currently irrelevant events, since this distinction is at least partially referential in nature, not discourse-based, and in any case represents only a small percentage of classical third-person usage.

8.

This applies in particular to the 'preterit' use of CP. Its use as a 'present perfect' is not at issue here, since it is not technically a 'past' T-A in those cases. See Waugh 1987a for a discussion of these two uses of CP and for a rationale as to how to reconcile them.

9.

For a similar use of the terms figure/ground, see Wallace 1982, Monville-Burston et Waugh 1985, Reinhart 1985, Waugh and Monville-Burston 1986; for the use of other

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terms such as mise-en-relief, foregrounding vs. backgrounding, high vs. low focus of attention, see Weinrich 1973, Adam 1976a, 1976b, Reid 1977, 1979, Hopper 1979, 1982, Boyer 1985, Fleischman 1985. 10.

Foreground(ing) is not a binary notion (see Grimes 1975, Adam 1976a, 1976b, Jones & Jones 1977, Wallace 1982, Boyer 1985, Fleischman 1985, 1990). Moreover, Chvany (1985), for example, shows that while, in Russian, the perfective aspect is basically associated with the foreground, and imperfective with the background, there are some­ times reversals of this: backgrounded perfectives and plot-line imperfectives. The former are treated in Monville-Burston et Waugh 1985, and Waugh and Monville-Burston 1986; the latter are particularly germane to this discussion and will be treated in the section below on the imparfait pittoresque.

11.

The following conventions are used in both the French original as well as in the English rendering (provided by the author): any COMPOUND PAST is in capitals, any SIMPLE PAST is

both in capitals and underlined, any imperfect or pluperfect is underlined and in small let­ ters, any other T-A (e.g., present, future, recent past) is bolded. 12.

For some discussion, see Monville-Burston et Waugh 1985, Waugh and Monville-Burston 1986, and Waugh 1987a and 1987b and references cited therein.

13.

Also, it is not for nothing that studies of the imparfait pittoresque have noted that one of its uses is to underline the beginning or the ending of a story. It is here that we can find the seeds of the new logic underlying avant-garde use.

14.

Notice by the way that the first sentence actually contains an imperfect in a subordinate clause; our focus here, however, will be on the main predicate. It is, of course, not acci­ dental that the imperfect should be used in a subordinate clause.

15.

It should also be mentioned that the article was preceded by a picture on page one enti­ tled "ESPAGNE: UN BOEING SE "CRASHE," 149 MORTS" [SPAIN:A BOEING CRASHES, 149 DEAD].

16.

It is perhaps no accident that both of these texts come from first-person narratives. Whether this is typical of literary — vs. journalistic — usage is one question which remains for future research.

17.

Although there are texts in which the opening is given by CP without the closing also being in that T-A, the best examples are those where both are found. It remains for future research to determine if this is an accident of the texts looked at so far, or a sys­ tematic tendency.

REFERENCES A d a m , Jean-Michel. 1976a. "Langue et texte: imparfait/passé simple." Pratiques 10, 49-68. 1976b. "La 'mise en relief' dans le discours narratif." Le français moderne, 312-29.

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Benveniste, Emile. 1966. "Les relations de temps dans le verbe français." Problèmes de linguistique générale, 237-50. Paris: Gallimard. Boyer, H. 1985. "L'économie des temps verbaux dans le discours narratif." Le français mod­ erne 53, 78-89. Chvany, Catherine. 1985. "Backgrounded Perfectives and Plot-Line Imperfectives: Towards a Theory of Grounding in Text." The Scope of Slavic Aspect, ed. by M. Flier and A. Timberlake, 247-73. Columbus, OH: Slavica Publishers. Cohen, Maurice. 1956. Emplois du passé simple et du passé composé dans la prose contemporaine. Travaux de lTnstitut de linguistique, Faculté des lettres de l'Université de Paris 1, 43-62. Comrie, Bernard. 1976. Aspect. Cambridge: University Press. de Both-Diez, A.-M. 1985. "L'aspect et ses implications dans le fonctionnement de l'imparfait, du passé simple, et du passé composé au niveau textuel." Langue française 67, 5-22. Fleischman, Suzanne. 1985. "Discourse Functions of Tense-Aspect Oppositions in Narrative: Toward a Theory of Grounding." Linguistics 23, 851-82. 1990.

Tense and Narrativity: From Medieval Performance to Modern Fiction. Austin: Univ. of Texas Press.

Galet, Yvette. 1974. "Passé simple et passé composé." Le français moderne 42, 13-19. 1977.

Les corrélations verbo-adverbiales, fonctions du passé simple et du passé composé, et la théorie des niveaux d'énonciation dans la phrase française du XVIIème siècle. Paris: Champion.

Grevisse, Maurice. 1969. Le bon usage. Gembloux: Duculot. Grimes, Joseph. 1975. The Thread of Discourse. The Hague: Mouton. Guenther, F., J. Hoepelman, and  Rohrer. 1978. "A Note on the Passé Simple." Papers on Tense, Aspect, and Verb Classifi­ cation, éd. by  Rohrer, 11-36. Tubingen: Gunter Narr Verlag. Harmer, L. C. 1965. "The Present State of French, 1." Forum for Modern Language Studies 1, 250-65.

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Hopper, Paul. 1979. "Aspect and Foregrounding." Discourse and Syntax, ed. by Talmy Givón, 213-41. New York: Academic Press. 1982.

"Aspect between Discourse and Grammar: an Introductory Essay for the Volume." Tense-Aspect: Between Semantics and Pragmatics, 3-19. Amster­ dam: John Benjamins.

Howden, Marcia. 1979. "Structure in the Lexicon: The French Adjectives Neuf and Nouveau." Con­ tributions to Grammatical Studies, ed. by L. Waugh and F. van Coetsem, 7092. Leiden: Brill. Imbs, Paul. 1960. L'emploi des temps verbaux en français moderne. Paris: Klincksieck. Jakobson, Roman. 1932. "Structure of the Russian Verb." Russian and Slavic Grammar: Studies, 1931-1981, ed. by L. Waugh and M. Halle, 1-14. Berlin: Mouton (1984). 1936.

"Contributions to the General Theory of Case: General Meanings of the Russian Cases." Russian and Slavic Grammar: Studies, 1931-1981, ed. by L. Waugh and M. Halle, 57-103. Berlin: Mouton (1984).

1953a. "Pattern in Linguistics." Selected Writings II, 223-28. The Hague: Mouton (1971). 1953b. "Results of a Joint Conference of Anthropologists and Linguists." Selected Writings II, 554-67. The Hague: Mouton (1971). 1957.

"Shifters, Verbal Categories, and the Russian Verb." Selected Writings II, 130-47. The Hague: Mouton (1971).

Jakobson, Roman and Linda R. Waugh. 1979. The Sound Shape of Language. Bloomington, Ind: Indiana University Press. Second, augmented edition, 1987. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Jones, Larry . and Linda K. Jones. 1979. "Multiple Levels of Information in Discourse." Discourse Studies in MesoAmerican Languages, ed. by L. K. Jones, 3-28. Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics. Kamp, Hans and Christian Rohrer. 1983. "Tense in Texts." Meaning, Use and Interpretation of Language, ed. by R. Bäuerle, . Schwartze, and A. von Stechow, 250-69. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. Monville-Burston, Monique and Linda R. Waugh. 1985. "Le passé simple dans le discours journalistique." Lingua 67:121-70.

186 1990.

LINDA R. WAUGH "Multivalency: the French Historical Present in Journalistic Discourse." Dis­ course-Pragmatic Approaches to the Verb: the Evidence from Romance, ed. by S. Fleischman and L. Waugh. London.

Reid, Wallis. 1977. "The Quantitative Validation of a Grammatical Hypothesis: the Passé Sim­ ple and the Imparfait." Columbia University Working Papers in Linguistics 4.59-77. (also in The North Eastern Linguistic Society 7.315-33). 1979.

The Human Factor in Grammatical Analysis:Passé Simple and Imperfect. Columbia University Ph. D. Dissertation.

Reinhart, Tanya. 1982. "Principles of Gestalt Perception in the Temporal Organization of Narrative Texts." Linguistics 22.6, 779-809. Saunders, H. 1969. "The Evolution of the French Narrative Tenses." Forum for Modern Lan­ guage Study 5, 141-61. Simonin[-Grumbach], Jenny. 1975. "Pour une typologie des discours." Langue, discours, société, ed. by Julia Kristeva et al., 85-121. Paris: Editions du Seuil. 1977.

"Linguistique textuelle et l'étude des textes littéraires: à propos de Le Temps de H. Weinrich." Pratiques 13, 77-90.

1984.

"Les repérages énonciatifs dans les textes de presse." La langue au ras du texte, ed. by Françoise Atlani et al., 133-203.

Stavinohová, Zdeñka. 1969. "Sur les 'mélanges' du passé simple et du passé composé." Etudes romanes de Brno 4, 195-210. Vet, Co. 1980.

Temps, aspect, et adverbes de temps en français contemporain. Genève: Lib­ rairie Droz.

Vet. Co. and Arie Molendijk. 1986. "The Discourse Functions of the Past Tenses of French." Temporal Struc­ tures in Sentence and Discourse, ed. by V. Lo Cascio and C. Vet, 133-60. Dordrecht: Foris. Wallace, Stephen. 1982. "Figure and Ground: the Interrelationships of Linguistic Categories." TenseAspect: Between Semantics and Pragmatics, ed. by Paul Hopper, 201-23. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Waugh, Linda R. 1976a. "The Semantics and Paradigmatics of Word Order." Language 52, 82-107.

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1976b. "Lexical Meaning: the Prepositions en and dans in French." Lingua 39, 69118. 1977. A Semantic Analysis of Word Order. Leiden: Brill. 1979.

"The Context-Sensitive Meaning of the French Subjunctive." Contributions to Grammatical Studies: Semantics and Syntax, ed. by Linda Waugh and Frans van Coetsem, 179-228. Leiden: Brill.

1982.

"Marked and Unmarked — a Choice between Unequals in Semiotic Struc­ ture." Semiotica 38, 299-318.

1987a. "Marking Time with the Passé Composé: Toward a Theory of the Perfect." Linguisticae Investigationes XI, 1-47. 1987b. "Tense-Aspect and Hierarchy of Meanings: Pragmatic, Textual, Modal, Dis­ course, Expressive, Referential." In New Vistas in Grammar: Invariance and Variation, ed. by Linda Waugh and Stephen Rudy. Amsterdam: John Ben­ jamins. In press. 1987c. "Roman Jakobson's Dynamic Synchrony and Discourse Functions of TenseAspect." Proceedings of the International Conference on Roman Jakobson: Linguistics and Poetics. Roma: Università. In press. Waugh, Linda R. and Monique Monville-Burston. 1986. "Aspect and Discourse Function: the French Simple Past in Newspaper Usage." Language 62, 846-877. Weinrich, Harald. 1973. Le temps, le récit et le commentaire. Paris: Editions du Seuil. Wilrnet, Marc. 1976. "Le passé composé narratif." In Etudes de morpho-syntaxe verbale, 61-82. Paris: Klinsieck. Zezula, Jaroslav. 1969. "Le passé simple dans la langue de la presse française d'aujourd'hui." Beit­ räge zur Romanischen Philologie 8, 336-45.

2. Ideo-pragmatic and conceptual-semantic correlates of aspect and the perspectival organisation of discourse

Notes on the "Metaphysics" of Russian aspect Boris G a s p a r o v University of California, Berkeley

1. The past two decades have been marked by significant progress in the study of the meaning of the aspectual forms of the Russian verb. Throughout several decades, linguists were aiming at finding a common basis by which to unite the infinite variety of concrete meanings taken by the forms of perfective and imperfective aspect (Perf. and Imp.) in various specific cases. Striving for the attainment of this end, linguists have appealed to the ever broader and more abstract semantic categories in order to formulate in a more generalized and more coherent way a strategy which speakers of Russian follow in their use of aspectual forms. Each time, however, that research reached a more generalized level, it appeared that even at this level there existed a variety of relevant factors which had not been previously noticed. Consequently, the picture of the use of aspect at this new level split again into a series of particular cases which, in their turn, suggested the necessity of a new, still more generalized and abstract approach. The first step in this development was taken by structural studies in the 1930s-1960s. The structural approach replaced the empirical description of the meaning (or meanings) of each of the aspectual forms taken separately, by introducing the concept of systemic correlations between the two aspects. It allowed scholars to explain the diffuseness of the meanings of Imp. by presenting Imp. as the unmarked member of the binary opposition between the two aspectual forms (Jakobson 1931/1984: 3-4; Jakobson 1956/ 1984: 48-49; Isacenko 1960: 201-202). However, after considerable progress was achieved in the study of diverse syntactical constructions in which Perf. and Imp. were used, it became increasingly evident that the use of Perf. is characterized by no less diversity than that of Imp. (Bondarko 1971: 11-21).

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Since Perf. was characterized as the marked member of the aspectual corre­ lation, the diversity of its meaning could not be successfully explained on the basis of such fundamental concepts of the structural model as the notions of binary privative opposition and markedness/unmarkedness. Structural studies were followed by functional studies of aspect, which went beyond immanent descriptions of aspectual forms and their systemic correlation. Aspect was scrutinized in its interaction with various mor­ phological and syntactical factors relevant for the meaning of the sentence as a whole. The variability of these factors served as an explanation for the diffuseness of concrete meanings of aspect and of those criteria on the basis of which the speaker chooses an aspectual form in a specific utterance. This approach has prompted studies of how the meaning of aspect interacts with various forms of tense and modality (Rassudova 1968), and how the interpretation of an aspectual form is influenced by a syntactical framework of the sentence: by interrogative construction, negation, impersonal con­ struction, etc. (Gasparov 1978; Kucera 1985; Nichols 1985). The further functional research advanced, the more morphological and syntactical fac­ tors relevant for the use and meaning of aspect came to light. By now, the plurality and diversity of the factors, which ought to be taken into consider­ ation in this respect, have reached the point where it became virtually impossible to present all functional variations of aspectual meaning in a coherent description. The next stage in the study of aspect, which emerged in the 1970s, was connected with the discovery of the role played by the narrative perspective of the text in the use of the aspectual forms. While the functional approach had viewed aspect in the context of morphological and syntactical factors active within the limits of a single utterance, the newly-developed narrative approach considered the use of aspect in a still broader context, outside the framework of a single utterance. The choice of aspectual form in each specific case was considered in the context of a narrative as a whole, that is, was viewed as a part of the overall strategy by which the entire narrative is structured. The most general narrative feature, which proved to be relevant for the choice of aspectual form, is an opposition between the story's fore­ grounding (a successive chain of events which the narrator builds up as the "plot" of his story) and its backgrounding (static descriptions and side com­ mentaries which are not forwarding the story and do not belong to its out­ line). The choice of Perf. or Imp. corresponds, in principle, to these two

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basic narrative functions (Forsyth 1970: 357; Hopper 1979: 213-217). The further development of the narrative approach led to an under­ standing that the formation of narrative perspective is a complicated, multilevelled process whose content is far from being restricted to the opposition between the two basic narrative functions. In the works of recent years it was shown that a single narrative may contain several different narrative perspectives which would give way to each other by turn in the course of the unfolding of the story. The narrator may shift from one type of story to another, and the understanding of the story's plot and of its background would change accordingly (Chvany 1985: 248-249). These shifts may be further complicated by a deliberate "play" with narrative: for instance, in cases when fictitious changes of the narrative perspective are offered in order to achieve certain stylistic effects (Chvany 1985: 256-258; Thelin 1984: 234-236). All of these phenomena are particularly abundant and diverse in literary texts; consequently, the problem arises of describing indi­ vidual strategies of the use of aspect, which would be characteristic of a par­ ticular author or individual text (Jensen 1984; Thelin 1984a). Another problem which still remains to be examined further is to what degree the narrative functions of aspectual forms may vary for different forms of communication and different narrative styles and genres. For instance, how different these functions would be in strictly formal and in colloquial communication; in monologic and dialogic speech; in oral and written texts; 1 in explicative prose; in the discourse of skaz, in the genre of "a poet's prose," in folkloric discourse (or discourse stylized after folklore), etc. Various types of discourse apparently create different preconditions for the formation of narrative structure; this, in its turn, may change the condi­ tions under which the aspectual forms are used in the text. There is little doubt that further progress in studying various forms of discourse will make the picture of the use of aspect in the text still more complex and diver­ sified. Thus, the narrative approach has in its turn proven to be too narrow to encompass all the variety of strategies apparently employed by speakers of Russian in the use of aspect. 2. The goal of this article is to introduce an even broader perspective for describing the meaning of aspect. My hypothesis, which will serve as a starting point for subsequent discussion, is that the invariable distinction between the two aspectual forms lies not in any particular speech situation (be it a single situation described by an utterance, or the content of a whole

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narrative), but rather in two different world outlooks constituting two opposite modi of presentation of reality in language. The opposition of Perf. and Imp. is one of the most powerful tools (although by no means the only one) by which these two modi are expressed in the Russian language. In the framework of a proposed hypothesis, the meaning of Perfective and Imperfective aspect is related to two different models of the world (two "Weltanschauungen") in whose formation the category of aspect, together with many other components of linguistic structure, takes its part. This abstract, "metaphysical" distinction between the meaning of Perf. and Imp. turns into a variety of concrete meanings, as the use of the aspectual forms is being adapted to different types of discourse, different functions in the narrative, and to the specific features of various situations described by single utterances. As is well known, the meaning of Perf. is connected with a concept of the 'integrity' (or 'compactness,' or 'closeness') of the described situation. This general interpretation of the invariable meaning of Perf. is expressed in such concurrent linguistic concepts as that of the 'limitation' of the pro­ cess {predel'nost'\ Maslov 1948), or of potential limitation: the 'telicity' (Vendler 1967).2 In the framework of a proposed "metaphysical" approach this feature could be interpreted as the imposition of a particular world out­ look according to which the process of life is viewed as a chain of successive events; the choice of Perf. for a certain utterance presents the situation described in it as a discrete "link" in this chain. The ensuing effect is as if the situation were enclosed into a "frame" which singled it out as a discrete event. The speaker views the situation as something "completed," or at least having a potential limitation ('telicity'), no matter what the actual matter-of-fact content of the situation might be. The relevant factor in vie­ wing the situation from the perspective suggested by the Perf. form is not the limited nature of the described process, but rather, the very fact that the given situation has been perceived as a discrete event and thus singled out from the continuous flow of time. With the use of Perf., the speaker assumes an external (objective) perspective in his view of the situation. He separates himself from immediate participation in the situation (hence the impossibility of Present tense with Perf.) and views it from the outside, as a "narrator." Because of this, the speaker is able to comprehend the situation as an integral phenom­ enon.

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Thus, the use of Perf. projects a world view according to which a per­ son assumes the position of an external observer who is not immediately involved in the processes he describes in his message, although his actual experience is inextricable from the continuous stream of time in which all these processes are developing. By approaching the reality from this posi­ tion, the speaker achieves a segmentation of his continuous experience; he singles out from his experience certain entities which become the integral objects of his observation and his description — in other words, become "events" in the framework of his message. On the other hand, by choosing Imp., the speaker places himself, as it were, inside the very course of the described process. The external bound­ aries of the process are lost from this perspective. Such an outlook misses the "frame" of the situation; it is unable to single out the situation from the continuity of time flow. Consequently, the situation would not be perceived as a discrete event. Attention is concentrated on the very course of the pro­ cess, on its flow and development, rather than on the essence of "what hap­ pened." In this case, the speaker assumes an internal (subjective) perspective in his view of the situation. Such a position projects an "existential" view of the world; it views life as a continuous experience into which every person (including the speaker) is inextricably immersed. Whatever portion of this continuous process (from the present, past, or future) comes into the speaker's attention, his position in regard to it would be that of a co-experiencer, rather than that of an external observer and "narrator." No matter what part (if any) the speaker actually took in the described action, he iden­ tifies his perception of it with the very process of its continuous unfolding. Because of this, the situation is perceived (and presented) not as an "event," but rather as a part of a continuous "experience." The two different general perspectives projected by the two alternative aspectual forms are externalized in a multitude of concrete interpretations, each of which would depend on the character of other components of a given communicative act. The meaning of aspectual form is altered each time, adapting itself to the impact of multifarious factors involved in each concrete act of communication. Several examples are given below of how the general meaning of aspectual form, as formulated in our preliminary hypothesis, interacts with speech factors of different levels — from the par­ ticular character of the situation to the general perspective of the narrative. Following this, I will return, in more detail, to the question of the general "metaphysical" meaning of the category of aspect.

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3. The multitude of concrete situations presented in the speech receives a different interpretation depending on which of the two aspectual forms has been chosen by the speaker. The subject matter of the situation and the general meaning of the aspect adapt to one another. Those components of the situation's content which correspond to the meaning of the chosen aspectual form, are actualized in the view of the situation projected by the given utterance. These components are projected onto the foreground of the message and come into the focus of the speakers' attention. At the same time, other components of the situation's subject matter, which could not be matched with the meaning of the chosen aspectual form, recede into the background and lose their relevance for the approach by which the situa­ tion is interpreted in the given utterance. Because of the interpretative nature of the impact which the choice of aspect makes on the content of the message, the difference in the general meaning of each aspect can be seen in a particularly manifest way when both aspectual forms relate to the situations which are identical in terms of their subject matter. 3.1. Let us examine, for example, how the general meaning of Perf. and Imp. causes different interpretations of the situations in which recur­ ring actions are involved. The recurrent situation as such contains in its subject matter certain semantic components concurrent with the meaning of both Perf. and Imp. On the one hand, the phenomenon of recurrence can be easily associated with the concepts of continuity, inertia, habituality — that is, with semantic features which are characteristic for Imp., and which therefore contain a potential contradiction to the meaning of Perf. However, this does not pre­ clude a possibility for recurrent situations to be presented within the inter­ pretative framework projected by Perf. The presentation of recurrent phenomena through the form of Perf. becomes possible if the speaker is able to project a perspective, by which the whole chain of the recurrent sit­ uations would be viewed in its entirety, as a single "macro-situation"; in this case, this macro-situation would be portrayed as an integral event. For instance, the expression On perecital pis'mo pjat' raz 'He reread the letter five times' represents its subject matter as a macro-action of a "multiple-five reading," rather than as the five-time recurrence of the action of "reading" a letter. This view of the event, as projected by the form of Perf., allows one to enclose the entire process of repeated readings

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of a letter into a "frame" of a single event, despite the fact that actually the situation consists of five physically separate actions. In order to ensure that a similar situation could be interpreted, without strain, in the framework of Perf., the number of recurrences should be somehow delimited. It can be said: Perecital pjat' razl neskol,ko razl mnogo raz 'Reread five times/ several times/ many times.' However, it is impossi­ ble to say: *Perecital vsegda, *perecital inogda '* Reread always, *reread sometimes.' Thus, the crucial condition for the use of Perf. is not the actual number of recurrences (large or small, definite or indefinite), but the con­ tainment of a recurring situation: the lack of potential possibility of its con­ tinuation. The closed character of repetition allows for the interpretation of the entire sum of recurring situations as a single event (although consisting of a series of sub-events); that is, it allows for the actualization of the phe­ nomenon of recurrence in the framework of the meaning of Perf. On the other hand, the meaning of Imp. is easily adaptable to the con­ cept of continuity which is implicit in any recurrent situation. The subject matter of a recurrent situation contains, however, some semantic compo­ nents which are potentially contradictory to the meaning of Imp. as well. In order to realize the effect of recurrence, one has to interpret each of the recurring situations as a conclusive event separated from the other analog­ ous events. To put it another way, the idea of recurrence presupposes such a perspective in relation to each single event, which would be characteristic for the meaning of Perf. but does not go along with the general meaning of Imp. This difficulty in interpretation of recurrence through the form of Imp. can be resolved due to the fact that by choosing the form of Imp. one shifts the focus of attention from the particular events as such to the very fact of their recurrence. It is not the chain of events which appears on the fore­ ground, but the moment of transition from one event to another. In this case, the recurring situation is interpreted as a fluid process of "life routine." In this perspective, the eventuality of recurrent actions recedes to the background of the message. The difference in presentation of the recurrent situation by the forms of Perf. and Imp. can be summarized as follows: (1) (2)

On perecital pis'mo neskoVko raz. He reread (Perf.) the letter several times. On perecityval pis'mo neskoVko raz. He reread (Imp.) the letter several times.

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(1) {* * * *} (2) * * * *

Table 1. Sentences (1) and (2) project different views of the same situation. Sentence (1) interprets the situation as the accumulation of several particu­ lar events, forming, in sum, a single macro-event. The speaker captures this macro-event as a whole, and is able to view it in the capacity of a single "fact." Sentence (2) interprets the same situation as a continuous flow, or a state of inertia, which generates an infinite progression of recurrent actions. 3.2. One more case when both aspectual forms relate to the same situa­ tion is found in the perfective use of Imp. (in the meaning of 'assessment of an accomplished action' —  '  '). The use of Imp. in a sit­ uation, which is in principle typical for the meaning of Perf., creates the possibility of concurrent pairs of utterances such as the following: (3)

(4)

Ja citai ètu knigu. II My uze obedali. II On tuda uze xodil. I read (Imp.) this book. // We already dined (Imp.). // He already went (Imp.) there. Ja procitai ètu knigu. II My uze poobedali. II On tuda uze sxodil. I read this book (through) (Perf.). // We already dined (Perf.). // He already went (Perf.) there.

In this case the difference between the two competing forms of aspect relates not to the presentation of action as such but to the character of the time span in which the action is completed. Perf. establishes a perspective by which the life process is broken up into a series of individual events, suc­ cessively arranged in time. In this framework, the verbs procital, poobedal, sxodil refer to a point in the past at which the given action has taken place ('has happened'), while the moment of speech constitutes another discrete point in the time progression, in which the result of the past action is pre­ sent. When Imp. is used in an analogous situation, the speaker's attention is concentrated on the continuous stream of time. Although the event per se in this case is accomplished and bears a concrete result in the present, the speaker, by choosing Imp., avoids placing the situation in a determined point in the past and makes it "float," in a somewhat indetermined fashion,

ON THE "METAPHYSICS" OF RUSSIAN ASPECT

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in the continuous flow of the speaker's previous experience. Thus, the difference between Perf. and Imp., when both forms refer to a single completed event in the past, lies in the fact that Perf. characterizes the situation in the past as an occurring event, while Imp. refers to it as to a part of the past experience of the subject who has committed the described action. Procital knigu (Perf.) — relates to the event itself and indicates that it took place in the past; citai knigu (Imp.) — relates rather to the characteristics of the subject: it means that the past experience of the subject included the fact of reading the book: {the moment of speech} (3) citai knigu (Imp.) ('part of the past experience') (4) procital knigu (Perf.) ('event in the past') Table 2. The past event may receive an "existential" interpretation, as a result of the use of Imp., only if the time span within which the event occurred in the past is sufficiently broad; this breadth is necessary in order to interpret the described event as an indeterminate part of past experience, rather than as a concrete point in the past: (3)

a. Ja citai ètu knigu god nazad. I read (Imp.) this book a year ago. b. Ja citai ètu knigu včera. I read (Imp.) this book yesterday.  Ja xodil v magazin včera. I went (Imp.) to the store yesterday.

In (3a) the time indicator is broad enough to present the event as "floating" in the stream of past experience. However, if the time span is narrowed, the perfective interpretation of a sentence with Imp. becomes impossible. Thus, in (3b) the time span is too narrow (considering what would constitute a "normal" length of time for this particular event to be accomplished) to allow a perfective interpretation of the situation. The event cannot be viewed as "floating" in the past, since it fills entirely the indicated quantum of time. Consequently, the sentence (3b), although pos­ sible in principle, cannot mean an "accomplished action." The only possible

200

BORIS GASPAROV

interpretation of sentence (3b), allowing for the use of Imp. in it, would be the incompletion (continuation) of the action. In this case, the concept of "existential" fluidity, invariably conveyed by Imp., is transferred from the image of the past experience as a whole, in which the situation would be dissolved, to the character of the situation itself. On the other hand, the phrase (3c) can present the action as com­ pleted: inasmuch as the "normal" length of the event 'going to the store' is significantly less than one day, this event can be viewed as indeterminately "floating" within the limits of 'yesterday,' and therefore can be presented in an existential modality. In the examples discussed in this section the choice of Perf. or Imp. allowed for the varied interpretations of situations identical in their subject matter. The difference in interpretation depends on the fact that one and the same situation appears in two different modi of presentation. The choice of Perf. establishes the "event-modus," in which the world is viewed as a series of discrete events; any situation placed in this framework is vie­ wed as an event, that is as something new, something which "has hap­ pened" and has brought a change to the previous state of the world. The choice of Imp. establishes the "existence-modus," in which the world appears as a continuum, a state of perpetual evolving; in the framework of this modus any situation is interpreted as the continuation of an unbroken "process of existence." 4. On the level of the narrative the described features of the two aspec­ tual forms are manifested in the role which each of these forms plays in the unfolding of the narrative text, and consequently, in the way the text as a whole is interpreted by the reader. The simplest and most evident difference between Perf. and Imp. on the level of narrative consists in the opposition of the foregrounding and the backgrounding of the story. The use of Perf. and Imp. in relation to these two basic functions of narrative has already been sufficiently well studied, and there is no need to dwell on these questions in great detail. I would only note that the "event-modus" characteristic for the meaning of Perf., on the one hand, and the "existence-modus" characteristic for Imp., on the other, correspond well with the given two functions of narrative: the part of the narrative text which is designated by Perf., is perceived by the reader as a series of discrete events, that is, this part of the text builds up the struc­ ture of the plot, while the utterances with Imp. build up the static

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background of the story. I wish, however, to go beyond this basic distinc­ tion and concentrate on those particular cases in which the use of aspects in the narrative is not confined to the two general narrative functions. It should be noted that even in cases when the usage of Perf. and Imp. in the narrative does not correspond to their primary narrative functions, the choice of Perf. or Imp. actualizes those elements in the development of the story which would agree with the general semantic modus of the chosen form. Let us consider, as an example, how the meaning of Imp. is manifested in situations when Imp. is used in the framework of the "historical" and "dramatic" present. 3 It was demonstrated that in these cases Imp. takes part in the formation of the basic outline of the story, that is, fulfills a func­ tion which usually belongs to Perf. (Chvany 1985: 256-262). Nevertheless, this displacement of the basic function does not change the general modus of presentation characteristic for Imp. Generally, the reader/listener proceeds in his perception of the narra­ tive on the presumption that the text at hand constitutes some "story," that is, consists of a chain of events which are somehow related to each other. The simplest realization of this expectation would be the case when all events relevant for the plot of the story are conveyed by the utterances with Perf. In this case, the event-modus, activated by the choice of Perf., suggests to the reader that all these utterances as a whole constitute a sub­ sequent chain of events, that is, convey the essence of the story. (5)

On

VOŠEL

[a], OGLJANULSJA

vokrug [b] i UVIDEL [c]

He went out [a], looked around [b], and saw [c] < . . . > [a]→[b]→[c] Table 3. However, the use of Imp. in the meaning of the historical and dramatic present frustrates this simple expectation. Encountering an utterance with Imp., the reader is prepared to give up his external point of view from which he followed the progress of the story and to immerse himself in the current situation. The simplest explanation for this change of perspective would be that at this point the reader is offered a background commentary which does not belong to the core of "what happened" in the story. How-

202

BORIS GASPAROV

ever, there are cases when the reader would be unable to exclude the utter­ ance with Imp. from the core succession of events without compromising the sense of "what happened" in the story. In such cases, the reader would search for a more complicated explanation which would allow him to recon­ cile the apparent contradiction between the way the event is presented in the utterance and the role played by this utterance in the progress of the story. If the reader is familiar with literary conventions, he would perceive this change of perspective as a special literary device aimed at achieving a secondary stylistic effect rather than actually interrupting the story's plot. In this case, the reader's "immersion" into a particular situation (prompted by the form of Imp.) would be prompted by understanding the transitional and deliberate nature of this change of perspective. By looking at the situa­ tion from within, the reader would get a sense of participation in it, that is, would identify himself with its subject; however, having understood the conventional and temporal character of this shift, he would not lose track of the story's progress as it is viewed from the external position (that of the narrator/observer). The reader's perception of the story would in this case consist of two different interpretative operations: he experiences certain sit­ uations "existentially," as their immediate participant, and then translates these situations into the plot, thus restoring the external point of view from which he perceives the meaning of the story as a whole. This double interpretation can be shown on a scheme as follows: (6)

On

VOŠEL

[a], OGLJANULSJA

vokrug [b], i vidit [c]
I didn't say anything about it, I'm only saying < . . . >

The hero of the story experiences two conflicting states of mind: he wants to maintain "dignified silence," but is unable to refrain from answer­ ing his offender. He does not notice the contradiction in his statements since they are presented in different perspectives: the first statement con­ veys "what happened," in the narrator's opinion, in the situation, while the second statement reflects the narrator's spontaneous "experience" (not acknowledged by him as an "event"). However, the reader familiar with the conventions of such switches of narrative perspective performs the usual interpretative operation, that is, he translates both statements into the objective perspective, thus obtaining an absurd result: a sequence in the development of the plot which consists of two mutually exclusive situations. To summarize, utterances with Imp. become part of the narrative out­ line of the story only when they are incorporated into the plot through the use of special interpretative devices which are conventionally employed in certain narrative genres. 5. A logical conclusion from the above is that a narrative text, taken as a whole, should, in principle, contain at least some utterances with Perf. Even if a part of the plot is covered by sentences with Imp., the usage of Perf. would be necessary in order to establish a basic narrative perspective, from which the temporary nature of the narrative's switch into Imp. could be understood. The reader of a narrative story should be able to grasp the story's meaning in its entirety, to perceive the story as a coherent unity, as if it were enclosed in a narrative "frame." The succession of situations pre­ sented in the text must make sense as a whole — only under this condition would the reader understand the text presented to him as a "story." The perception of the text as a united "story" fits into the general meaning of Perf.; because of this, the sentences with Perf. function as the

204

BORIS GASFAROV

constitutive element of the narrative (Gasparov 1979). It can be said that Perf., by introducing into the text an external (objective) point of view on some of the situations described in the text, serves as a "predicate" of the narrative as a whole. The use of Perf. determines the status of the text as a "story," making it possible to grasp its content from an external perspective — that is, from the perspective of the reader/listener. 5.1. A characteristic example of how sentences with Perf. fulfill the function of the predicate of the entire narrative text is Bunin's story "The Idol" ("Idol"). The story is given below with some abridgements which do not change its general narrative structure:  vsegda zimoj, v moskovskom Zoologiceskom sadu bylo v tu zimu ljudno, oživlenno: na katke s trex casov igrala muzyka i tuda slo i tam tolpilos' i katalos' množestvo narodu. A po doroge na katok vse na minutu priostanavlivalis' i ljubopytno gljadeli na to, cto predstavljalos' ix glazam v odnom iz zagonov vozle dorogi: < . . . > tam stojal ëskimosskij cum, < . . . > a vozle cuma, prjamo na snegu, sidel, podžav pod sebja korotkie skrescennye nogi v pegix mexovyx culkax, < . . . > ne to kakoj-to živoj idol, ne to prosto ženopodobnyj, bezborodyj dikij muzik; < . . . > i zanimalsja ètot idol tem, čto s trex casov do pozdnego vecera sidel sebe na snegu, ne obrascaja vnimanija na tolpjascijsja pered nim narod, i ot vremeni do vremeni daval predstavlenie: mez ego kolen stojali dve derevjannye miski, — odna s kuskami syroj koniny, a drugaja s cernoj krov'ju, — i vot on bral kusok koniny svoej korotkoj ruckoj, makal  v krov' i soval v svoj rybij rot, glotal i oblizyval pal'cy, vsemu procemu sovsem ne sootvetstvennye: nebol'sie, tonkie i daze krasivye... V ètu zimy, v cisle procix, xodivsix na katok v Zoologiceskom sadu i mimoxodom smotrevsix na takuju udivitel'nuju raznovidnost' celoveka, byli zenix i nevesta, student i kursistka. I tak na ves' vek i ZAPOMNILIS' im te scastlivye dni: < . . . > s katka doletajut takty val'sov, a on sidit i vse suet sebe v rot kuski mokrogo i černogo ot krovi mjasa, i nicego ne vyrazajut ego temnye uzkie glazki, ego ploskij zeltyj lik. In the Moscow zoo that winter, as always in winter, it was crowded and lively: at the rink music was played (Imp.) at three o'clock and a throng of people moved (Imp.), and crowded (Imp.), and skated (Imp.) there. And along the way to the rink everyone came to a halt (Imp.) look­ ing (Imp.) curiously at what appeared (Imp.) before their eyes in one of the enclosures near the road: < . . . > There stood (Imp.) an eskimo tent < ...>, and near the tent, right on the snow, there sat (Imp.), crossing his short legs in their skewbald fur leggings < . . . > some sort of a living idol, or perhaps just an effeminate, beardless wild muzhik < . . . > This idol's only occupation was (Imp.) that he was just sitting (Imp.) on the snow from

ON THE "METAPHYSICS" OF RUSSIAN ASPECT

205

three o'clock to late evening, not paying attention to the people crowding in front of him, and from time to time was giving (Imp.) a performance: between his knees stood (Imp.) two wooden bowls — one with pieces of raw horse-flesh and the other with black blood — and he would take (Imp.) a piece of horse-flesh in his little hand, dip (Imp.) it in the blood, shove (Imp.) it in his fish-like mouth, swallow (Imp) and lick (Imp.) his fingers which were not in keeping with all the rest: they were small, fine and even beautiful... That winter, among others who went to the rink at the Moscow zoo and who looked in passing at that surprisingly different person, were a fiancé and his betrothed, a student and coed. And this is how they REMEMBERED (Perf.) all their lives those happy days < . . . > from the rink waft (Imp.) the strains of waltzes, while he sits (Imp.) and puts (Imp.), again and again, pieces of moist meat, black with blood, in his mouth, and his dark, narrow eyes, his flat, yellow face express (Imp.) nothing.

Almost the entire development of this story is based on sentences with Imp. All situations are presented from the point of view of an immediate participant; there is only one sentence with Perf., but it sets the perspective of the entire story for the reader. The sentence with Perf. suggests that the point of the story as a whole lies in the fact that its content had remained in the witnesses' memory and apparently attained in retrospect some impor­ tance for them — something that made it worth being told as a "story." For the reader, to explain why the picture of the "idol" has remained "forever" in the memory of the young couple, is to find the story's main point. A plausible explanation could be that after the revolution the scene in the park attained a symbolic meaning. The idol-like "muzhik" with his passion­ less and expressless appearance, doing what would seem abominable and horrifying from a "normal" point of view, would be perceived in retrospect, in memory, as a symbol of what had happened to Russia — the country of the couple's youth. Having arrived at this explanation, the reader perceives that the static "picture" presented in the text is not an introductory descrip­ tion, to be followed by a narrative, but the "story" in itself: the story whose general meaning becomes clear from the retrospective point of view that is set by the key sentence with Perf. 5.2. The constitutive role of the sentences with Perf. in the narrative text is manifested particularly clearly in those cases when Perf. is com­ pletely absent from the story. In these cases the reader, in order to under­ stand the text as a "story," must find an explanation for the fact that the

206

BORIS GASPAROV

narration lacks a "frame" which would indicate its general point. The search for such an explanation yields a special semantic effect, on which the writer counts when constructing a narrative without Perf. In this case the role of Perf. in the creation of the narrative framework is manifested in a negative way: it shows in an additional semantic effect which arises due to the absence of Perf. Bunin's story "The Eve" ("Kanun") may serve as an example of how this narrative device can be used in artistic prose: V gorode, po puti na vokzal. Izvozcik mcit vo ves' dux, s gory i na most, cerez recku. Pod mostom, na beregovoj otmeli, otvernuvsis' ot proezzix pod naves mosta i  by dija zascity podnjav pieci, stoit bosjak, spesno,  sobaka, poziraet cto-to vrode nacinki. A pozadi groxocut, letjat, tocno nagonjajut, lomovye telegi, trjasutsja, visja s grjadok, strasnye sapogi muzikov. Vse v muke — mukomoly, — vse velikany, i vse ryzie, bez sapog, v krasnyx rubaxax raspojaskoj... A potom vagon, vtoroj klass. I kakoj-to sidjascij protiv menja gospodin let za sorok, sirokij i strižennyj bobrikom, v zolotyx ockax na ploskom nosu s naglymi nozdrjami, vse vstaet i, ne gljadja na menja, — ot prenebrezenija ko mne, — vse popravljaet na setke svoi xorosie, v krepkix cexlax cemodany i cemodanciki. Akkuratnyj i uverennyj v sebe gospodin, spokojnyj za svoe blagopolucie i strogoe dostoinstvo... Šla, odnako, uže osen' sestnadcatogo goda. In the .city, on the way to the train station. The cabby rushes (Imp.) at full speed, from the hills and to the bridge, across the river. Under the bridge, on the coastal sand-bar, turning away from the thoroughfare under the bridge's overhang, a tramp stands (Imp.), devouring (Imp.) hurriedly, like a dog, something in the way of stuffing. And behind, dray-carts are rumbling (Imp.), speeding (Imp.) as if they were racing (Imp.); the muzhik's dreadful jackboots, hanging from the carts' edge, are trembling (Imp.). Everyone is in flour, — the millers, — all of them the giants, all red-haired, without caps, in unbelted red shirts... And then the car, second class. Across from me a gentleman is sitting, over forty years old, broad and with a French crop, gold-rimmed glasses on his flat nose with impudent nostrils; he repeatedly is standing up (Imp.), not looking at me, — out of disdain for me, — and rearranging (Imp) on the laggage rack his expensive suitcases... Such a precise and self-confident gentleman, serene in his well-being and severe dignity... And yet, the fall of 1916 was already passing (Imp.).

This text achieves the status of narrative due to the implied reference to the impending disaster of the revolution which is to occur very shortly thereafter. The implied information plays the role of the key point which allows the reader to view all transient images presented in the text as a

ON THE "METAPHYSICS" OF RUSSIAN ASPECT

207

coherent whole. Apparently, the meaning of this whole situation is a curi­ ous lack of anticipation of what is to occur in a few weeks. From this point of view, the very uneventfulness of what is presented on the surface of the story contains a meaningful contrast to the story's implied "continuation." The narrator of the story is completely immersed in the everyday continu­ ous process of living which appears to be so peaceful and routine that it seems to lack any appearance of an event, and therefore any foundation for relating it as a "story." The reader, however, knows the "denouement," and this knowledge gives him the external position in relation to the described stream-of-life routine, allowing him to comprehend the succes­ sion of seemingly uneventful situations as a narrative theme. The following example — Bunin's story "The Sky Above the Wall" ("Nebo nad stenoj") — illustrates this phenomenon in a still more radical fashion. In this narrative an explicit framework of an event is also missing; but unlike the previous example, here the implied narrative frame is not so obvious: V solnečnoe zimnee utro uezzaju iz Rima. Xmel'noj, vozbuždennyj starik, vezuscij menja na vokzal, v odnom pidzake i kasketke sidjascij na vysokix kozlax, dergaet loktjami, gonit svoju uzkuju kljacu po tesnoj dlinnoj ulice, v teni i svežej syrosti. No vot ulica kruto povoracivaet vpravo, obryvaetsja spuskom na prostornuju plosčad', na slepjascee teploe solnce. Kljača s razbegu saditsja na zadnie nogi, starik, upav na bok, bystro krutit tormoz. Kolesa skrebut i nojut, kopyta krepko cokajut po kamnju. Vperedi, v ètom bleske, esce zybkom, vlažnom, gusto dymitsja vodjanoj pyl'ju, valit v raznye storony serymi klubami ogromnyj fontan. A sleva, rjadorn s nami, idet kakaja-to drevnjaja ruina, tjanetsja dikaja, kak krepost', radostno ozarennaja solncem stena, nad obrezom kotoroj jarko i gusto sineet nebo. I starik, tormozja, kosit glaza kverxu, v divnoe lono ego rajskix krasok, i kricit, vosklicaet: - Madonna! Madonna! On a sunny winter morning I depart (Imp.) from Rome. A drunken, excited old man taking me to the train sits, without coat, on the high coach-box, tugs (Imp.) at his elbows, urges on (Imp.) his scrawny jade along the crowded long street, in the shadow of fresh dampness. But here the street suddenly turns (Imp.) to the right, breaks off (Imp.) in a descent into a spacious square, into the blinding warm sun. The old nag sits down (Imp.) on its hind legs, the old man, falling to the side, quickly throws on (Imp.) the brakes. The wheels scrape (Imp.) and whine (Imp.), hooves clatter (Imp.) soundly on stone. Ahead, in this fluid, damp brilliance, the gray puffs of an enormous fountain pour (Imp.) on different sides, their spray billowing (Imp.). And on the left, next to us, an ancient ruin passes

208

BORIS GASPAROV by, and an abandoned wall stretches (Imp.), like a fortress, joyfully illumi­ nated by the sun, above whose edge the sky shows (Imp.) blue clearly and thickly. And the old man, while braking, squints (Imp.) his eyes upwards, to the wonderful bosom of its heavenly colors, and cries (Imp.), exclaiming (Imp.): - Madonna! Madonna!

The whole narrative is given in the narrator's subjective perspective and is presented as the narrator's current experience, in which he seems to be completely immersed. The reader would wait in vain for the beginning of a proper "story," for which this picture might serve as a preparatory background. The reader, in his effort to make sense of the story, has to come to a realization of the fact that the only narrative focus of the story consists in the very absence of any explicit eventual focus. In this case, the story can be interpreted as a narrative about the "flow of life," about being as an existential, non-discrete process. The meaning of the story is focused on an understanding that life as a continuous experience is "greater," and more significant, than any occurrences in the realm of "events," and that therefore the author/narrator refuses to place the descriptive part of his experience in the framework of a conventional "story." Paradoxically, this very understanding imposes a narrative framework on the text and allows the reader to apprehend the text as a story: a story about the impossibility of conveying the experience of life in the form of a story. If, however, a few of the situations described in the story were to be explicitly presented as events (by applying Perf. to them), the whole mean­ ing of the story would change, despite the fact that its subject matter would remain the same. Let us, for example, switch several verbs in the middle of the story into Perf. : ulica kruto POVERNULA vpravo, OBORVALAS' spuskom < ...> Kljaca s razbegu SELA na zadnie nogi, starik < . . . > STAL bystro KRUTIT' tormoz.

TURNED BROKE OFF SAT D O W N THREW ON

In this case, the story turns into a narrative about an adventure which the narrator had during his ride to the train station. Verbs in Perf. form a chain of events which the reader would understand as the essence of the story. Correspondingly, the adjacent part of the narrative remaining in Imp. would be perceived as the historical present, that is, as a temporal and conditional change of narrative perspective; in this capacity, the sentences with Imp. would be ascribed by the reader to the development of the plot.

ON THE "METAPHYSICS" OF RUSSIAN ASPECT

209

And finally, an opening sentence with Imp. would be perceived as an intro­ duction which precedes the beginning of the story as such. Insofar as the framework of an event is present in the story (even in a minimal fashion), the reader has no need to search for the meaning of the story outside the limits set by its apparent plot; as a result, the "existential" perspective, which was present in the original narrative text, disappears. 6. To sum up, it is necessary to emphasize once again that the principal, most basic difference in the meanings of Perf. and Imp. consists neither in the character of the situations represented with their help, nor in the con­ tent of the narrative story as such, but rather in two fundamentally different world views projected onto the content of what is said, be it a single state­ ment or a story. The category of aspect offers to the speaker a formal instrument with the help of which the speaker is able to place two funda­ mentally different and mutually complementary points of view onto human experience. These two Weltanschauungen present the world as consisting either of events or of existential experiences. The use of Perf. suggests the interpretation of the entire process of existence as consisting of discrete events. Each of these events appears as a single, compact whole, looked at in its entirety, as if from an external (ob­ jective) point of view. The perception of the flow of time, in which each of these events occurs, either remains implicit, or is segmented into individual quantums, each of which coincides with the borders of each individual event; in the latter case, the flow of time is simply equated with the sequence of events. By contrast, the choice of Imp. encourages the interpretation of being as a non-discrete temporal flow — a state of con­ tinuous evolvement experienced by the subject. The action as such is dissol­ ved in the temporal flow, the borders of the action as an individual event erode. The message in this case is focused not on action in a strict sense, but rather on conditions experienced by the subject in the process of producing these actions. Such a perspective offers a picture of the world presented in a passive modus. The world is viewed as a total experience, in which, in essence, nothing "new" can happen, no "event," in the strict sense of the word, can occur; within this modus of presentation, everything which hap­ pens proves to be only a development of the total process of existence, con­ tinuous and limitless in its flow. The "metaphysical" nature of verbal aspect in Russian may be com­ pared with the way in which the category of definiteness functions in lan-

210

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guages which have articles. The choice of the definite or the indefinite arti­ cle allows the speaker to present all objects in two fundamentally different "metaphysical" dimensions. Generally speaking, the determinate form gives an actual description of the object, viewing it as a component of a sit­ uation, while the indeterminate form gives a classificational description of the object, viewing it as a representative of a certain conceptual class. Thus, the whole domain of objects can be alternatively treated within an "opera­ tional" or "conceptual" mode of presentation. This fundamental alternative in the presentation of objects is lacking in Russian; however, a similar phenomenon arises in Russian in the domain of processes, due to the category of aspect. The necessity of employing one or another aspectual form compels the Russian speaker to continually make a choice between two alternative points of view on the processes, in a way not unlike that in which the necessity of using articles makes the speaker of one of the Germanic or Romance languages choose between two different points of view on objects. In speaking of the similarity between articles and aspect, we should bear in mind that what is meant here is a general, "metaphysical" similarity of the principles according to which the world experience is presented and organized in language, rather than an actual resemblance between the meaning of the two categories. What is common among the two categories is the presense of alternative perspectives under which certain facts of life (objects in one case, processes in another) can be presented. The form of Imp. serves as the most powerful and the most regular means by which the existential picture of the world, as an alternative to the modus of actions/events, is formed in the Russian language. However, there are many other highly effective means for the expression of the exis­ tential meaning in Russian: such as, for instance, impersonal constructions, or certain variants of word order (the reverse word order "Predicate — Subject"). On the whole, grammatical devices aimed at expressing existen­ tial meaning are extremely well represented in the Russian language.

NOTES 1.

On the problem of structural differences between monologic vs. dialogic, standard vs. colloquial, written vs. oral speech see, respectively: Jakubinskij (1923); Zemskaja, Kitajgorodskaja, Širjaev (1981: 19-40); Gasparov (1978a).

ON THE "METAPHYSICS" OF RUSSIAN ASPECT

211

2.

A more sophisticated version of this concept is discussed in Timberlake (1985: 163-165).

3.

See a discussion on the distinction between "historical present" and "dramatic present" in Chvany (1980: 13-15).

REFERENCES Bondarko, A.V. 1971. Vid i vremja russkogo glagola. Moscow: "Prosvescenie." Chvany, Catherine V. 1980. "The Role of Verbal Tense and Aspect in the Narration of The Tale of Igor's Campaign." The Structural Analysis of Narrative Texts, ed. by Andrej Kodjak, Michael J. Connolly & Krystyna Pomorska. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers, Inc. 7-23. 1985.

"Backgrounded Perfectives and Plot-Line Imperfectives: Towards a Theory of Grounding in Text." In: Flier & Timberlake 1985. 247-273.

Flier, Michael S. & Alan Timberlake (eds.) 1985. The Scope of Slavic Aspect. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers, Inc. Forsyth, J. 1970. A Grammar of Aspect. Usage and Meaning in the Russian Verb. Cambridge: At the University Press. Gasparov, B.M. 1978. "Aspektual'nye znacenija neopredelenno-prediciruemyx predloženij v russkom jazyke." Voprosy russkoj aspektologii III. (Acta et commentationes universitatis Tartuensis 439). Tartu. 64-88. 1978a. "Ustnaja reč'  semioticeskij ob"ekt." Semantika nominacii i semiotika ustnoj reci (Acta et commentationes universitatis Tartuensis 442). Tartu. 63112. 1979.

"O nekotoryx osobennostjax funkcionirovanija vidovyx form v povestvovatel'nom tekste." Voprosy russkoj aspektologii IV (Acta et com­ mentationes universitatis Tartuensis 484). Tartu. 112-127.

Hopper, Paul J. 1979. "Aspect and Foregrounding in Discourse." Discourse and Syntax. New York: Academic Press. 213-241. Isacenko, A.V. 1960. Grammaticeskij stroj russkogo jazyka v sopostavlenii s slovackim. Mor­ fologija. Part 2. Bratislava.

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Jakobson, Roman. 1931. "Zur Struktur des russischen Verbums." Quoted from the Engl. transl. in: Jakobson 1984. 1-14. 1956/1984. "Shifters, Verbal Categories, and the Russian Verb". Quoted from repr. in: Jakobson 1984. 41-58. 1984. Russian and Slavic Grammar Studies, 1931-1981, ed. by Linda R. Waugh and Moris Halle. Berlin — New York — Amsterdam: Mouton. Jakubinskij, L.P. 1923. "O dialogiceskoj reči." Russkaja reč' 1, ed. by L.V. Scerba. Petrograd. 96194. Jensen, Peter Alberg. 1984. "Imperfektives Erzählen: Zum Problem des Aspekts in der späten Prosa Cechovs." Russische Erzählung — Russian Short Story —  , ed. by Rainer Grübel. Amsterdam: Rodopi. 261-279. Kucera, Henry. 1985. "Aspect in Negative Imperatives." In: Flier & Timberlake 1985. 118-128. Maslov, Ju.S. 1948. "Vid i leksiceskoe znacenie glagola v sovremennom russkom jazyke". Izvestija AN SSSR. Otdelenie literatury i jazyka 7, No. 4. 303-316. Nichols, Johanna. 1985. "Aspect and Inversion in Russian." In: Flier & Timberlake 1985. 94-117. Rassudova, O.P. 1968. Upotreblenie vidov glagola v russkom jazyke. Moscow: MGU. Thelin, Nils B. 1984. "Coherence, Perspective and Aspectual Specification in Slavonic Narrative Discourse." . de Groot & H. Tommola (eds.), Aspect Bound. Dordrecht. 225-238. 1984a. "Komposition, Perspektive und Verbalaspekt in Puskins Prosa: Entwurf einer poetisch-linguistischen Methode." Signs of Friendship. To Honour A.G.F, van Holk, ed. by J.J. van Baak. Amsterdam. 257-293. Timberlake, Alan. 1985. "Reichenbach and Russian Aspect." In: Flier & Timberlake 1985. 153-168. Vendler, Zeno. 1967. "Verbs and Times." In: Z. Vendler, Linguistics in Philosophy. Ithaca: Cor­ nell University Press. 97-121. Zemskaja, E.A, M.V. Kitajgorodskaja, E.N. Sirjaev 1981. Russkaja razgovornaja reč.' Obscie voprosy. Slovoobrazovanie. Sintaksis. Moscow: "Nauka".

Verbal aspect, discourse saliency, and the so-called "Perfect of result" in modern Russian Catherine V. Chvany Massachusetts Institute of Technology

0

Introduction

The present paper is a part of ongoing work on a theory that seeks to explain how and why we perceive a narrative plot line against a background, how and why we discern the "main thread" of a text, and just what makes such a main thread or "plot line" stand out against "background commentary." Section 1 provides a necessarily skeletal out­ line of the theoretical and empirical background, along with the saliency hierarchy, a working hypothesis for predicting the relative foregroundability of sentences in text. Section 2 outlines some recent findings on aspect in discourse and focuses on Russian perfective sentences for which a sentenceinternal saliency measure makes incorrect predictions. These sentences pro­ vide counterevidence to the claim (as in Beedham 1982) that an aspectual "perfect of result" is encoded in Russian sentence grammar as a category distinct from those "perfects" that report actions. Section 3 presents a brief non-sequential prose text (from Cvetaeva's Mo] Puskin) and confirms our finding that, rather than encode the distinction action vs. result in the pred­ icate (or even in the containing sentence), the Russian perfective is sys­ tematically vague. This vagueness makes possible a literary effect which is necessarily distorted in translation into English or Bulgarian, languages which require a more precise division of labor among the forms in their verb paradigms.

214 1

CATHERINE V. CHVANY Theoretical and empirical underpinnings

In seeking to account for linguistic aspects of literary texts, I am mainly concerned with the grammatical and other signals that correlate with replic­ able intuitions that some sentences make up the "foreground" of a text, while other grammatical categories cluster in the "background." 1 Intuitions of grounding are based on a narrative norm correlated with a linguistic norm: in language after language, it is normal for certain grammatical categories to cluster in foregrounded clauses, others in backgrounded ones. 2 Intuitions of grounding are reported in terms of visual metaphors; this is one of many — apparently universal — cognitive links between language and vision. For an understanding of the perceptual strategies involved, lin­ guists have returned to some insights of early Gestalt psychology. Recent studies have shown a systematic correlation between the spatial principles that facilitate visual perception of figure against ground and the grammati­ cal properties and textual organization that facilitate perception of certain parts of a text as its "foreground," "main thread," or "plot line." 3 Much as visual norms — perceptual and cultural — provide a background for appreciating modern paintings, narrative and linguistic norms create the expectations against which we perceive literary devices. The expected correlation of the narrative norm with certain linguistic fea­ tures allows grammatical features to serve as indexes of relative grounding, even in texts that depart from the narrative norm. Central among the gram­ matical indexes of grounding is, of course, verbal aspect. But since the norms are probabilistic rather than absolute, the co-variance of linguistic and narrative properties is not trivial,4 and that is what allows authors of artistic literature to play with our expectations. 1.1 The domain: a narrative norm The hypothetical narrative norm against which we perceive device is most often approached in non-literary or pre-literary texts, such as unembellished oral or written reports of events, or stories for children. L. Tolstoj 's version of "The Three Bears" (Tri Medvedja) comes close to the norm, but even that contains elementary literary devices. The predictable (i.e. normal) grammatical clusterings are seen most clearly in such texts, while literary devices involve deviation from the narrative and linguistic

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norms. Such effects are sometimes also termed "foregrounding" — in trans­ lations of Russian vydelenie or aktualizacija, Czech aktualizace, French mise en relief (as in Hansen-Löve 1981; cf. also Achmanova 1966). But these devices represent a secondary effect, which depends on the more basic and constant perceptual phenomenon defined on the norm. In order to avoid confusion, I call the secondary kind of vydelenie "poetic foregrounding." Prerequisite to a theoretically sound model of poetic foregrounding (and so-called "poetic language") is an understanding of the norm which under­ lies such secondary effects. The idealized narrative form is defined by the following properties: 1.1.1 Story sequence without departure from event sequence A sequence of events is narrated in order of real or imagined occur­ rence. This is the French structuralists' degré zéro narrative, where récit equals histoire (or the Russian formalists' sjuzet equals fabula). Moreover, in the norm, "plot line" and "foreground" coalesce. 1.1.2 Explicit or implicit causality; narrativity Causality has been part of the narrative norm since Aristotle ("no event that does not make probable or inevitable some other event"; Poetics 8). Causality, which tends to be inferred from sequence (post hoc, ergo propter hoc), lends coherence and creates conditions for further events, including the conflict that is essential to another testable concept, that of "narrativity" in the sense of Prince 1981. For instance, in the following pairs, readers asked which clause suggests the better story are likely to agree on (lb) and (2b): (1) (2)

a. The princess left and the tsar died. b. The princess left and the tsar died of grief. a. Ivan killed Boris and then the borscht boiled over. b. Ivan killed Boris and jumped out the window. (Here, though causality is not stated, it may be inferred; the fact that dam­ age has been done is a probable cause for further events.)

It is in this norm that Čechov violates in stories like "Dom s mezoninom," or "Pripadok," where actions are performed pocemu-to 'for some reason,' ne znaju pocemu T don't know why,' masinal'no 'mechanically.' Temporal sequence remains, but once causality is removed, a single dominant plot line is difficult to discern (cf. Shukman 1977).

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1.1.3 Relative grounding and relative importance Movement affecting a person is normally more important than move­ ment of a door or other inanimate object. This hierarchy is reflected in potential for syntactic subordination. This is why, without additional con­ text, (3a) is more normal (and hence carries a smaller information load5 than (3b), where the act or fact of closing the door is presented as unexpec­ tedly important. (3)

a. Ivan vosel, zakryv za soboj dver'. 'Ivan entered, closing the door behind him.' b. Vojdja, Ivan zakryl za soboj dver'. 'After entering, Ivan closed the door behind him.'

In Russian culture as in English-speaking cultures, murder is normally viewed as an action far more important than just moving about or sleeping. The last line from Čechov's famous story "Sleepy" ("Spat' chocetsja") plays on this norm by presenting the murder of a baby as less important than its nanny's desperate need for sleep: (4)

Zadusiv ego, ona bystro ložitsja... 'Having suffocated him, she quickly lies down...'

The two linguistic means for this effect are: grammatical subordination, which is iconic of backgrounding, and the present tense, which — like the rest of the ego-hic-nunc context of this speech event — is iconic of foreg­ rounding. This effect is possible only because of the non-trivial correlation of properties of the norm. Foregrounding and importance to humans are independent of each other, hence separable. 1.1.4 Direct speech or dialogue in foreground Direct speech eclipses the sequential verb of saying that introduces it.6 "Tri medvedja" illustrates this with the bear's roar Kto chlebal v moj caske!! (Who has been eating from my bowl!!) a foregrounding visually reinforced through the huge capital letters of the printed text. It is this norm that is turned upside down in Čechov's "An Attack of Nerves" ("Pripadok"): As a nervous young man, Vasil'ev, follows his friends to a brothel, they sing an inane song; but, contrary to the norm, Cechov uses direct speech for background music. The quoted song lyrics form a startling contrast to Vasil'ev's silently racing fantasies about fallen women. The conflict with reality that eventually causes the breakdown of the title rests on those fan-

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tasiies; yet the stuff of "narrativity" — the cause-and-effect sequence cen­ tered on Vasil'ev — is nonetheless linguistically and textually backgrounded. 1.1.5 Grammatical specialization The narrative norm shows clear clustering of certain grammatical categories in the foreground, of the opposite categories in the background. This specialization facilitates the perception of a clear foreground and background. 1.2 A grammatical norm correlated with the narrative norm The cross-linguistic evidence for the correlation of grammatical cluster­ ings with judgements of grounding in text is so strong as to be a candidate for a linguistic and cognitive universal. 7 The clauses identified as relatively foregrounded tend to feature active, telic, "achievement" or "accomplish­ ment-culmination" verbs referring to specific actions performed at specific times by individuated participants. Clauses in foregrounded passages are also predominantly indicative and affirmative, while the background clauses are more often negative or modal, with indefinite or missing parti­ cipants and durative or stative verbs. The functional explanation for this distribution (based in part on Hop­ per and Thompson 1980) is that story-tellers (and speakers generally) have an anthropocentric bias, with a normal tendency to give greatest promi­ nence to effective (change-and-conflict-causing) events involving reference to individual humans (icons of the speaker); descriptions or optional com­ ments on such events are lower on the anthropocentric hierarchy. Lan­ guages reflect such human and cultural priorities in their grammatical sys­ tems. Of particular interest for linguistic theory is the fact that, although grounding is a textual phenomenon, almost all the grammatical specializa­ tion can be identified at the sentence level. One such sentence-internal sig­ nal in Russian is morphological case marking. Nominative case (as the nor­ mal case of the agent in the quintessential narrative clause) is an index of foregrounding. As controller of agreement and anaphora, the Nominative NP is also an icon of the agent. As an icon of agent, it is also iconic of the speaker, hence foregroundable along with other categories of the ego-hicnunc context. Oblique case marking is an index of backgrounding, not only

218

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by virtue of opposition with the nominative, but in its own right (this prop­ erty is attributable to inherent features expressing limited or marginal par­ ticipation in the narrated event, cf. Jakobson 1936). Take, for instance, the two stative clauses (a,b) referring to Ivan's absence from Moscow; they contain the same lexical items in the same order and contrast only in case marking and consequent control of agree­ ment. (5)

a. Ivan

[NOM]

v Moskve ne byl.

[AGREEMENT]

b. Ivana[GEN] v Moskve ne by lo. [NO AGREEMENT]

Though both clauses are identifiable, even without context, as carriers of background information, (a) characterizes Ivan as a person who hasn't been to Moscow and its interpretation requires less contextual help than (b), which is about Ivan's absence from some (presumably foregrounded) event in Moscow. That is, a well-formed instance of (a) requires only the givenness of Ivan and Moscow; but the felicitous use of (b) requires additional information about what was going on in Moscow. The theme-rheme struc­ ture of (a) is clear, while that of (b) may elicit disagreements. While (a) can be read as Tvan didn't go to Moscow' (a meaning that is not inherent in byt' 'be' but may be contextually inferrable), (b) excludes such an active interpretation in any context. We thus proceed with an examination of the grammatical correlates of grounding, confident that most (though not quite 100%) of the information about a sentence's potential discourse prominence is contained in the sen­ tence itself. One example of grammatical clustering included in Hopper and Thompson's data, and familiar to all Slavists, is the distribution of the Rus­ sian genitive of negation; categories from the high-foregroundability pole predominate in (6a), while (6b) has a majority of features from the backgroundability pole: (6)

a. Ivan Petrovic otkryl vse okna. Tvan Petrovic opened [PERF] all the windows b. Nikto ne otkryval . 'Noone opened [IMPERF] any windows [GEN].'

[ACC].'

What Hopper and Thompson's typological studies (cf. note 2 above) show is that Russian is not alone — that the clustering of punctual telic verbs (usually encoded in Russian as perfectives) with definite subjects and objects, and of durative, atelic (imperfective) aspect with indefinite partici-

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pants, oblique case, and negation, far from being a peculiarity of Russian alone, is normal for the world's languages. This linguistic norm is a prob­ abilistic,8 not an absolute one. 1.3 Aspect via a typology of situations A theoretical account of the relation of grammar and grounding across languages must be as independent as possible of language-specific categories. 9 Hence we must find a cross-linguistic equivalent for Perfective and Imperfective, which are specific to Slavic languages. One such crosslinguistic approach to aspect is via a typology of situations. In the literary tradition, this view has its roots in Aristotle's Events, Activities, and States, subsequently refined by the philosophers Ryle and Vendler. Adaptations of the Aristotle-Ryle-Vendler classes in light of Slavic grammatical systems have been developed by Kucera (1983,1984) and, most recently, by Brecht (ms.), who posits five classes as shown in (7). In applying the typology to measure relative Saliency (or discourse prominence), I assign arbitrary and provisional point values; the scale may be made more or less sensitive as appropriate to particular tasks. (7) sentence

Typology of situations (Aristotle.. .Vendler.. .Kucera.. .Brecht) situation type Saliency

he reached the summit/drew a circle she arrived/he fainted I was working they worked at MIT Boris knew Ivan

accomplishment/culmination event/achievement activity habit, uncounted iteration state

4 3 2 1 0

This hierarchy, which subsumes telicity, punctuality, completion, durativity, and other aspectual meanings, allows us to treat aspect, not only as a morphological or lexical category, but as part of a property of sentences that describe situations in a connected discourse or text. For the purpose of quantifying this global property or sentences across languages, aspect may be viewed as just one scale among other parameters which, together, define a scalar, global property of sentences, which predicts their relative Saliency in texts approaching the narrative norm. One such scale, which incorporates the typology (7), is the Saliency hierarchy shown in (8).

220

CATHERINE V. CHVANY

(8)

The Saliency hierarchy: Individuation features Main participant (regardless of case) referential anthropocentric Second participant (in direct case) (A single participant does not require decision between A and O.) Iconic Individuation and Main clause...Subordinate...Participle Dialogue (ego-hic-nunc)...Narrative

3 2 4 3 2 same criteria

4

1 1

0 0

2

1 1

0 0

2

1

0

3

2

1

0

3

2

1

0

3

2 2

1 1

0 0

1

0

3

(±1)

Transitive S....Impersonal S (Participants in direct cases only.) Volitionality-Agentivity Related to Gestalt principles Individuation and Achievement... Activity... State (subsumes telicity, punctuality...) Tentatively related to causality, and thence to good continuity Realis.. .Hypothetical.. .Irrealis Effect on most affected participant (regardless of case) Affirmative-Negative10

4

The Saliency hierarchy does not strive for exhaustiveness, nor is economy a primary goal. While Hopper and Thompson's Transitivity scale (c.f. note 7) features almost exclusively binary parameters, most of the Saliency hierar­ chy's parameters are represented in terms of two to five factors. For our experimental purposes, the high redundancy inherent in a multi-factor scale is strategically useful. The Saliency parameters are divided into icons of grounding, and inde­ xes of grounding relatable to Gestalt principles (cf. note 3). Individuation features are listed first, for they not only relate to Gestalt principles but are iconic of the speaker. The three-point "referential" scale assigns a point each for: Sentence-initial topic or Sentence focus; Personal pronoun or proper name, referential or not; Referential (i.e. "specific") noun phrase. The four-point "anthropocentric" scale counts a point each for: Animate,

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Concrete, Count, Singular. Individuation of participants is thus measured on a seven-point scale with considerable built-in redundancy, which is strategically fruitful at this stage of investigation, for it provides a corrective for inconsistencies or errors inevitable in quick intuitive judgements. Saliency is meant to be a flexible pre-theoretical tool; the analysis of par­ ticular texts may require additional parameters, e.g., Human as well as Animate, for a story about people and animals. The axis of syntactic subordination (iconic of backgrounding) is arbit­ rarily divided into five segments with the point values 4-3-2-1-0: (4) Main Clause; (3) Complement of a main clause verb of saying or of phasal or modal verb, coordinated clause with da or i,or appositive relative clause; (2) Other main clause complement, including nominalization; (1) Adverbial or restrictive relative clause embedded in main clause; (0) Deeper embedding, participle, gerund, predicate nominal. The second axis is Dialogue vs. Narrative, reflecting the foregrounding effect of direct speech; the (±1) adds a point for present tense and subtracts one for such categories as the Bulgarian indirect narration forms. The participant scales allow for the impersonal sentences of languages like Slavic, and depart from Transitivity in not assigning the actant in single-participant sentences to Agent or Object. The backgrounding effect of oblique case marking is captured by limiting one of the participant scales to direct cases. 2

Aspect in Discourse

2.1 Limitations of Sentence Grammar The following examples are listed in order of descending Saliency, and thus, in descending expectation of foregroundability in text. The intuitive rankings, of both Russian and English sentences, are replicable, and so are relative rankings for Saliency (or Transitivity, cf. note 7), even though exact scores tend to vary from one count to another. (I leave the testing of these statements — and the arithmetic — to the reader.) (9)

a. b. c. d. e.

Ivan ubil Borisa Ivan brosilsja iz okna Russkie ljubjat vodku Vodki ne bylo Nicego ne bylo

Ivan killed Boris Ivan jumped out the window Russians like vodka There was no vodka There was nothing

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Sentence grammar tells us that (9a), which scores highest in Saliency and Transitivity, is a plot-advancing foregrounded clause par exellence. But the prediction is not absolute. Any of the sentences, even the lowest scoring ones, could be foregrounded in direct speeches that eclipse their main clause: 'vodki ne bylo', skazal Ivan ('there was no vodka,' said Ivan). Sen­ tence grammar goes a long way in signaling grounding, but it is not enough. Full interpretation requires a context beyond the clause. The first sentence (9a) could also be backgrounded flashback, Ivan ubil Borisa (Ivan had kil­ led Boris), requiring a wider context for interpretation. Beedham (1982) has claimed that such uses of the Russian perfective represent a "perfect of result," a "compositional aspect" distinguished from other uses of the per­ fective past through sentence-internal contextual features.11 This suggests that a Saliency measure that would correctly reflect intuitions of grounding must classify some perfective sentences as states rather than events {achieve­ ments, culminations). But, as I will show, this would obscure the nature of the Russian perfective. My claim, made in the context of research outlined in the next section, is that Russian does not encode an action/result opposi­ tion in its verbal system, and that the interpretation of clauses like (9a) as focusing, not on an event but on a state resulting from an event, requires appeal to a context beyond the containing clause. 2.2 Some recent results on Russian aspect in discourse Though it has been claimed that Russian aspect grammaticizes ground­ ing (e.g., in Hopper 1979), that claim has been shown to be too strong. The analysis in Chvany 1985a, b showed that both aspects occur in foreground and background, though imperfectives in the foreground are a minority, perfectives in background even more exceptional. This difference in dis­ tribution is due to interplay between inherent grammatical meanings (marked and unmarked) and deviation from expected norms, or contextual markedness. For detailed evidence the reader is referred to those papers; the next paragraphs merely summarize the results of the investigation. 2.2.1 Imperfective in narrative As might be expected of the inherently unmarked category (according to Jakobson 1957/1984), the imperfective has a broader range than the per­ fective. The "Three Bears" passages analyzed in Chvany (1985a, b) contain more imperfectives in the foreground than perfectives in the background.

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But only about half of these exceptional imperfectives involve device, expressive or structural. 2.2.2 Present tense (necessarily imperfective) in narrative Present tense has a foregrounding effect only when contrasted with perfective past. This kind of foregrounding, unusual in written English, is very frequent in Slavic folk tales: (10) a.

Vyšel starik na bereg I govorìt.

..

T h e old man came out on the shore and says...' or (10) b. Devocka voslav domik i vidit... T h e little girl came into the house and sees...' Such "dramatic presents" have an effect similar to that of a cinematic closeup (cf. Chvany 1979, 1980). In monoaspectual present tense narration, on the other hand, one gets a purely structural account of events, one that allows narrative device to be avoided. This neutral "historical present" narrative (as in plot summaries) is stylistically as neutral as one can get.. It must be distinguished from the dramatic present illustrated in (10a,b). There are other, quite normal uses of imperfective in foreground, of which the most obvious examples are pro­ vided by direct speech. This is another instance where an accurate measure of grounding must reach beyond the containing sentence; the (+1) that Saliency awards for present tense would better reflect grounding if we scored only those present tense forms that contrast with past tense in the narrative text. 2.2.3 Imperfective pasts in foreground Plot line imperfectives in a past narrative are a structural device for varying narrative tempo: sequential (aoristic) imperfectives slow down a narrative, while iterative ones (summarizing a series of like events) speed it up. Other devices involve deliberate blurring of foreground and background (much as Matisse plays with our perceptions of figure and ground in "The Red Studio") or other illusions (for examples from Russian literature, see Shukman 1977, Thelin 1984).

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2.2.4 Perfective in narrative Perfective is an index of foreground. Though background perfectives do occur, they always require context beyond the sentence for their interpretation as background. They also involve device — departures from the narrative norm. The most common backgrounding device is structural rather than expressive — the separation of narrative sequence from event sequence (of sjuzet from fabula) in flashbacks or flashforwards. If, how­ ever, a flashback is long enough to express a sequence, the chain of perfec­ tives becomes foreground within its backgrounded region, a plot within a plot. The simplest of these devices is flashback, a departure from degré zéro narrative. Flashback-initial perfectives are easily recognized in context and usually translated as pluperfects. Other background perfectives, such as comments on the main action, are also possible, but they often elicit uncertainty or hesitation among informants asked to identify them as foreground or background. The gram­ matical specialization in such perfective clauses is not as clear as it is in the obviously plot-advancing ones. 2.3 Summary, and a residual counterexample to Saliency In the research summarized above, grounding was shown to be scalar and context-bound, strongly correlated with global properties of sentences. These properties are quantifiable —however imperfectly — on multi-factor scales such as Saliency. Aspect is just one of a complex of clustering proper­ ties which have analogues in principles of Gestalt perception and are statis­ tically associated with grounding. But grounding in text is shown to be inde­ pendent of its grammatical companions, as well as of its narrative fellowtravelers. Within the narrative norm, foregrounding is in tandem with sequence, causality, importance — and with perfective aspect and other high saliency features. These two norms, narrative and linguistic, provide a base for literary effects. Devices where one or another of the expected cor­ relates of grounding is absent, or is used in a novel way, are possible only because each of these correlates is independent. But, although grammatical specialization within sentences does predict discourse saliency to a remarkable extent, there are counterexamples, such as the dramatic present, whose effect depends on contrast with past tense in neighboring clauses. Another striking example of the inadequacy of sen­ tence grammar is the ambiguity of a clause like (9a) between the action or

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225

result (or flashback) readings. Consider a similar example from "The Three Bears," whose dominant reading is that: of a plot-advancing foreground clause: (11) a.

Oni usli guljat' po lesu They went out for a walk in the woods.'

Yet, in some contexts, the interpretation is stative, or resultative: (11) b. Medvedej ne bylo doma. Oni usli guljat' po lesu. T h e bears weren't home. They had gone out for a walk in the woods.' In the actual text, the reading is that of a flashback, a backgrounded explanatory comment on the bears' absence. It would not be difficult to reflect the difference in the Saliency scale, by including a convention to score contextually identified results as states, thus lowering the score to con­ form with intuitions of relative grounding. This would mean reaching beyond the clause, but it could be useful for literary applications, such as quantifying the transfer of grounding in translation. Such an analytical strategy does not, however, entail evidence that the action vs. result distinc­ tion is systematically encoded in Russian grammar. On the contrary, it shows that the distinction can only be recognized by appeal to a wider con­ text. Within sentence grammar, the Russian perfective is systematically vague with respect to the opposition action vs. result. 3

Saliency in a non-sequential text

This final section provides further evidence for the inherent vagueness of the perfective and shows how Marina Cvetaeva exploits this property of Russian grammar for literary effect. The text (12) is a non-sequential frag­ ment from Marina Cvetaeva's reminiscences, where the poet reinterprets her childhood exposure to Puskin and his poetry. She knew of the duel in which he'd been killed, but not about his wife, Natal'ja Goncarova, the ulti­ mate cause of the duel: (12)

 Goncarovoj ne upominalos' vovse, i ja o nej uznala tol' vzrosloj. Zizn' spustja gor jaco privetstvuju takoe umolcanie materi. Mescanskaja tragedija obretala velicie mifa. Da, po suscestvu, tref ego v ètoj dueli ne bylo. Byli dvoe: Ijuboj i odin. To-est' vecnye dejstvujuscie lica puskinskoj liriki: poèt

226

CATHERINE V. CHVANY

—i cern'. Čern, na ètot raz v mundire kavalergarda, ubila — poèta. A Goncarova,  i Nikolaj I-yj — vsegda najdetsja. 'Goncharova wasn't mentioned at all, and I found out about her only when I grew up. A lifetime later I fervidly salute that concealment of mother's. A domestic tragedy acquired the magnitude of myth. And in essence there was no third in that duel. There were two: anyone and the one. That is the eternal dramatis personae of Pushkin's lyric, the poet — and the dark mass [i.e. the rabble, CVC]. The dark mass, this time in the uniform of a cavalry guardsman, killed the poet. And a Goncharova, like a Nicholas I, is always available.' (Translated by J. Marin King.) I now juxtapose the clauses in these texts with their Bulgarian equivalents (from Cveta Lenkova's translation), along with the Russian's Saliency scores, cf. (13). (13)

.  Goncarovoj ne upominalos' vovse, Za Goncarova izobstbo ne stavase duma Goncharova wasn't mentioned at all,

(Ru) (Bu) (En)

Saliency 14 16 15

b. i jaonej uznala i za neja naucih and I found out about her

19

c. tol'ko vzrosloj. (=only as an adult) edva kogato porasnah. only when I grew up.

10 15

d. Zizn' spustja gorjaco privetstvuju Sega, cjal zivot po-kasno, goresto odobrjavam A lifetime later I fervidly salute

23

e. takoe umolcanie materi. premàlcavaneto ot strana na majka mi. that concealment of mother's.

19

f.

19

Mescanskaja tragedia obretala velicie mifa. Esnafskata tragedija pridobivase velicieto na mit. A domestic tragedy acquired the magnitude of myth.

ASPECT AND DISCOURSE SALIENCY

227

g. Da, po suscestvu, tret'ego v ètoj dueli ne bylo. Păk i v săstnost treti v duela ne e imalo. And in essence there was no third in that duel.

10

h. Bylo dvoe: ljuboj i odin. Bili sa dvama: njakoj si i edin. There were two: anyone and the one.

10

i.

To-est' vecnye dejstvujuscie lica puskinskoj liriki: 10 Toest vecnite dejstvuvasti lica . . . That is the eternal dramatis personae of Pushkin's lyrics:

i'. [byli]poèt — i čern', poetăt i sganta the poet and the dark mass [were there],

+5?

j.

26-27

cern , na ètot raz... ubila —poèta. sganta, tozi păt v mundira..., be ubila poeta. the dark mass, this time..., killed the poet.

k. A Goncarova,  i Nikolaj I-yj, —vsegda najdetsja. 14 A Goncarova, kakto i edin Nikolaj I, vinagi ste se nameri. And a Goncharova, like a Nicholas I — is alays available. [Bulgarian transliterated as follows: x=h; =.] The sentence in this text that is intuitively recognized as most foreg­ rounded, in Russian and English, is j . cent'..,ubila poèta', it also ranks high­ est in Saliency,12 yet this foregrounded perfective clause is not sequential: Cvetaeva is commenting on her childhood memories about Puskin. Why is this ubila so foregrounded, in spite of context, while the non-sequential sentence (10b) about the bears, oni usli guljaf po lesu (they had gone out for a walk in the forest) is so obviously backgrounded? The answer lies in their different contextual frames. If we consider the clauses in the text in terms of the continuum of universal semantic situations shown above in (7), we see the pattern in (14).

228

CATHERINE V. CHVANY

(14) a. ne upomînalos' (1) habit-state b. uznala (3) event-achievement . tol'ko vzrosloj (0) state d. privetstvuju (2) activity e. umolcanie (4) accomplishment f. obretala (2) activity i'.,i.,h.,g. ne bylo, byli, [byli], to-est' (0000) states j . ubila (3) event-achievement . vsegda najdetsja (1) habit-state At the center of the text is ., the accomplishment (or culmination), mother's having kept the story from her; it is flanked by activities, in turn framed by states, in turn framed by the foregrounded pair of event-achieve­ ments, the whole enclosed by the paired habit-states of a. and k. The remarkable symmetry is violated only once: While the first perfective uznala is followed by a single stative, the second one is preceded — and thus contrasts with — four statives. The sentence j . is thus isolated from the con­ text that would identify it as a flashback, while its inherent resemblance to the active sentence type allows it to be perceived as such a sentence. Both English and Bulgarian have pluperfect forms to distinguish action vs. result ox flashback, but King's translation features the simple preterite,

ASPECT AND DISCOURSE SALIENCY

229

to preserve the foregrounding effect of the Russian. The Bulgarian be ubila, on the other hand, while rendering the non-sequential meaning, sac­ rifices some of the clause's saliency. The one alternative open to the Bulga­ rian translator — the aorist form, with its connotation that the event was witnessed — would have exaggerated the clause's saliency far more than the English preterite does. 4

Conclusion

Though sentence grammar provides an adequate measure of discourse saliency in a narrative norm, and almost adequate indexes of grounding based on that norm, it fails to quantify the discourse saliency of aspect forms in texts representing the most elementary literary devices: The foreg­ rounding effect of present tense depends on contextual contrast with past tense narrative, cf. (10a, b). The resultative or flashback reading of the per­ fective clauses in (9a) and (11b), which requires appeal to context beyond the sentence, also involves departure from the narrative norm, a separation of story sequence from event sequence (cf. section 1.11). The vagueness of the Russian perfective allows an effect that is necessarily sacrificed in trans­ lation into languages such as English and Bulgarian, which encode finer dis­ tinctions in their verb forms. King chooses to preserve saliency in English at the cost of blurring the non-sequential nature of the clause; Lenkova, faced with a choice between greater exaggeration of the effect or sacrificing it to accuracy, chooses accuracy over effect. I conclude (contra Beedham 1982) that Russian sentence grammar does not encode in the perfective aspect a difference between action and result (state resulting from an action). The contextual literary effect described in section 3 is possible only because Russian grammar is vague with respect to the distinction.

NOTES 1.

Fuller documentation than is possible in a conference paper is found in Chvany 1985a, b, 1987, and references therein. Further notes will refer to specific points in those papers.

2.

Hopper and Thompson (1980) provide data from some 40 of the world's languages as evi­ dence of the association of relative grounding with grammatical specialization. Relative grounding in simple texts is perceived quite consistently; that is, grounding as a percep­ tual phenomenon (independent of secondary literary effects) lends itself to replicable

230 C A T H E R I N E V. C H V A N Y

testing. In other words, if informants are asked to pick out the foregrounded or plotadvancing clauses in simple non-literary sequential texts (such as those illustrated in the appendix to H&T), or in a children's story such as Tolstoj's "The Three Bears" (Tri medvedja), in the original or translation, the agreement is too striking to be attributed to coin­ cidence. Similar agreement is found in judgements over relative grounding of clauses within a foregrounded or backgrounded passage. Hesitations and uncertainties, if any, predictably appear over the same few clauses (cf. illustrations from "The Three Bears" in Chvany 1985a, b). Intuitions of grounding are quite basic to language competence and develop rather early in the second language acquisition process: I have obtained similar results in infor­ mal experiments with students whose Russian was far from native. For the purposes of this paper, Hopper and Thompson's most important contribution is that they made it pos­ sible to correlate a narrative norm with a linguistic norm, thus providing an empirical basis for the study of literary deviations from these norms. The seminal study of Reinhart (1982/1984) served as a springboard to my own investiga­ tions. Reinhart relates spatial principles facilitating the visual perception of figure against ground (with illustrations drawn from the work of the pioneers of Gestalt psychology) to properties that facilitate the perception of a sequential plot line in a narrative. Sequentiality is related to Gestalt's "good continuity"; aspect and pinpointing (i.e. individuating) categories to Gestalt's "small size, proximity, closure." Reinhart also points out that the visual perception of figure is independent of importance (anthropocentric or culturally determined). And, most importantly for the analogy with normal vs. poetic foreground­ ing, the interpretation of a figure is dependent on a contextual frame. My 1985 papers confirm, enrich and extend Reinhart's analogy with support from Slavic data, suggesting that the principle of "good continuity" can also account for the way grammatically similar clauses "cohere" into a "plot line" or "main thread." The fit between principles of temporal perception (e.g., of narrative) and of spatial perception (e.g., of pictures) is such that the Gestalt principles can aid in the construction of a theoretical model of the grammatical properties of narrative. An equally fruitful return to early Gestalt psychologists' insights about interrelations between space and time, two cognitive domains that many languages encode similarly, is found in Jackendoff 1983. 4. The non-trivial nature of the statistical correlation between grounding and aspect in Rus­ sian (contra a claim in Hopper 1979) is demonstrated in Chvany 1985a. 5. Prince's concept of "narrativity" provides the norm with an interest requirement ("a point," 74-76) which accords with the "principles of conversation" formulated by Searle (1971 and elsewhere): "Be informative!" (cf. the application of Paduceva 1982 to Lewis Carroll's "Alice" stories); or with Culler's and Prince's requirement of human scale (Cul­ ler 1975: 143, cited in Prince 1981:63). In Labov's studies of non-literary oral narrative, the minimal interest level of the narrative norm is subject to a behavioral test: it must not elicit from the addressee the dreaded question: "So what?" (1972:366). 6. This property of direct speech is well known, cf. Benveniste (1966); it is often signaled by word order and intonation, viz. the exercises in Bryzgunova 1972. There is, however, evi­ dence that languages differ in the extent to which they allow other sentence elements to be eclipsed; this question, first raised in Chvany 1973 as a problem for transformational syntax, must now be reexamined in terms of language typology — languages that require,

A S P E C T A N D D I S C O U R S E SALIENCY

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admit, or forbid the dropping of personal pronouns seems to behave differently with respect to the presentation of direct speech. The Cechov examples are analyzed in my 1985a. 7. Hopper and Thompson's universal "Transitivity Hypothesis" was that, in any language, grammatical categories that are grammaticized together will be drawn from the same pole on a scale much like the one shown in (i). According to H&T, the more categories from the left hand column — which includes components of perfective aspect — the more likely the clause is to be perceived as foregrounded. (i) Transitivity (slightly adapted from Hopper and Thompson 1980) Salient (perfective, 'Transitive') pole action; volition telicity (goal-directedness) punctual event affirmative status; realis mode participants (2 or more) affected by the action highly individuated; referential

opposite pole non-action; non-volition no goal or object durative event or state negation; irrealis mode participants (1 or 0) unaffected non-individuated or missing

The Transitivity scale was the first systematic attempt to relate grounding to a global, sca­ lar typology of sentences, providing the impetus to my own investigations. On Russian aspect in light of Transitivity, see Holden 1981. Research since 1980 has shown that some of Transitivity's predictive claims are too strong; it remains essentially valid, however, as a probabilistic statement, cf. notes 8, 9, 10 below. 8. There do exist Russian constructions that violate the Transitivity hypothesis, where categories grammaticized together are not from the same column; such constructions as Smotri ne upadif 'Watch out you don't fall!' where a non-volitional perfective combines with negation, or On vypil vody 'He drank some water,' where perfective combines with partitive genitive, are departures from the typological norm represented by the genitive of negation. Mustajoki 1985 shows that the statistical clustering involving the genitive vs. accusative in negated objects (to the extent that it has been studied) is not as clear as had been thought. However, though few individual grammatical factors associated with G or A have predictive value for case choice, it seems clear that the grouping of factors has a cumulative effect strongly favoring one case or another. Though we still lack computeraided statistical confirmation of clusterings, Frumkina's experiments (1971) show that lin­ guistic competence includes quite reliable (and replicable) statistical intuitions; her infor­ mants' ranking of words according to frequency showed more agreement among them­ selves than among corpus-based counts. Such results permit a certain confidence in rely­ ing on spot-checked intuitions until they can be replicated in large-scale statistical studies. (On the typologically non-normative constructions, cf. Kucera's, Rappaport's and Nichols' papers in Flier and Timberlake 1985.) 9. The ideal of a language-independent measure of grounding has receded as research shows that some parameters must have different values in different languages. One of these is, of course, overt pronouns, whose Saliency depends on whether it is normal to drop them in a particular language. Another, discovered in a comparison of English-Russian and Russian-English literary translations by Rugaleva (1984), is that English has a much

232

CATHERINE V. CHVANY

greater statistical preference for two-participant structures than does Russian (e.g. on ne pokazyvalsja might be translated as he didn't show his face, and vice-versa) — this in spite of the fact that English shows a far greater preference for passive (derived intransitive) constructions than does Russian (e.g. he was robbed is more normally translated as the active ego ograbili lit.: 'unspecified people robbed him' than as the passive on byl ograblen). This finding supports the notion of a parameterized universal grammar, viz. Chomsky 1981/1982. 10.

The necessary provisional Saliency scale adapts only slightly the individuation features of Transitivity (cf. note 7 above). The role of anaphoric elements in individuation and grounding requires much more work, for it is obvious that the parameters of pronoun dis­ tribution will have to be set differently for different languages (cf. note 9). It is also clear that their role within clauses (where they are usually thematic) must be distinguished from their role in discourse. Another parameter that needs examination is the Affirmative/Negative axis. The clustering of negation with background categories is not universal (cf. note 8), and the role of negation in narration requires further investigation. For instance, it is not clear that the correlation of negation with background is statistically significant. One important variable is the effect of negation on the situation hierarchy (7): in some contexts, non-per­ formance of an action may constitute a volitional, plot-advancing, foregrounded event, but elsewhere a negated event or activity may be equivalent to a state.

11.

Beedham's concept of aspect derives from the 1972 work by Verkuyl. Historically, Verkuyl's notion of "compositional aspect" was an important step toward the conception of aspect, not as a property of lexical verbs or their individual forms but of whole sentences. This work can now be seen as one of many forerunners of the approach to aspect through a typology of situations. (An equally important forerunner is Miller 1970, which suggests that aspect, as well as stativity, must be defined on sentences.) A detailed critique of Beedham 1982 is found in Chvany 1987.

12.

The same clause also gets the highest Transitivity score (see note 7). This text is discussed in terms of both scales in Chvany 1985b, which illustrates some limitations of Transitivity and justifies the multi-factor Saliency approach for the practical study of belletristic texts, and for quantifying cross-linguistic transfer of grounding in translations.

REFERENCES Aristotle. 1942.

The Poetics. Translated by Preston Epps. Chapel Hill.

Achmanova, A. S. 1966. Slovar' lingvističeskich terminov. Moscow: Sovetskaja ènciklopedija. Beedham, Christopher. 1982. The Passive Aspect in English, German and Russian (=Tübinger Beiträge zur Linguistik, 186). Tübingen: Gunter Narr Verlag.

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Benveniste, Emile. 1966. Problèmes de linguistique générale I-II. Paris: Gallimard. Brecht, R. D. To appear. The Grammar of Time. Bryzgunova, E. A. 1972. Prakticeskaja fonetika i intonacija russkogo jazyka. Moscow: Russkij jazyk. Chomsky, Noam A. 1982. Lectures on Government and Binding. Dordrecht: Foris. Chvany, Catherine V. 1985a. "Backgrounded Perfectives and Plot Line Imperfectives (Toward a Theory of Grounding in Text)." In Flier and Timberlake, eds., 247-73. 1985b. "Foregrounding, 'Transitivity', Saliency." Essays in Poetics 10/2, 1-27. 1987. Review of Beedham 1982. Folia Slavica 8, 352-60. 1980.

"The Role of Verbal Tense and Aspect in the Narration of The Tale of Igor's Campaign." In Andrej Kodjak, Krystyna Pomorska, M. J. Connolly, eds., The Structural Analysis of Narrative Texts. Columbus: Slavica, 7-23.

1979.

"Grammatical categories in the Narration of Elin Pelin's Zemja." Folia Slavica 3,296-316.

1973. "On 'Root' and 'Structure Preserving' in Russian." In You'll take the High Node and 11 Take the Low Node (Papers from the Comparative Syntax Parasession, CLS IX). Chicago: Chicago Linguistic Society, 252-90. Culler, Jonathan. 1975. Structuralist Poetics. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Flier, Michael S. and Alan Timberlake, eds. 1985. The Scope of Slavic Aspect (=UCLA Slavic Studies, 12). Columbus: Slavica. Frumkina, R. M. 1971. Verojatnost' èlementov teksta i recevoe povedenie. Moscow: Nauka. Hansen-Löve, Aage. 1981. "Russian formalism." (Transl, by Alison Herford). Essays in Poetics 6/2, 54-62. Holden, Kyrii T. 1981. "Some Recent Contributions on Russian Aspect in the RLJ in the Light of Transitivity Theory." Russian Language Journal 35, nos. 121-122, 45-57. Hopper, Paul J. 1979. "Aspect and Foregrounding in Discourse." In Discourse and Syntax (=Syn­ tax and Semantics, 12). New York: Academic Press, 214-31.

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Hopper, Paul J. and Sandra A. Thompson. 1980. "Transitivity in Language and Discourse." Language 56, 251-99. Hopper, Paul J. and Sandra A. Thompson, eds. 1982. Studies in Transitivity (Syntax and Semantics, 15). New York: Academic Press. Jackendoff, Ray S. 1983. Semantics and Cognition. Cambridge: MIT Press. Jakobson, Roman. 1957/1971. "Shifters, Verbal Categories and the Russian Verb." Reprinted in Selected Writings II. The Hague: Mouton, 130-47. Also in Waugh and Halle, eds. 1936/1971. "Beitrag zur allgemeinen Kasuslehre." Reprinted in Selected Writings II. The Hague: Mouton, 23-71. Also in Waugh and Halle, eds. Kucera, Henry. 1983. "A Semantic Model of Verbal Aspect." In American Contributions to the IXth Congress of Slavists, Kiev, U.S.S.R., M. S. Flier, ed. Columbus: Slavica, 171-84. 1985. "Aspect in Negative Imperatives." In Flier and Timberlake, eds., 118-28. Labov, William. 1972. "The Transformation of Experience in Narrative Syntax." Language in the Inner City. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 354-96. Miller, J. E. 1970. "Stative Verbs in Russian." Foundations of Language 6, 488-504. Mustajoki, Arto. 1985. Padez dopolnenija v russkich oiricateVnych predlozenijach, 1: Izyskanija novych metodov v izucenii staroj problemy (=Slavica Helsingensia, 2). Hel­ sinki: Yliopistopaino. Nichols, Johanna. 1985. "Aspect and Inversion in Russian." In Flier and Timberlake, eds., 94-117. Paduceva, E. V. 1982. "Tema jazykovoj kommunikacii v skazkach L'juisa Kerrolla." Semiotika i informatika 18, 76-119. Prince, Gerald. 1981. "Narrativity." In Karl Menges and Daniel Rancour-Laferriere, eds., AXIA. Davis Symposium on Literary Evaluation (Stuttgarter Arbeiten zur Ger­ manistik, 94). Stuttgart: Akademischer Verlag Hans-Dieter Heinz, 61-76. Rappaport, Gilbert  1985. "Aspect and Modality in Contexts of Negation." In Flier and Timberlake, eds., 194-223.

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Reinhart, Tanya. 1984. "Principles of Gestalt Perception in the Temporal Organization of Narrative Texts." Linguistics 22, 779-809. Rugaleva, Anelya. 1984. "Transitivity and Situation Representation." Paper read at New England Slavic Association (NESA) Conference, Cambridge, Mass. Searle, J. R. 1971. "What is a Speech Act?" In J. R. Searle, ed., The Philosophy of Language. London: Oxford University Press, 39-53. Shukman, Ann. 1977. "Ten Russian Short Stories — Theory, Analysis, Interpretation." Essays in Poetics 2/2, 27-95. Thelin, Nils . 1984. "Coherence, Perspective and Aspectual Specification in Slavic Narrative Discourse." In Casper de Groot and Hannu Tommola, eds., Aspect Bound: A Voyage into the Realm of Germanic, Slavic and Finno-Ugrian Aspectology (Proceedings from the First Scandinavian Symposium on Aspectology in Vaasa, Aug. 26-28, 1983). Dordrecht: Foris, 225-38. Waugh, Linda R. and Morris Halle, eds. 1984. Roman Jakobson. Russian and Slavic Grammar. Grammatical Studies 19311981. Berlin: Mouton.

Cited Texts A. P. Čechov. 1962 Sobranie socinenij, ed. by V. V. Ermilov. Moscow: Gos. izd. chud. lit. L. N. Tolstoj. 1960 "Tri medvedja." In Lukomor'e, Skazki sovetskich písatelej, ed. by T. Gabbe and I. Chalturin. Moscow: Detgiz, 130-33. Marina Cvetaeva. 1967. Moj Puskin. Moscow: Sovetskij pisatel', 34. Marina Cvetaeva, Anna Ahmatova. 1979. Mojat Puskin. Eseta. Transl, by Cveta Lenkova. Varna: Georgi akalov, 15-16. Marina Tsvetaeva. 1980. A Captive Spirit. Selected Prose. Transi, and ed. by J. Marin King. Ann Arbor: Ardis, 319.

Discourse analysis of aorist and imperfect in Bulgarian and French* Jean-Pierre Desclés Université de Paris-Sorbonne

0

&

Zlatka Guentchéva Centre National de la Recherche scientifique

Introduction

It is well known that the feature "past" is associated with both French and Bulgarian imperfect and aorist forms (Passé Composé and Passé Sim­ ple in French, or Aorist in Bulgarian). We shall not treat this deictic func­ tion here even though the exceptions where reference to the past is not clearly brought out by these forms, merit discussion. Our analysis of imperfect and aorist forms in Bulgarian and French will be founded on the conceptual opposition State/Process/Event. The paper is organized as follows : Section 1 gives an outline of our theoretical princi­ ples; it presents the three above concepts and also gives information about two referential systems : an enunciative system and a non-actual system; Section 2 uses the preceding concepts to discuss the values of "Passé Sim­ ple" (PS) in French and the values of "Aorist" (AOR) in Bulgarian and gives some contrastive differences between these two forms; Section 3 investigates some principal uses of Bulgarian and French Imperfects (IMP) attempting to discover an eventual invariant meaning underlying this kind of grammatical form. There are different methods to describe aspects and tenses in natural languages. One of these combines the principles of generative semantics with traditional structuralist research to describe the grammatical categories of aspect and tense by means of hierarchical features. This method was used by Thelin (1978) on Slavic material. Our approach involves integrating discursive functions to investigate the meaning of gram-

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matical categories. This approach is based on the enunciative conception of E. Benveniste (1966) and more generally of Indo-European linguists like J. Kurylowicz (1975), J. Safariewicz (1974) and R. Jakobson (1963). Our description takes into account the discursive function associated with aorist and imperfect forms. We will use the opposition between fore­ grounding and backgrounding introduced by Weinrich (1964) and used by Hopper (1979), with the difference that the basic opposition aorist/imperfect forms is not equal to foregrounding/backgrounding but is based on the notions of Event, Process or State. Foregrounding and backgrounding are therefore consequences of the above aspectual-temporal opposition. 1

Theoretical preliminaries

From the point of view of reference, it is necessary to differentiate between the time axis and the temporal referential system of the speaker. The latter is complex since it is organised with two sub-systems: the enun­ ciative system and the non-actual system. The enunciative system is the temporal referential system of instants which are directly related to the speaker; it is the temporal system of dialogues between the speaker and other participants. The non-actual system is the temporal referential system of instants which is not directly related to the speaker: the instant and the Event are defined by the plot line of the narration. This distinction rejoins Benveniste's distinction: discourse ("discours")/ history ("histoire") or Weinrich's distinction: Besprechung/Erzählung. While it is mentioned in the article it is not used explicitly (the details of its application to the Bulga­ rian AOR may be seen in Guentchéva/Desclés 1982; Guentchéva 1985). To understand our paper, it is not necessary to know in detail all characteristics of the two systems. Different values of linguistic markers (of aspect and tense) exist which reveal the organisation of the underlying temporal refer­ ential systems of languages. Some morphological markers can be specifi­ cally related to one sub-system. For instance, we will show that PS is specific to the non-actual system. But this is not the case of its Bulgarian "analogue" — the aorist. We will also show that the markers like IMP have different meanings according to the referential system where they are used. We shall not develop here this important discourse function. We prefer to insist on another aspectual-temporal distinction: that of State, Process and Event.

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239

Linguistic literature is not very clear on the notions of 'State,' 'Process' and 'Event.' For instance, Comrie (1976: 13) differentiates them in his definition, but only by means of more intuitive notions ("complete whole," "static/dynamic") or by means of notional oppositions ("Perfective/ Imperfective") related to morphological oppositions like Perfective/ Imperfective in Slavic languages. 1 Saying that Events are viewed "perfectively" presupposes that "Perfectivity" has already been defined. Often, Perfectivity is 'defined' as indicating the view of a situation as a 'single whole,' without distinguishing the various phases that make up that situa­ tion. It may also be 'defined' as an action (or Event) 'pure and simple,' with no mention of additional overtones. In short, 'Event' is often defined through 'Perfectivity' and perfective meaning is defined as being very close to the notion of Event. In a more recent study, Mourelatos (1981) attempts to classify verbs according to their aspectual properties, using a terminology similar to Vendler's (1967): Activities ( run around, walk, swim along, push (a cart) ); Accomplishments (run a mile, paint a picture, grow up, recover from ill­ ness); Achievements (recognize, find, win (the race), start, stop, be born, die); States (desire, want, love, hate, dominate). Mourelatos (1981: 201) proposes a binary hierachy where situations are divided into states and occurrences (Actions), occurrences into processes (Activities) and events (Performances), events into developments (Accomplishments) and punc­ tual occurrences (Achievements). 2 We will not follow the Mourelatos-Vendler typology because we for­ mulate the basic concepts within a language-independant framework and in universal terms. For this, we will use a topological language (Desclés 1980a; 1980b; 1987) with figurative representations. 3 Furthermore, the trichotomy 'State,' 'Process' and 'Event' is based neither on morphological oppositions as perfective/imperfective forms, nor on a classification of verbs where lexical meaning is interrelated with grammatical meaning. While we claim that this trichotomy is necessary to organize the system of grammati­ cal meanings in aspectology, we do not agree with the following basic idea: "the perfective aspect denotes Events, the imperfective aspect denotes States and Processes." Indeed, in Bulgarian, the AOR is formed not only from perfective (pf) but likewise from imperfective (impf) verb stems: (1)

Bg. Tja pisa (impf, AOR) pismoto dva casa. "She wrote the letter for two hours."

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(2)

Bg. Tja napisa (pf, AOR) pismoto za dva casa. "She wrote the letter in two hours."

In the two cases, the denotations are Events while, in the first, we have an imperfective form and, in the second, a perfective form. Universal concepts can be used: (i) to give a well-founded description of aspects and tenses in different languages based on the same system con­ cept; (ii) to set up contrastive analysis for teaching purposes; (iii) to serve as a broad basis for typology free from language-dependant notions. Lan­ guage-dependent notions like Perfectivity or Imperfectivity defined only from observed markers (perfective and imperfective forms) in some specific languages (Russian, Bulgarian) make it difficult to construct good typologies and to have general and efficient methods for foreign-language teaching. We distinguish two kinds of situations: static and dynamic. Each State is a static situation; Process and Event are dynamic situations. A STATE is characterized by the absence of change of discon­ tinuity; all phases of the static situation are the same. In a State, we have neither a starting point (indicating change) nor an end­ ing point (also indicating change). Each State is represented by a n OPEN INTERVAL.

In general, the representation of grammatical denotations of tenses and aspects must be presented not only with points or instants (Reichen­ bach 1947) but with intervals. Instants are points which belong to a referential axis (which is a rep­ resentation of time) and an interval is a part of this axis.4 An INTERVAL is an oriented set of contiguous instants (which are elements of a continuous line) delimited to the left and to the right by two BOUNDARIES which separate the INTERIOR (instants between the boundaries) and the EXTERIOR (instants which are not between the boundaries) of the interval. Each interval is characterized by two boundaries: one to the left, another to the right. Given a boundary to the left of an interval, two cases are possible: either there is a first point instant in the interval and that is said to be closed to the left or there is not a first point instant in the interval and that is said to be open to the left. Given a boundary to the right of an interval, two cases are also possible: either there is a last point instant in the

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interval and that is said to be closed to the right or there is not a last point instant in the interval and that is said to be open to the right. If an interval is open then both boundaries (to the left and to the right) are open. We represent an open interval by the following shaded domain on the temporal axis excluding boundaries:

Figure 1. If an interval is closed then both boundaries (to the left and to the right) are closed. We represent a closed interval by the following shaded domain on the temporal axis including boundaries:

Figure 2. The concept of CLOSED INTERVAL is to be distinguished from that of BOUNDED INTERVAL. Indeed, an interval is bounded when the distance between the two boundaries can be measured by a finite number, i.e. when this interval is commensurable with finite duration. In the same way, we distinguish an open interval from that of an unbounded interval: an interval is unbounded when it is impossible to encompass the interval with bound­ aries i.e. to measure this interval with a number. For instance: (3)

a. Bg. Pătjat kojto izlizase (IMP) ot seloto, krivolicese (IMP) V podnozieto  planinata. b. Fr. La route qui sortait (IMP) du village, serpentait le long de la montagne. "The road which led out of the village, wound around the mountain."

The two examples are narrative. They provide the background in the discourse. The two Imperfects (in Bulgarian and in French) denote PERMA­ NENT STATES, where the distance between boundaries is not finite, i.e. these permanent states are without duration. The referential domain here is an OPEN AND UNBOUNDED INTERVAL.

Consider another example: (4)

a. Bg. Tozi den vremeto bese (IMP) xubavo, no izvednâz nebeto potămnja (pf, AOR) i zapocna (pf, AOR) da vali.

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JEAN-PIERRE DESCLÉS & ZLATKA GUENTCHÉVA b. Fr. Ce jour-là, le temps était (IMP) doux, mais tout à coup le ciel devint (PS) noir et il se mit (PS) à pleuvoir. "That day, the weather was fine but all at once the sky became dark and it started to rain."

An initial descriptive background is expressed by "that day the weather was fine" denoting two states: "that day" and "the weather was fine." These states are not permanent (each day ends, the weather is not always fine). We call them CONTINGENT STATES. A S H. Galton says (1967: 167) "those lasting states were also bounded, but the grammatical form does not indi­ cate this. It merely tells us so-and-so lasted in the past, regardless of limits." The temporal referential domain of the two contingent states denoted by (4a) and (4b) is an OPEN BUT BOUNDED INTERVAL. With these examples, it is clear that permanent or contingent states denote open situations (bounded or unbounded) without beginning or end, that is without a first instant or a final instant included in the referential domain. Static backgrounds in dis­ course are always states. Now, let us give the definition of Process. A PROCESS is a change against a static background; it is oriented from an initial static situation toward a final static situation. A Process is always characterized by a beginning, the starting instant of the change (from the initial static situation). Each Pro­ cess is represented by an interval where the boundary to the left is closed. Progressive presents in English can be considered as instances of Processes: (5)

John is swimming / John is running

The progressive present is analysed by means of the intersection of two intervals representing two Processes: 1) the utterance Process, with the boundary T o to the right; 2) the Process involved in the predicative relation, also with the boundary to the right. T

-[

[//////////////////////A °

 utterance process → ← Process involved in the predication → Figure 3.

>

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The symbol T designates THE ORIGIN (the landmark point) of the tem­ poral referential system of the speaker (for more explanations, see Desclés 1980a). The relation between the beginnings of the two overlapping proces­ ses is not verbalized and is not expressed by specific grammatical markers: the progressive present 'is...ing' indicates only that the two Processes (the utterance Process and the Process involved in the predicative relation) are under way and simultaneous at the landmark point T . When a Process is interrupted in its flow, two kinds of Processes may be obtained — completed Processes and non-completed Processes — depending on whether, or not, the landmark point where the Process is interrupted, coincides with the ending point of change involved in the Pro­ cess that is depending on whether the final State is obtained or not. When the Process is interrupted, the last instant in the Process is always consid­ ered; this last instant is either the ending instant of change (then the Process is COMPLETED) or is not the ending instant of change (then the Process is NONCOMPLETED). In other words, the last instant where the interrupted Process is true, is not always the ending instant of the change involved in it. In both cases, when the Process is interrupted, we obtain a non-progressive Pro­ cess. Each interrupted Process generates an Event as well as a resulting State. For instance, the perfect value expressed by the Bulgarian Perfect and some uses of the French "Passé Composé," codes a resulting State, i.e. a State which is contiguous and provided by the preceding interrupted (completed or non-completed) Process (Desclés/Guentchéva 1982). As we have seen above, the notions of interrupted Process and Event are very close. However, the concepts of 'Process' and 'Event' must be explicitly distinguished to provide an adequate analysis of the functions of progressive and non-progressive forms in English, the oppositions between perfect and aorist forms in Bulgarian or the different uses of the "Passé Composé" and "Passé Simple" in French. In our view, the conceptual trichotomy 'State,' 'Process' and 'Event' is basic and ontologic (Desclés 1987); it cannot be reduced to a conceptual dichotomy like 'State/Action' (Mourelatos 1981: 201) or 'State/Event' (Galton 1976: 15). It is true that Process and Event are related to dynamicity but there are States (for instance the resulting State) which are generated by some preceding Proces­ ses. Consequently, these Sates are not independent of the notion of dynamicity. However, it must be recalled that there are permanent States and contingent States (like: John is young) which are independant of dynamicity.

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We have then, on the one hand, the opposition static/dynamic and, on the other hand, the aspectual trichotomy 'State,' 'Process,' 'Event' which are basic concepts and dialectic counterparts to each other. We should now define the concept of Event. An Event introduces discontinuity against a static background. Each occurrence of an Event is a single whole viewed without regard to what happens before or after this occurrence. Each Event is represented by a closed interval. The concept of Event is closely connected with aoristic meaning. 5 In many languages where the Aorist exists (Ancient Greek, Bulgarian, Alba­ nian, Georgian...), it always denotes an Event. In other languages, other tenses may denote Events. In our view, the invariant meaning of the French "Passé Simple" is that of Event. This value is more fundamental than either foregrounding (as it exists in the discourse opposition foregrounding/ backgrounding; Hopper 1979) or the three semantic features which characterize the usage of "Passé Simple": Past, Detachment and Dimensionalization (Waugh and Monville-Burston 1987). We claim that aoristic forms (Aorist, Past Definite, Preterite,...) are represented by closed intervals and are usually commensurate with dura­ tion (that is the distance between boundaries is positive). We reject the assertion that aoristic forms denote always punctual Events. For instance, the following example: (6)

The Atomic bomb exploded for over a minute.

denotes an Event but it is compatible with duration. Although punctuality is not the basic characteristic of the AOR, the latter may effectively convey it. Closed intervals are adequate figurative representations of aoristic meaning since a point is always a closed interval, that is a closed interval with a null distance between boundaries. Some specific properties of Events will be presented below in studying the Bulgarian AOR and French PS. 2

French 'passé simple' and Bulgarian aorist

A review of the grammatical literature on the PS in French reveals that this tense is seen as ideal for a narrative since it allows a sequence of Events to mark progress in narration.

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Many scholars have associated the PS and the IMP, in French, with the discourse functions of foregrounding and backgrounding, respectively (Weinrich 1973; Hopper 1979). However, for us, the basic function of the PS is not foregrounding but the following: each occurrence of a PS denotes an Event. By definition, each Event is set off against a static background. Thus, consequently, the PS marks a foregrounding in contrast with a backgrounding, often given by IMPs. We agree with Waugh and MonvilleBurston's (1986: 868) observations which showed that there are many news­ paper contexts where the PS does not clearly assume the foregrounding dis­ course function. However, in all their examples, the occurrences of the PS clearly denote Events which happened in the narrative context. In their example (Waugh and Monville-Burston 1986: 870) (7)

[Renoncer ou relancer]... On a souvent dit, à l'occasion des heures difficiles, et elles furent nombreuses dans la vie de la communauté, que nous arrivions à un moment décisif.... (Gérard Jacquet, Le Monde, 1-5-84)

" [ Give up or start again]... It has often been said, when times are difficult, and there were many in the history of the [Common Market] Community, that we were approaching a decisive moment..."

the writer asserts the occurrence of an Event by means of a PS. More importantly, we see that the commentary function is assumed by a PS — contradicting those studies which have claimed that PS functions only for foregrounding and not for commentary (c.f. especially Weinrich). In what follows, we will explore some general properties of Events, discussing them as they occur in specific examples. Two Events can never overlap. They are either concomitant (the closed intervals which represent them are the same) or disjoint (not over­ lapping). Thus, one Event is either before or after another in succession or in simultaneity (in concomitance) with or inside another Event: 6 (8)

Bg. ... dokaraxa (pf, AOR)... koli, deto gi kacixa (pf, AOR), kato otdelixa (pf, AOR) ednovremenno i ranenite. "They brought carts, onto which they lifted them, simulta­ neously separating the wounded." (K. Velickov, quoted in Dejanova 1966:21 and in Lindstedt 1985:83)

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French PSs are used to give structuration to narration by means of a sequence of events: (9)

Fr.

Barnabe contempla la maison, ouvrit les portes et les fenêtres; puis, important, il se promena dans toutes les pièces. "Barnabé contemplated the house, opened the doors and the windows; then, proudly, he walked through all the rooms."

In Bulgarian, the pf AOR plays an analogous function: (10) Bg. Rano v sveta nedelja, otec Ignatij se metna  svoeto pur­ gavo konce, prekrasti se, izleze iz sirokite manastirski porti i se spusna nadolu kăm poleto da obide nivi i livadi. (Elin Pelin, Proletna izmama) "Early that Sunday morning, Father Ignatij mounted his frisky little horse, blessed himself, left the monastery by its large doors and went down to their holdings where he made a tour of the fields and pastures." The Events are associated with the succession structure. Many scholars have pointed out that normally aorist forms "constitute the backbone of a story built on a succession of events" but IMP "can never by itself constitute a story" (Galton 1976: 167). In French, a chain of PSs assumes completely this succession function since each PS denotes an Event located before and after another Event. But the succession function is not inherent in the grammatical meaning of PS (and more generally of aorist forms): the invariant meaning is always "Event." It is possible to include an Event inside another Event: (11) Fr.

Pierre passa toute la journée chez lui: il rangea sa bib­ liothèque, mit à jour son courrier et corrigea toutes ses copies. "Pierre spent all day at home: he straightened his book­ shelves, caught up on his mail and corrected all his papers."

It is also possible to include other Events inside a non-punctual Event. A non-punctual Event may be decomposed into a finite number of Events; each Event resulting from such decomposition is contained in the original Event:

DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF AORIST AND IMPERFECT

(12) Fr.

Les Dinosaures vécurent apparurent il y a plus de "The Dinosaurs lived appeared more than two

247

il y a bien longtemps. Les premiers deux cents millions d'années. long, long ago. The first ones hundred million years ago."

In this case, there is an Event ('lived') and, inside this complex Event (with a duration), we locate the first constitutive Event ('appeared') in the history of Dinosaurs. In narration, each PS denotes one Event which has to be set off against a static referential background often expressed by means of IMP forms (the so-called descriptive IMP). In this case, the Event takes place with the fore­ ground discourse function: (13) Fr.

C'était à cette époque-là également qu'une dame anglaise, épouse d'un médecin, découvrit des dents bizarres, grosses comme des rochers. "It was at this time too that an English lady, the wife of a physician, found some peculiar teeth as big as boulders."

We have seen that Events take place against a static background with­ out introducing any change into that background. However, there are Events that can introduce a change into a referential background which then becomes divided by the occurrence of this Event into two States: a preceding background (to the left of the Event) and a following background (to the right of the Event). This following background is a 'new State' which is implicitly generated by the Event, changing the referential background. To illustrate this change, consider the following sentence: (14)

The weather was fine but all at once the sky became dark and it started to rain.

The initial State is "the weather was fine." The events "the sky became dark" and "it started to rain" introduce changes into the background and generate the new static situation "there was rain." This is represented by the following diagram: preceding state :← 'the weather was fine' → :

event

new state generated by event :

Figure 4.

←

'there was rain'

←

:

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The foreground Events are not independant of background States. In some cases, the Events of the narration modify the referential framework. When a narrative Event happens, it belongs to the plot line of narration; it gives dynamicity to the story and it can introduce a change in preceding States but "in principle, successive verb forms do not necessarily reflect any chronological links. Each of them carries its own chronology with it, and as a rule these are ordonated in one way or another, but not by morphological means, only within the contexts of the sentence" (Galton 1976: 169). From the above examples, it would be possible to infer that pf AOR in Bulgarian and PS in French are analogous. It is clear that AOR and PS are closely related in narrations. But there is an essential difference between them. Indeed, the PS is only used with the "non-actual referential system." In modern French, it is impossible to use the PS in "the actual or enuncia­ tive referential system." All PS are always used to distance Events from the Speech Act. They designate Events which belong to a system which is shar­ ply cut off from the moment of writing. We agree with Waugh and Monville-Burston (1986: 854): "Thus, when PS is used, there is an obligatory detachment, distancing, or lack of immediacy within the communication situation." The cutting off or the detachment posits Events in another referential system, that is, the nonactual. For us, the PS denotes an Event which no longer has any referential relation to the Speech Act and the effect of "distant past" is not inherent to the PS, it is only a general tendency which is a consequence of the lack of any relation with the speaker's (or writer's) temporal referential system. Furthermore, the PS can refer to fairly "recent Events." If the PS is used as a commentary (see (7)), then the Event denoted by the PS is not localized in the writer's referential system, but in the system of narration. The occurrence of an Event expressed by PS, is not directly related to the presence of the writer. In Bulgarian, the AOR shares with the PS the discourse function to denote Events inserted in a succession structure. However, the uses of the AOR are wider than that of the PS since it can even be used in the enuciative system. In this case, it may indicate either an occurrence of an Event in relation with other events or a single occurrence of an Event: (15) Bg. Edna zvezda se sovna (pf, AOR) i prerjaza (pf, AOR) nebeto s ognena certa. -Njakoj siromax predade (pf, AOR) bogu dux — progovori Lazo.

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-Ja njakoja miada bulka se predade (pf, AOR) drugimu. (E.Pelin, Kosaci) "A falling star streaked down and cut the sky with a brillant light." "Some poor soul has died — proffered Lazo." "Or some woman has given herself to someone." The first two pf AOR se sovna and prerjaza designate two successive Events in a narrative system while the next pf AOR designate two single Events in reference to an enunciative system. It should be pointed out that AOR can be formed from both perfective and imperfective stems. The two aspects of the AOR can be used either in the enunciative system or in the non-actual system. While the pf AOR is very closely tied to narrative function, the impf AOR may also be employed: (16) Bg. Jusuf pisa (impf, AOR), bärsa (impf, AOR), pisa (impf, AOR), bärsa (impf, AOR) i vkraja nakraistata otnovo se zadârza na ieroglifno napisanata duma 'istălb.' "Jusuf wrote, erased, wrote, erased and finally kept the word written in hieroglyphics 'istălb'." The difference between pf AOR and impf AOR is the following: the pf AOR always marks the completion of the Process (in French: 'achèvement du processus'); the imperfective aspect does not explicitly mark this. In dis­ course, the impf AOR appears after a sequence of pf AOR which form the links of the plot narrative line. Thus, by means of imperfective aorist forms, one signals the occurrence of an Event, an Event not necessarily considered in its completion ('achèvement') but only as a whole with a boundary at the moment of interruption of the Process; grammatically, completion is not marked. With the opposition completed/non-completed Event, we can explain the value of some derived impf AOR. 8 For instance, in: (17) Bg. Nejko izprazva (impf, AOR) i napălva (impf, AOR) disagite njakolko pàti. "Nejko emptied and refilled the sacks several times over." the two derived impf AOR indicate the intended but not necessarily realized completions of two Events. Because the intention of the narrator is to focalize attention on iteration and not on the intended completion, he has used the derived imperfective aspect.

250

JEAN-PIERRE DESCLÉS & ZLATKA GUENTCHÉVA It is useful to compare the same example with pf AOR: (18) Bg. Nejko izprazni (pf, AOR) i napălni (pf, AOR) disagite njakolko pàti. "Nejko emptied and refilled the sacks several times over."

The translation, as we can see, is not able to take into account the dis­ course effects of the Bulgarian text. Indeed, the perfective forms izprazni "emptied" and napalni "refilled" designate, as we see it, completed Events, iteration becoming secondary. When we replace the derived imperfectives by primary imperfectives, we obtain: (19) Bg. Nejko prazni i păini disagite njakolko păti. Primary imperfective does not mark either the realized completion or the intended completion of the Event. These forms indicate that comple­ tion (realized or intended) is not expressed. Since the impf AOR is neutral in terms of the opposition completion/ lack of completion of the Event, this form is useful to express the mere occurrence of an Event. Indeed, let us compare: (20) Bg. Pi (impf, AOR) li si kafeto na obed? "Did you have your coffee at lunch?" (21) Bg. Izpi (pf, AOR) li si kafeto na obed? "Did you drink your coffee at lunch?" Pi (impf, AOR) denotes only the occurrence of a realized Event while izpi (pf, AOR) marks in addition that the denoted Event is considered until its termination. In the example: (22) Bg. Izpix (pf, AOR) si kafeto, da varvim. "I have had my coffee; let's go." the completion of the Event is considered and the second Event is pre­ sented as a consequence of the first. When we replace the pf AOR izpix by the impf AOR pix, the effect of consequence is lacking. In conclusion, the analysis which we propose of various uses of the PS and of the AOR (pf and impf) allows us to specify the following invariant features: (i) (ii)

PS and AOR always denote Events; All uses of PS are restricted to narrative in the non-actual refer­ ential system;

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(iii) The morphological opposition perfective/imperfective codes the aspectual opposition between completion ('achèvement') and non-completion; (iv) PS does not grammaticalize the opposition completed/non-com­ pleted Event; (v) The uses of aorist forms are not restricted to narrative in the nonactual referential system; they can be employed in the enuncia­ tive system also; (vi) General Aoristic meaning always involves the notion of Event. Other features and restrictions in use are additional and specific to an aoristic form in a specific language. The discourse effects of aoristic forms are always compatible with this basic meaning; (vii) PS can be considered as an aoristic form with restricted uses and with the general meaning of an Event. 3

Imperfect

As we have said above, imperfect (IMP) provides in narrative the backgrounding of the plot line of the story. In this case, the discourse oppo­ sition between aorist forms and IMP is sharply constrasted. Let us take the following text in Bulgarian with its translation in Eng­ lish: (23) Bg. Doktor Sokolov cukna (pf, AOR)  svojata vratnja. Edna stara iena mu o t v o r i (pf, AOR) i toj vlezna (pf, AOR), kato popita (pf, AOR) bărzeskom: -Kleopatra kakvo pravi ? -Pita za tebe — otgovori (pf, AOR) babata usmixnata. Doktorăt premina (pf, AOR) dălgija dvor i vleze (pf, AOR) V stajata si. Tazi staja, kojato mu sluzese (impf, IMP) za rabota, za apteka i za spalnja, bese (impf, IMP) gola, siroka, s dolapi v stenite i s dälboka kamina. Na ednata policka stojaxa (impf, IMP) naredeni vsickite mu lekarstva; na masickata xavance, njakolko medicinski knigi, razxvärljani, i re­ volver. Nad legloto mu vísese (impf, IMP) dvucevna puska s cantickata. Samo edna kartina ukrasjavase (impf, IMP) stajata: (...) (Ivan Vazov, Pod Igoto) "Sokolov knocked at the door of his house. An old woman opened it. He entered and asked briskly:

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"How is Cleopatra?" "She asked about you — replied the smiling old woman." The doctor crossed a long courtyard and entered his room. The room which served him as office, pharmacy and bed­ room was spacious, almost bare, with closets and a deep fireplace. A single shelf held all the medicine; on a small table was a mortar, a few scattered medical books and a revolver. Above his bed hung a double-barrelled shotgun and a game bag. A single painting decorated the room (...)" This text contains seven pf AOR (which must be translated in French by seven PS). The first three pf AOR succeed one another and refer to three successive Events. The next two (popita 'asked' and otgovori 'replied') are also two successive Events: they place a dialogue inside the development of the story. The next pf AOR premina 'crossed' and vleze 'entered' are also Events which are linked to the preceding sequence of Events. The conjunc­ tion kato (with a temporal meaning) seems to confuse the succession of Events. Kato introduces a hierarchy between two Events: popita 'asked' being considered as secondary with regard to vlezna 'entered.' Without kato the two Events have to be considered as belonging to the same level. The English translation does not take this hierarchy into account. The seven pf AOR express the facts objectively, independent of the narrator. The five impf IMP do not contribute to building the skeleton of the story but rather give information on the decor behind the Events. They denote descriptive states which form the background of the story. The successive IMPs on the syntagmatic axis do not code any succession of States on the time axis. Accordingly, it can be concluded that aorists build a dynamic succession based on successive changes from one Event to the next Event while IMPs establish a static situation based on the unchanging: "(...) unchanging states are to occupy their proper place as the dialectic counterpart of change" (Galton 1967: 167). There are different kinds of States denoted by impf IMP. Some States are non-bounded, as in (3a) and (3b) or, in general, in the descriptions of heros as in: (24) Bg. Sam ostanal prost, Marko obicaše (impf, IMP) ucenieto i učenite. "Though he himself remained uneducated, Marko loved education and cultured people."

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Other impf IMPs denote contingent States, as in: (25) Bg. Taja proxladna majska vecer corbadji Marko, gologlav, po xalat, vecerjase s celjadta si na dvora. Fr. Par une fraîche soirée de mai, le corbadji Marko, nu-tête, enveloppé dans sa robe bordée de fourrure, dînait en plein air avec sa famille. "On a cool evening in May, corbadji Marko, bare-headed, wrapped in his fur-trimmed robe, dined outside with his family." This example may be represented by means of a bounded open inter­ val: the contingent State is enclosed within a finite duration. The occur­ rence of a contingent State is often indicated by some temporal adverbial expression as by taja proxladna majska vecer 'on a cool evening in May.' According to Galton (1976: 167), "(...) those lasting states (are) also temporally bounded, but the grammatical form does not indicate this. It merely tells us so-and-so lasted in the past, regardless of limits." This characterisation corresponds exactly to what we call "contingent states which are represented by bounded open intervals." However, in our view, the underlying, or invariant, meaning of the Imperfect forms is not "the expression of a State which continued unchanged for a shorter or longer period" (Galton 1976: 169) since some uses of IMP indicate processes with the exact meaning we have defined above. This value appears in the follow­ ing example: (26) Bg. Sibil, strasnijat xajdutin, kogoto zaptieta i kărserdari tärsexa (impf, IMP) pod därvo i kamăk, slizase (impf, IMP) ot planinata i otivase (impf, IMP) da se predade. Fr. Chibil, le redoutable brigand que la police et la maréchaus­ sée recherchaient dans tous les coins et recoins, descendait de la montagne et allait pour se rendre. "Chibil the dangerous brigand whom the police and the constabulary had searched for in every nook and cranny, came down from the mountain and went to turn himself in." The first impf IMP tärsexa occurs in a subordinate clause. While it describes a static background, the next two impf IMP occur in the principal clause and mark dynamic situations, not only Events but also Processes. A Process is a sequence of instantaneous States where each instantane­ ous State is different from the preceding and the following instantaneous

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States (Desclés 1980). On the other hand, a permanent or contingent State is also a sequence of instantaneous States but each instantaneous State remains identical to the other instantaneous States of the sequence. The value of Process expressed by an impf IMP is very clear in the fol­ lowing example: (27) Bg. Denjat mina, svečerjavase se. (Quoted by Maslov 1959:256) Fr. Le jour passa, la nuit tombait. "Day ended, night fell." where the AOR (or the PS) is opposed to the impf IMP: an Event is opposed to a Process. Here, it is difficult to assign a value of State to the IMP because there is a manifest changing in the static background. It is impossible to assign to this form the value of Event since then two AOR must be used to indicate the succession. The choice of IMP indicates that it is impossible to consider the last instant where the predicative relation svecerjavase se "ended" is true. It is usual to call attention to the iterative value of impf IMP. Maslov (1959) calls it neogranicenno-kratnyj tip 'the unlimited repetition type.' In our conception, iteration must be analysed as an Open Class of discrete Events. This class is constructed by sequence of occurrences of the same Event without considering a first or a last occurrence of the Event. We propose the following representation: e

e

e

Figure 5. When stativity is relative to the durative continuity of non-changing, it is represented by an open interval. When stativity is constructed by succes­ sive discrete Events, as in iteration, it is represented by an open class. In both the above cases, and more generally, stativity is always associated with the concept of open boundary (to the left and to the right): Consider the following example: (28) Bg. Toj cas po cas izlizase (impf, IMP) navän i dălgo se vglezdase (impf, IMP) V tămnija masiv na planinata. Fr. Il sortait tout le temps dehors et regardait longuement la montagne. "He went outside all the time and looked at length at the mountain "

DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF AORIST AND IMPERFECT

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It is clear that the IMPs do not directly indicate the occurrence of two succesive Events but rather generate an Open Class of the two iterated events. In this way, a static background is created. Iteration is indicated by markers as adverbial expressions. The value of habit is a particular case of the above value and is con­ structed as an Open Class generated by the same Event: (29) Bg. Vsjaka sutrin Belco stavase (impf, IMP), otărsvase se (impf, IMP) ot slamata, oblizvase (impf, IMP) si naträpnalite ot lezane mesta, izlizase (impf, IMP) izpod sajvanta i trägvase (impf, IMPF) ă rekata da pie voda. (Elin Pelin) "Every morning Belco got up, shook himself free of hay, licked the stiff parts of his body, went out of the stable and went off toward the river to drink." It is interesting to note that in this kind of example the impf IMP does not directly denote events (but an open class of events) and that these Events do not carry the main line of the narrative. Thus, an open class plays the same role as a descriptive State expressed in an example like (29). An Open Class constitutes a static background and not a sequence of fore­ ground Events located on the plot line. In some cases, it could be thought that an IMP denotes a single Event, like the PS or AOR do. This would be an incorrect analysis. Indeed, in the following example, the two IMP denote not only two single and successive events but also two new states: (30) Fr.

Cinq semaines plus tard, il épousait Jane, puis, trois mois après, il  étranglait, redevenant libre et prêt à rechercher une nouvelle victime... "Five weeks later, he married Jane, then three months afterwards he strangled her, becoming free again and ready to look for a new victim..."

The value of the first IMP épousait "married" takes place against a sta­ tic background. This IMP generates both an Event and a new State which is a consequence of it. The second IMP expresses another Event which takes place during the new State generated by the preceding Event and which provides another new State in consequence of the Event. It is clear that each new State changes the preceding static background. Note that this value of IMP appears with specific markers as adverbial expressions ("five weeks later," "five minutes later," ...). In the above example, IMP is not

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equivalent to a PS or an AOR because, as these aoristic forms denote only single events, they cannot express new states generated by events. It is the same in Bulgarian (cf. Stankov 1966: 75). It is possible to find a sequence of PS and IMP, as: (31) Fr.

Le train roulait à 180 km/heure. Le mécanicien s'endormit et cinq minutes plus tard le train déraillait... "The train was travelling at 180 km/hour. The mecanic fell asleep and five minutes later the train derailed ..."

Note that if PS is used (Cinq minutes plus tard le train dérailla), only an Event in a succession of events is expressed and the notion of a new State is never implied. This use of IMP is well known because many novelists use this form. Researchers (Martin 1971: 98; Durin 1985; ...) propose different labels ("pittoresque," "journalistique," "judiciaire"...) and different explana­ tions. The value of Event and the creation of a new State have not been mentioned. In our opinion, this analysis gives a unified view of the multiple uses illustrated above. In some specific contexts, a similar proposition with an IMP as (32) Fr.

Cinq minutes plus tard le train déraillait "Five minutes later the train derailed."

gets a modal value (called in French 'irréel') where the fact represented by the proposition was not true: the Event did not happen, therefore no new State was created. In: (33) Fr.

(34) Fr.

Sans l'intervention du mécanicien, le train déraillait. "Without the engineer's intervention, the train would have derailed." Heureusement que le feu est passé au rouge car alors le train déraillait. "Thank goodness the light turned red or the train would have derailed."

it is understood that "it is false that the train derailed." This value is pro­ vided by a negative or privative expression. The modal value can occur with a modal adverb like 'probably': (35) Fr.

Navjarno v tozi moment toj vlizaše vece v grada. Struvase i se, ce go vizda. Toj razkazvaše sluckata na Lavin; bieden ot valnenie, Lavin zvăneše  prisluznicata...

DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF AORIST AND IMPERFECT

257

(Quoted by Stankov 1969: 97 and by Lindstedt 1985: 141) "He was probably already entering the city. It was as if she saw him. He was telling Lavin about the incident; pale with emotion, Lavin was ringing for the maid..." Here, the modal expression makes us leave the foreground. The adver­ bial expression "at that moment" inserts a new referential which is, in this case, hypothetical in the plot line of the story. Each Event (expressed by an IMP) is located in this hypothetical referential. The IMP is associated with the creation of an hypothetical or 'irréel' (in the above examples) stative referential. We shall describe neither the uses of IMP in the enunciative system, nor the uses of pf IMP in Bulgarian (the latter form is employed in subordi­ nate clauses). While the Bulgarian AOR and the French PS do not overlap in their uses (see Section 2), the Bulgarian and French IMP are very close (we leave aside the perfective/imperfective morphological opposition). It is not certain that a clear invariant meaning can be associated with all uses of IMP. Scholars such as Ivancev refuse an invariant meaning for IMP: "The value of IMP is not unified; it is intrinsically contradictory and it can­ not be reduced to a general value. It is constructed on several levels because the different values result from its historical development" (Ivan­ cev 1965: 18). From the above analysis emerges, not a clear invariant, rather the fol­ lowing general tendency: when an IMP occurs, there is an open right boun­ dary. We deduce from this property the following points: (i)

IMP is not compatible with the value of an occurrence of an Event (assumed by aoristic forms); (ii) In a static situation, the right boundary is always open; it has been seen that IMP, in many examples, very often denote States (a descriptive State or static background...), hence the right boundary is open; (iii) IMP can denote a Process in progress; hence the right boundary is open; (iv) The notion of iterativity is analyzed by means of what we call an Open Class of Events (where there is not a last Event), hence the right boundary is also open;

258

JEAN-PIERRE DESCLÉS & ZLATKA GUENTCHÉVA (v) (vi)

4

With the value "new State" there is not simply an Event but a State generated by an initial Event; With modal values (called 'irréel' and hypothetical), a new refer­ ential axis is created where a static background (fictitious, uncer­ tain or probable...) is located inside this new static background.

Conclusion

From the above discussion, the following conclusion can be deduced: while aorist forms always denote events, IMP never denote a single Event on a plot line but rather a State, a Process, an Open Class of Events or the insertion of Events inside a new static background. In our opinion, the con­ cepts of State, Process and Event are fundamental to an understanding of the opposition between aorist and imperfect forms. The description of dif­ ferent uses is closely related to these three concepts. We think that aspec­ tual and temporal categories are founded on this primitive conceptual opposition. The aorist and imperfect opposition is epitomized in a last example which has by now become classical: (36) Bg. -Piati (pf, AOR) mu čovekăt... I sto leva baksis mu davase (impf, IMP)... - Vzex (pf, AOR) li gi? -Ne, ne gi vze (pf, AOR), ama davase (impf, IMP) gi covecăt. (Quoted by Maslov 1959: 256 and by Lindstedt 1985: 219220) "The man paid him. And offered him one hundred leva baksheesh..." "Did I take it." "No, you didn't, but he offered it?" The perfective Aorists piati and vzex clearly denote Events with com­ pletion while the Imperfect davase denote a Process (in the past) which was not completed because it did not reach the right boundary of achievement and the right boundary of Process is not closed but remains open.

D I S C O U R S E ANALYSIS O F A O R I S T A N D I M P E R F E C T

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NOTES *

We are grateful to Jean Coyner and Marguerite Manaheim for preparing the manuscript, and for helpful comments.

1.

"States are static, i.e. continue as before unless changed, whereas events and processes are dynamic, i.e. require a continual input of energy if they are not to come to an end; events are dynamic situations viewed as a complete whole (perfectively), whereas proces­ ses are dynamic situations viewed in progress, from within (imperfectively)" (Comrie 1976: 13).

2.

Cf. also Maslov 1978, 1984; Bulygina 1982; Kucera 1983.

3.

We want to associate grammatical categories with their meanings in the same way as Langacker (1982).

4..

The axis is orientated. The notions 'to the left' and 'to the right' and also 'anteriority,' 'simultaneity' and 'posteriority' are constructed by means of temporal orientation.

5.

"Aorist forms in Bulgarian denote essentially bounded situations (Events), each with its beginning and end" (Lindstedt 1985: 81).

6.

No natural language has grammatical markers to express the overlapping of Events.

7.

We represent this situation by a complex Event decomposed into a sequence of simple Events where the first Events are the successive appearances of Dinosaurs.

8.

A non-completed Event is always represented by a closed interval but the boundary to the right is the last instant of the Process and not its termination.

REFERENCES Benveniste, E. 1966. Problèmes de linguistique générale, I. Paris: Gallimard. Bulygina, T.V. 1980. "Grammaticeskie i semanticeskie kategorii i ix svjazi." Aspekty semanticeskix issledovanij, ed. by N . D . Arutjunova & A . A . Ufimceva, 320-355. Moskva: Nauka. Comrie, B. 1976. Aspect. Cambridge: University Press. Dejanova, M. 1966. Imperfekt i aorist v slavjanskite akademija na naukite.

ezici, Sofia: Izdatelstvo na Bälgarskata

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Desclés, J.-P. 1980a. "Construction formelle de la catégorie grammaticale de l'aspect (essai)." (Colloque de Metz sur l'aspect 18-20 mai 1978). Notion d'aspect, ed. by J. David and R. Martin. Paris: Klincksieck. 1980b. "Mathématisation des concepts linguistiques." Modèles linguistiques II:1. Presses Universitaires de Lille. 1987. "The concepts of State, Process and Event in Linguistics." Forum Linguisticum (forthcoming). Durin, j . 1985.

"Stases de concomitance/stases de consecution." Ile colloque franco-bulgare de Linguistique contrastive déc. 1982, 100-126, ed. by Z. Guentchéva and J. Fontaine. Paris: Institut d'Etudes Slaves.

Galton, H. 1976. The Main Functions of the Slavic Verbal Aspect. Skopje: Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts. Guentchéva, Z. 1985. Contributions à l'étude des catégories grammaticales du bulgare littéraire con­ temporain. Vol. II. Thèse de doctorat d'Etat. Département de Recherches Linguistiques. Université de Paris VII. Guentchéva, Z. and J.-P. Desclés. 1982. "L'aoriste en bulgare." Cahiers balkaniques 3: 31-62. Publications Langues' O. Paris: Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales. Hopper, P.J. 1979. "Foregrounding and Aspect in Discourse." Syntax and Semantics 12, Dis­ course and Syntax, ed. by T. Givón, 213-241. New York: Academic Press. Ivancev, S. 1965. "Za xaraktera na protivopostavjaneto aorist: imperfekt v slavjanskite ezici." Ezik i literatura XX: 5, 17-30. Sofia. Jakobson, R. 1963. "Les embrayeurs, les catégories verbales et le verbe russe." Essais de linguis­ tique générale. Paris: Editions de Minuit. Kucera, H. 1983. "A Semantic Model of Verbal Aspect." In M.S. Flier (ed.) American Con­ tributions to the Ninth International Congress of Slavists, vol.1: Linguistics, 171-184. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers. Kurylowicz, J. 1975. Esquisses linguistiques IL München: Wilhelm Fink Verlag.

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Langacker, R. 1982 "Space Grammar, Analysability, and the English Passive." Language 58, 2280. Lindstedt, J. 1985. On the Semantics of Tense and Aspect in Bulgarian. (Slavica Helsingiensia 4) Helsinki. Martin, R. 1971. Temps et aspect. Essai sur l'emploi des temps narratifs en moyen français. Paris: Klincksieck Maslov, J. S. 1959. "Glagol'nyj vid v sovremennom bolgarskom Hteraturnom jazyke (znacenie i upotreblenie). Voprosy grammatiki bolgarskogo literaturnogo jazyka, ed. by S.B. Bernstejn, 157-312. Moskva: Izdatel'stvo AN SSSR. 1978. "K osnovanijam sopostavitel'noj aspektologii." Voprosy sopostavitel'noj aspektologii, Vyp. I, 4-44. Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo Leningradskogo universiteta. 1984. Ocerki po aspektologii. Leningrad: Izdatel'stvo Leningradskogo universiteta. Mourelatos, A. P. D. 1981. "Events, Processes, and States." Syntax and Semantics 14: Tense and Aspect, ed. by Ph. Tedeschi and A. Zaenen, 191-212. New York: Academic Press. Reichenbach, H. 1947. Elements of Symbolic Logic. New York: Macmillan. Safarewicz, J. 1974. Linguistic Studies. Mouton. The Hague-Paris. Stankov, V. 1966. Imperfektàt v sàvremennija bàlgarski knizoven ezik. Sofia: Izdatelstvo na Bälgarskata Akademija na naukite. Thelin, N. B. 1978. Towards a Theory of Aspect, Tense and Actionality in Slavic (=Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, Studia Slavica Upsaliensia, 18). Uppsala. Vendler, Z. 1967. Linguistics in Philosophy. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. Weinrich, H. 1964. Tempus. Stuttgart. Waugh, L.R. and Monville-Burston, M. 1986. "Aspect and Discourse Function: The French Simple Past in Newspaper Usage." Language 62:4, 846-898.

Narrative context and Russian aspect* G r a c e E . Fielder University of Virginia

The goal of this paper is to illustrate the importance of the narrative level in the process of encoding morphological aspect in Russian. Much of the discussion in aspectology today concerns the role of the narrative level as opposed to lower nested levels. In his 1982 article, Timberlake estab­ lished a number of semantic aspectual parameters which, although they operate on the different nested levels (i.e. the base level, the verb level, the predicate level, the propositional level, the narrative level), determine mor­ phologically encoded aspect in Russian primarily when operating on the propositional level, i.e. the predicate in relation to the event frame (1982:214). In his introduction to the volume in which Timberlake's article appears, Hopper (1982:5) equates the propositional level with sentencelevel or clause-level semantics and suggests that "the fundamental notion of aspect is not a local-semantic one but is discourse-pragmatic, and is characterizable as completed event in the discourse" He further claims that "the encoding of percepts in the world always takes place within a discourse rather than a sentence framework and that the potential or real bounding of events in this discourse is a significant parameter in the strategies for for­ mulating an utterance" {op.cit. :6). It is not the object of this paper to argue for one or the other claim, but rather to show that the narrative level may be as important as the propositional level, or in some cases even more important, in the encoding of morphological aspect in Russian. I will do so by showing that the use of the imperfective as konstatacija fakta dejstvija (general-factive, denotative, etc.) cannot be accounted for without refer­ ence to the narrative level. In order to accomplish this, I have selected the verb pair prosit'l/poprosit p "to request, to ask" as representative of those pairs consisting of a

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simplex imperfective and a prefixed perfective — pairs that tend to skew the accepted patterns of usage for aspect. Typically in Russian one finds that in the past tense the perfective verb will be used in unique contexts, and, while the imperfective may also be used to express a unique action, it is characteristically found in durative or iterative contexts. However, text counts based on 3000 pages of contemporary Russian prose reveal that while all contexts with poprosiP are unique, as should be expected, fully two-thirds of the contexts in which prosit is used can also be construed as unique. This use of the imperfective in a context where the perfective aspect might otherwise be expected is usually explained by invoking the term konstatacija fakta dejstvija "an assertion of the fact of the action." For­ syth (1970:82) relabels this use as "simple denotation," which is "the most basic and general function of the imperfective verb: to identify the type of action, naming it without reference to the question of its 'perfectivity' or otherwise." He includes prosit'i/poprosit,p in a group of "verbs of speaking" which "show a considerable degree of indifference in the use of the imper­ fective or perfective past tense" (96) and summarizes their aspect use as fol­ lows: As these verbs belong chiefly to semantic groups 4 and 5 [accomplishments denoting concrete processes or manifestations of human consciousness, and unpaired imperfectives denoting various states and activities], the dis­ tinction between the aspectual forms is not complicated by additional nuances of resultativity. The imperfective may therefore be used instead of the perfective without any chance of confusion, except in contexts where it is essential to mark the sequence of events or to sum up the quality of the utterance as a whole. The essential information is what is said and who said it, so that the imperfective can be used as a denotative copula bearing little logical stress, and merely serving to link these two important items of information. (97)

It is a fact of Russian that there is a marked tendency to use the the imperfective as konstatacija fakta dejstvija more often when the aspectual pair consists of a simplex imperfective and a prefixed perfective, such as the pair under discussion here. It is also a fact that this use is frequently difficult to account for in other than negative terms, that is, the imperfective is used in order to avoid the meaning of the perfective (e.g., to avoid the meaning of result). Forsyth seems to imply that there is little, if any, difference in the meaning between the past tense of prosit'1 and poprosit,p in these contexts other than a difference in emphasis (90-91). In actual fact, his explanation supports the theory that the perfective aspect is used for foregrounding

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265

and the imperfective for backgrounding actions (Hopper 1979:57-90) and we should expect, therefore, to find motivation for the aspect use in the discourse structure. There is, however, a danger of circularity in his claim: namely, an action is said to be foregrounded if it is perfective and backgrounded if it is imperfective.1 In an attempt to avoid this circularity, I will present a number of examples that illustrate specific factors that under­ lie the choice between prosit and poprosiP in unique contexts in the past tense. All the examples presented below have been presented to native speakers of Russian in order to determine the preference for one form over another. This methodology allows an encoding analysis rather than the potentially circular decoding analysis of the data. The speakers' responses are reported in terms of the gradation in (l): 2 (1)

[no mark] acceptable/preferred [+] acceptable/not preferred [?] marginally acceptable/not preferred [*] unacceptable

The original aspect form in the text is given with the source citation in parentheses following the example. 3 The first distinction to be made is that between the use of the perfec­ tive to denote a concrete action versus the imperfective to denote a nonconcrete action. In Forsythian terms this would translate into the use of the perfective for an action presented at a specific juncture versus the use of the imperfective without reference to a specific juncture. The notion of concreteness would also correspond to Thelin's feature of time-relatedness (1984). PoprosiP is used to indicate a concrete action — one that occurred at a specific point in time — as opposed to prosit which indicates merely that the action occurred. This distinction is consistent with the traditional values of the perfective and imperfective aspects. In examples (2) and (3) the fact that the action is located at a specific point in time presents it as concrete, and thus poprosiP is preferred. (2)

Proslo nedeli tri. Pervaja bol' pritupilas'. Passed weeks 3 First pain dulled "About three weeks had gone by. The initial pain had dulled somewhat.

266 GRACE E. FIELDER

Korolenko po-prežnemu vprjagsja v rabo tu. V avguste Korolenko as before buried(self) in work In August Korolenko buried himself in work as before. In August I. E. Repin, s kotorym ja videlsja počti ezednevno, I. E. Repin with whom I met almost everyday I. E. Repin, whom I saw almost every day, + +prositIpoprosiP menja peredat' Vladimiru asked [++i/p] me to give Vladimir asked [++i/p] me to convey to Vladimir Galaktionovicu ego gorjacuju pros'bu — posetit' Galaktionovic his fervent request to visit Galaktionovic his fervent request that he visit vozmozno skoree "Penaty. " possibly sooner Penaty. 'Penaty' as soon as possible." (KČ:119, poprosiP) 3). Zdes' budet umestno pripomnit',  otzyvalsja  Here will be appropriate to recall how responded to "It would be appropriate here to recall how I. E. Lunacarskom I. E. Repin, otrezannyj togda ot Rossii. Lunacarskij I . E . Repin, cut off then from Russia. Repin, at that time cut off from Russia, responded to Lunacarskij. Ja kak-to — uze v dvadcatyx godax — *prosili/poprosiP I once already in twenties' years asked [*i/p] I once — already in the twenties — asked [*i/p] Anatolija Vasil'evica poslat' Repinu čto-nibud' iz Anatolij Vasil'evic to send Repin something from Anatolij Vasil'evic to send Repin something from svoix socinenij. Repin poznakomilsja s nimi, his(own) works. Repin acquainted(self) with them his work. Repin familiarized himself with them, i oni poljubilis' emu. and they appealed him. them, and they appealed to him." (Č:399, poprosiP)

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267

In (2) the temporal expression v avguste 'in August' pinpoints the action along the time axis and thus makes it relatively concrete. In (3) to 'somehow, once, one day' serves the same function. Hence in both the perfective is preferred. If the context does not specify a location along the time axis, however, it is generally possible to use either aspect. Use of poprosiP would still indicate that the action is concrete, despite the lack of an overt conditioning context, whereas use of prosit would assert merely that the action occurred, without reference to its concreteness. Example (4) illustrates this point. (4)

Inogda ja videi ego s milovidnoj goluboglazoj Sometimes I saw him with pretty blue-eyed "Sometimes I would see him with a pretty blue-eyed belokuroj devuskoj. Xozjain mne skazal kak-to, cto blonde girl Landlord me said once that blond girl. The landlord once told me that èto ego nevesta. — On prosili/poprosiP  this his fiancee He asked [i/p] me this was his fiancee. 'He asked [i/p] me to porekomendovaf emu neboVsuju kvartiru, — skazal mne recommend him small apartment said me recommend him a small apartment,' xozjain,—gde-nibud' poblizosti...Iz ètogo rajona on landlord somewhere close From this region he the landlord told me, 'somewhere close by. He ne xocet uxodit'. not want to leave doesn't want to leave this region.'" (VSE:173, prosit)

In (4) the request is not concretely located at a specific point along the time axis. What is being asserted therefore is that at some point in time someone made a request: there occurred an event of asking. When there is no concretizing feature in the context, that is, a specific point in time, the imperfective prosit is more likely to be found than when there is (note the textual form). Examples (5a) and (5b) demonstrate that the presence of specification along the temporal axis favors selection of the perfective aspect, while the lack of specification favors the imperfective.

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(5)

a.

Tamozenniki zastavili menja togda sdat' v bagaz Customs officers forced me then to give to baggage "The customs officers then forced me to check the paket s lekarstvom, kotoryj rabotniki sovetskogo package with medicine which workers soviet package with the medicine which the workers at the Soviet posol'stva v Berline nakanune moego ot"ezda embassy in Berlin day before my departure consulate had asked [++i/p] me on the eve of my departure + +prosili/poprosilip menja dostavit' v Movskvu. asked [++i/p] me to take to Moscow. to deliver to Moscow." (~VSE:26)

b. ..., kotoryj rabotniki sovetskogo posoVstva v Berline which workers soviet embassy in Berlin "..., which the workers at the Soviet consulate had prosilii/++poprosilip menja dostavit' v Moskvu. asked [i/++p] me to take to Moscow asked [i/++pl me to deliver to Moscow." (VSE:26, prosili1) Concreteness, or specification along the time axis, clearly conditions the perfective. Apparently this specification provides an aspect locus on the propositional level with reference to which the event can be evaluated as closed. Closure is a semantic parameter consistent with the perfective aspect. Lack of such an aspect locus will tend to favor the imperfective since it makes the evaluation of closure more difficult, or perhaps just less cru­ cial. In a context that lacks an aspect locus, the selection of the perfective asserts closure if necessary, while selection of the imperfective is indifferent to closure. If the imperfective were chosen in a context where an aspect locus were provided, this would imply that the action is being evaluated as open, rather than closed, and would be an example of the imperfective being used to assert a notion consistent with the semantics of the imperfec­ tive aspect, for example, an uncompleted action or process. 4 The notion of the concreteness of the action is not limited to temporal specification, but can be extended to non-temporal circumstances, such as adverbials which locate the action at a point during the narrative rather than strictly speaking along the time axis. The next set of examples will demonstrate this use.

NARRATIVE CONTEXT AND RUSSIAN ASPECT

(6)

269

- Slucaj tak proizosel. S popom vo mnenijax — Incident thus happened With priest in opinions "This is what happened. The priest and I had a razoslis'. Časovnju stroili  nas v sele. Nu, (we) differed Church built by us in village. Well difference of opinion. A chapel was built in our village. Well a ja xudozestvom-to syzmal'stva zanimalsja. Vot i and I art from youth busied(self) Here and and I'd been busying myself with art since childhood. So then ?prosili/poprosiP menja otec Innokentij izobrazit' na asked [?i/p] me father Innokentij to paint on Father Innokentij asked [?i/p] me to paint Hell on dverjax časovni ad. "Da ty, syn moj, postrasnee doors chapel hell Yes you son mine more horrible the doors of the chapel. 'Yes, my son, draw a most horrible ad-to narisuj. Ctoby znali gresniki, kakie muki im hell draw So that know sinners what tortures them Hell. So that sinners will know what sufferings have been ugotovany, esli gresit' budut, o cerkvi i prepared if sin (they) will about church and prepared for them, if they will sin and forget church and molitvy zabudut."' prayers (they) will forget their prayers.'" (VSE:256, poprosiP)

In (6) poprosiP is strongly preferred because of the concrete nature of the request. The phrase vot i 'here, so then' is used to describe a series of events graphically (Borras and Christian 1971:275). In a story it locates the action with respect to the other actions of the narration and is therefore a typical foregrounding strategy for Russian. A similar example is (7), in which tut ze 'on the spot, right then and there' locates the action in the narrative and thus makes the context con­ crete. Again, the perfective is preferred to the apparent exclusion of the imperfective.

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(7)

 ili inace, oficiaVnaja vstreca Can Kajsi i So or differently official meeting Can Kajsi and "One way or the other, the official meeting between Can Kajsi and voennogo attase Sovetskogo Sojuza sostojalas'. military attache Soviet Union took place the Soviet military attache took place. He

On He

uznal, cto ja privez, peredal cerez  found out what I brought sent through me found out what I had brought, conveyed his blagodarnost' Sovetskomu pravitel'stvu i posovetoval gratitude Soviet government and advised thanks to the Soviet government through me and advised  zanjat'sja izuceniem obstanovki v Kitae. me to occupy(self) study situation in China me to study the situation in China. Ja tut ze ?prosili/poprosilP ego ukazanij I here (part) asked [?i/p] his orders I asked [?i/ p] him on the spot/right there and then for his instructions oznakomit'  s polozeniem na fronte. to familiarize me with situation at front to acquaint me with the situation at the front." (VC:67, poprosiP) The above examples have shown that a specific location in the narra­ tive will condition the choice of the perfective to indicate concrete action. Thus both a specification along the temporal axis and specification in the narrative structure may serve as an aspect locus with respect to which the event may be evaluated for closure. Both of the above factors operate on the propositional level and thus affect the encoding of aspect. If, however, there is no specification (tem­ poral or narrative) on the propositional level, either aspect may be found. In order to explain the aspect use in such unspecified contexts, we must go beyond the propositional level and seek motivation on the narrative level. The examples that follow illustrate the types of factors that operate on the narrative level.

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One factor that can influence the preference for prosit or poprosiP makes reference to the fact that asking or requesting is an act of communi­ cation, which involves the evaluation both of the event itself and its conse­ quences, i.e. its relationship to subsequent events. As Leinonen (1984:244) points out in her discussion of Russian and Finnish aspect: "what is impor­ tant from the narrative point of view is the consideration of the next stage." In a successfully executed request, the hearer will respond to the speaker's request, either negatively or affirmatively. If there is no response, then the act is judged to be incomplete: the act of requesting has not had the desired result — a response. If there is no response specified or implied in the con­ text, the imperfective prosit is more likely to be used. If a response is specified or implied, then the perfective poprosiP is more likely. This choice is consistent with the traditional association of the notion of result with the perfective and lack of result with the imperfective.5 Moreover, this criterion is consistent with the values of the perfective as [+completed] and the imperfective as [-completed] with respect to the aspectual parameter of closure. This difference in usage is illustrated in examples (8a), (8b) and (8c). (8)

a.

Trudno budet— obraščajtes' ko mne, čem smogu — Difficult will be turn to me what will be able "If things get difficult — come to me, I'll help with whatever pomogu. NacaVnik upravlenija i glavnyj inzener will help head administration and main engineer I can. Your head of administration and the main engineer glavki  vas očen' xorosie partijnye tovarisci. central board by you very good party comrades of the central board are good party comrades. Oni vam podrobno rasskazut, čto konkretno vam They you detailedly will tell what concretely you They will tell you in detail what specifically nuzno budet delat'. Tevosjana ja toze necessary will do Tevosjan I too needs to be done. I have also ++prosili/poprosilP pomoč' vam na pervyx . asked [++i/p] to help you at first times asked [++i/p] Tevosjan to help you out in the beginning." (VSE:356, poprosilP

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b. Tevosjana ja toze prosili/?poprosilP pomoc' vam na Tevosjan I too asked [i/?p] to help you at "I also asked [i/?p] Tevosjan to help you out pervyx r, no on ešče ne soglasilsja. first times but he still not agreed in the beginning, but he still hasn't agreed." (~VSE:356)  Tevosjana ja toze prosit1/poprosiP pomoč' vam Tevosjan I too asked [i/p] to help you "I also asked [i/p] Tevosjan to help you out na pervyx ,  on otkazalsja. at first times but he refused in the beginning, but he refused." (~VSE:356) In (8a) poprosiP was preferred because it is implied in the narrative context that Tevosjan had agreed to help. In (8b), by contrast, the context specifi­ cally states that there has not yet been a response which triggers the choice of the imperfective prasili. In (8c) there is a response, albeit negative. Here, either prosit or poprosiP was selected, depending on how the speaker viewed the action. Both forms were acceptable for the speakers in terms of the context, but with a difference in meaning. For three of the five speak­ ers, the difference was either concrete vs. non-concrete, or that the request was made once vs. several times (until the requester finally accepted "no" for an answer). The two remaining speakers, however, felt that use of the perfective would imply agreement and preferred the imperfective in this context.6 The next examples illustrate how the narrative context can affect the evaluation of the response and thus the encoding of aspect. (9)

Zavod vstretilsja s trudnostjami: pervye otlitye iz Plant met with difficulties first cast from "The plant met with difficulties: the first bronzy detali byli neudacny. Direktor bronze components were unsuccessful. Director components cast from bronze were unsuccessful. The director obratilsja  nam za pomošč'. ?Prosili/ProposiPvydaf turned to us for help Asked [?i/p] to give turned to us for help. He asked [?i/p] [us] to give

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emu na priobretenie novyx materialov ssudu. My him for acquisition new materials loan We him a loan to get new materials. We vynuzdeny byli na èto pojti— nas podpirajut forced were on this to proceed us push were forced to act on this — the deadline was pushing us. sroki. No vot zakaz byl vypolnen,... deadline But here order was filled But the order was filled after all,..." (VSE:113, poprosiP) In (9) the request was evidently complied with. In fact, one speaker jus­ tified not choosing the imperfective because it would imply that they hesi­ tated or thought things over for a while — an interpretation not consistent with this context. (10)

A kogda biblioteka + 4-prosilai/poprosilaP ego, ctoby And when library asked [++i/p] him so that "And when the library asked [++i/p] him to on prislal ej svoju fotografiju, on poobescal ej he sent it his(own) photograph he promised it send them his photograph, he promised to prislat' portret Alfonsa Dode. to send portrait Alphonse Daudet send them a portrait of Alphonse Daudet." (Č:47, poprosilap)

Although the response in (10) was not the one the library had in mind, it was nonetheless a response. The act of communication is completed, and poprosiP is preferred. (11)

Ja prosili/poprosilP Alekseja Maksimovica I asked [i/p] Aleksej Maksimovic "I asked [i/p] Aleksej Maksimovic to intercede poxodatajstvovat' ob ucasti cetyrex gatcinskix realistov, to intercede about fate four Gatcina realists concerning the fate of four realists from Gatcina who zasazennyx na Spalernuju (soplivye kontrrevoljucionary!). seated in Špalernaja snotty counterrevolutionaries were locked up in Špalernaja [prison] (the snotty counter­ revolutionaries!).

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No Aleksej Maksimovič, uze prinimavsij ran'se But Aleksej Maksimoviöc already having taken earlier But Aleksej Maksimovic, who had already taken pod svoe krepkoe krylo moix podobnyx klientov, under his(own) strong wing my similar clients similar clients of mine under his strong wing before, zabolel. Togda ja pristal  A.V. Lunacarskomu fell ill Then I badgered to A . V . Lunacarskij fell ill. Then I badgered A. V. Lunacarskij (and

(i (and

tože v pjatyj, kažetsja, raz). too in fifth (it) seems time for the fifth time, too, it seems.)" (Č:189, prosit) In (11) prosit can be allowed, and even preferred (see textual form), because the request was apparently not responded to. Although Čukovskij makes it clear that Gor'kij would have responded favorably to his request, Gor'kij fell ill and it seems that was the end of the matter. In this example it is not a case of refusal or acceptance, but rather the inability to respond. Two speakers cited this as the motivation for selecting prosit. The perfec­ tive may be selected, however, as it was by another two speakers, if the context is felt to be concrete (apparently due to the specificity of the request). This variation could potentially be significant in terms of estab­ lishing a hierarchy of factors that condition the choice between the perfec­ tive and imperfective. It seems that if the context is concrete enough to con­ dition the perfective (i.e. the action is foregrounded), then the issue of response is not as crucial. This distinction in the meaning of prosili/poprosilP seems to parallel that of another verb: zvonit'i /poprosil P 7 Forsyth (1970:100-101) discusses the distinction between zvonit'1 and pozvonil 'p 'to ring, to ring a bell, to have a telephone conversation.' He asserts that the difference between the imperfective and perfective is that the use of zvonit4 indicates that the sub­ ject telephoned, but did not get through, that is, either there was no answer or the person he wanted to speak to was not at home. By contrast, pozvonit'p indicates that the connection was made and a conversation with the desired person took place. This same type of distinction can be made between prosit4 and poprosit,p. The similarity between these two verbs is demonstrated in example (12).

NARRATIVE CONTEXT AND RUSSIAN ASPECT (12)

275

—

Čut' bylo ne zabyl: nekotoroe vremja nazad Almost was not (I) forgot certain time ago '"I almost forgot: a while ago

gerr Goranof zvonit pò telefonu. prosili++poprosilP Herr Goranof called on telephone Asked [i/++p] Herr Goranof called on the telephone. He asked [i/+ +p] me peredat', cto on i tot, drugoj, budut zdat' to convey that he and that(one) other will wait to tell you that he and that other guy would wait vas v pjat'... you at five for you at five...' — V pjat'? No sejcas uze bez pjati sest'... At five But now already less five six 'At five? But it's already five minutes to six... Xoroso po krajnej mere, cto vy ob ètom ne Good at least measure that you about this not At least you didn't tell me about soobscili posle pollinoci. inform after midnight it after midnight...'" (BR:372, prosit) The use of zvonit here indicates that Goranof did not get through to the person he wanted to speak to. Similarly, prosit indicates that the appropri­ ate response to his request did not occur (at least not immediately). 8 Another interesting fact about the semantics of prosit'1, which is consis­ tent with the above, is that there seems to be an almost conative use as shown in example (13). (13)

No xlopcy okruzili  celo] tolpoj. But "xlopcy" surrounded me entire crowd "But the boys surrounded me in a crowd. Zadnie vlezli na tormoznye ploscadki i krysi Rear(ones) crawled on brake platforms and roofs The ones in the rear crawled out onto the brake-platforms and roofs

276

GRACE E. FIELDER i ubezdali nj xorom. Orti prosili1/ and were convincing me chorus They asked and tried to convince me in a chorus. They kept begging *poprosilP  nj toVko odnogo: peredvinut' [i/*p] of me only one(thing) to move [i/*p] me for only one thing: to move the train

poezd train

na dva metra. for two meters by two meters." (AM:512, prosili1) In (13) there is a clear parallel between the conative use of ubeždaiï 'to try to convince' and prosilii which in this context is synonymous with uprasivatn 'to beg, beseech.' The use of prosit for an uncompleted request (i.e. without response) is thus a situation consistent with the imperfective aspect and furthermore, one that appears to be a mid-way point, semantically, betweeen prosit as a simple assertion of the request and prosit as a synonym for the conative uprasivat'1.9 The conative use, as described by Maslov (1948:305-306), derives from the failure of closure with respect to the aspect locus and underlies the use of the imperfective as conative and for an uncompleted request. Hopper (1982:11) considers this use to be an additive meaning which "is not part of the meaning of the imperfective itself, but must be inferred from the context." Finally, I would like to comment on what seems to be a stylistic influ­ ence on aspect selection, but can be explained by appealing to the pragma­ tic level (presumably included in the narrative level). When there is no specification on the propositional level, use of the imperfective prosit can be stylistically marked in unique contexts, and this factor is an influence on its frequency of occurrence. The imperfective aspect is often used to express a formal request, i.e. one that is very polite. Although the evalua­ tion of a context as sufficiently formal to justify the use of prosit is certainly a subjective one from the point of view of the speaker, it is based on dis­ course-pragmatic considerations. The stylistic nuance derives from the situ­ ation when the perfective aspect is expected, but the imperfective is used instead. 10 This use of prosit mirrors the use of the imperfective imperative, which Borras and Christian (1971:146) discuss as follows: An imperfective command, in general, names the type of action to be per­ formed whereas a perfective command requires its completion and often

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looks to its result. This difference may make the perfective command more peremptory than the imperfective which is often rather a request or an invitation than an order.

Example (14) illustrates this stylistic nuance overtly. (14)

Odnazdy ja polucil ego pis'mo, v kotorom on Once I received his letter in which he "I once received a letter from him, in which he prosit/++poprosiP uskorit' otpravku trub dlja asked [i/++p] to hasten dispatch pipes for requested [i/++p] that the shipping of pipes for avtomobil'nyx poluosej. Pis'mo bylo, vidimo, automobile semi-axles Letter was evidently automobile semi-axles be sped up. The letter had evidently podgotovleno kem-to iz rabotnikov otdela prepared someone from workers department been prepared by one of the workers in the supply department snabzenija zavoda i sostojalo iz trafaretnyx slov: supply plant and consisted of hackneyed words of the factory and consisted of hackneyed phrases: "I hereby "Prosu Vas uskorit' otpravku..." No i ètomu (I) ask you to hasten dispatch But even this request you to expedite the shipping..." But even to this formaVnomu dokumentu Lixacev pridal svoe osoboe formal document Lixacev added his(own) special formal document Lixacev had added his own special zvučanie. Pered slovom "prosu" on sinim karandasom, sound Before word (I) ask he blue pencil ring. Before the word "request" he added in the blue kotorym podpisal pis'mo, dobavil: "ocen'." which (he) signed letter (he) added very pencil with which he signed the letter: "very much"." (VSE:402, prosit)

As the context overtly indicates, this letter is an official request written in a formal, even hackneyed style, and thus prosit is more appropriate.

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Sociolinguistic factors can also affect the stylistic register. Compare examples (15) and (16). (15)

Narkom, rukovodivsij rybnoj promyšlennost'ju, v Narkom managing fishing industry in "The narkom who ran the fishing industry, under the vedenii kotoroj naxodilos', v castnosti' proizvodstvo jurisdiction which was located in part production purvue of which was, in part, the production of bocek, s mol'boj v golose prosili/?poprosilP barrels with entreaty in voice asked [i/?p] barrels, asked [i/?p] Zernov with a note of entreaty in his voice Zernova otmenit' standart na bocki. Zernov to change standard for barrels to change the standards for barrels. —A pocemu ego nado otmenjat'? — And why it necessary to change 'And just why is it necessary to change them?' doprasivat Zernov. questioned Zernov. questioned Zernov. — Da po ètomu standartu daze lucsij bondar' Well by that standard even best barrelmaker 'Why, even the best barrelmaker in the country strany ne smozet izgotovif ni odnoj bocki! — country not will be able to make not one barrel couldn't make even one barrel up to this standard!' the s vozmusceniem ob"jasnjal narkom. with indignation explained narkom narkom explained indignantly." (VSE:552, prosit)

In (15) the person making the request is clearly the subordinate of Zernov and as such has no right to assume the request will be complied with. The narrative context justifies this interpretation in two ways: the fact that his request is practically an entreaty, cf. s mol'boj v golose on prosili, and the reaction of Zernov, who demands an explanation for the request, cf. the verb doprasivali 'to interrogate, to question' (not even doprosilP), rather

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than the semantically more neutral sprosiP. In (16) the situation is reversed. (16)

Ja ob"javil, cto vospitanniki dolzny organizovat'sja I explained that pupils must to organize "I announced that the pupils would have to organize

po by

otrjadam, v kazdom otrjade dvadcat' celovek, detachments in each detachment twenty persons themselves into detachments, in each detachment 20 people, + + prosit1/poprosiP nazvaf cetyrnadcat' familij dlja to narne fourteen surnames for (I) asked [-f+i/p] I asked [++i/p] them to give 14 names naznacenija komandirami. Oni molcali. Ja designation commanders They were silent I to be designated as commanders. They were silent. I + +prosili/poprosilP/poprosiP zadat' voprosy, oni toze molcali. asked [++i/p] to give questions they also were silent asked [++i/p] for questions, they still kept silent." (~AM:462) The person making the request here is in charge. Yet as the context indi­ cates, he is receiving no response. Although this would seem to condition the imperfective prosit, the perfective poprosiP was preferred for stylistic reasons. Use of the perfective indicates that he asked with authority, deci­ sively, and maintained control of the situation. Generally speaking, if a per­ son in charge is making the request, poprosiP is more appropriate because compliance is expected. In a situation where subordinates are requesting, prosit is more appropriate. The exception to this, of course, is when the criterion of politeness or formality intervenes, which is why, for example, organizations, whose authority is a given, usually use prosit, since their authority to make the request (and expect its fulfilment) is firmly estab­ lished. By way of confirming this analysis, example (17) offers an interesting problem for determining what constitutes an official or formal request, and thus serves to emphasize the subjective nature of this type of evaluation for aspect choice. (17)

Zadaca byla sformulirovana cetko i jasno. Assigment was formulated precisely and clearly "The assignment had been formulated precisely and clearly.

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GRACE E. FIELDER

Stalin prosili/++poprosilP menja ne razglasat' soderzanii me not to divulge contents Stalin asked [i/++p] Stalin requested [i/++p] that I not divulge the content besedy. Byt' mozet, i naprasnoe conversation To be may even vain of our conversation. This was, perhaps, an unjust preduprezdenie. Ja— celovek voennyj... warning I person military warning. After all, I am a military man..." (VČ:58, prosit) The expectation here would be for the perfective since Stalin certainly has enough authority to expect compliance with any request he might make. Yet the imperfective was preferred by most speakers. In fact, most speak­ ers initially chose the perfective, but immediately changed their selection to the imperfective, citing Stalin as the reason. Stalin's status is apparently felt to be official enough in and of himself for prosilito be used in its formal, polite sense without the addressee questioning his authority. In the foregoing discussion several semantic and stylistic criteria have been asserted to have an influence on the choice between prosit and poprosiP. The use of the imperfective as konstatacija fakta dejstvija has been linked to specific types of contexts, all of which are unique, but express non-concrete action, uncompleted act of communication, or formal request.11 The term konstatacija fakta dejstvija thus refers to, rather than describes the phenomenon of the imperfective being used in place of the perfective. In order to account for its appearance it is therefore necessary to refer to specific factors that have an influence on aspect choice in these con­ texts. All the factors mentioned here are consistent with the traditional val­ ues of the perfective and imperfective aspect and can all be related to the semantic parameter of closure. What is significant is that they do not oper­ ate solely on the propositional level, but may operate on the narrative level as well. Since specific cases can be accounted for only in terms of closure operating on the narrative level, it must be assumed that the propositional level does not have a monopoly on the encoding of aspect. At the same time, the evidence indicates that the propositional level is more important, in that if closure (or any other aspectual parameter) is overtly operating on the propositional level, it will generally have preeminence. In the absence of an overt parameter on the propositional level, however, perhaps by default, reference must be made to the narrative level.

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NOTES * I would like to thank Alan Timberlake and Ellen Contini-Morava for their comments on this paper. I would also like to thank the five native speakers who assisted me: N. Dubrovič, E. Nesterov, . Kagan, . Bolshun and L. Dmitrieva. 1. This is not, in actuality, a lock-step correlation. Chvany (1985) discusses the use of the imperfective for foregrounding, or plot-line events, and the perfective for backgrounding. 2. This notation has been adapted from Timberlake 1982. 3. Examples which have been modified and thus do not represent the original text are so indicated by a tilde preceding the source citation. 4. This is consistent with Thelin's claim that the imperfective can be + time-related, but then is necessarily —totality (=open). For more on the aspectual parameter of closure with respect to an aspect locus, see Timberlake 1982 and Chung and Timberlake 1985. 5. See Swan (1974:519-520) for his discussion of the criterion of result-nonresult as a basis for choosing between the perfective and imperfective in Russian. 6. Example (i) shows that the criterion of response can be relevant for aspect choice in con­ texts other than unique, (i) is an iterative context that is presented as singularized, hence the perfective aspect is expected (note sdelaP and zastaviP used as singularized itera­ tives). However, prosit is used instead of the expected poprosiP because it is clear that up to this point in time there had been no response to the request. (i)

"ProjdeP vremja, — vspominaet   [Cexov] Sergej Ščukin, — Will come time recalls about him [Cexov] Sergej Ščukin,— "'Time passes,' Sergej Ščukin remembers about him [Čexov], zabudes9 sam,  Č prosit/?poprosiP, a on vdrug (you) will forget self about what asked [i/?p] and he suddenly 'you yourself forget what it was you had requested [i/?p], and he suddenly ob"javljaet, ëto vot nakonec on sdelaP, ëto nuzno, i otvet announces that here finally he did what needed and answer announces that here at last he has done what was necessary and the answer na pros'bu vot kakoj; udiviš'sja?, vspomnis"p, i toVko to request here such (you) will marvel (you) will recall and only to the request is such and such; you're amazed, you remember, and it simply stanetp stydno, ëto zastaviP ego xlopotat' ob ètom." will become shameful that (you) forced him to trouble about it becomes embarassing that you forced him to take the trouble over it.'" (KC:28, prosit)

7. I owe this observation to Mel Strom. 8.

Although one speaker claimed that this was a fixed expression in that prosit" always com­ bines with peredat' in such situations, this comment is not counterevidence. The semantic

282

GRACE E. FIELDER value of this expression has been evidently formalized and is still consistent with the interpretation of prosit'1 to indicate an incomplete act of requesting, i.e. to convey a mes­ sage not received originally.

9.

Indeed for one speaker this criterion was a major influence in his selection of prosit ver­ sus poprosilPin several other examples, for instance, (8c) and (11).

10.

The Discourse Semantic Amalgamation Rules (DSAR), the Cognitive Structures Amal­ gamation Rules (CSAR) proposed by Brecht (Forthcoming) could provide a mechanism for accounting for such aspect use.

11.

Note that the semi-conative use of prosit (example (12)) apparently derives from a durative-processual use.

REFERENCES Borras, F. and R. Christian. 1971. Russian Syntax. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press. Brecht, R. Forthcoming. A Grammar of Time. Chung, S. and A. Timberlake. 1985. "Tense, Aspect, and Mood." Grammatical Categories and the Lexicon (= Language Typology and Syntactic Description, 3), ed. by T. Shopen, 202258. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press. Chvany, C. 1985. "Backgrounded Perfectives and Plot-Line Imperfectives: Towards a Theory of Grounding in Text." The Scope of Slavic Aspect (= UCLA Slavic Studies, 12), ed. by M. Flier and A. Timberlake, 247-273. Columbus:Slavica. de Groot, . and H. Tommola. 1984. Aspect Bound: A Voyage into the Realm of Germanic, Slavonic and FinnoUgrian Aspectology. Dordrecht & Smithfield:Foris Publications. Flier, M. and A. Timberlake (eds.) 1985. The Scope of Slavic Aspect (= UCLA Slavic Studies, 12). Columbus: Slavica. Forsyth, J. 1970. A Grammar of Aspect: Usage and Meaning in the Russian Verb. Cam­ bridge: Cambridge University Press. Hopper, P. 1979. "Aspect and Foregrounding in Discourse." Discourse and Syntax (= Syntax and Semantics, Vol. 12), ed. by T. Givón, 213-241. New York:Academic Press.

NARRATIVE CONTEXT AND RUSSIAN ASPECT 1982.

283

"Aspect Between Discourse and Grammar: An Introductory Essay for the Volume." Tense-Aspect: Between Semantics and Pragmatics (= Typological Studies in Language, 1), ed. by P. Hopper, 3-18. Amsterdam John Benja­ mins.

Hopper, P. (ed.) 1982. Tense-Aspect: Between Semantics and Pragmatics (= Typological Studies in Language, 1). Amsterdam:John Benjamins. Leinonen, M. 1984. "Narrative Implications of Aspect in Russian and in Finnish." Aspect Bound: A Voyage into the Realm of Germanic, Slavonic and Finno-Ugrian Aspectology, ed. by C. de Groot and H. Tommola, 239-256. Dordrecht & Smithfield:Foris Publications. Maslov, Ju. S. 1948. "Vid i leksiceskoe znacenie glagola v sovremennom russkom literaturnom jazyke." Izvestija Akademii Nauk SSSR, Otdelenie literatury i jazyka, torn VII, vyp. 4, 303-316. Shopen, T. 1985. Grammatical categories and the lexicon (= Language typology and syntactic description, 3). Cambridge:Cambridge University Press. Swan, O. 1977. "The Mystery of the Imperfective-Completive." SEEJ 21:4, 517-525. Thelin, N.B. 1984. "Coherence, Perspective and Aspectual Specification in Slavonic Narrative Discourse." Aspect Bound: A Voyage into the Realm of Germanic, Slavonic and Finno-Ugrian Aspectology, ed. by C. de Groot and H. Tommola, 225238. Dordrecht & Smithfield.Foris Publications. Timberlake, A. 1982. "Invariance and the Syntax of Russian Aspect." Tense-Aspect: Between Semantics and Pragmatics (= Typological Studies in Language, 1), ed. by P. Hopper, 305-331. Amsterdam:John Benjamins.

SOURCES AM - Makarenko, A. 1977. Pedagogiceskaja poèma. Moskva. BR - Rajnov, B. 1979. Tajfuny s laskovymi imenami. In A. Sobkovic (ed.), Sovremennyj bolgarskij detektiv. Moskva. KČ-Čukovskij, K. 1967. Sovremenniki. Portrety i ètjudy. Moskva.

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VC - Cujkov, V. 1981.

Missija v Kitae. Zapiski voennogo sovetnika. Moskva.

VSE - Emeljanov, V. 1974.  vremeni,  tovariscax, o sebe. Moskva.

Temporal and semantic factors affecting Russian aspect choice in questions Patricia R . C h a p u t Harvard University

1

Introduction

The topic of this investigation is aspect use in past-tense yes-no ques­ tions and, briefly, past-tense who-questions. It assumes that predictive rules for aspectual usage require not only a specification of the temporal config­ urations of the system, but also the appropriateness conditions for usage. This investigation is part of a continuing study aimed toward establishing a taxonomy of situations and identifying aspect functions. Function here cor­ responds to a general purpose on the part of the speaker for the particular utterance. For example, there is evidence that imperative use under nega­ tion can be described in terms of two functions, prohibition and admoni­ tion, and that choice in denials is also determined by two functions, some­ thing like completion-failure and error-correction (Chaput 1985). These functions are made possible by the numerous factors which interrelate to create a complex system of possible perspectives on actions, which can then be used to certain purposes. In the most general terms, the lexico-semantic content of the predicate combines with the temporal perspective of the aspectual system, which together with certain presuppositions 1 on the part of the speaker produce the observable pattern of usage. As the following analysis will show, yes-no questions do show a consistent pattern of usage which has direct bearing on the problem of imperfective usage often termed konstatacija fakta "statement of fact" or "simple denotation" (Forsyth 1970:82). In its most basic manifestation in Russian the yes-no question is a syn­ tactically simple construction with the question variant identical to its

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declarative counterpart but marked intonationally. If such questions are analyzed semantically as being identical to statements except for the ele­ ment of doubt (Lyons 1977:754), then one must add that any of the lexicosemantic units of the question may be doubted (queried). The following analysis treats only those questions in which the verb is the focus of the query. 2 Both yes-no and who-questions are more characteristic of dialogue than of narrative description, both can function as the first half of a minimal interactive unit consisting of an initiation and a response (Stubbs 1983:104), as well as initiate exchanges of more than one unit. When used minimally to initiate exchanges aspect choice is maximally open and subject to the speaker's perception and interpretation of the existing state of affairs. Pasttense yes-no questions are especially interesting because they show a com­ plexity of interaction between the linguistic systems of aspect, tense, and actual time frames. For example, if some letters were to be mailed by 5:00 one can ask both before and after 5:00 whether the letters were mailed, but only before 5:00 is there still time to mail them. Therefore the speaker's motivation behind posing the questions may be different, so that before 5:00 the question might act as a prelude to the act of mailing the letters, whereas subsequent to the act the result might be in question (e.g. if the let­ ters were not received) or the performance of the individual (did he do what he was supposed to do?). As will be shown, in this type of question in which a single completed action is queried, the speaker's intention affects the choice of aspect. It does not, however, affect the obligatory imperfective of the iterative, or of the progressive or durative configurations (Timberlake 1982: 85), and so they have generally been omitted from consideration. 2

The Problem

As the examples below illustrate, in yes-no questions the use of one aspect or the other with various types of verbs and situations can communi­ cate quite different messages. (1)

To find out if Boris has cleaned his room: Neutral:  ubralp komnatu? Did you clean your room (as you were supposed/ expected to?) Also:  ubiral1 komnatu? Did you clean your room? (and did you happen to find my glasses?)

ASPECT CHOICE IN QUESTIONS

(2)

(3)

287

To find out if Boris has had supper: Neutral:  uzinal1? Have you had supper? Also:  pouzinalP? Did you (already) have supper (and am I too late?) To find out whether Boris found his keys:  našelp kljucil Only: *  naxodil1 kljucil Did you find the keys?

Of course, "neutral" here does not express any real neutrality, but rather our expectations about the kinds of questions which are asked in certain types of situations. More specifically, depending on precisely what the speaker wishes to express, one or the other aspect choice is appropriate, while the other expresses an allowable nuance, is slightly odd, or is com­ pletely inappropriate. In fact there is much more variation in nuance possi­ ble than the above examples show, but those given illustrate the point that there is not a simple one-to-one correspondence between the aspect of the verb and the possible circumstances of the question. 3

Assumptions

There is a level of lexical aspect which has to do with the semantic properties of predicates in terms of their inherent temporal orientation, so that 'reading a book' or 'building a chair' are bounded actions which will necessarily come to an end, whereas 'running' or 'knowing' are unbounded, or have no inherent temporal limit. Lexical aspect is different from propositional aspect, which refers to the temporal perspective supplied by the perfective-imperfective system of Russian in a given proposition (Timberlake 1982). For example, znat' "know" is a lexical stative, whereas Boris citaet knigi "Boris reads books" is a propositional stative. Perfective actions are those in which an inherently bounded or unbounded action is presented propositionally as bounded. Imperfective actions may similarly be inher­ ently bounded or unbounded, so that in sum, the combination of proposi­ tional aspect with lexical aspect yields the various "contextual configura­ tions" of aorist, durative, progressive, and others (Timberlake 1985). Before continuing it is necessary to consider lexical aspect in more detail. One of the most familiar typologies of predicates is that of Vendler (1967), although Vendler makes no reference either to aspect or to any Ian-

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guage but English. According to Vendler, activities (e.g. running, pushing a cart) are "processes going on in time," appropriately queried in terms of the durative "for how long," and also homogeneous, so that "any part of the process is of the same nature as the whole" (p. 101). States are also questioned by durative "for how long," and involve "time instants in an indefinite and non-unique sense" (p. 107) so that at any time in the duration of the state it can be said to be true that the state holds. Accomplishments are contrasted to activities in that accomplishments "proceed toward a ter­ minus which is logically necessary to their being what they are" (p. 101). They are queried by "how long did it take?" because they take a certain time to complete. Achievements occur at a single moment and are approp­ riately queried by "at what time" (p. 102-3). Although there has been much discussion and modification of the Vendler temporal schemata, there is still no consensus on a single typology adequate for a model of Russian aspect. Therefore I will continue to use the familiar Vendler typology but introduce further distinctions necessary for the syntactic environment of yes-no ques­ tions. These further distinctions will almost certainly be necessary in other environments as well. The relationship of lexical aspect to the morphologically encoded (perfective/imperfective) dichotomy is taken to be as follows. States and activities are most naturally expressed by imperfective verbs (Brecht 1985:11). When expressed perfectively they denote either a temporally de­ limited activity (Flier 1985; e.g. pocitat'p "to read for a while," prostojat* "to stand for some time"), or the inception of a state, an achievement (e.g. ponjat'? "to understand, grasp" poljubit* "to come to love"). Accomplish­ ments can be viewed imperfectively (Boris citai1 knigu "Boris 'read' the book"), in which 'read' stands for any of the imperfective contextual vari­ ants of durative, progressive, iterative, or simple denotation, or perfec­ tively (BorisprocitaP knigu "Boris read the book"). Achievements can also be viewed both imperfectively and perfectively, but the contextual variants which are realized in the imperfective are both limited and inconsistent. Thus, for some perfective achievements the corresponding imperfective form expresses a state with no progressive reading (e.g. ponjat*Iponimat'1 "understand"), for some the imperfective allows a progressive reading (e.g. umeret'?/umirat'1 "die"), whereas for others only an iterative reading is pos­ sible (e.g. najtivlnaxodifl "find"). 3 It is true, of course, that some kinds of iteration are equivalent to states (as in the example already cited, Vendler's "habits," Kucera's "attributes," 1983), but propositional and lexical sta-

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lives operate on different levels. There may well be more distinctions in types of achievements, but these three appear to be sufficient for yes-no questions. For convenience I will refer to them as follows: True achievement: (Imperfective = iterative only) slucit'sja "happen," najti "find," podarit' "give as a gift" Inceptive achievement: (Imperfective = lexical state) ponjat' "understand," poljubit' "come to love" End-in-sight Achievement: (Imperfective allows progressive) umeret' "die," utonut' "drown," vernut'sja "return" Since accomplishments and achievements have in common that they are inherently bounded, 4 they will be referred to together as telic predicates to differentiate them from inherently atelic states and activities.5 It should also be recognized that activities and imperfective accomplishments are in many ways identical in behavior. Accomplishments and end-in-sight achieve­ ments have in common that they have some kind of phase which precedes the terminus. 4

Situational Temporal Perspective

In order to understand the appropriateness conditions for questions it is necessary to identify a third, presupposed level of situational temporal perspective by which actions are associated with real times and expecta­ tions. For example, aspect in denials is sensitive to the relation of the action to a real time limit, in that many predicates require the perfective if situa­ tional closure is present, but allow a choice of aspect in its absence (Chaput 1985). This time limit might be more aptly called a relevant time frame or interval, since it is rarely so specific a point in time as in the example of the letters cited earlier (5:00). More often time frames are non-specific, implicit contracts between individuals which depend on the nature of the action in the given state of affairs. For example, if I give you a book for a month, then the relevant time frame is a month, more or less, and if I give it to you for the afternoon, then the relevant time frame depends on how we define that particular afternoon. I might also give a book to you without specifying any time period, but still after some time has elapsed feel justified in asking if you have read it. The relevant time frame acts as a kind of situational locus, so that a given state of affairs, viewed from the perspective of a single time frame, is viewed as a single, unitary occurrence.

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Not all situations, however, are unitary. Whereas unitary situations are potentially, but not necessarily repeatable, others are viewed as naturally iterative. Like blinking or coughing on the lexical level, many situations are seen as occurring on a regular basis, and usually at a reasonably regular time. Examples include eating meals, feeding pets, buying the newspaper, daily cleaning, and various activities in which individuals take turns. Mem­ bers of this group are often cited in connection with discussions of simple denotation. One of the important aspects of these habitual activities is that their occurrence is not in question. When they are queried it is often to determine the attendant circumstances of when or where (Forsyth 1970:92). However, it has not been made clear under what circumstances simple denotation is appropriate and when it is not. As will be shown, the habitual nature of such events is crucial to understanding their aspectual behavior. 5

Aspect Use in Questions

With the inclusion of the situational temporal perspective we find the following combinations: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Unitary, perfective, lexically telic predicate Unitary, perfective, lexically atelic predicate Unitary, imperfective, lexically telic predicate Unitary, imperfective, lexically atelic predicate Habitual, imperfective, lexically telic predicate Habitual, imperfective, lexically atelic predicate Habitual, perfective, lexically telic predicate Habitual, perfective, lexically atelic predicate

5.1 Unitary y perfective, lexically telic or atelic predicate The perfective of lexically telic predicates is appropriate in querying the completion of actions which the speaker presupposes to be required or expected. This function might be called new-event-confirmation and the consequent answer is "yes." The perfective is appropriate both before any actual deadline or after it has passed. Used before the time frame of expected completion, the question queries "completed yet"; subsequent to it the focus is either on whether the individual performed as required, or on whether the task reached its inherent terminus as required/expected.

ASPECT CHOICE IN QUESTIONS

(4)

(5)

(6) (7) (8)

291

 ubralp komnatu? Did you clean your room (as you were supposed to)? Did you clean your room? (Is it clean yet?) Vy pročitalip? knigu? Did you read the book (as you were supposed to)? Did you read the book? (Can I take it back?)  polucilP ego pis'? Did you receive his letter? (It is on the way.)  poluci? poctu? Did you get the mail (as you were supposed/expected to)?  našelp kljuci? Did you find the keys (which you were looking for)?

Before the deadline the same question under negation appears only to add the nuance of increased courtesy. It can be softened further by the addition of slucajno "by chance" (9). After the deadline negation will usually be accompanied by tak i, the marker of finality. The question confirms that the event was not completed as expected/required (10). (9)

(10)

 (slucajno) ne nase? kljuci? Did you happen to find the keys (which you were looking for)? Vy tak i ne procitai? staf ju? You didn't read the article?

Direct accusations are also a kind of new-event-confirmation since the speaker is in fact confirming an event which he believes to have been com­ mitted. (11)

Vy vzjalip kljuci? Did you take the keys?

A subgroup of this category may be considered questions where the speaker is verifying that the event expressed by this telic predicate is in fact the correct one. This variant is frequent of inadvertent actions (accidents) with a perceivable result as in (13). (12) (13)

Vy ubralip komnatu? Vy dolzny byli pokrasifF ego! You cleaned the room? You were supposed to paint it! Vy upalip? Did you fall? (Is that why you are limping?)

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Lexically atelic predicates may also be used perfectively with the same appropriateness conditions. As long as the event is viewed as situationally unitary, then the perfective will be used under the presuppositions of expectation or obligation. This is, however, a less expected usage, contrast­ ing with 5.3 below. (14) (15) (16)

 p o z a v t r a k a l p ? Did you have breakfast (yet) (as you were supposed to do)?  pocitalP vslux? Did you read aloud (as you were supposed to do)? Vera vystupilcP? Did Vera speak (as she was supposed to do)?

Accusation is also possible: (17)

Vy vystupilp? Did you speak (when you had been forbidden to)?

New-event-confirmation, then, is a "package" consisting of a single rele­ vant time frame, propositional boundedness (perfective), and the presup­ position of obligation and/or expectation. 5.2 Unitary, imperfective, lexically tellc (or atelic) predicate Imperfectives, are used under at least five conditions, when some fea­ ture of the perfective package is inappropriate. a) The perfective is inappropriate on a propositional level because the event has not reached its terminus. This is true, for example, when there is some sense of lack of completeness associated with the action. The associa­ tion of success with the perfective is strong and exemplified by such classic examples as ucit'I-vyucit'p "study"-"learn," rešat'I~rešit'p "work on"-"solve." However, success is implicit in many other actions as well: (18) (19)

(20)

Ja ob"jasnilap, no on ne ponjalP. I explained (properly), but he didn't understand (his fault). On ob"jasnjall, no ja ne ponjalap. He explained (incompletely), but I didn't understand (his fault). On ob"jasnilp no ja ne ponjalap. He explained (properly), but I didn't understand (my fault).

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There are many ways in which an event can be perceived as incomplete, depending on the semantic make-up of the predicate. In some cases it might be perceived as a failure to achieve a goal, in others the lack of the desired result, in others the apparent "annulment" of the action. (21) (22)

(23)

Vy posylali1 pis'ma? Did you send the letters? (He didn't receive them.) Vy citali1 stat' ju? Did you read the article? (You don't seem to know its con­ tents.)  ubiral1 komnatu? Did you clean your room? (It still looks dirty.) 6

What appears to be happening here is a shift in focus from the terminus of the event to a preceding phase, a kind of backtracking to reconstruct the event. 7 For purposes of identification this function will be called eventreconstruction, since it is as if the speaker shifts to a phase of the event which necessarily precedes the terminus. The phase-shift is possible only of predicates which can express a preceding phase (i.e. a progressive variant) and therefore possible with end-in-sight achievements but impossible with both inceptive and true achievements. (The * here and below indicates unacceptable variants in this function. (25) is of course possible as a lexical state, and (26) as a propositional state, but not to indicate event-reconstruc­ tion.) (24) (25)

(26)

Vy davaliI emu kljuci? Did you give him the keys? (He can't find them.) * Vy ponimali1 voprosy? Did you understand the questions? (You seem not to know them.) * Vy naxodili1 kljuci? Did you find the keys? (You seem not to have them.)

b) A second use of the Imperfective is when the result or terminus of the event is irrelevant because the focus of the speaker's interest is on some part of the preceding phase. This function might be called shared-experi­ ence, and is again possible only with phasal predicates and impossible with either inceptive or true achievements. (27)

 ubiral1 komnatu? Did you clean the room? (Did you happen to see my glas­ ses?)

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(28) (29)

(30) (31) (32)

 citai1  rasskaz? Did you read her story? (Interesting, wasn't it?)  polucal1 stipendiju? Did you go to pick up your scholarship? (Did you notice the office is much larger now?) Vy davali1  rasskaz? Did you assign her story? (What did you think?) *Vy ponimali1 voprosy? Did you understand the questions? (Difficult, weren't they?) * Vy naxodili1 kljuci? Did you look for the keys? (Did you notice the house was clean?)

Focus here seems to be on the action performed as a vehicle or cir­ cumstance for some other observation. An additional constraint is that these actions have some duration. c) The perfective is inappropriate if the time frame in which the action was completed is not the current, relevant one. This frequently occurs when the speaker suspects that the action has already been performed, suggesting that there is no need to repeat it (cf. Rassudova 1982:53), or that it is some­ one else's turn. This is the dissociated action of Rassudova ("razobscennost' dejstvija s momentom reci," p. 49), the "abstracted" time of Thelin (1984:227), but not so abstracted as questions of the type Vy kogda-nibud' citali1 "Annu Kareninu?" "Have you ever read Anna Karenina?," in which the iterative variant occurs. That this is iterative was observed by Ras­ sudova (1968:49)8 and is supported by the fact that the "ever" variant is possible with imperfective True Achievements, unlike the dissociatedaction variant found in these imperfective questions (see below). The use of uze "already" is common in this type of question, very likely to differentiate it from event-reconstruction above. The uze here functions to locate the action in another time frame. As with (a) and (b), this usage is not found with inceptive or true achievements. (33)

(34)

Vy uze citali1 staf ju? Have you already read the article? (No need to read it again?) Vy uze posylali1 pis'ma? Have you already sent the letters? (Do they have the letters? No need to send them again?)

ASPECT CHOICE IN QUESTIONS

(35)

(36)

(37)

295

Vy uze ubiraliI komnatu? Have you already cleaned the room? (Is it someone else's turn?) * Vy uze ponimali1 voprosy? Have you already understood the questions? (No need to understand them again? Someone else's turn?) * Vy uze naxodili1 kljuci? Have you already found the keys? (No need to find them again?)

(d) The perfective is inappropriate if the presuppositions of expecta­ tion or obligation are inappropriate. Perhaps the best example of this is in the courtroom, where defendants are questioned not on what they were supposed or expected to do, but on the facts of the events, simply whether they were performed. This appears to be the purest form of simple denota­ tion. (38) (39)

Vy ubirali1 svoju komnatu? Did you clean your room? Vy vozvrašcalis'1 domoj posle teatra? Did you return home after the theater?

(e) The fifth condition requiring the imperfective is to express confir­ mation of a continuing state of non-performance, found with all verb types, In practical terms it verifies non-performance of the action, and is particu­ larly suitable with first person subjects to express surprise. Since this vari­ ant is a propositional stative as a result of negation (as opposed to the imperfective-perfective opposition) it will not be included further in the dis­ cussion below. (40) (41) (42)

(43)

Vy ne davaliI ej kljuci? You didn't give her the keys? (Razve) ja ne posylalaI vom pis'ma? Did I (really) not send you the letters? Vy ne padaliI You didn't happen to fall (there hasn't been a fall, as an explanation for this recurring problem)? Vy ne uznavaliI ego? You didn't recognize him?

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Although not entirely clear, the unitary imperfective of lexically atelic predicates appears to be used for the durative, progressive, and iterative configurations only; otherwise see 5.3 below. 5.3 Habitual, imperfective, lexically telic or atelic predicate This combination represents the example (2) earlier of neutral queries of habitual actions. A telic or atelic action has acquired the status of an activity on a regular schedule of opportunity, and for some reason the speaker wishes to know whether the individual has performed the action on this occasion. He may ask before the expected occurrence, perhaps because he would like to participate also (shared-experience), or of a past occur­ rence, simply to discover whether the action took place (simple denota­ tion). In the latter case, however, the action is not queried with respect to an expected result; the focus is on the participant and the action alone, one occurrence of many. In theory there is no single consequent answer to the imperfective question; it may be either yes or no. (44) (45) (46) (47)

 zavtrakalI? Have you had breakfast? (I would like to join you.) davalIkorove seno? Have you given the cow her hay? (She needs some grain.) On vystupalI? Has he spoken (yet)? (I would like to hear him.) PeredavaliI prognoz pogody? Have they given the weather report?

Notice the inappropriateness of a result: (48)

(49) (50)

 segodnja pokupal1 gazetu? Have you bought a newspaper today? (I would like to come along.) vs. *  segodnja pokupal1 gazetu? Have you bought a newspaper today? (Show it to me.)  segodnja kupiP gazetu? Did you buy a newspaper today? (Show it to me.) (But com­ pare (51)-(55) below.)

This perspective is possible only with predicates capable of denoting an activity. It contrasts with 5.4 below.

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5.4 Habitual, perfective of telic or atelic predicate Like the delimitive perfective of lexical activities, the perfective of habitual actions expresses the completion or delimitation of the activity, frequently with the added nuance of being "too late." This is a different question from new-event-confirmation, which queries the event as it was supposed to occur. (51)

(52) (53) (54)

(55)

6

Vy uze popili P caj? Did you already finish with tea? (Shall I wash the dishes?), or Did you already have tea? (Am I late?)  uze dalP korove seno? You already gave the cow her hay (and I am late)? On uze v y s t u p i l P ? He already spoke (and we missed it)? Uze peredalip prognoz pogody? Did they already give the weather report? (Did I miss the weather report?) Vy uze kupiliP gazetu? Did you already buy a paper? (Am I too late to go with you?)

Discussion

There are several interesting observations which can be made of the above data. The first is that a given state of affairs is open to several differ­ ent interpretations, so that the choice of aspect offers more than two pos­ sibilities. In the examples below there is no way to differentiate between the variants (57) and (58) without drawing on the presupposed situational perspective. (56) (57) (58)

zavtrakalI?(habitual situation) Have you had breakfast? (If not I will fix you something.) p o z a v t r a k a l P(habitual situation) Did you (already) have breakfast? (I wanted to join you.) pozavtraka P ?(unitary situation) Did you have breakfast (as you were supposed to)?

In dialogue, of course, these variants would be supported by intonation and by the extended context of the conversation (cf. Forsyth 1970:87).

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Second, a number of functions are proposed for aspectual behavior in questions. It would seem desirable to reduce their number, and it is tempt­ ing to look for some kind of symmetry. One might say that unitary situa­ tions are naturally perfective (cf. Brecht 1985 on telic actions), and that the imperfective results from an activity-shift. In parallel fashion, habitual situ­ ations, which are actions viewed as activities, undergo an event-shift in what is essentially a temporal delimitation, which is comparable to the tem­ poral delimitation of the lexical activities (Flier 1985) but on a different level. This would pattern as follows: (59)

(60)

New-event-confirmation under presuppositions of obligation/ expectation, or Activity shift: Event-reconstruction Shared-experience Dissociated-action Simple denotation (absence of presuppositions) Activity-confirmation : Simple denotation Shared-experience Event shift for temporal delimitation

This possibility, as well as references to activities in the preceding sec­ tions requires some reconsideration of the activity definition proposed by Vendler. Vendler's criteria were duration and homogeneity, and while duration seems essential, homogeneity within each action would be difficult to support. These actions do have a kind of homogeneity, but it is rather in the fact that each occurrence follows a similar pattern. More important, however, is the fact that activities are dynamic situations requiring a con­ tinuous input of energy (Comrie 1976:49) and are subject to the control of the individual, especially in their initiation and termination (Flier 1985:5455). Activities are therefore independent actions which may, but need not, proceed toward a terminus. Flier notes the fact that atelic activities can be perfectivized both as accomplishments and delimitives (p.55). This appears to be the pattern in questions, where activities play one role in unitary situ­ ations as a phase preceding the terminus, and another in habitual situations where they are recurring actions subject to perfective delimitation. Looking at the proposed functions, it appears that shared-experience shows a valid activity shift. Those combinations which are allowed show

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independence of the action and a sense of duration. (61) would be odd in this function, but (62) or (63) would not because they have assumed the status of activites. (61)

(62)

(63)

?Vy davali1 Vere kljuci? Did you give Vera the keys? (Did you notice her office has been painted?) Vy davali1 korove seno? Did you give the cow her hay? (Did you notice the barn has been painted?) Vy davaliI detjam moloko? (Did you notice the room has been painted?)

It should be noted that the determination of the acceptability of a given combination as an activity is in many cases a subjective determination on the part of the speaker, and that there was not unanimous agreement on the part of speakers questioned. Looking at event-reconstruction, it turns out that many of the predi­ cates tolerating the shift are accomplishments with activity phases (e.g.  resal1 zadaci? "Did you work on the problems?"  uznavala1 raspisanie? "Did you go to find out the schedule?") Yet others are end-in-sight achieve­ ments, the imperfective of which is not an activity as defined. Looking further one finds that the incidence of physical transfer is high {On davalI tebe kljuci? "Did he give you the keys?," Ona polucalaI pis'mo? "Did she receive the letter?," etc.), which might be charaterized as a kind of change of state. However, uznat'Pkogo-nibud' "recognize someone" similarly denotes a change of state, but does not tolerate this imperfective shift.9 In fact, this seems to be a case of partial control over the action, control over one part of a two-part transaction. The shift is prohibited with just those events for which control would be quite odd: recognizing someone, falling, dropping something, noticing something. Note, however, that the inadver­ tent commission of an inherently controlled action permits this shift: Vy braliI moi kljuci? "Did you take my keys?". This variant is softer than the perfective in that it shifts to the participant and the action (event recon­ struction) as opposed to the focus on the (negative) result.10 Dissociated-action seems also to have a strong association with activities and other controlled actions, but this group requires more investi­ gation. This fact may simply be a consequence of the strong association of dissociated-actions with the notion of "no need to repeat" and also with

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turn-taking. Both of these imply volitional activities and options. In any case, it is clear that uniquely occurring actions which are viewed as avolitional are excluded: (64) (65)

* On uze umiral1. He already died. (No need to repeat.) * Ona uze naxodilaI kljuci. She already found the keys. (No need to find them again.)

Simple denotation seems to follow the same pattern as dissociatedaction. One might argue that they should be combined, but it seems prema­ ture to make that decision. As long as there is the difference in association between, on the one hand, dissociated-action and the focus on repetition and turn-taking, and on the other simple denotation and the avoidance of the perfective presuppositions of expectation and obligation, it seems more reasonable to leave them separate. In aspect literature it is common to find statements similar to the fol­ lowing one by Forsyth: "Whatever meaning can be read into an imperfective form in context, the grammatical reason for its use is always simply avoidance of the precise meaning of the perfective" (Forsyth 1970:82). However, Forsyth himself qualifies this statement by saying that such meanings as duration, process, and tendency "are so firmly associated with the imperfective that to some extent they act in the mind of the Russian speaker as criteria for the positive choice of the imperfective" (p. 118). This investigation indicates that this statement could be made much stronger. The avoidance of the perfective is not the avoidance of a single feature of totality, but rather the inappropriateness of any part of the perfective "package." Each part, when inappropriate, contributes to a slightly differ­ ent perspective, or function. To recapitulate, the perfective package in the function of new-eventconfirmation consists of the following: - propositionally denoted terminus - relevant time frame - presuppositions of obligation/expectation - presupposed unitary situational perspective In reference to a given state of affairs the imperfective is possible within certain presupposed (volitional) and lexico-semantic limits, and then according to a particular schedule of inappropriateness. The inappropriate­ ness of the terminus yields two variants. In event-reconstruction the ter-

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minus is doubted, incomplete (Did you clean the room? It is still dusty.). In shared-experience the terminus is irrelevant because the speaker is interested in the circumstances accompanying the activity (Did you find my glasses?). The inappropriateness of the relevant time frame yields dissociated-action, the completion of the event "at some previous time", e.g. Vy citali1 Annu Kareninu? "Did you (already) read Anna Karenina (at some previous time)?" The inappropriateness of the presuppositions of obliga­ tion/expectation make appropriate simple denotation — the action just in terms of whether or not it occurred. Simple denotation may contrast with new-event-confirmation by a subtle shift in emphasis from the agent to the object: (66)

(67)

Vy postaliP pis'ma? Did you send the letters (as you were supposed to do)? or Did you send the letters (and can we take the next step)? Vy posylaliI pis'ma? Were the letters sent? (Do they have the letters?)

Last, the inappropriateness of the unitary perspective gives the neutral form for habitual situations, activity confirmation (e.g. Vy obedaliI? "Have you had/Did you have dinner?"). It is also true that habitual situations may be questioned in the func­ tions of shared-experience or simple denotation. They differ from unitary situations in not having a dissociated action variant indicating no need to repeat (contradictory given the nature of habitual situations which repeat by definition) or event-reconstruction (inappropriate because of the lack of terminus). They do show a perfective in a function something like activitydelimitation. In sum: Unitary: Pf. : New-event-confirmation Impf.: Event-reconstruction Shared-experience Dissociated-action Simple denotation (absence of presuppositions)

Habitual: Pf. : Activity-delimitation Impf.: — Shared-experience — Simple denotation (neutral question)

There are two more observations which should be made. The first con­ cerns the verbs of "communication," such as govorit'I "speak," or zvonit' I

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"telephone." It has been observed that these verbs occur frequently in the imperfective (Forsyth 1970:96-102), and they do in yes-no questions as well. This fact would seem to be explainable by considering their behavior as a type of shared-experience. In fact, in shared-experience, the queried verb acts as a kind of vehicle for the speaker's main purpose. The verbs of com­ munication seem to behave in a similar pattern in that, as the following examples show, the speaker's object is not simply to establish communica­ tion, but rather the message which follows: (68)

(69)

Vy govoriliI s nej? Ona pridetP? Did you speak with her? Will she come? (speaker's goal is the invitation) -Vy zvoniliI emu? -Da, zvonilI. OnpridetP. "Did you call him?" "Yes, I called him. He will come."

This use of the imperfective contrasts, for example, with the opposition of zvonit' I to pozvonit' P "call" when the imperfective is used for an unsuccess­ ful call. If the object is the call itself (new-event-confirmation), the perfec­ tive will be used. (70)

Vy pozvonili P ej? Did you succeed in calling her?

Finally, it should be pointed out that yes-no questions point to a differ­ ence in behavior among the so-called "annulled action" verbs. Whereas intransitive verbs of the type prixodit'I in non-iterative past tense construc­ tions are open only to the interpretation "came and went," transitive verbs in non-iterative constructions need not necessarily refer only to annulled action. Rassudova states that of a book which has been placed in a desk drawer one can say either (71) or (72) (Rassudova 1982:61). (71) (72)

Èto vy polozili P knigu v jascik? Was it you who put the book in the drawer? Vy klaliI knigu v jascik? Did you put the book in the drawer?

In both cases the book can be present, but the first is a neutral new-eventconfirmation, while the second can express displeasure, irritation, or even pleasure. The latter appears to be a conversational usage and one not used by all speakers, but it is a type of event-reconstruction. The focus is on the

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activity of placing the book (under the presupposition of volition), so that the displeasure is focussed more on the action and the participant, and less on the total fact that the book is in the drawer. Similarly, Kto otkryvalI okno? "Who opened the window?" (see below) can be said easily of a win­ dow which is closed. This is not true if the agent himself is the object in motion, where such a use is impossible. 7

Who-Questions

Rassudova (1982:55-62) devotes considerable discussion to this type of question, offering that perfectives are associated with result, verbs of crea­ tion and discovery, and creative authorship. Imperfectives she associates with emphasis on the process of carrying out the action, or when only the agent could answer the question. She also points out that imperfectives are difficult to imagine with verbs of negative result, such as breaking a cup. These comments lend strong support to the functions identified for yes-no questions. The emphasis on result, discovery, and creative authorship would all be appropriate expressions of new-event-confirmation: (73) (74) (75) (76)

Kto napisalP ètot rasskaz?9 Who wrote this story? Kto kupiP tebe èti tufli? Who bought you these shoes? Kto podarilP tebe èti tufli? Who gave you these shoes? Kto razbiP ètu casku? Who broke this cup?

However, when the speaker wishes to focus on the process (event-recon­ struction) he shifts to the imperfective. This shift is used to focus on the specifics of the process involved, often when it was performed badly, but also if it was performed well. As with yes-no questions, the shift is possible only with predicates capable of denoting an activity or otherwise volitional phase. (80) is odd because it is difficult to imagine the activity of breaking the cup performed badly as an activity. (81) is impossible because true achievements have no preceding volitional phase. (77)

Kto pisalI ètot rasskaz? Who wrote this story? (It is not a new event; focus is only on who wrote it.)

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(78) (79) (80) (81)

8

Kto pokupal I tebe èti tufli? Who bought you these shoes? (They are too small!) Kto gotovil1 ètot sup? Who made this soup? (It is too salty.) * Kto razbivalI ètu casku? Who broke this cup? * Kto darilI tebe èti tufli? Who gave you these shoes?

Conclusion

By describing in some detail the aspectual pattern in yes-no questions it has been shown, first, that the range of options cannot be understood without taking into account the situational perspective. Second, the choice of the imperfective is not a single simple avoidance of perfective totality, but rather a complex of choices conforming to individual functions and further limited by the nature of the predicate. Whatever the eventual status of these functions, they have significant heuristic power. Finally, by show­ ing how the semantic content of predicates interrelates with the pattern of functions, I hope to have shed some additional light on the problem of sim­ ple denotation.

NOTES 1.

Presuppositions here are pragmatic, as in Stalnaker (1974).

2.

The second type of question, using the particle li and an adjustment in word order, is not specifically treated here. It is not identical in usage to the first type of question, but many of the aspectual observations will be valid for it as well.

3.

For more discussion of this point see Kucera (1983). The "historical present" is excluded.

4.

Timberlake (1985) argues persuasively that Achievements should be analyzed not in terms of moments, but in terms of a single interval of time.

5.

This usage follows Brecht (1985), who uses Garey's term (H. Garey, "Verbal aspect in French," Language 33, 91-110) and differs from Comrie (1976) who states that for "telic situations it is important that there should be both a process leading up to the terminal point as well as the terminal point. Thus the example... John reached the summit, is not telic..." (p.47).

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6.

Cf. Forsyth (1970:83) Pocemu zdes' tak pyVno?  ubiral segodnja komnatu? "Why is it so dusty here? Have you cleaned the room today? or Did you clean the toom today?"

7.

Rassudova mentions "reconstruction of the picture of past events" briefly, with one example, but she seems to be treating it in a broader sense, more like the "courtroom usage" of simple denotation (1982:53).

8.

This fact is found in her earlier edition only.

9.

It can, in fact, be said that the essence of the perfective is some kind of change of state, which probably explains why this line of investigation is not fruitful (Townsend 1985).

10.

In fact, all four of the possible combinations can be used as forms of accusations. Listed from strongest to weakest they are: (Èto) vy vzjali moju knigu? Vy slucajno ne vzjali moju knigu? Vy brali moju knigu? Vy slucajno ne brali moju knigu?

REFERENCES Brecht, Richard. 1985. "The Form and Function of Aspect in Russian." Issues in Russian Morphosyntax, ed. by Michael S. Flier and Richard D . Brecht, 9-34. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers. Chaput, Patricia. 1985. "On the Question of Aspectual Selection in Denials." The Scope of Slavic Aspect, ed. by Michael S. Flier and Alan Timberlake, 224-233. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers. Comrie, Bernard. 1976. Aspect. An Introduction to the Study of Aspect and Related Problems. bridge: University Press.

Cam­

Flier, Michael S. 1985. "The Scope of Prefixai Delimitation in Russian." The Socpe of Slavic Aspect, ed. by Michael S. Flier and Alan Timberlake, 41-58. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers. Forsyth, J. 1970. A Grammar of Aspect. Usage and Meaning in the Russian Verb. Cambridge: University Press. Kucera, Henry. 1983. "A Semantic Model of Verbal Aspect." American Contributions to the Ninth International Congress of Slavists. Vol. 1: Linguistics, ed. by Michael S. Flier, 171-184. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers. Lyons, John. 1977. Semantics. Cambridge: University Press.

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Rassudova, O.P. 1968. Upotreblenie vidov glagola v russkom jazyke. Moscow: Moskovskij Univer­ sitet. 1982.

Upotreblenie vidov glagola v sovremennom russkom jazyke. Moscow: Russkij jazyk.

Stalnaker, Robert S. 1974. "Pragmatic Presuppositions." Semantics and Philosophy, ed. by Milton K. Munitz and Peter K. Unger, 197-213. New York: New York University Press. Stubbs, Michael. 1983. Discourse Analysis. The Sociolinguistic Analysis of Natural Language. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Thelin, Nils B. 1984. "Coherence, Perspective and Aspectual Specification in Slavonic Narrative Discourse." Aspect Bound, ed. by C. de Groot and H. Tommola, 225-238. Dordrecht. Timberlake, Alan. 1982. "Invariance and the Syntax of Russian Aspect." Tense-Aspect: Between Semantics and Pragmatics, ed. by Paul J. Hopper, 305-331. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 1985.

"The Temporal Schemata of Russian Predicates." Issues in Russian Morphosyntax, ed. by Michael S. Flier and Richard D. Brecht, 35-57. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers.

Townsend, Charles. 1985. "Can Aspect Stand Prosperity?" The Scope of Slavic Aspect, ed. by Michael S. Flier and Alan Timberlake, 286-295. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Publishers. Vendler, Zeno. 1967. "Verbs and Times." Linguistics in Philosophy, 97-121. Ithaca: Cornell Uni­ versity Press. Reprinted from The Philosophical Review 66 (1957), 143-160.

Russian aspect in questions: information and invariance in discourse1 Peter T. Merrill Phillips Academy

0

Introduction

The goal of this article is to discuss a framework within which to inte­ grate observations and theories of aspect, discourse, and yes-no questions. 2 Questions seem to have the desirable quality (desirable, that is, from the researcher's point of view) of being a relatively constrained type of dis­ course; much more constrained, for instance, than past-tense indicative narration, with which we are all so comfortable. This quality makes ques­ tions a reasonable avenue for early research on aspect in discourse, inas­ much as there are thus fewer variables to manipulate in developing an analysis. The order of presentation in this article will be: a brief overview of aspect semantics; a fuller elaboration of a discourse framework; the place of questions within this discourse framework; and discussion of aspect in questions. 1

Theoretical overview

1.1 Semantics of aspect The theory of aspectual meaning followed in this article is essentially Jakobsonian (see, for instance, Jakobson 1932). The aspectual opposition is viewed as subordinative: the perfective aspect quantifies the event of a predication 3 such that the event is defined as reaching its lexically defined conclusion (that is, it predicates realized telicity), while the imperfective is

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unmarked and contributes no such quantification. That is, the imperfective simply predicates of certain participants the situation named by the verb ("simple denotation" in Forsyth's (1970) terms). It is important to view meaning at this level as Searle (1969) does, that is as predication rather than as assertion. If we view all grammatical and lexical meaning as a type of assertion, then we will be at a loss to talk about meaning in non-assertions (e.g., in questions). On this view, predications delineate properties to be ascribed to arguments in a sentence. For the purposes of this article, it is not terribly important which of the possible meanings that have been proposed for the perfective we accept.4 What is important, however, is the subordinative nature of the opposition. In fact, one of the intended contributions of this article is a discussion of subordinative marking, and the demonstration that precisely this sort of opposition is critical to understanding the functioning of aspect use in ques­ tions. Together, the notions of predication and subordinative marking give us a system in which the perfective aspect represents a component of a predi­ cation which may be asserted, questioned, required, etc. of a participant. As such it is capable of being highlighted in ways that the imperfective can­ not be; furthermore it is a prominent element of predications and, as we will see below, its misuse can lead to what are often thought of as presup­ position problems. 1.2 The discourse frame In analyzing the meaning of a particular grammatical category within a theory based on invariance, there is an obvious but critical observation that must be made concerning contextual variation. Namely, everything else is context; or more accurately, everything that contributes to utterance value is part of a text and interacts with the rest of the text. While the semantics of aspect are perhaps less complicated than may superficially seem to be the case, the interrelation of this meaning with con­ text is the nut which aspectologists still must crack. At the simplest level, it is clear that the contribution of aspect (and probably of any component of meaning) to what Brecht (forthcoming) calls UTTERANCE VALUE is far more complex than its relatively simple semantics. A concern of this article is to consider how we compute such utterance values, and in particular, the types of contributions that aspect can make to utterance-level meaning.

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According to the view being developed here, the aspectual meaning of realized telicity is invariant, that is, semantic. Other meanings, such as simultaneity, sequentiality, durativity, and iterativity are pragmatic; that is, derived through essentially conventional contextual algorithms (roughly, Grice's (1975) implicatures 5 ). The work of, e.g., Vendler (1967) and Mourelatos (1978) has been important to aspectology because it provides valuable insights into the structure of event semantics. This structure turns out to be of critical significance to many instances of those particular com­ ponents of utterance values that seem to derive largely from aspect. 6 The perception that the two events of (1) are simultaneous is an example of an inference relying on what Brecht (forthcoming) calls the "amalgamation" of aspect and event semantics. (1)

kManja citala1 gazetu, Vitja varil1 obed. while Manja readfi] newspaper Vitja cooked[i] dinner "While Manja was reading the newspaper, Vitja was cooking dinner."

The reason that notions like simultaneity are considered to be pragma­ tic rather than semantic is that they are not invariably associated with the imperfective in structures such as (1). It is possible to collocate two perfec­ tive verbs referring to durative events in a similar structure and produce a reading of simultaneity7 (especially with the prefix do -: in (1) replace citala with docitalap "read through," and varil with dovarilP or svarilP "finished cooking"). The general problem of constructing a theory of discourse as it relates to aspect involves the process of inference that speakers and hearers make use of to develop the appropriate contextual meanings for a given utter­ ance. A necessary beginning point is that participants in a discourse come equipped with some sort of knowledge that can be drawn upon in the dis­ course. In particular, we are interested in that portion of the knowledge which is in the intersection of the sets of knowledge possessed by the partic­ ipants. I will follow Sperber and Wilson (1986) in calling the general set of accessible facts a person's COGNITIVE ENVIRONMENT, and the intersection of such cognitive environments the MUTUALLY MANIFEST facts. The goal of an utterance is, then, typically to make some new fact(s) manifest to the hearer, and thus to make facts mutually manifest.8 Sperber and Wilson further view communication as primarily a process of inference, rather than simply of decoding. They therefore attribute to

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the process of inference even those facts which are usually thought of as arising through straightforward decoding. They point out that we do not communicate states of the world. We communicate our beliefs concerning states of the world, from which beliefs the hearer makes inferences about the states of the world. Sperber and Wilson go on to distinguish between explicatures and implicatures, with the former type of assumptions clas­ sified according to the degree of explicitness with which they are communi­ cated. A particularly germane example of Sperber and Wilson's argumenta­ tion is found in the following discussion of the English perfect concerning (2) and (3) (their (24) and (25), 1986: 189-190): [(2)] [(3)]

I

I have had breakfast. have been to Tibet.

What can be recovered from these utterances by decoding and refer­ ence assignment is that the speaker has had breakfast, or been to Tibet, at some point within a period of time preceding her utterance. In real life, a hearer would be expected to make some more or less specific assumption' about how long that period was. In this, he is guided by the fact that a pre­ sumption of relevance has been communicated. In the case of [(2)], for example, it would normally go without saying that the speaker had had breakfast at some point in her life. If she intends her utterance to be man­ ifestly relevant, she must intend to make manifest that she has had break­ fast recently enough for it to be worth remarking on: for example, recently enough not to be in immediate need of food. In the case of [(3)], by con­ trast, the mere fact that the speaker had visited Tibet at some point in her life could well be relevant enough, and in the absence of more specific information this is the interpretation that would be consistent with the principle of relevance.

It is this sort of logic that the discussion below of aspect in questions aims to pursue. There, rather than tense information, the inference process is begun with information about the telic status of events. Also important to the functioning of discourse is the distinction between focal and non-focal information. Utterances typically contain information serving two different functions, which have been given a vari­ ety of names: theme/rheme, topic/comment, old/new information. The dis­ tinction is probably better thought of as gradable, rather than complemen­ tary. This is not a central issue in this article, but where necessary, the terms theme and rheme will be used.

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A final important aspect of discourse is its incremental nature. Thelin, in describing his model, speaks of the central importance of: die Beziehungen zwischen der Aufnahme neuer Information und dem Zugang zu alter (präsupponierter) Information in Form eines fortlaufen­ den interpretativen Ansammlungs- (Speicherungs-) Prozesses (Thelin 1985: 165).

That is to say that the cognitive environment of the speaker and hearer in a discourse is continually being added to by each contribution of a speaker. Furthermore, according to Sperber and Wilson the most important require­ ment for participation in discourse is that the speaker believe that her con­ tribution is relevant. In their terms, relevance entails both being germane and enriching the cognitive environment (i.e., advancing the discourse). In the case of Russian, the interaction of aspect and event semantics is one area that has received a large amount of attention in aspectology. Much of this work has focussed on narration, and especially past tense, indicative narration. 9 Further work in aspect will involve shifting these, and other, variables. We know, for instance, that aspect use in future tense utterances is not identical to aspect use in the past tense. Another type of interaction concerns aspect and mood. Less work has been done here, for the obvious reason that yet another compounding factor is being introduced. What hap­ pens to aspect choice when we must factor into the algorithm the modal status of the utterance world in addition to the existing factors of event and aspect semantics? The particular variable that we will address here concerns what I call discourse mode, that is, the utterance types10 in which a discourse can take place: assertion, question, command. Certainly the majority of work on aspect concerns the assertive mode. Ideally, we hope to discover that many of the findings from this mode carry over to the other modes, with certain reasonable modifications. 1.3

Questions

Questions are one of the possible discourse frames in which aspect can occur. If this discourse mode is perhaps less comfortable turf for aspectologists, the trade-off for present purposes is that the functioning of aspect seems to hinge here on fewer variables — or at least on less subtle deploy­ ment of the variables. Our goal now is to identify some of these variables, integrate them into the discourse framework, and then demonstrate that

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this framework makes aspect behavior (appear) sensible. What makes the question mode of interest is that it seems to be more constrained than the assertive mode in particular ways. A major reason for this stems from the fact that in asking a question, a speaker is giving up con­ trol of the flow of information. Firbas points out that: V voprositel'nom predioženii glavnoj cel'ju govorjascego javljaetsja polucenie manija ot slusajuscego; on trebuet ot slusajuscego, ctoby tot zanjal poziciju govorjascego, i, stav govorjascim, otdal trebuemoe znanie (Fir­ bas 1972: 57). "In an interrogative sentence the main objective of the speaker is the receipt of information from the listener. He requests of the listener that he take the position of the speaker, and, having become the speaker, that he provide the requested information."

In order to receive precise information, it is necessary to attempt to const­ rain the possible responses. In making assertions, and particularly in narration made up of long strings of assertions, the speaker is interested, roughly speaking, in convey­ ing a verbal picture. It is possible for only very small parts of each assertion to contain focal material, but it is equally possible for large parts of an assertion to contain focal information (we might distinguish these as blunt vs. rich styles). Especially in a so-called "rich" style, as the hearer processes an assertion two sorts of consequences may ensue, even simultaneously: new assumptions deriving from (roughly) the rheme may be conjoined to an existing cognitive environment; information from the theme — corres­ ponding to old information — may serve as corrective information and alter some presupposition. Thus in the assertive mode, the speaker is less con­ strained in her attempts to manipulate the cognitive environment of the hearer. A series of assertions will tend to contain self-correcting informa­ tion should miscommunication occur. She may be as subtle as she wishes, provided the consequences of being too subtle do not undermine the narra­ tive goals. In the case of questions, negative consequences are much more likely to crop up, and also much more severe. In the case of yes-no questions, the speaker's goal is to elicit information about the state of some world. This elicitation is done in a very restricted fashion, however. Goffman has the following to say about questions and their answers: Notwithstanding the content of their questions, questioners are oriented to what lies just ahead, and depend on what is to come; answerers are

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oriented to what has just been said, and look backward, not forward. Observe that although a question anticipates an answer, is designed to receive it, seems dependent on doing so, an answer seems even more dependent, making less sense alone than does the utterance that called it forth (Goffmanl981: 5).

In essence, the speaker proposes an assertion, to which the hearer can only assent or dissent. By saying too much in the assertion-proposal, the speaker runs a greater risk of incurring dissent. There is, therefore, clear incentive for the speaker to be very careful about asking assent to no more informa­ tive an assertion than is necessary, and to be very precise as to the focal issue of the question. Sperber and Wilson suggest that "interrogative utterances are interpre­ tations of answers that the speaker would regard as relevant if true" (1986: 252). One of the issues to be examined below is the utility of relevance to understanding the inference process surrounding the interpretation of ques­ tions. 2

Aspect in questions

The purpose of the following discussion is to examine the general role of aspect as it contributes to the logic of question interpretation. For detailed discussion of broader situational influences in questions and answers see Chaput's rich work (1985 and this volume). Let us begin with a relatively clear case in which contextual inference makes a difference in aspect choice. In (4), either aspect is, in principle, possible. (4)

 [opazdyvalI/opozdalp] na lekciju? you late[i/p] for lecture "Were you late for the lecture?"

The reason that either aspect is possible, however, is that there is no con­ text. All that the assertion that either aspect is possible tells us is that there is nothing in the predication that makes one aspect or the other inapprop­ riate. At the discourse level — that is, when we assign a referent to ty, and discover that the event is viewed, say, as a progressive — "free choice" of aspect may disappear. If (5a) is said by a nagging sibling as prelude to the question in (4), the perfective is strongly preferred there.

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(5)

.  segodnja utrom ocen' pozdno uselP. you today morning very late left[p] "You left very late this morning." b. Pocemu ty segodnja utrom tak bystro useP. why you today morning so quickly left[p] "Why did you leave in such a hurry this morning?"

The task is to explain the nature of the inference process that leads to this requirement; and there is a great deal to explain. The following will perhaps seem labored, but is meant to indicate the extent of the work that must still be done in sorting out how speakers mean and understand mean­ ing. To begin, ocen' pozdno "very late" can only be understood relative to some existing, but here only implicit, scenario for this brother's mornings. It is, therefore, illusory to conceive of even (5a) as providing "enough" con­ text to fully explicate aspect choice in (4). In fact, all (5a) can do is more or less significantly narrow the choice of possible scenarios in which (4) might occur. One implicated premise necessary to understanding (5a) is (6). (6)

Brother usually leaves at time t for some reason.

From (5a) and (6) it can be inferred that, at the the time (5a) is uttered, brother was running late; therefore, before (4) is uttered, the speaker's and hearer's cognitive environments can be expected to include this assumption of tardiness. At the critical moment of aspect choice, then, the speaker has two options. She may use the imperfective, which, according to the theory elaborated above, in essence merely restates the presupposed state of affairs. As such, it is not really an acceptable question, inasmuch as it fails the relevance principle by not advancing the discourse. Alternatively, she may use the perfective, which builds on that state of affairs and asks for evaluation of a further assertion: were you in fact late for the lecture to which you were going? As the title of this article indicates, one of the purposes of this article is to discuss invariance, and more particularly, subordinative markedness. Brecht (forthcoming) argues that subordinative marking is a more complex form of markedness than is privative markedness (although he nonetheless holds that aspectual meaning, in contrast to tense, is an example of subor­ dinative marking). While this may be true if we think of it simply in the traditional terms as "no statement of X," from the perspective of informa-

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RUSSIAN ASPECT IN QUESTIONS

tion processing this seems less obvious. In fact, it may be the case that, under certain circumstances, privative markedness is the more complex. What I am suggesting is that we think of the contribution of the marked (perfective) aspect to an utterance value roughly as an additional predication. 11 The unmarked (imperfective) aspect is processed as simply no additional predication. In the case of a past-tense assertion, a verb in the imperfective asserts only that a situation by that name existed. A perfective verb makes both that assertion, and asserts that the situation reached its terminus. Rappaport (1985) names these "process statement" and "telic statement." 12 For the sake of consistency, I will call them PROCESS PREDICA­ TION and TELIC PREDICATION.

The preceding discussion of (4-6) is actually not the whole story. It is based on a particular reading of (4); namely, one in which the focal point of the question intonation falls on opozdal "was late." If the intonation focus falls on lekciju "lecture," a different question is posed. The discussion above presupposes that the speaker knows that it was a lecture to which her brother was going. If this information is, in fact, not known, and is the focus of the question, then the choice of aspect has different consequences. If the imperfective is used, she makes no presumption concerning the out­ come of his running late. This reading would be consistent if (5b), rather than (5a), preceded (4). The perfective, on the other hand, is consistent with a presupposition of achieved lateness, and poses the familiar danger of presupposition: if the outcome is different than is presupposed, the whole question may be thrown into doubt. If the hearer was, in fact, going to lec­ ture, but was not late, he would still have to answer negatively, and thus address the incorrect presupposition. This framework provides a particularly rewarding analysis of the troublesome data associated with so-called konstatacija fakta dejstvija "statement of the fact of an event" (henceforth, KFD). Aspect theories such as those found in Bondarko (1971), Haltof (1967, 1968), Thelin (1978), and Timberlake (1982), which contain features intended to corre­ spond to the central uses of aspect, typically have difficulty with this usage of the imperfective, precisely because aspect makes no identifiable con­ tribution to utterance value. Exchanges such as the following, from švedova and Trofimova, illus­ trate the problem. (7)

a. -Sasa, ty zakazyvalI zelezno-doroznye Sasa you ordered[i] railroad

bilety po tickets by

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PETER T. MERRILL

telefonu? telephone "Sasa, have you [ever] ordered train tickets by telephone?" b. -Da, zakazyvalI, a cto? yes ordered[i] and why "Yes, I have. Why?"  -U tebja ne soxranilsjaP nomer telefona? by you not saved[p] number of telephone Mne nado zakazat' bilety. me necessary to order tickets "Have you saved the telephone number? I need to order tic­ kets." (Svedova & Trofimova 1983: 56) The choice of aspect in (7a) is based on much the same logic as proposed by Sperber and Wilson for the examples concerning the English present per­ fect discussed above. In posing this question, the speaker must decide whether to ask simply about the event, or about the successful completion of the event. Given (7b), it is clear that the speaker is interested only in the general occurrence of the event, and not necessarily in its completion. If she follows Grice's Maxim of Quantity, the speaker will be inclined to use the imperfective and ask no more than she really needs to. Sperber and Wilson argue that the rationale for this stems directly from the principle of relevance (see quote above). Communication carries with it the promise of relevance. Were the speaker to use the perfective in (7a), the hearer would assume that its use was intentional, and he would therefore be expected to make appropriate inferences. The primary inference related to use of the perfective aspect would be that completion of the event was relevant. From this inference comes what I take to be an instance of an implicated premise: speaker expects hearer to have ordered tickets. 13 Implicated premises are either retrieved directly from memory or constructed from other "assumption schemas retrieved from memory" (Sperber & Wilson 1986: 195). By using the imperfective in (7a), the speaker makes no predication of realized telicity, thus provoking no inferences related to it. Event semantics are also relatively uncomplicated: the context of (7a) contains no coordi­ nated event with which the predicated event might be simultaneous, and the event semantics of zakazyvat' "order" do not require it to be under­ stood as iterative. Thus, about the only way for the hearer to interpret the question is as an instance of KFD.

RUSSIAN ASPECT IN QUESTIONS

317

In (7c), the use of the perfective triggers — together with the general structure of the sentence, with its possessive construction  tebja "[lit.] by you" — a different implicature, this time an implicated conclusion: speaker would like to know the number. The result of saving a telephone number is possession of that number, and further the ability to share this information. That this is the correct conclusion is made explicit by the follow-up sentence of (7c). The information provided in each of the utterances of (7) thus serves to create an inferential pattern that leaves the hearer of each question little choice as to how to interpret the questions. More precisely, it is the infor­ mation and the principle of relevance that lead to the correct assumptions. 3

Conclusion

While questions provide what appears to be a more restrained dis­ course mode, there remains much to be done to complete the picture. One such issue concerns the role of event semantics. Any model of questions must somehow allow for a different correlation between aspect use and event semantics than is observed in assertive narration. Similarly, the treat­ ment of focal material must be elaborated on, again, particularly in contrast with assertions. In fact, the simplifications cited in footnote 10 concerning speech act types must be removed. The use of the imperfective in KFD, and the perfective in questions involving expectation or in a perfect of result have long been recognized. The intent of this discussion has been to try to flesh out both the type and the extent of inferences that might be involved in arriving at these portions of utterance values in yes-no questions. Sperber and Wilson's framework, although still largely programmatic, is appealing because it seems to locate the elements of the inferential process in sensible places. It is clearly impos­ sible for the perfective to denote expectation directly. Expectation is much more likely to derive either directly from memory (that is, hearer directly recalls the request to do something) or from a hypothesized scenario con­ structed from assumption schemas in memory. Of further significance is the role that subordinative invariant meaning plays in this process. It is the crit­ ical first step in all inferences deriving from aspect selection.

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NOTES 1.

This research was assisted by a grant from the Joint Committee on Soviet Studies of the Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies with funds provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Ford Founda­ tion, and by a semester research leave given by the Arts and Humanities Division of the University of Maryland, College Park. The author wishes to thank Richard Brecht for much conversation on the topics discussed here.

2.

I will use the term 'question' throughout to refer to yes-no questions, unless explicitly indicated otherwise. Also, I will follow the convention used, for example, in Sperber & Wilson 1986 of referring to the speaker as 'she' and to the hearer as 'he.'

3.

I am following Searle (1969) in distinguishing between predicating and asserting. He argues (pp. 22-4) that (a-d) all contain the same predication (a propositional act), while only (a) is an assertion (a type of illocutionary act). a) Sam smokes habitually. b) Does Sam smoke habitually? c) Sam, smoke habitually! d) Would that Sam smoked habitually.

4.

One is tempted, in fact, to suggest that many of the competing meanings proposed for aspect are, to use a once popular phrase, notational variants of one another. This is not to say that at the level of psychological reality there are no differences among them; rather, that at the level of abstraction at which most linguistic work is currently done, the translation from one system to another is relatively straightforward. While I have an intuitive preference, based in part on the work presented in Merrill 1983 and 1985, this issue will not be explored in detail in this article.

5.

Much of what follows in the discussion of discourse is based on Sperber & Wilson 1986. They disagree with Grice on the nature of implicatures in many ways. Concerning the type of inference at issue here, they speak of semantic enrichment of the propositional form (see esp. pp. 183-193). They argue that inferences of this sort must be made before it is possible to determine the truth value of an utterance. This type of inference is differ­ ent from what they call implicated premises and implicated conclusions, which are neces­ sary not to determine truth values but to understand how an utterance is relevant to a par­ ticular discourse. While this is an important issue for discourse in general, it is much less so for the purposes of this paper, and I will continue to use the more general term implicature for all cases of inference concerning context and invariants.

6.

See Brecht 1985 for a discussion of the interaction of aspect and event semantics in Rus­ sian.

7.

This is generally what motivates me to reject a feature based analysis of aspect of the sort described in Thelin 1978, 1985 and Timberlake 1982. Association of these meanings with features that are essentially semantic in nature ought not to correlate with meaning that seems to be derived from a process of inference, even when some of the inferences may be exceedingly common.

319

RUSSIAN ASPECT IN QUESTIONS

8.

Sperber and Wilson insist on "mutual manifestness" rather than "shared knowledge" in order to avoid problems of infinite regression that are inevitable with the concept of shared knowledge. It is easy to imagine that the central thesis of their book will arouse much debate, and in particular that there will be criticism that their notion of relevance — which they define in terms of contextual effect — is too elusive to be of any value. In addition to their argumentation, however, one might cite Jackendoff s (1983: 77) discus­ sion of categorization; Barwise and Perry (1983: 10) on "attunement" to relationships between situations; Chvany (1985: 251f.), especially on saliency; and Thelin (1985: 163-4) on the significance of attention to change. All of these authors present evidence that the ability to attend to particular portions of the environment is an essential (human) ability. In this sense, attention to "relevance" is very general, and its applicability to language is then simply a subcase of the larger phenomenon.

9.

Although not always explicitly stated, it is clear that the past tense indicative is often thought of as "moodless." While this may or may not be strictly correct, it probably is a reasonably accurate intuition inasmuch as the functioning of aspect here seems to be gen­ erally directly predictable based on event and aspect semantics and without reference to modal factors. In general, this context is the one in which the interplay of aspect with event semantics is richest.

10.

By this' I mean something similar to Searle's (1969) illocutionary types, although for the sake of simplicity I will deal only with cases where the form of the utterance matches its function (where there is a direct relationship between the illocutionary type and the locutionary type).

11.

For discussion of markedness from a contextual point of view (as opposed to inherent, or lexical, markedness), see Chvany 1985: 248-249.

12.

Rappaport, however, claims that the process statement of a perfective verb is always a background implicature. Sperber and Wilson (1986) argue in detail that the notions of foregrounding and backgrounding, theme and rheme are highly derivative. To restrict the telic statement to the status of background implication can be seen in this light as a strongly empirical claim — and one which I prefer to avoid.

13.

Militating against this implicature (in addition, that is, to aspect), is the presence of po telefonu 'by telephone.' If the speaker were indeed interested in the results, the hearer would be justified in assuming that she would be unlikely to care whether it was accomplished over the telephone or in person.

REFERENCES Barwise, Jon & John Perry. 1983. Situations and Attitudes.

Cambridge, Mass. & London: M.I.T.

Bondarko, A . V. 1971. Vid i vremja russkogo glagola (znacenie i upotreblenie). cenie.

Moscow: Prosves-

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Brecht, Richard D. 1985. "The Form and Function of Aspect in Russian". Issues in Russian Morphosyntax, ed. by Michael S. Flier & Richard D. Brecht, 9-34. Columbus, Ohio: Slavica Brecht, Richard D. Forthcoming. The Grammar of Time: Temporal Specification in English and Rus­ sian. Chaput, Patricia R. 1985. "On the Question of Aspectual Selection in Denials". In Flier & Timberlake (eds.), 1985. 224-233. Chvany, Catherine V. 1985. "Backgrounded Perfectives and Plot-line Imperfectives: Towards a Theory of Grounding in Text". In Flier & Timberlake (eds.), 247-273. Firbas, J. 1972. "Funkcii voprosa v processe kommunikacii". Voprosy Jazykoznanija 2. 5565. Flier, Michael S. & Alan Timberlake, (eds.) 1985. The Scope of Slavic Aspect. Columbus, OH: Slavica. Forsyth, J. 1970. A Grammar of Aspect: Usage and Meaning in the Russian Verb. Cambridge: Cambridge University. Goffman, Erving. 1981. Forms of Talk. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania. Grice, H. P. 1975. "Logic and Conversation". Syntax and Semantics 3: Speech Acts, ed. by Peter Cole and Jerry L. Morgan, 41-58. New York: Academic. Haltof, Brigitte. 1967. "Die Aspekte des modernen Russischen". Zeitschrift für Slawistik 12. 735743. Haltof, Brigitte. 1968. "Ein semantisches Modell zur Aspektdeterminierung im modernen Russis­ chen". Probleme der strukturellen Grammatik und Semantik, ed. by Rudolf Růzicka, 133-150. Leipzig: Karl-Marx-Universität. Jackendoff, Ray. 1983. Semantics and Cognition. Cambridge, Mass. & London: M.I.T. Jakobson, Roman. 1932/1971. "Zur Struktur des russischen Verbums". Selected Writings II: Word and Language, 3-15. The Hague & Paris: Mouton.

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Merrill, Peter. 1983. Reference Time and Event Quantification in Russian Aspect. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles. 1985.

"Aspect as Evaluation: The Case of Negation". In Flier & Timberlake (eds.), 129-152.

Mourelatos, Alexander P. D. 1978. "Events, Processes, and States". Linguistics and Philosophy 2. 415-434. Rappaport, Gilbert C. 1985. "Aspect and Modality in Contexts of Negation". In Flier & Timberlake (eds.), 194-223. Searle, John R. 1969. Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language. Cambridge: Cam­ bridge University. Sperber, Dan & Dierdre Wilson. 1986. Relevance: Communication and Cognition. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Uni­ versity. Svedova, L. N. & T. G. Trofimova. 1983. Posobie po upotrebleniju vidov glagola dlja raboty s filologami-rusistami. Moscow: "Russkij jazyk". Thelin, Nils B. 1978. Towards a Theory of Aspect, Tense, and Actionality in Slavic (= Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis. Studia Slavica Upsaliensia 18). Uppsala. 1985.

"Kognitiv-pragmatische Korrelate semantischer Strukturen in einem Zirkel­ modell für prozessuelle Sprachanalyze". Zeitschrift für Slawistik 30.2. 153199.

Timberlake, Alan. 1982. "Invariance and the Syntax of Russian Aspect". Tense and Aspect: Between Semantics and Pragmatics, ed. by Paul Hopper, 305-331. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Vendler, Zeno. 1967. Linguistics in Philosophy. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University.

3. Aspect, case and discourse

The aspectual case of predicative nouns in Lithuanian texts Alan Timberlake University of California, Berkeley

A variety of parts of speech in Lithuanian — adjectives, participles, nouns, prepositional phrases — can participate in the predicative construc­ tion, a complex syntagm which in its maximally explicit form involves three constituents (Nichols 1978): in combination with a host verb, the predicative reports a property of the controller, a major argument of the verb. If the predicative is morphologically inflected, it can appear in one of two cases, either agreeing case — the same case as the relevant argument (most trans­ parently nominative or accusative, but occasionally dative or genitive) — or instrumental. The present paper examines actual case usage in two autobiographical texts totalling about 700 pages1 in order to document pos­ sible semantic correlates of case choice. Five syntactic contexts which show variation between nominative and instrumental in predicative nouns are considered. On the analysis developed below, the semantic opposition between agreeing case and instrumental in Lithuanian is essentially an aspectual one. Approximately, the instrumental signals that the predicative — which is, after all, a kind of semantic predicate though not a morphological verb — is aspectually restricted. In contrast, agreeing case indicates minimally the absence of such a restriction, and may even signal the avoidance of such a restriction. Of some interest is the observation that this value of aspectual restriction has variable scope: in individual examples, it may be interpreted as applying narrowly to the predicative or more broadly to the relationship of the predicative to the surrounding text. In the latter instance, the aspec­ tual semantics of case is very much a text (or discourse) phenomenon.

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It should go without saying that this analysis presupposes an extended understanding of aspect, one that goes beyond morphological expressions on lexical verbs and their associated semantic values; the term is used here to include any semantic value which is of the same type as the value corre­ lated with the familiar morphological expression in verbs. (If one prefers, the term aspectuality might be better suited to this extension.) The advan­ tage of this extension is that it forces the analyst to develop a vocabulary of primitives and operations which could in principle be used to describe aspect in both the narrow sense and this extended sense of aspect. This search for a metalinguistic vocabulary for aspect is, of course, consistent with a wide range of recent research. Prior work on the case of predicatives in Lithuanian (originally Fraenkel 1925, more recently Nichols 1981b) has established a number of parameters that limit case assignment. These can be formulated in terms of the three constituents of the construction as hierarchies of the form 'X > Y,' to be read as 'X is more likely to have agreeing case than Y.' Some rel­ evant factors are stated in (l): 2 (1)

Agreeing Case > Instrumental a. host:finiteness finite > (adverbial) participle > infinitive b. host:lexical tense-aspect-mood neutral > marked  host:tense-aspect-mood present > past > conditional > future d. controller relation NOM subject > inverse DAT> DAT indirect object > ACC e. predicative:part of speech participle > adjective > noun f. predicative :lexical semantics descriptive > restrictive

Examination of textual examples in general confirms the parameters stated in (1). As in (la), agreement is sensitive to the finiteness of the immediate syntactic host of the predicative: for nouns, the instrumental is virtually required when the immediate syntactic host is an infinitive and is normal with adverbial participles;3 the nominative occurs freely only with finite predicates. For nouns, even under the best of conditions (finite syntactic host in the past tense), predicate hosts with temporal, aspectual, or modal

ASPECTUAL CASE

327

coloring of their lexical semantics take the instrumental. Thus, the predi­ cates tapti, darytis(pasidaryti) 'become,' and virsti 'be transformed' showed the instrumental in four fifths of the examples (42xx of 52xx) in the past tense. In contrast, atrodyti and pasirodyti 'seem' show nominative preferen­ tially (in 6xx out of 8xx examples); and the most neutral predicate būti 'be' even more strongly prefers the nominative. The effect of lexical semantics of the host is summarized in (lb). As (lc) states, case choice is also corre­ lated with the tense-aspect-mood of the host predicate. With būti, present tense almost (but not quite) obligatorily uses the nominative; past tense strongly prefers the nominative but occasionally allows the instrumental; future and conditional show mixed usage. The syntactic relation of the con­ troller in principle affects case choice ((1d)), but with predicative nouns (as opposed to adjectives) agreeing case other than nominative rarely occurs, so (1d) is by and large moot for predicative nouns. Textual examples clearly confirm ((le)) that case choice is sensitive to the part of speech of the pre­ dicative: participles never occur in the instrumental, adjectives do so very rarely, but nouns frequently do. The semantic factor noted in (1f) is only a small part of a larger picture of the semantics of predicatives, and it belongs in a more general model for describing the semantics of predicative nouns. The model presented here has three components. One component is a set of nested levels of semantic structure, of which three seem to be directly relevant to predicatives: the level of the predica­ tive itself; the clausal level — the relationship of the predicative to its host; and the interclausal level — the relationship of the predicative clause to the adjacent text. Eventually it will be necessary to add a fourth level of perspective, expressing the relationship of the speaker to the predicative. In principle the semantic values of all four levels are simultaneously relevant to the interpretation of any predicative; in practice these levels often do not need to be distinguished from each other. The second component is a set of primitives. I assume here that seman­ tic predicates report a series of states that hold (more carefully, which the speaker invites the addressee to imagine holding) over a set of time inter­ vals and in a set of partially ordered worlds. This report can be termed the predicate history (or more simply, history). Histories can be uniform (that is, statives) or change continuously (processes); they can result in definitive changes of states after which further change is not possible in any world (perfective), and so on. The third component of this model, then, is the pat-

328

ALAN TIMBERLAKE

terns or shapes that histories may take. Although in principle there may well be a large number of such pat­ terns, languages characteristically pay attention to a small number of such patterns (and further, the cross-linguistic possibilities are also limited). For the problem at hand, what seems to be relevant is a contrast of histories that are uniform in one or another way as opposed to those that are restricted. Restricted histories are those in which there is a discontinuous change in the value of the reported states across one or both of the timeworld variables. 4 This in effect gives four types of histories: (a) those that are not restricted (termed here descriptive, though they could equivalently be termed static); (b) those that are restricted in time alone (termed here temporally restrictive, or more concisely temporalized); (c) those that are restricted over worlds alone (termed here modalized); and those that are restricted simultaneously over time and worlds (for which the term aspectualized is adopted here). Putting this typology of patterns together with the nested levels, we obtain the following picture of semantic values relevant to the discussion of predicatives. 5 (a) Descriptivization. A predicative is descriptive if it merely predicates some property or properties of the controller referent; informally, the descriptive sense of a predicative is that a given individual x happens to have, possibly among other properties, the property of being a member of the class of π individuals. At the predicative level, lexically descriptive nouns include names of things or abstractions, such as asmuo 'person,' zmogus 'person, man,' kūrinys 'creation,' reikalas 'matter,' atkürimas 'revitalization.' At the clausal level, a predicative is descriptive if it reports the predicative property as coincident with the time and conditions of the host predicate. At the interclausal level, a predicative is descriptive if its clause provides static background description for adjacent events. (b) Temporalization. A predicative is temporalized if it predicates a property that changes over time; informally, the temporalized predicative reports that an individual x changes from not being a member of the class of π individuals at some time t' to being a member of this class at some other time t. At the predicative level, lexically phasal nouns, such as vaikas 'child' or gymnazistas 'gymnasium student,' studentas 'university student,' are tem­ poralized in this sense. At the clausal level, temporalization is the assertion of a change of state over the history of the host predicate; as noted in (lb), hosts like tapti 'become' almost automatically impose temporalization on

ASPECTUAL CASE

329

their predicatives. Sequentialized narration is interclausal temporalization. (c) Modalization. A predicative is modalized if it predicates a property that is contrasted with other possible properties (or values of a property) that might hold in alternative situations; informally, the modalized sense of a predicative is that an individual x is discussed qua its membership in the class of  in a given world w in contrast to its possible non-membership in this class in an alternative world w'. At the predicative level, lexically classificatory nouns — those that partition individuals into classes of identities — are modalized in this sense. In the strong case, there is a series of possi­ ble identities that are mutually exclusive. Examples are cultural ranks such as klierikas 'cleric, novice,' kunigas 'priest,' diakonas 'deacon.' Predicative nouns that imply an opposition between membership and non-membership in some group or ideology are weakly classificatory; examples are eretikas 'heretic,' bedievis 'non-religious person,' bolsevikas 'bolshevik,' abstinentas 'teatotaller.' At the clausal level, a predicative is modalized if it is the focus of information of the clause — if the predicative is contrasted with other possible properties that might be reported. Interclausally, the predicative clause is modalized in relation to adjacent clauses if the predicative clause is contrasted with other possible states or events that might hold; it is not modalized if the predicative relation is not at the center of attention — for example, if what is of interest is the mere fact of the existence of the pre­ dicative relation rather than its specific character. (d) Aspectualization. A predicative is aspectualized if it predicates a property that holds over time but is subject to cancellation at any time; informally, under the aspectualized sense of a predicative, an individual x acts as, or functions as, a member of the class of π for a certain period of time t and in a certain world w, but during time t and in world w there is the imminent possibility that at some nearby time t'and world w' this x might well not be a member of the class of π. In this way, what I term aspec­ tualized here is simultaneously temporalized and modalized. Lexically, functional nouns — those that characterize identities presup­ posing activity — are aspectualized. Conventionalized occupations and cul­ tural roles are strongly aspectualized: dainininkas 'singer, minstrel,' artistas 'artist,' kunigas 'priest,' profesorius 'professor,' rektorius 'rector,' teisèjas 'judge,' mokytojas 'teacher.' Agentive nouns, such as liūdininkas 'witness, one who observes,' isdavikas 'betrayer, one who betrays,' teisèjas 'one who judges,' are weakly aspectualized. Clausal aspectualization is the durative aspectual relation. Predicatives presented as conditions or consequences of

330

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other events are interclausally aspectualized. Though this model is complex, it can often be simplified in practice in two ways. Often the predicative will have the same semantic value at the three levels. For example, it would be natural for a functional (or lexically aspectualized) noun to be used in a durative clause, and, further, for the durative clause to be the condition or consequence of some other situation or event. Only when the three levels do not line up do we observe interest­ ing semantic tension between the levels. When the levels do line up, as is usual, it is not necessary to draw a rigorous distinction among them. A sec­ ond simplifying factor is that, generally speaking, the descriptive value (at any level) is opposed to the other three values — temporalized, modalized, and aspectualized; these can be collapsed under the loose term restrictive, as is reflected in (1f) above. I turn now to consider five contexts with case variation. In doing this, I attempt first to show that the distribution of case correlates largely with the lexical opposition of descriptive vs. restrictive nouns, and then use deviations from this distribution to document semantic values from the clausal or interclausal levels. The first context I will consider is that in which the immediate syntactic host of the predicative is the infinitive būti and the governing predicate of the host is one of the three auxiliaries6 tureti 'have,' galéti 'be able, be pos­ sible,' or norti 'want.' This context shows an almost perfect distribution of case according to the lexical semantics of the noun: (2)

Case with Infinitive of 'be' (Matrix Auxiliary) noun semantics NOM INS total

%INS

descriptive restrictive

7 1

0 16

7 17

00% 94%

total

8

16

24

67%

In the lone exception to this distribution, a series of restrictive nouns is coordinated, descriptivizing them at the predicative level: (3)

O kas is tavqs bus, kai iseisi i kunigus? Būsi tiktai dvasiskis. Nei muzikas, nei dainininkas, nei {zymus artistasNOM tu negatesi tada büti. [J. Ragauskas, 409]

ASPECTUAL CASE

331

'And what will become of you if you enter the priesthood? You'll just be a man of religion. Then you won't be able to be a singer, or a minstrel, or a famous artist NOM .' Of some additional interest is the fact that there is strong covariation between the matrix auxiliary and the lexical semantics of the predicative. The obligational, non-agentive auxiliary tureti occurs only with descriptive nouns (6xx, all in the nominative), while the intensional, agentive auxiliary norti occurs only with restrictive — especially functional — nouns (9xx, all in the instrumental). (The more neutral and semantically variable auxiliary galèti occurs with both descriptive and restrictive nouns.) The covariation of lexical semantics of the predicative and the semantics of the auxiliary confirms the connection between aspectuality at the predicative and clausal levels. The second context is the present active semiparticiple, which shows the instrumental about two thirds of the time (40xx of 53xx). Case choice again closely follows the lexical semantics of the noun. Unproblematic examples illustrating this distribution include (4), with descriptive noun in the nominative, and (5), with restrictive noun in the instrumental: (4)

(5)

Budama zmogaus kurinysNOM, religija dazniausiai atrodydavo jam kaip kazkas, stovis virs jo, galingesnis uz ji pati esas jo lemtis, jo amzina laimè ar nelaimè. [J. Ragauskas, 9] 'Being man's creation NOM , religion usually seemed to him like something standing above him, more powerful than he himself, like his fate, his eternal fortune or misfortune.' Beje, vèliau, pats büdamas kunigu, seminarijos darbuotojulNS ir tq jezuitq pazinqs is arciau, suzinojau, kad [....] [J. Ragauskas, 131] 'Also, later, myself being a worker in the seminaryINS and having gotten to know this Jesuit from up close, I learned that [....]'

Statistically, we observe the following:

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(6)

Case with Semiparticiple of 'be' noun semantics NOM descriptive restrictive total

INS

total

%INS

9 4

2 38

11 42

18% 90%

13

40

53

75%

Let us look at the two exceptional cells. In the bottom left cell — nominative with restrictive nouns — two of the four have been descriptivized at the predicative level by descriptive adjectives, coordination, or degree modifiers. An example: (7)

Büdamas uolus vikarasNOM, as negalèjau nesipiktinti sitokia religinio kulto negerove ir tokia baznycios veidmainyste. [J. Ragauskas, 234] 'Being a committed vicar NOM , I could not help but be dis­ turbed by this failure of religious practice and by such hypoc­ risy of the Church.'

Here the fact of being a vicar is presupposed; what is focused on in the semiparticiple clause is the quality of the vicardom. Switching to the top right cell — instrumental with descriptive nouns — in one of the two the instrumental serves to differentiate the current sit­ uation, when the first-person hero is one kind of person, from a possible future situation, when he will be a different person (note in this connection jau 'already'): (8)

Bet jeigu po to laiko ir gr{siu atgal, tai jau büdamas kitu zmogum INS . [J. Ragauskas, 94] 'But if I should come back after some time, then it's already being another person INS .'

This is an example of the application of a process of temporalization — assertion of change of state — to a lexically descriptive predicative at the clausal level. Now returning to the bottom left cell, the two remaining examples with nominative for restrictive nouns can be interpreted as signalling the con­ verse process, an absence of attention to the aspectual quality of the pre­ dicative.

ASPECTUAL CASE

333

Semiparticiple clauses have a range of temporal, aspectual, and modal relations to the matrix event. At one extreme, they may restrict the aspec­ tual relation of one clause to another, if the matrix event holds only for so long as the semiparticiple event holds, and only under the condition that the semiparticiple event holds. 7 At the other extreme, such clauses may be aspectually harmonious with the matrix event, if the matrix event happens to hold at the same time, and under the same conditions, as the semipartic­ iple event. The matrix event may even be understood to hold in spite of the fact that the semiparticiple event holds; that is, that there may be an ele­ ment of concessive conditionality. For this latter sense — the absence of attention to aspectual values — the term antiaspectualization is appropriate. Antiaspectualization can be illustrated by the two examples of nomina­ tive with restrictive nouns: (9)

(10)

— Prisiminkite, ponía, tas dienas, hai jūs, büdama noviciatéNOM, isimylèjote klierikq Pranq. [J. Ragauskas, 414] 'Recall those days, lady, when you, being a novice NOM , fell in love with the cleric Pranas.' Pasirodo, tu jau nebe vaikas! Jeigu tu jau taip praktiskai ziüri i savo pasirinkimq, jeigu, jau klierikasNOM būdamas, neturi jokiu iliuziju siuo reikalu — kq gi... Laimingo vejo! [J. Ragauskas, 411] 'Apparently you're no longer a child. If you in fact look at your choice so practically, if, now already being a cleric NOM , you don't have any illusions on this score — well then, pleas­ ant journey!'

In (9), the nominative indicates that what is of interest is that the refe­ rent's act of falling in love happened to occur at the time when, and even despite the fact that, she was a novitiate. In (10), both cases would no doubt be possible, with a difference in emphasis. The instrumental would focus on the past transition from one rank in the church hierarchy to the new rank of cleric, and would suggest that that transition caused disillusion­ ment. The nominative downplays transition and takes as its point of depar­ ture the situation when the referent is (already) at a certain rank in the hier­ archy. Thus, given an expected correlation between lexical semantics and case — descriptive implies nominative and restrictive implies instrumental — we

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have documented two converse semantic processes signalled by case: instrumental with descriptive noun ((8)) signals temporalization at the clausal level (change in the value of the predicative property over time); conversely, nominative with restrictive noun ((9, 10)) signals antiaspectualization (simultaneity and concessive conditionality). The third context is predicative nouns with the future and conditional of būa, a context that shows the instrumental on the order of a third of the time (16xx of 50xx). The distribution of case in this context largely follows the lexical semantics of the predicative: descriptive nouns take the nomina­ tive, restrictive nouns the instrumental (though alongside the nominative in this context): (11) Case with Future and Conditional of 'be' noun semantics NOM INS

total

%INS

descriptive restrictive

21 13

2 15

23 28

09% 54%.

total

34

17

51

33%

Some well-behaved examples: descriptive nouns with nominative ((12-14)) and a restrictive noun with instrumental ((15)): (12)

(13)

(14)

Jeigu aukšciausias neleistu nusidèti, tai tuomet zmogus būtu ¡au nebe zmogus, bet aklas automatasNOM. [J. Ragauskas, 253] Tf the Almighty wouldn't let man sin, then man would be no longer a man, but a blind automaton NOM .'  jeigu jis nusidejelius baustu amzina kancia pragare, tai tuomet būtu kartu ir ziauruolisNOM. [J. Ragauskas, 246] 'And if He would punish sinners with eternal torment in Hell, then He would be a tyrant NOM .' Zemé be kunigo, be to gyvo tilto targ dangaus ir zemés, — ū vien tik niüri asaru pakalnéNOM. [J. Ragauskas, 213] T h e world without a priest, without that living bridge be tween heaven and earth, would be just a sad vale of tears NOM .'

ASPECTUAL CASE

(15)

335

O kad dievas yra ir visada bus drauge su manimi, kai būsiu kunigulNS, tuo as ne kiek neabejojau. [J. Ragauskas, 124] 'And if God is with me and will always be, when I will be a priestINS, then I am not so uncertain.'

As (11) indicates, there are a number of deviations from the idealized expectation involving restrictive nouns in the nominative. Of these thirteen examples, eight are clearly descriptivized at the predicative level, through descriptive adjectives or coordination.8 In the remaining five, the unex­ pected nominative with restrictive nouns appears to be motivated by a semantic process operating on the clausal or interclausal level, a process which might be termed antimodalization. This process is exemplified by the following two examples: (16)

(17)

Na, o dievas, tverdamas Judq, zinojo, kad jis bus Kristaus isdavikasNOM, ar nezinojo? [J. Ragauskas, 347] 'Well now, did God, when he made Judas, know that he would be Christ's betrayerNOM, or not?' Pagaliau ivaziavome pro atkeltus vartus i kiemq. Tai buvo Būtos nomai,  as čia būsiu piemuoNOM. [J. Šmotelis, 74] 'Finally we drove through open gates into the yard. That was Būta's house, here I would be a shepherdNOM.'

In the first ((16)), the question is whether God knew what the eventual sit­ uation would be, not whether he knew which specific role (of many possible roles) Judas would perform. And in the second ((17)), the narrator charac­ terizes the properties of the new location he arrives at, one of which is the fact that he will perform a certain function; the sense is something like 'what is true of this place is that I will be a shepherd' rather than 'here I will act as a shepherd rather than as something else.' In both examples, the nominative avoids contrastively selecting one specific identity of the refe­ rent to the exclusion of other possible identities. The nominative signals rather that the attention falls on the fact that the predicative relation holds at all. Antimodalization, then, is a shift of attention away from the specific predicative relation to the mere fact of the existence of the relation. The fourth context involves host predicates which impose a temporalized value — actual or virtual change of state — on the predicative.

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Textual examples reveal differences among different predicates, in accor­ dance with the hierarchy described in Nichols 1981b. Virsti 'be trans­ formed,' takes instrumental in all examples (admittedly only 4xx in this cor­ pus). The obligatory character of the instrumental with this host predicate is presumably due to its semantics; it implies actual change against resis­ tance to change (that is, against the expectation of absence of change). Next come the two host predicates that report actual change (though not against expectations): tapti 'become,' with instrumental 27xx out of 31xx, and darytis(pasidaryti) 'become,' with instrumental 8xx out of lOxx. Sig­ nificantly different is (pa)likti 'remain,' which reports the failure of actual change against the expectation of possible change; this host predicate has instrumental in only 3xx of its 7xx. Considering only tapti and darytis(pasidaryti), we observe the following interaction of case and lexical semantics of the predicative: (18) Case with Temporalizing Host Predicates 'become' noun semantics NOM INS total

%INS

descriptive restrictive

5 1

11 26

16 27

69% 96%

total

6

37

43

86%

Again, case correlates with lexical semantics, in that nominative occurs relatively more frequently with descriptive nouns. But the temporal seman­ tics of the host predicates is strong enough to force a preference for the instrumental with both types of predicatives. A natural subcontext to look for semantic value of case choice is descriptive nouns with tapti, which uses nominative 4xx and instrumental 8xx. With this predicate as host, case signals a difference in the way in which the predicative clause relates to the surrounding text. The instrumen­ tal is used in ordinary sequential narration; in (19) the predicative change of state follows another event: (19)

Kai Alsèdziu baznycia gavo naujus vargonus, giedojimas tapo pasilinksminimulNS. [J. Šmotelis, 169] 'When the Aìsèdziai Church got its new organ, singing became a pleasureINS.'

ASPECTUAL CASE

337

In (20) and (21), in contrast, the change of state implied by tapti is not pre­ sented in sequence with other events. The text describes a set of coincident states, one of which happens to be the predicative state that has resulted from a prior (pluperfect) change of state. (20)

(21)

Tq ziemq tèvas darbavosi namie. Mūsu geroji troba tapo dirbtuvè ir sveciu kambarysNOM. Sveciu uzeidavo kasdienq. [J. Šmotelis, 18] 'That winter father worked at home. Our good hut had become a workshop and a sitting room NOM . Every day guests would come.' Nūn, kada tèvas susirgo, [...] — nūn atsirado mumyse meilè jam. Nün jis tapo müsu tévelisNOM. Mes jo gailèjomès. [J. Šmotelis, 27] 'Now, after father had become ill, [...] — now love for him emerged in us. Now he had become our father NOM . We felt sorry for him.'

In such examples, the unexpected nominative with tapti signals interclausal antitemporalization (attention to the coincidence of states rather than their sequence) of the predicative. The fifth and final context is the past tense of būti. It is convenient, and probably justified, to first eliminate two subcontexts. Sentences with sub­ ject tai 'this, that' took the nominative in all 56xx (22xx in J. Ragauskas, 34xx in J. Šmotelis). In fact, in all these examples the predicative noun is non-restrictive (equational or descriptive or descriptivized restrictive), so the obligatory use of the nominative is not surprising. A second and more elusive subcontext is that in which the second nominal is as specific in refer­ ence as the first nominal, as in: (22)

(23)

Kita linksminanti zvaigzdeNOM buvo Mikas Jozavaitas. [J. Smotelis, 177] 'Another entertainment star NOM was Mikas Jozavaitis.' Mokytojuim buvo A. Petratis. [J. Šmotelis, 207] 'The teacher INS was A. Petratis.'

In such instances it may well be that it is the first nominal which is predica­ tive, inasmuch as the first nominal may appear in the instrumental ((23)). It is difficult to identify instances of such inverted predicatives independent of case usage, but to the extent that they can be identified on the basis of the

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semantic criterion of referential specificity (Padučeva and Uspenskij 1979), case usage follows the lexical semantic properties of the predicative noun. The noun can only be nominative when it is descriptive or descriptivized restrictive, and is preferentially instrumental when restrictive: (24) Case with Past Tense of 'be', Inverted noun semantics NOM INS total %INS descriptive/descriptivized restrictive

9 9

0 13

9 22

00% 57%

total 18 13 31 41% If these two subcontexts are eliminated, the distribution of case in the context of the past tense of büti correlates with the lexical semantics of the noun, in that all instances of the instrumental are restrictive (with one exception to be discussed shortly). With respect to restrictive nouns, the two texts differ slightly. J. Ragauskas uses the instrumental sparingly for restrictive nouns, and equally for weak and strong restrictive nouns: (25) Case with Past Tense of 'be' (J. Ragauskas) noun semantics NOM INS

total

%INS

descriptive descriptivized(restrictive) weak restrictive strong restrictive

56 13 8 10

1 0 2 3

57 13 10 13

02% 00% 20% 23%

total

87

6

93

06%

J. Šmotelis uses the instrumental for weak restrictive nouns as frequently as J. Ragauskas — at most in a quarter of the examples — but uses the instru­ mental consistently for strong restrictive nouns:

339

ASPECTUAL CASE

(26) Case with Past Tense of 'be' (J. Šmotelis) NOM INS noun semantics

total

%INS

descriptive descriptivized(restrictive) weak restrictive strong restrictive

38 34 19 2

0 0 5 6

38 34 24 8

00% 00% 21% 75%

total

93

11

104

11%

In looking for covert semantic values of case choice, it is useful to sep­ arate the two texts. In J. Ragauskas, all five examples of restrictive nouns (weak or strong) with instrumental are aspectually restricted at the clausal and/or interclausal levels. Clausally, they indicate a durative aspectual restriction ('throughout a given period, the predicative state holds, but not at other occasions'). Interclausally, the predicative relation is presented as a condition for or a consequence of adjacent events in the text. An extended and multiple example is (27). After an initial descriptive predica­ tive, the semiparticiple phrase imposes a durative aspectual restriction: (27)

[...] ne tik uoliai lankydavau baznyciq, [...], bet ir buvau aktyvus ateitininkasNOM. Mokydamasis septintoje klasèje, buvau savo klasès ateitininku kuopelès pirmininkulNS,  aštuntoje, — visos Panevèzio atietininku kuopos [...] pirmininkulNS. Be to, buvau eucharistininku ir visuomenininku sekciju nariu1NS. [J. Ragauskas, 66] 'I not only devoutly attended church, [...] but I was also an active newcomer NOM . While I was studying in the seventh class, I was the leader of the group of newcomers in my clas­ sa 8 , and in the eighth — the leader of the group of newcom­ ers in all PanevèzysINS . In addition, I was a member of the Eucharist and social groups INS .'

In many of the examples of nominative with restrictive nouns, conversely, the predicative relation is antitemporalized; temporal particles like kai 'when,' kol 'while,' or tada 'at that time' focus attention on the predicative relation that holds specifically at a certain time and avoid a contrast of dif­ ferent states at different times. 9 An example:

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(28)

Kai dar bovau gimnazistasNOM, i studentus ziürèdavau kaip{ kokius dievaicius. [J. Ragauskas, 73] 'When I was a gymnasium student NOM , I used to regard uni­ versity students as some kind of gods.'

The other text, J. Smotelis, distinguishes strong and weak restrictive nouns. As the table above in (26) shows, weak restrictive nouns typically take nominative. The instrumental with a weak restrictive noun emphasizes the aspectualized character of the predicative relation at the clausal level, as in the two examples below; that is, the instrumental with agentive nouns invites the interpretation that the individuals actively functioned in these roles: (29)

(30)

Kai pradejome Čkagoje leisti Naujienas, Kazlauskas buvo Naujienu, išvežiotojuINS. [J. Smotelis, 95] 'When we began to put out "The News" in Chicago, Kazlaus­ kas was [=acted as] the distributor INS .' Po to per visq kelionq laive buvau rüpintojéliu1NS, rüpinaus, kad mano draugai būtu sotūs. [J. Smotelis, 110] 'After that for the whole journey on the ship I was [=acted as] the procurer INS , I made sure that my friends were full.'

As shown in (26), strong restrictive nouns in this text appear in the instrumental, with only two exceptions. One is antitemporahzed through the use of the localizing temporal expression tuo metu: (31)

Tuo metu jis buvo valsciaus seniünasNOM ir vienq dienq kas savaite praleisdavo valsciaus rastinéje. [J. Smotelis, 37] 'At this time he was the regional elder NOM , and he would spend one day a week in the regional office.'

The other ((32)) is less clear, but the nominative seems to signal that the predicative is presented as one of many properties, thus antimodalizing the predicative interclausally: (32)

Zvirsdinai buvo trys: papünis ir mamūné, abu apie 45 tu, ir dukté Kaziūnè 13-14 m. Ji buvo piemenéNOM, bet ir karves meliti mokejo. [J. Smotelis, 84]

ASPECTUAL CASE

341

There were three in the Zvirsdinas family: father and mother, both about 45, and a 13 to 14-year old daughter Kaziüne. [Not only] she was a shepherd NOM , but she could milk cows.' Overall in both texts, then, there is a strong preference for the nomina­ tive with the past tense of būti. Case variation is correlated with familiar parameters. Descriptive nouns are uniformly in the nominative; only restrictive nouns can appear in the instrumental, though they tend to be in the nominative as well. The occasional examples of instrumental can be interpreted as signalling an additional semantic operation, such as aspectualization, at the clausal and/or interclausal level. Given its very strong preference for the nominative, especially with descriptive nouns, the past tense of būti provides an illustration of a differ­ ent semantic value for case. As recorded in the tables ((25, 26)), there was only one example among 142xx of the use of the instrumental for a descrip­ tive or descriptivized noun: (33)

Juk tada nè{ galvq neatèjo suabejotipacíais scholastikospagrindais: mano palies protavimas buvo tvirtai istatytas { scholastikos vèzes — tikèjimo dogmos buvo kartu ir mokslinèmis tiesomislNS, netgi aksiomomislNS. [J. Ragauskas, 71] 'At that time it never occurred to me to doubt the scholastic principles themselves: my own thinking was firmly based in scholastic ways — the articles of faith were for me both scien­ tific truths INS and also axioms INS .'

Here the use of the instrumental for a descriptive noun serves to differen­ tiate two points of view, or perspectives, that are implicitly always available in an autobiographical text: the stable, global, external point of view of the author, and the variable, local, internal point of view of the first-person hero of the narrative. It bears repeating that the text from which (33) comes is a inverse confessional autobiography of a religious man who became a priest and then subsequently saw the light and renounced Catholicism in favor of dialectal materialism. The instrumental differentiates the current enlightened point of view of the author from the prior benighted state of faith of the first-person hero. For another example of case signalling perspective, recall that in the context of the semiparticiple (see (6)) only two of the eleven examples of

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descriptive nouns had instrumental. One was cited above ((8)) as an exam­ ple of temporalization (change of state). The other ((34)) may indicate dif­ ferentiation of perspective, inviting the gloss 'the brevorium was the puta­ tive symbol...': (34)

Brevijoriaus kalbéjimas, büdamas "kunigiskosios gyvybés" zenklulNS, kartu tq gyvybe palaiko. [J. Ragauskas, 451] 'Saying the brevorium, being the symbol of priestly lifeINS, had for now abandoned that life.'

The use of case to signal perspective can be further illustrated by the following minimal pair with a strong restrictive noun, for which one expects instrumental in the future: (35)

(36)

Buvo keista ir net baugu vaizduotis, kad as, tuomet dar vaikas, po ketveriu metu jau būsiu progimnazijos ar gal net gimnazijos mokytojulNS! [J. Ragauskas, 61] Tt was strange and even pleasant to imagine that I, at that time still a child, would already in a few years be a teacher INS in a pre-gymnasium or even a gymnasium!' "Na ir kas bus, kai baigsiu universitetq? — galvodavau. — Būsiu gimnazijos mokytojasNOM, kaip ir visi tie draugai, kurie

[....]" [J. Ragauskas, 81] '"So what will happen when I finish university?" — I thought. — "I'll be a teacher NOM in a gymnasium, like all those others who [....]'" Although both examples report the speech of the text-internal speaker, they represent different kinds of perspective. The instrumental, which is used in a clause that is the complement to a world-creating predicate, indi­ cates that the predicative relation holds only in this imagined world of the text-internal speaker, not in the extratextual reality of the text-external speaker. The nominative, in contrast, is used when the author cites himself in direct speech and adopts the perspective of the text-internal speaker. In general, the instrumental signals that the predicative relation holds only from the perspective of the text-internal speaker, while the opposite value of this relation would hold from the perspective of the text-external speaker. The nominative signals that the perspective of the text-internal

ASPECTUAL CASE

343

speaker is not differentiated from that of the text-external speaker: either the two perspectives are consistent, or the text-external speaker yields to perspective of the text-internal speaker. 10 By way of summary, the description above has shown that case usage is largely predictable from information about the syntactic context, espe­ cially the host predicate, and the lexical semantics of the predicative noun. Lexical semantic properties of predicative nouns can be typologized into descriptive vs. restrictive, where the latter can be more carefully typologized into temporalized (or phasal), modalized (or classificatory), and aspectualized (or functional). Deviations from the expected usage sig­ nal semantic values at other levels of the semantic structure of text — the level of perspective, the interclausal level, or the clausal level, though the levels usually line up in their values. It is this fact that is responsible for the impressive correlation between case usage and lexical properties of predica­ tives. When the case usage differs from the usage that would be expected for a given syntactic context on the basis of the lexical properties of the pre­ dicative noun, this is tantamount to actively superimposing a new semantic value on the predicative relation. Thus, in contexts in which one expects the nominative (descriptive nouns in various contexts), use of the instrumental signals an operation of temporalization (change of state in the predicative; sequentialized narrative), modalization (focused predicative; contrastive narrative), or aspectualization (durative predicative; conditionalized narra­ tive). More interestingly, the use of the nominative in a context where instrumental would be expected is an active signal that the predicative is descriptivized in context — through a process of antimodalization (focus on the existence of the predicative relation rather than on its specific charac­ ter), antitemporalization (emphasis on temporal simultaneity), or antiaspectualization (coincidence and concessive conditionality). The semantic values signalled by case at the clausal and interclausal levels can be described in terms of a vocabulary of primitives and semantic operations that is comparable to that used for the lexical level; the distinc­ tion for perspective is an analogous one of homogeneous vs. differentiated perspective. Inasmuch as this terminology is aspectual in character, case variation in Lithuanian predicative nouns is essentially an aspectual seman­ tic operation. Of some interest is the fact that the semantic value of case is variable in scope; it can in any given example point to a different level of semantic structure, including the level of text (or discourse).

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With predicative noun case in Lithuanian, as with problems of aspect, a familiar problem arises: how do all these variables get manipulated in a single instance of case choice? The discussion above suggests a partial answer to this question. Generally values from various levels will line up, and various distinctions will be collapsed, other things being equal. As a result, most of the variables are not active in a given instance of case selec­ tion; a failure of these other-things-being-equal expectations is necessary to signal semantic values out of the ordinary. The effect of this is that selecting (as an encoder) or interpreting case (as a decoder) is a process of construct­ ing a record of the mapping relationships among different levels of semantic structure. NOTES 1.

J. Smotelis, Atsiminimu skirsneliai (Chicago, 1977, 246pp.), is the life of a peasant who left Lithuania for America; it describes first the life of Lithuanian peasants at the turn of the century and then the life of Lithuanian immigrants in Chicago in the teens and twen­ ties. J. Ragauskas, 'Ite, missa est!' (Vilnius, 1960, 488pp.), is the autobiographical confes­ sion of a priest who suffered a crisis of faith and left the Church. Since, in printed texts, -a nouns without modifiers do not distinguish nominative and instrumental, they were not included.

2.

This list is based primarily on Nichols (1981b), although most of the hierarchies were in effect observed by Fraenkel (1925). He notes the effect of finiteness ((=la)); the prefer­ ence for the instrumental among "Verben des Verwandeltwerdens" (p. 88) ((= lb)); the effect of tense-aspect-mood ("so ist präd. Instr. besonders beliebt bei den Formen, die der Bedeutung des Übergangs in einen neuen Zustand ... am nächsten kommen können," (p. 90), by which he means the future, conditional, and imperative) ((= lc)); the role of the case of the controller ((= Id)); and the difference by part of speech (pp. 88, 94) ((= le)). The role of nominal semantics ((= 1f)) is mentioned occasionally, in statements such as the instrumental "ist denn notwendig, wenn es sich um etwas Transitorisches oder um eine Art Vergleich handelt" (p. 90).

3.

Participles are not uniform. Predicative participles — participles which are themselves governed predicatives of their syntactic hosts, and whose controllers are subjects — require agreement in noun predicatives (in these texts, 18xx). A particularly exuberant example is (i) ir jis is tikruju pradeda jaustis esqs nepaprastas zmogusNOM. [J. Ragauskas, 178] 'and he truly was beginning to feel himself to be a special person NOM .' in which the nominative is used even though the host of the participle is an infinitive. Similarly, participles without an overt syntactic host — in reported speech — always use the nominative, as do participles that are part of complex tenses. Only adverbial partici­ ples show mixed case usage.

ASPECTUAL CASE

345

4.

It is easy enough to develop a formal model that can adequately characterize uniform vs. changing histories over times or worlds (all that is necessary is to compare the states over different times and worlds to determine if they are the same or different), but there are some unstated difficulties here in making explicit the notion of discontinuous change. First, to distinguish discontinuous change from ordinary continuous change is not easy. One possibility would be to require that all the change in the value of a state take place over a single indivisible interval of time or worlds. That is, one could require that at (t_1, w_1) the predicative have a negative value and at (t +1 , w +1 ) a positive value, with only one interval (t0, w0) between the other two intervals. Second, at any time and world there are obviously numerous alternative situations in which the states would be quite different. In some way attention must be restricted to those times and worlds that are relevant (or con­ sidered by the speaker to be relevant). The problem is especially acute with, for example, instances of temporalization described later, in which certain localizing temporal adverbs focus attention on a time interval over which the predicative state holds without change; these localizing adverbs clearly do allow for the possibility that at other times that are not in immediate focus the value of the state could be different. One possibility would be to have an operation of focusing, or the like. For discontinuous change, the focused interval would be the (t0, w0) over which all change occurs; for absence of change, the focused interval (t0, w0) would be one on which no change occurs (and usually, one whose adja­ cent intervals (t _1 w_1) and (t +1 , w +1 ) experience no change). I mention these difficulties to acknowledge that the problem of formalizing these notions is not trivial (see Timberlake 1986 for an attempt at formalizing the relationship between temporality and modal­ ity for a similar problem in Russian).

5.

It is common practice to distingish between two uses of predicative nouns, equational and characterizational (Halliday 1967; Kuno and Wongkhomthong 1980; Rothstein 1986). This distinction is not crucial to case choice in Lithuanian. The equational use patterns together with what I call the descriptive use of predicatives.

6.

Semantically richer governing predicates, such as pasizadeti 'promise' or stengtis 'try,' require the instrumental (l0xx): (i) AS, buves jos tikybos mokytojas, stengiausi büti tame jos kelyje ramsčiu ir vadovuINS. [J. Ragauskas, 371] 'Being his teacher of faith, I tried to be comfort and leader INS on this journey of his.'

7.

Fraenkel attempts to motivate the general preference for the instrumental in this context in terms of an implicit modality: "da das Ganze leicht eine modale Färbung aufweist und sich durch 'in Eigenschaft, fungierend als ' wiedergeben lässt" (p. 90).

8.

In one of these, descriptivization is conditioned by a oblique complement, which focuses on the respect in which the predicative relation holds: (i) jūs savo dvasia dar tebebūsite kunigaiNOM. [J. Ragauskas, 161] Tn your soul you will still be priests NOM .' This example also illustrates the use of the nominative to emphasize maintenance of the predicative state over time.

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9.

Jakobson (1936/71) comments about the use of the nominative in Russian with localizing temporal adverbs as follows: "wofern nicht die Bestimmungen togda 'damals,' v svoe vremja 'seiner Zeit' als Antithesebezeichnungen gegeben sind, dann enthalten sie eben die Forderung eines statisch anmutenden N-s." This is in effect a definition of antitemporalization.

10.

The use of the instrumental to signal a differentiation of point of view is noted for Russian in Nichols 1981a. A somewhat tangential but instructive parallel arises in a study by Lopatina (1985) of the use of Russian de as a marker of reported speech in transcriptions of seventeenth century legal depositions. Lopatina shows that de is normally used only to mark the start of an extended unit of reported speech. When it is used internally, within a local unit of text, it serves to mark "opasnye slova" — that is, speech of the secondary speaker which the primary speaker wishes to disassociate himself from.

REFERENCES Fraenkel, E. 1925. "Der prädikative Instrumental im Slavischen und Baltischen und seine syntaksischen Grundlagen." Archiv für slavische Philologie 40:77-117. Halliday, M. A. K. 1967. "Notes on transitivity and theme in English." Journal of Linguistics 3:37-81; 3:199-244. Jakobson, R. 1936/71. "Beitrag zur allgemeinen Kasuslehre." Selected writings, 2. Word and lan­ guage, 23-71. The Hague & Paris. Kuno, Susumu, and Prey a Wongkhomthong. 1980. "Two copulative verbs in Thai." Harvard studies in syntax and semantics, 3, ed. by S. Kuno, 243-316. Cambridge, Mass. Lopatina, L. E. 1985. "Sredstva organizacii teksta pri peredace cuzoj reci (na materiale sudebnyx dokumentov XVII v.)." Vostočnye slavjane. Jazyki. Istorija. Kul'tura.  85letiju akademika V. I. Borkovskogo, 57-64. Moscow. Nichols, J. 1978. "Double dependency?" Papers from the Fourteenth Regional Meeting, Chicago Linguistic Society. April 13-14, 1978, ed. by D. Farkas et al., 326339. Chicago. 1981a. Predicate nominais: A partial surface syntax of Russian. Berkeley, Calif. 1981b. "Predicate instrumental and agreement in Lithuanian." Studies in the lan­ guages of the USSR, ed. by . Comrie. Edmonton-Carbondale.

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Paduceva, E.V., and .A. Uspenskij. 1979. "Podležašcee ili skazuemoe? (Semanticeskij kriterij razlicenija podležascego i skazuemogo v binominativnyx predloženijax)." Izvestija AN SSSR, Serija literatury i jazyka, 38:349-60. Rothstein, R. 1986. "Equation vs. ascription: The nominative/ instrumental opposition in West Slavic." Case in Slavic, ed. by R. E). Brecht and J. S. Levine, 312-22. Colum­ bus, Ohio. Timberlake, A. 1986. "The semantics of case in Russian predicate complements." Russian Linguis­ tics 10:137-165.

On Finnish "aspect" in discourse Hannu Torninola University of Tampere

0

Introduction

Östen Dahl's monograph on tense and aspect categories includes Fin­ nish and Estonian in the corpus of the languages investigated. An essential conclusion made by Dahl (1985a: 33-35, 182 and passim) is that the marking type for the tense and aspect (and mood) categories can be predicted rather easily, i.e. for a certain semantic category there is a typical (morphological or other type) way of marking. According to this prototypical view, these semantic categories are not well-determined so that one cannot define the semantic features necessary and sufficient for a particular category, and, moreover, the categories in different languages vary as to their morpholog­ ical expression and their semantic features (use in different contexts). This view is similar to the concepts of subjecthood (Keenan 1976) and colour terms (Berlin & Kay 1969). The semantic category referred to as aspect in these Baltic-Finnic lan­ guages is quite different from all the other categories represented in the rest of the languages included. If the Russian perfective/imperfective aspect opposition (soveršennyj/nesoversennyj vid, henceforth SV/NSV) is far from a prototypical perfective/imperfective category (Dahl 1985a: 69, 84), the Finnish and Estonian accusative/partitive (henceforth also Acc./Part.) direct object (DO) opposition is even more idiosyncratic. One cannot even speak of verbal aspect in this case. Aspect marking in the DO nouns makes this category highly dependent on discourse functions: the definiteness and specificness/non-specificness of the object reference. However, in Finnish and Estonian, there are also aspectually relevant morphologically marked verb classes: the so-called momentatives and fre-

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quentatives. Hypothetically, Finnish has morphological means that, in theory, make possible a development resulting in a Russian-like verbal aspect system. 1

On Finnish procedural verbs

Finnish frequentative verbs are derived by suffixes as in Russian the imperfective verbs are. The momentaneous verbs are also derived by suf­ fixes, which are comparable to the Russian semelfactive suffix -nu- (cf. levätä/levähtää and otdyxat'/otdoxnut' "to rest"). In certain cases there are, in fact, such pairs as ratkoalratkaista "to solve," where the continuative-frequentative verb only corresponds to the Russian NSV rešat', whereas the momentative one has the resultative meaning of the SV verb resit. In kertoalkertoilla "to tell, to narrate" the first one must be regarded as primary (not differentiated as to the aspect meaning), corresponding to the Russian SV rasskazat', but also to the NSV rasskazyvat', whereas the latter, fre­ quentative one, only corresponds to the NSV. Actually, the structural dif­ ference is merely the lack of a process of prefixation in Finnish, which in Russian supplies the perfective verbs denoting the needed resultative (Ak­ tionsart) meaning. Although these "procedurals" — momentatives and fre­ quentatives — are rather productive in Finnish, they are not compulsory and their frequency is rather low (Tommola 1986: 241, 247, 281n). Thus they cannot be identified as aspects proper. On the other hand, we could play with the hypothesis that they should gain in ground and lose their lexi­ cal-semantic restrictions, thus obtaining a status of grammatically relevant aspect pairs, marked by "perfectivizing" and "imperfectivizing" suffixes. The fréquentatives can really have both main functions of the Russian NSV, i.e. a progressive meaning (the continuative variant of the continuative-frequentative verbs) and an iterative meaning (the frequentatives proper), e.g.: (1)

(Finn.) Hän lopettelee <juuri> puhettaan. (Russ.) On zakancivaet svoju reč'. "He is finishing his speech ."

(2)

Hän kertoili samaa juttua. On rasskazyval odnu i tu ze istoriju. "He told/was always telling the same story."

So, instead of saying presidenta nimittää ministerit "the president appoints

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the ministers" we would say *presidentti nimittELee ministerit, using the form marked for "non-semelfactivity." Further, instead of saying hän veti kiistassa pitemmän korren "he won the dispute" (lit. "he drew the longer straw"), we would say hän vetÄISi pitemmän korren, using the form marked for "semelfactivity." The dilemma is that even if, in some cases, the Russian suffix -nu- has a perfectivizing function (as in likvidirovaf /likvidNUt' "to eliminate"), the main perfectivizing process remains the prefixation. Of course, for an advancement of the procedurals towards aspect proper a coexistent decline of the non-marked verbs would be necessary, or, at least, a reinterpretation of their aspectual meaning — in one or the other direction. After this trip into the world of fantasy let us leave the thought of Finnish VERBAL aspect and take into the consideration the case system. I shall confine myself to the most important aspectually rele­ vant opposition, the DO Acc./Part. case alteration. Even if this category does not apply to the large number of intransitive sentences, it is still the only GRAMMATICAL means — consistently marked in every transitive sentence — that has something to do with aspect. 2

The direct object case opposition

One might wonder how a speaker of Finnish can afford without pre­ fixed or some other kind of compound verbs. The answer that could be suggested as a partial solution is that the existence of DO case variation makes it possible to interpret one of these cases (the accusative) as indicat­ ing RESULTATIVITY or some kind of TOTALITY, and that is what var­ ious verb complements/compound verbs in different languages are often used for (about Swedish, see Tommola 1983). 2.1 The partitive case The role of the partitive as a member of the case opposition as such cannot be taken as genuinely "imperfective," because in intransitive clauses it can stand in the position of the subject, thus competing with the nomina­ tive, though without any function of denoting imperfectivity. One can ask with good reasons if the partitive really is a "case," or if it is something con­ nected with quantification, number, articles (actually, lack of articles), i.e. a marker of indefiniteness or non-specificness. If compared with Germanic

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languages, the partitive can be said to correspond to the lack of an article, with at least as good evidence as it is said to correspond to NSV if compared with Slavic languages. To these two documented contemporary functions we may add some unproductive uses in the local meaning "from" that reflect the original ablative meaning (cf. the similar origin of the genitive in Indoeuropean and its use to denote partiality in different languages). Anyway, it cannot be denied that the partitive is relevant in aspect semantics in Finnish. From this it is not a great step to establish an aspec­ tual FUNCTION, which really has been attached to the partitive (see, for example, Erkki Itkonen 1972: 188). To make clear in which way the Finnish DO cases deviate in use from the functions of Slavic aspect (vid), I shall later in this article show the discrepancy in the correspondence of the Fin­ nish accusative to the Russian SV, and of the Finnish partitive to the Rus­ sian NSV. The partitive, historically a new-comer compared with the accusative as the DO case, should be considered to have originally been the case which was marked in this function. The partiality meaning is found in several uses in the modern language, too, the most obvious cases being those in which a mass noun is used in the partitive as opposed to the use of the accusative (in a perfective context) that is said to indicate a total affectedness of the refer­ ence. (3)

Söin leipää. (Part.) Söin leivän. (c.) "I ate <some> bread." "I ate a bread." (Cf. Russ.: Ja poel (SV) xleba/Ja s"el (SV) xleb.)

From this use, where a partial affectedness of the object reference is expressed, the partitive could progress to imperfective contexts, where the partial affectedness is a natural consequence of the progressive meaning: an activity that is reported as ongoing at a certain moment cannot refer to any totality of the action. Thus, the partiality of the object reference affected ensues from the partiality of the action — but not vice versa. The partiality of the object reference does not entail partiality of the action, as is seen from (3) compared with (4). (4)

Söin leipää (Part.), kun hän tuli. "I was eating bread, when he came." (Cf. Russ.: Ja el (NSV) xleb, kogda on prišel.)

Therefore, we can't say that the imperfectivity (of the action) is marked by partiality (of the object reference). There is Leino's (1982)

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353

suggestion, supported by Heinämäki (1984), that the partitive is the neutral case of the DO, while the accusative is more restricted in use. There are also transitive verbs that do not express any real affectedness of the objectverbs of emotional and other relations, feelings etc. In these cases there can hardly be any question of "partiality." Moreover, we must assume that the partitive used instead of the accusative is a reinterpretation of the case meaning, now denoting anything but the total affectedness entailed by the accusative. This is the meaning on which we can base all the other uses of the partitive as the DO case. I have labelled the marked meaning of the accusative SPECIFIC RESULTATIVITY (Tommola 1986). 2.2 The accusative case It has been shown, for example by Dahl and Karlsson (1976), that the Finnish DO will be in the accusative if the sentence is a) affirmative and b) perfective, and c) if the denotatum of the DO is conceived of as total. None of these prerequisites is sufficient alone. It must be kept in mind that this is a hierarchy explaining the use of the accusative, case marking of the D O , which is NOT primarily an ASPECT category. As is seen from this hierar­ chy, it is not sufficient for the accusative to appear, if the sentence is affir­ mative and the aspect "perfective" (criterions a and b), but the object refer­ ence is not conceived of as total (cf. example 3). To precisize the totality we can state that the object reference must be specific and quantitatively defi­ nite (see Dahl 1985b). This is also what the SV verbs in Russian require if they denote resultativity: transitive verbs such as napisat' "to write" or sdelat' "to make" could hardly be used without any specification/quantifica­ tion of the DO (it will be implied, at least). So, the Finnish accusative DO seems to correspond to the use of a sub-type of Slavic SV verbs, denoting specific resultativity. The notion of resultativity should be regarded in more detail. First of all we should check what is actually meant by "perfectivity" on the second level in Dahl's and Karlsson's hierarchy. However, it is more convenient to examine those "imperfective" meanings that are excluded with the use of the accusative in Finnish. Quite clearly, this imperfectivity means an ongo­ ing action, the most obvious imperfective feature of non-completedness of action. The two other meanings of the Russian NSV simply do not block the use of the accusative in Finnish. A repeated (habitual, generic) action can perfectly well be expressed with an accusative DO if the other condi-

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tions (affirmativity, total affectedness) are fulfilled. Similarly, the generalfactual use (or meaning?) of the Russian NSV is, in general, translated into Finnish with verbs requiring an accusative DO (again, if the other condi­ tions are fulfilled). This is quite natural, because the general-factual use is often referred to as "NSV instead of SV," i.e. as NSV denoting an action that in reality was completed (but this fact is "not essential in the communi­ cation," as it is said, which is to be understood as meaning that it is not emphasized/focused). In a large number of cases this use of the NSV can be seen as due to the lack of the surface-category perfect/non-perfect, as a sur­ rogate of the existential perfect (Tommola 1986: 35-39, 47-48, 106). 3

The Finnish accusative and NSV

If the three criterions mentioned above are fulfilled, the accusative is used in Finnish as the DO case, and, one of the criterions being "perfectivity" of the sentence, we have, so to speak, normally to do with "harmoniz­ ing" instances, where the functions of the grammemes in both languages coincide. Without making too a strong claim, we can — taking the specific resultativity concept — maintain that when the use of the grammemes coin­ cide, the meaning of the Russian SV can always be interpreted as resulta­ tive. But there are, roughly speaking, two instances, when the Finnish accusative is used although the Russian translation has the verb in NSV. These are: a) an iterative resultative action (habitual meaning), and b) when the verb does not express any real action (state meaning). 3.1 Iteration In the habitual meaning the Russian NSV is used almost without exceptions. This is not a compulsory general rule in Slavic. The Russian sys­ tem has generalized the NSV use where the old imperfect would have been used. It should be noted that the Finnish DO case opposition (as well as the use of the procedural verbs, for that matter) seems to have very little if any­ thing of the functions characteristic of this particular (aorist/imperfect) aspect opposition. The partitive in the progressive context is only a logical implication from the context, as we have seen above (examples 3 and 4).

ON FINNISH "ASPECT" IN DISCOURSE

3.2

355

Quasi-Resultativity

In Finnish grammar, after Terho Itkonen (1976) the concept of "quasiresultative" verbs (or more exactly: a quasi-resultative use of certain verbs) has been employed (henceforth the abbreviation QR will be used for this kind of verbs). Firstly, there is a group of verbs denoting perception, which are used either with the meaning "beginning of the perception, feeling" or with the meaning "actual, lasting perception, feeling" (cf. the Russian SV uvidet' and the NSV videt' with the meaning "to see"). These verbs govern the accusative not only in the first type of context ("event of the percep­ tion"), but in the latter ("state of the perception") as well. Secondly, there are also a few "absolute QR" verbs having in the modern language only the latter use omistaa or ornata "to possess," käsittää "to consist of," and sisältää "to connect," erottaa "to separate," peittää "to cover" are typical. Prob­ ably these QR verbs do not constitute a strictly definable group. Moreover, the event function SV counterparts (uvidet' "to see", uslysaf "to hear," ponjaf "to understand," vspomnif "to remember" etc.). Thirdly, scholars have thought that many other verbs can be QR verbs. These verbs are, as far as I can see, potentially — and primarily — resultative actional verbs, which can be used "metaphorically" with a state meaning. Verbs like yhdistää "to connect," erottaa "to separate," peittää "to cover" are typical. Prob­ ably these QR verbs do not constitute a strictly definable group. Moreover, actional verbs in general may acquire this kind of metaphoric use. Cf. the example, cited by Timberlake (1982: 312) for Russian, and the Finnish translation: (5)

Sirokij rot pridaval ego licu dovol'noe vyraženie. Leveä suu antoi hänen kasvoilleen tyytyväisen ilmeen. "The broad mouth gave his face an contented expression."

In fact, such QR verbs can occasionally be translated into Russian with an SV verb. In these cases the Russian SV past has to be interpreted as being used with the meaning of the perfect tense, i.e. the actual state is expressed by a "resultative construction" that denotes "secondary state" (for more details, see Tommola 1986: 140-165). It can be concluded that both variants (a and b) of the "deviation" instances in aspectual strategy of "perfectivity" in Finnish and Russian are based on the same factor. In Finnish, the temporal reference is not con­ nected with the resultativity/irresultativity, which makes it possible to refer

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HANNU TOMMOLA

to a resultative action even when it is repeated at various moments in time (a), as well as to refer to an actual state where the result of a thought foregoing event is present (b). In Russian, SV cannot normally refer to a non-bounded period, though the perfect-of-result meaning constitutes an exception. 4

The Finnish partitive and SV

4.1 Negation The hierarchy of Dahl and Karlsson mentioned before shows negation as entailing the use of the partitive on the highest level. This seems to be a formal rule, but in fact it is not quite so (this is also noted by Dahl & Karlsson 1976, and by Leino 1982: 119, 140). In his classic short story Juhani Aho begins a dialogue like this: (6)

Eikö meidänkin olisi aika hankkia lamppua? "Isn't it time for us, too, to get a lamp?"

The use of the partitive here sounds archaic. It follows the formal rule. In the modern language it should be more natural to use the accusative, because with this sentence nothing is being denied. The formal negation merely has the discourse function of suggestion. The pragmatics of the case alteration in modern Finnish could be illustrated by the sentences (7 and 8). (7)

Eikö meidän <muka> ole aika hankkia lamppua? "Is it not time for us to get a lamp?"

(8)

Eikö meidän ole aika hankkia lamppu?. "Isn't it time for us to get a lamp?"

Formally, both sentences are interrogative and negated. (7) (with the parti­ tive) is an astonished, reproachful reaction to a truly negative statement. In (8) (with the accusative) there is only a suggestion, having nothing to do with denial. Examples like (8) are exceptions to the FORMAL rule, but they are instructive from the point of understanding the discourse function of combining negation and the DO case in that they follow the SEMANTIC rule. An interesting question here is to what extent the pragmatic particles —  in (7) and -kin in (8) — are optional. From the strictly semantic point of view they are redundant, because the case alteration can be taken as sufficient information of the communicative sense in the sentences. In any

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case, they are not interchangable without a change in the meaning, which is an argument suggesting exactly the opposite, that the grammatical markers — the partitive and the accusative — are redundant! And the grammatician must admit that we can tolerate ungrammatical speech in communication just because there is normally a certain amount redundancy in it. This example shows not only the most idiosyncratic character of the pragmatic elements across the languages (just try and translate these pragmatic parti­ cles in isolation!), but also the subtlety adherent to the Finnish Acc./Part. opposition and related categories in other languages. As noticed, for example by Dahl and Karlsson, there is nothing astonishing in the use of the partitive with negation, given the resultative meaning of the accusative. When an action is denied, no result can have been achieved from this particular action. Another question arises when one wants to deny only a result (completion of an activity), not the action itself. It has been observed that, in Finnish, sentences like (9) are ambigu­ ous.. (9)

En lukenut (sitä) kirjaa. "I didn't read the/that book" a) b)

"at all" "didn't finish it"

(9) translates into Russian either a) Ja ne citai (NSV) knigu, or b) Ja ne pročitai (SV) knigu. But when translating back from Russian, b) must be trans­ lated with a further specification (10): (10)

En lukenut kirjaa loppuun. (lit.) "to the end"

In fact, there is no conflict here: also the Russian a) can — or must — mean that "no result was achieved"; only this is not focused or emphasized. The difference lies on another level: in communication one must know what is being negated. The negation of the result is expressed in Russian by the same resultativity marker as in the affirmative sentence (PROčital), whereas in Finnish for the assertion of the result the case of the DO is suffi­ cient, but the negation of the resultativity requires a lexical means (lop­ puun). It needs to be mentioned that Estonian follows here the Russian model in that the (lexical) resultivity marker is also necessary in an affirma­ tive sentence (ma lugin raamatu LÄBI). The difference between the accusative and the partitive (raamatu — raamatut) is not felt sufficient. The formal means are identical with those in Finnish, but these closely related languages differ in their use of them. In Estonian, the redundancy has in

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many cases become compulsory, presumably, since there are instances where the accusative (identical with the genitive) and the partitive con­ verge. The second level in Dahl's and Karlsson's hierarchy of DO case mark­ ing criterions is the aspectual one. It may be too strong a claim to say that all negated clauses are semantically "imperfective," but given the Finnish system, they are certainly irresultative. In this sense the Finnish DO case marking is aspectual on the first level, too. 4.2 Indefinite quantity On the lowest level of the hierarchy a restriction is made as to the use of the accusative in a "perfective" sentence: the accusative is allowed only with DO denotata of specific quantity. So, sentence (11) has not only an imperfective reading (a), but also a perfective (b): (11)

Pellolle rakennettiin taloja,. (Part.) a) "They were building houses in the fields." b) "Some houses were built in the fields."

In (11) the accusative seems to be impossible with this word order, but it is quite acceptable if the DO occupies the thematic position (12): (12)

*Pellolle rakennettiin talot (Acc.) Talot rakennettiin pellolle. "The houses were built in the fields."

The specification of the "houses" may also follow after the object and then, too, make the use of the accusative possible: (12) a. Pellolle rakennettiin talot, joihin tuli kirjasto ja koulu. "The houses were built in the fields, where a library and a school were acommodated." 4.3 Reduced transitivity The indefinite quantity function — the third level of the hierarchy — explains the partitive in (11). But there are still some instances where the partitive is not motivated in this way. For many verbs that are used only with the partitive the notion of "reduced transitivity" (Hopper &

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Thompson 1980) can be employed. Such are the verbs denoting various kinds of state (emotional: rakastaa "to love," relational: vastata "to corre­ spond to," of attitude: pitää "to regard as," etc.) or activity that does not immediately affect the object (with an instrumental meaning of the DO: käyttää "to use < a tool>," pelata "to play ," with an "internal" object: leikkiä "to play < a game>," ajatella "to think," puhua "to talk," etc.). The Finnish partitive with these verbs is not problematic from the aspectual point of view, because the verbs in question are also regarded as imperfectiva tantum in Russian. But let us look at a verb like auttaa "to help," and certain verbs that at least potentially denote "event": semata "to follow," koskea or koskettaa "to touch," katsoa "to look, to glance." All these verbs have in common that their D O , semantically, does not express an object. In the case of auttaa the partitive of the person "being helped" should not be regarded as the DO. As a matter of fact, this is an auxiliary verb, and if the main verb is transitive, the object of this main verb is the DO of the sentence. From the case of this object the aspectual resultativity/irresultativity meaning can be seen, cf. (13). (13) a. Hän auttoi minua (Part.) kuivaamaan astioita (Part.). "He helped me while I was drying the dishes." (Cf. Russ.: On pomogal (NSV) mne (Dat.) vytirat' (NSV) posudu.) b. Hän auttoi minua (Part.) kuivaamaan astiai (Acc). "He helped me drying the dishes." (Cf. Russ.: On pomog (SV) mne (Dat.) vyteret' (SV) posudu.) As to the verb semata, in (14) the sentences remain "quasitransitive" (in Russian they are intransitive), and, in Finnish, without a formal specifi­ cation of the aspectual meaning. Here the "perfectivity" in (b) is not of resultative character, but "aoristic," which in Finnish is left to be concluded from the context (two subsequent events). (14) a. Hän "He (Cf. b. Hän "He (Cf.

seurasi minua (Part.) taukoamatta. followed me without a pause." Russ.: On postojanno sledoval (NSV) za mnoj.) meni ulos ja minä seurasin häntä (Part.). went out and I followed him." Russ.: On vyšel i ja posledoval (SV) za nim.)

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To the verbs mentioned before some "speech verbs" can be added: kysyä "to inquire, to ask about," pyytää "to ask for," nimittää or sanoa "to call," and, maybe, some others. For the behaviour of all these verbs the relationship between the action and the object is important. They are not really (semantically) transitive. 4.4 Non-specific end state Dahl and Karlsson (1976) discuss examples with the verb ampua "to shoot," and they do in this connection accept the definition "decisive change in the state of the denotatum of the object" as the criterion for the use of the accusative. Here the partitive use corresponds to indirect objects in other languages, cf.: Engl. to shoot at, Germ. auf etw. schiessen, Swed. skjuta på, Russ. streljaf, vystrelif vo ëto, etc., which again speaks for reduced transitivity. And still the problems are not all solved. There remain verbs denoting "change" like muuttaa "to change into smth," vaihtaa "to < ex>change, replace," and siirtää "to move, change the position." See the following examples: (15)

Laiva muutti suuntaa (Part.). "The boat changed course." (Cf. Russ.: Korabl' izmenil (SV) kurs.)

(16)

Mies vaihtoi paitaa (Part.). "The man changed the shirt." (Cf. Russ.: Muščina peremenil (SV) rubašku.)

(17)

Isoisä siirsi kellonviisareita (Part.). "The grandfather moved the clock hands." (Cf. Russ.: Deduškaperevel (SV) strelki.)

The accusative will be necessary if we add to these sentences a specification of the end state in which the DO reference appears after the action: (15) a. Laiva muutti suunnan (Acc.) kohti Helsinkiä. "The boat took the course towards Helsinki" (16) a. Mies vaihtoi puhtaan (Acc. ) paidan (Acc. ). "The man put on a clean shirt." (17) a. Isoisä siirsi kellonviisarit (Acc.) oikeaan aikaan. "The grandfather moved the hands to show the correct time."

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We can see here that the needed specification may be a definition of the new state or position ("course bound where?"), where the object refer­ ence appears after the change, or a characterization of the new concrete reference of the object noun ("a clean shirt"). Certainly, this is not a formal syntactic requirement. The new end state may be, for instance, specified in the context before. So, if the "shirt" in (16) was mentioned before, one can indicate this using the accusative. Likewise, in (15), if in the discourse the need to "change the course" towards a certain goal was discussed, the accusative is fully possible, and the "course" in the accusative means then exactly this particular direction. 5

Conclusions

In the discussion above I have confined myself mainly to the role of the Finnish "aspect markers" on the sentence level. Finnish aspect was con­ fronted with the well-known vid-category in Slavic, such as it appears in Russian. Only occasionally have I taken up genuine discourse functions. As a matter of fact, the recent interest in aspect problems in non-Slavic lan­ guages, which has resulted in works (although rather few) dealing with the Finnish DO cases in an aspectual framework, may have decreased the more traditional treatment of the nominative/accusative versus partitive opposi­ tion. And yet it is there that the most obvious discourse functions could be found — in functions, related to those of articles. In fact the reverse is true, in the traditional aspect realm — in Slavic linguistics — an approach has gained ground that takes such notions as definiteness and specificness into consideration (Leinonen 1982, Kabakciev 1984). As mentioned above, the Finnish Acc./Part, opposition is not depen­ dent on temporal reference. Here it deviates from the SV/NSV opposition in Russian. I have already stated the resemblance between the Finnish accusative and the Russian SV precisely in resultative meaning, i.e. the sim­ ilarity between these categories lies on the denotative level, in Aktionsart semantics. It is the semantics of the aorist/imperfect opposition having very little in common with resultativity that constitutes the specific temporalaspect characteristics of Russian. Therefore, it is hard to find those dis­ course functions in Finnish — however similar Finnish semantics may seem to be to the resultativity semantics of SV/NSV — that can be discovered in Russian. The functions in question are to be traced in the old aorist/imper­ fect semantics. These and the original vid-functions are intertwined in the

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modern Russian vid. Such concepts as Maslov's (1980) for the narrative functions of the Slavic past ("axis of simultaneity" and "axis of sequence") simply do not apply to the Finnish DO category. The principal task of this article being to give an overall picture of aspect in Baltic-Finnic seen from a semantic-typological point of view, the discourse functions are only to be found in the comments on the examples. They can be presented more systematically after thorough investigations; for the present such works practically do not exist (see, however, Rajandi & Metslang 1979 on Estonian). Nevertheless, let us repeat some facts from the discussion before. Besides the pragmatic functions of the "exceptional" use of the accusa­ tive in negated sentences that were discussed in 4.1., the partitive, for its part, has analogous functions in formally affirmative sentences where nega­ tion is presupposed. Also the influence of word order on the DO case hinted at in 4.2. should be examined in more detail. Reduced transitivity, apparently, is a most important semantic factor behind the irresultativity (but not imperfectivity, as seen in 4.3.) of certain verbs. Most obvious dependence of the DO case upon discourse structure was found in 4.4., where the specificness of the end state was examined. What has not been discussed are some, as it seems to me, interesting verbs that denote "remaining as event" (jäädä "to remain, to be left," jättää "to leave") or "resultative non-changing" (pitää "to keep" and others). There are also the interrogative clauses where the partitive is "overrepresented," whose importance in discourse research is beyond doubt (see Tommola 1986). In this article these problems have not been discussed, because the presentation of the typology of aspects in Finnish was distorted through comparison with Slavic verbal aspect. And, in many cases, if the discourse functions of the Finnish DO cases are examined, we shall find that we are no longer discussing aspect — at least not verbal aspect.

REFERENCES Berlin, B. & Kay, P. 1969. Basic color terms, their universality and evolution. Berkeley: Univ. of California Press. Dahl, Ö. 1985a. Tense and Aspect Systems. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

ON FINNISH "ASPECT" IN DISCOURSE

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1985b. "Notes on Aspect, Case, and Trcinsitivity." Symposium in memoriam János Lotz (1913-1973). Foredrag hàllna vid minnessymposiet den 27 september 1983 vid Stockholms universitet, ed. by Wickman, ., 14-19. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International. Dahl, Ö. & Karlsson, F. 1976. "Verbien aspektit ja objektin sijanmerkintä: vertailua suomen ja venäjän välillä." Sananjalka 18, 28-52. Turku. (Engl.: "Verbal aspects and object marking: A comparison between Finnish and Russian." International Review of Slavic Linguistics 1:1. 1-29.) Heinämäki, . 1984. "Aspect in Finnish." Aspect Bound. A voyage into the realm of Germanic, Slavonic and Finno-Ugrian aspectology, ed. by de Groot, . & Tommola, H., 153-177. Dordrecht: Foris Publications. Hopper, P.J. & Thompson, S.A. 1980. "Transitivity in Grammar and Discourse." Language 56, 251-299. Itkonen, E. 1972. "Über das Objekt in den finnisch-wolgaischen Sprachen." Finnisch-ugrische Forschungen 39, 153-213. Itkonen, T. 1976. "Erään sijamoudon ongelmia." Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia: esitelmät ja pöytäkirjat 1974, 173-217. Helsinki. Kabakciev, K. 1984. "The article and the aorist/imperfect distinction in Bulgarian: an analysis based on cross-language 'aspect' parallelisms." Linguistics 22:5, 643-672. Keenan, E.L. 1976. "Towards a universal definition of 'subject'." Subject and topic, ed. by Li, C.N. New York: Academic Press. Leino, P. 1982. Lauseet ja tilanteet. Suomen objektin ongelmia. I-II. Helsinki (mimeo). Leinonen, M. 1982. Russian Aspect, "temporal'naja lokalizacija," and Definiteness/Indefiniteness {— Neuvostoliitto-instituutin vuosikirja, 27). Helsinki. Maslov, Ju.S. 1980. "Struktura povestovatel'nogo teksta i tipologija slavjanskix vido-vremennyx sistem." Svantevit 6:1, 43-70. Rajandi, H. & Metslang, H. 1979. Määramata ja määratud objekt. Tallinn: Volgus.

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Timberlake, A. 1982. "Invariance and the Syntax of Russian Aspect." Tense-Aspect: Between Semantics and Pragmatics (= TSL, 1), ed. by Hopper, P.J., 305-331. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Tommola, H. 1983. "lakttagelser om verbkomplement." LSP and theory of translation. Papers from a seminar ed. by Ingo R. & al., 115-134. Vaasa: University of Vaasa. Tommola, H. 1986. AspektuaVnost' v finskom i russkom jazykax (= Neuvostoliittoinstituutin vuosikirja, 28). Helsinki.

4. Aspect in Russian literary discourse

Aspect in textual deep structure (On the message theme of Puskin's The Bronze

Horseman)

André G.F. van Holk University of Groningen

1. The linguist trying to describe and analyse the semantic structure (in the sense of Metzeltin and Jaksche 1983) of a literary text1 faces the task to make explicit the devices by which the two systems of what Lotman has cal­ led the "primary" and "secondary language" (Lotman 1970: 10) are mapped into one another. While the first of these systems comprises the archetypal elements of culture which we shall refer to as literary themes, the other will consist of the units and categories of linguistic expression as established by the most appropriate linguistic methods. In accordance with Thelin's remark (Thelin 1984b: 257) on the necessity to correlate the relevant text structures with their poetic functions, I take it that the analysis of a literary text on the one hand presupposes its linguistic analysis, yet may impose a particular selection and re-arrangement of the linguistic data to fit its own particular needs. To avoid the pitfalls of circularity in determining linguistic form categories by means of their narrative functions2 (e.g., the perfective and imperfective aspects in Russian as implementations of 'foregrounding' and 'backgrounding,' respectively) it is necessary to start from the immediately observable surface of the text, the linguistic forms and their combinatorics; the situations of discourse and their derivatives (events, actions, achievements, and other 'Vendler categories') will then be obtained as mere models and programs for the statement of observed reg­ ularities in the distribution and composition of linguistic units. Among the boundary conditions imposed on the description of the tex­ tual surface by external pragmatic (communicative, literary-aesthetic, ritual, etc.) needs, one stands out as paramount: the description of culture

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in terms of literary themes requires a system of discrete primitives, inas­ much as experience seems to tell us that the number of possible literary themes is peculiarly limited; we recall in this connection the thirty-one 'functions' of Propp's Morphology of the Folktale (1958). The observation that every such 'function' may be implemented by a large variety of lexical items without loss of identity clearly points in the direction of a literary code which embodies only the categorial slots of every theme, while leaving open the selection of lexical material within the bounds of some form of subcategorisation (Lyons 1969: 50ff.). In delimiting these categorial slots, the discrete quantitive factors of linguistic structure, such as, in particular, the hierarchic arrangement of slots and paradigms in one or more dimen­ sions, naturally will have to be considered; cf. especially the notion of 'rank' as used by Seiler (1985), going back to the more general notion prop­ osed by De Groot (1949). As both De Groot and Seiler have pointed out, the surface feature of word or morpheme order may be interpreted in terms of universal 'deep' hierarchy founded on discrete degrees of 'closeness' between slots within the construction of noun phrase or verb phrase. In terms of such a hierarchy, aspect as a universal category will be assigned a definite slot between diathese and tense, on the grounds that, in a language like Russian and many others with sufficiently developed morphology, the exclusively aspectual suffixes like /ivaj—/ are added after prefixation specifying diathese, and before the addition of tense suffixes; thus the verb form in On zasluzivaet nagradu 'he merits a reward' will be rendered by a formula such as (1)

[za - služi -]-ivaj-]it,

where /it/ closes the morphologic construction of the verb (Bloomfield 1933: 196ff. ; 223, 268) at the level of the sentence. 3 As we shall see presently, the category of aspect as a whole is particularly suitable for the function of 'foregrounding' in narrative (which means that "perfektives und imperfek­ tives Erzählen," both belong to the aesthetic assets and liabilities of the Russian system; cf. Alberg Jensen 1984); it should be noticed, however, that in expressions indicating time-intervals and durations the category of aspect occurs in a decidedly backgrounded function; cf. noc in the stage directions to Witkiewicz' play Mister Price czyli Bzik tropikalny (2): (2)

Noc. Weranda Malabar-hotelu... 'Night. A verandah in the Malabar-hotel...' (Witkiewicz I, 1985: 289)

ASPECT IN TEXTUAL DEEP STRUCTURE

369

An important consequence of this discrete-quantitative approach to the structure of literary themes is the differentiation of action patterns by the number of modal relations between the agent and its co-actants. Thus the heroine of Ostrovskij's Groza, Katerina Kabanova, on the one hand functions as the agent of a series of actions covered by the category of verbs of 'meeting' (the sought-for meeting between the lovers), while on the other hand she is connected by four modal relations to her opponent (motherin-law Kabanixa), her adjuvant (sister-in-law Varvara), the key giving access to the forbidden locus of the meeting, and finally to the sought-for beloved (Boris); for more details cf. Van Holk (1984b). Another example is provided by Hebbel's play Judith (Hebbel 1981), where the heroine is the agent of an action culminating in the decapitation of Holofernes, and at the same time figures as the centre of four modal relations: offendedness because of the heroine's home town Bethylia, hatred (alternating with love) for Holofernes, rejoicing in the sword as a tool of vengeance, and satisfaction (symbolised by Holofernes' head as a trophy of victory over the Assyrians); for a detailed treatment, cf. Van Holk (1984a). In the present paper I propose to discuss the role of aspect as a universal deep category in the text of Puskin's poem Mednyj vsadnik {The Bronze Horseman, henceforth MV; Puskin 1977). What will be required is the incorporation of 'aspectual' distinctions provided by the textual surface in a suitable system of deep relations, using a variety of case grammar (with due revisions) as a starting-point. While an arbitrary text may be regarded as a random mixture of constructions of linguistic material, a literary text in gen­ eral will allow a division into archetypal raw material on the one hand, and, on the other, plot lines whose content is conveyed by certain narrative superstructures (to use van Dijk's term; Van Dijk 1978: 153); both are ulti­ mately based on a system of thematic constructions (TC's) which decom­ pose into elementary constructions (EC's) and re-arrange into complex constructions under specific stylistic conditions of the textual surface. An EC in general has to account for the way sentences are linked in the expres­ sion of a particular plot line; EC's therefore combine the permanent fea­ tures of the plot's executive character with the varying states predicated about it in the sentences of the plot line's expression; 4 the permanent fea-

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ANDRE G.F. VAN HOLK

tures constitute the underlying EC of the plot line, which is to capture its 'cultural content'. Let us cast a quick glance at the overall structure of EC's to see how aspectual features of the plot expression might fit in. 2. In accordance with the above requirements an EC is defined as the combination of a nuclear expression carrying the class features (number, diathese, aspect, tense, etc.) of the construction , with one or more accom­ panying modifying expressions, which determine the nucleus' position in the sentence; in the stylistically unmarked state of a complete utterance, to every class marker of the nucleus corresponds just one position marker. By way of example, consider the third person ending on the predicative verb as marking the position of the noun phrase as its subject (or, as the case may be, the accusative ending as a position marker of the object noun phrase, corresponding to the transitive class marker of the verbal predicate). Fol­ lowing Metzeltin and Jaksche (1983: 26) every EC is built up about a single (possibly dummy or zero) subject, whereas the verbal predicate and its con­ stituents (such as direct or indirect objects, and adverbs of aspect and tense) directly or indirectly modify this subject; within the subject noun phrase, the central noun may be modified by deictic, numerative, qualita­ tive and other constituents. To every EC one nucleus-modifier relation is assigned as characteristic. such a relation unites a given class of nuclear expressions with its context in the sentence in the simplest possible way, i.e. with minimal dependence on the sum total of constituents that happen to be present in that sentence. For instance, let the transitive construction of expressions like The wicked mil­ ler chased the poor boys away yesterday be based on the characteristic rela­ tion {chase away)R(the...boys); then the tense adverbial yesterday, with the corresponding preterit ending -ed, may be deleted without damage to the transitive relation at issue, whereas both the relations chase ... away and the miller ... chasing away appear to be included in the transitive EC's expres­ sion as implied constituents. EC's can be classified according to a twofold hierarchy, whose dimen­ sions are termed rank and extension. In a somewhat simplified fashion, rank may be defined as the number of nodes by which the characteristic relation of an EC participates in the sentence, as shown in (3):

ASPECT IN TEXTUAL DEEP STRUCTURE (3)

ranks

S

1 2 3

371

NP D

VP NP'

Nu

VP' NP"

VP"

NPObj NPIns

where Nu participates in the total S by the three nodes NP', NP and S itself, D by the two nodes NP and S, NPObj by the two nodes VP and S, NPIns by the three nodes VP', VP and S, NP and VP by the one node S. Exten­ sion is defined as the number of different constituents (cf. Fillmore's "sing­ ularity principle"5) at the rank to which the characteristic relation of that EC belongs. EC's of rank 2 and 3 (deictic and numerative constructions) may be divided, first, into nominal and verbal; the verbal ones fall into subjectoriented (intransitive), neutral (transitive), and clause-oriented (clauseadverbial) types; finally, both nominal and verbal EC's fall into concentric (non-personal) and eccentric (personal) types — the former with one, the other with two characteristic 'case lines' between nucleus and modifier (cf. Fillmore 1969: 116-117), e.g. 'definite' vs 'identified' in the deictic nominais of rank 2; 'plural' vs 'collective' in the numerative nominals of rank 3; 'prediccitive' vs 'agentive' in the intransitive EC's of rank 2, 'factitive-causative' vs 'experiential' among the transitives of rank 2, then 'locative' vs 'mo­ tional,' 'instrumental' vs 'comitative-reciprocal,' and finally 'resultative' vs 'narrative-indicative' constructions among clause-adverbial EC's of rank 2, and 'durative' vs 'retrospective' constructions among clause-adverbial EC's of rank 3. A summary representation of these EC's is given in (4):

deictic DEF ID PRED AG FAC EXP RES NAR numerative PLUR COL LOC MOTION INS COM DUR RETR

An aspectual EC may now be defined as a construction covering all but the last constituent of the full sentence constructions of rank 2 or 3; those of rank 2 are pivoted on the opposition 'perfect vs progressive' (E. be/have been-; be working/have worked, have been working', R. on rabotaet nad

372

ANDRÉ G.F. VAN HOLK

zadacej/on koncil zadacu 'he is working on a problem/he has finished work on the problem'); the aspectuals of rank 3 are pivoted on the opposition 'punctual vs linear,' which is regarded as a 'quantitive' (or 'numerative') category. Thus an aspectual EC is not necessarily finite, but always contains one modifier in addition to the diathetic core of the sentence, whose con­ stituents participate in diathetic transformations (active-passive). An aspec­ tual EC, moreover, always designates an action/event in relation to some other action/event (possibly an empty stretch of the plot line). Note that this is the so-called "phase" interpretation of aspect (cf. Renicke 1950). It is also possible to set up a representation of an aspectual EC along the line of Xolodovic (1969: 6-7), by adding to his formula for the 'causative' (5i) below, a clause adverbial, which then will split up into a constituent for the second action/event, say S', and one for the connection between the two (e.g. anteriority/posteriority and simultaneity), as shown in (5ii): (5)

i.

[r. s.]  [j. sj.] ego priezd zastavil nas ujti 'his arrival caused us to leave' ii. [ri. si.] AdvA.  [j. sj.]AdvA. posle ego priezda my resili ujti 'after his arrival we decided to leave' Legend: AdvA → clause-adverbial of aspect

Thus, while Xolodovic's formula of the causative (FAC in diagram 4) con­ sists oí five constituents of level 2 or 3, the corresponding aspectual EC con­ tains seven constituents at the ranks 2,3. This is in accordance with the fact that aspectual EC's cover seven of the eight possible positions of the full sentence construction of rank 2 or 3, as well as with the fact that according to Metzeltin and Jaksche (1983: 30) the SUCCESSIVENESS relation in narrative strings includes the CAUSALITY relation; (cf. the symbols "→" and " + , " i.e. 'successiveness' equals 'causality' + 'phase'). 3. Although, as stated above, we do not accept 'grounding' as a sufficient condition on the selection of aspectual forms in a Russian text, yet we believe this notion to be of paramount importance in the combinatorics of EC's (cf. esp. Chvany 1985). In particular, we draw attention to the fact that the nucleus of an EC, as a cluster of class markers, predominantly refers to the static entities which make up the background situation in nar­ rative or drama, whereas the modifiers, in particular the predicate, owing

ASPECT IN TEXTUAL DEEP STRUCTURE

373

to their connective function, are more suited to implement the dynamic foreground events (and the transient states giving rise to, or ensuing from, an event). If it is accepted that in any accomplished stretch of discourse (in a com­ plete text), the opposite grounding functions hold the balance, the question arises under what conditions (of a presumably pragmatic nature) their equilibrium is disturbed. For our present purpose suffice it to distinguish two such conditions: (i) the process of narration; (ii) dramatic performance (with intermediate cases, such as Berthold Brecht's epic drama, or dramatized narrative, with a powerful dialogue component, as in Dos­ toevskij's Crime and Punishment). This is not the place to go into the differ­ ent positions held by the author in narrative and drama; 6 from the standpoint of thematics, the two great genres are more similar then is gen­ erally admitted — the main distinction being in the visual support of backgrounding on the stage, the attributes of the set, and costuming, while foregrounding is enhanced by the equally visual enacting of events and states, with dialogue embedded in body movements, gestures and mimics (Elam 1980: 33-97). Narration, on the contrary, rather represents a oneman show, a monologue shaping the reader's or audience's tension by such devices as functional sentence perspective, optionally supported again by gestures and mimical acts. In general, then, we hold that both drama and narrative use pragmatic devices to differentiate descriptive from plotadvancing components, while in drama the separation of back- and fore­ ground is reinforced by visual (and possible other) means; this is shown in diagram (6): 7 (6)

pragmatic conditions of narrative or dramatic  communication

semiotically neutral function of EC

backgrounded function of nominal component (class markers dominating over position markers)

foregrounded function of verbal component (position markers dominating over class markers)

Nominal EC's, while referring to objects or persons, tend to become backgrounded, whereas verbal-predicative EC's, as the vehicles of rela­ tively novel, unexpected information, are more suited to the function of

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ANDRÉ G.F. VAN HOLK

foregrounding; the Locative EC occupies a peculiar position — although part of the predicate it definitely favours backgrounding function, in accor­ dance with the possibility of the Locative paradigm to assume the role of subject (cf. gazety pisut o nacavsixsja peregovorax 'the newspapers write about negotiations having begun' beside v gazetax pisut  nacavsixsja peregovorax 'in the newspapers they write about negotiations having begun'; na fabrikax izgotovljajutsja suveniry 'in the factories souvenirs are produced' vs fabrikami izgotovljajutsja suveniry 'souvenirs are produced by the factories.' We conclude, for the moment, that EC's of columns I, II and III (in diagram 4) easily lose one or more position markers, so as to become predominantly class-marking, with ensuing backgrounded function, whereas EC's of columns IV through VII easily acquire one or more excess position markers, so as to become predominantly connective or plotadvancing, i.e. foregrounded. The EC's of column VII (of 'aspectual' type), when foregrounded, cover a plot line of 'biographic' type, showing a por­ tion of the hero's life and development, or, depending on the nature of the hero and the initial situation, a string of events or actions culminating in the acquisition of the 'sought-for' object (the princess, etc.). 4. Coming now to our text, let us see whether and how aspectual EC's play any role in its narrative structure. 8 First of all, a tentative division of the textual material may be made into the following three components: (7)

i.

a backgrounded nominal EC representing the hero and his setting; in view of the fact that the hero, Evgenij, is engaged in a problematic relation with the people of his social class (dicitsja znatnyx i ne tuzit I ni o pocijuscej rodne I ni o zabytoj starine 'he shuns the great and does not care / for his deceased kin / nor for the forgotten days of yore') we inter­ pret this nominal as the eccentric EC of rank 3, i.e. the Col­ lective (diagram 4) without further proof;9 ii. two identical foregrounded EC's representing the two opposed components of the main action-event string — Evgenij's vain search for his beloved Parasa, and the inunda­ tion of the town.

The two EC's under (7ii) are implemented by expressions containing both 'punctual' actions/events and 'linear' ones, witness such passages as (8):

ASPECT IN TEXTUAL DEEP STRUCTURE

(8)

i.

375

Itak domoj prised, Evgenij Strjaxnul sinel', razdelsja, leg

'So having come home, Eugene Shook off his coat, undressed, lay down' ii. Ego terzal kakoj-to son. Prosta nedelja, mesjac — on  sebe domo] ne vozvrascalsja Zlye deti Erosali kamni vsled emu. Neredko kucerskie pleti Ego stegali... 'He was tormented by a certain dream. A week passed by, a month — he Did not return home Wicked children Would throw stones after him. Not seldom the coachman's whip Would strike him...' The inundation is likewise presented as a series of 'punctual' events com­ bined with the lasting state of the proud city and the effects of the flood: (9)

i.

/Neva/ I vdrug,  zver' ostervenjas', Na gorod kinulas'. Pred neju Vse pobezalo, vse vokrug Vdrug opustelo—vody vdrug Vtekli v podzemnye podvaly,  resetkam xlynuli kanaly I vsplyl Petropol', kak triton, Po pojas v vodu pogruzen. 'And suddenly [the Neva], enraged like a wild animal, Leaped on the city. Before her Every one fled, everything around Grew suddenly waste—the flood of a sudden Rushed into the subterranean vaults, The canals poured into the casements And Petropolis floated, like a triton Plunged into the water up to the belt'

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ANDRÉ G.F. VAN HOLK

ii.

Neva vsju noc' Rvalasja  morju protiv buri Poutru nad  bregami Tesnilsja kucami narod Neva Obratno sla, gnevna, burliva, I zatopljala ostrova, Pogoda pusce svirepela, Neva vzduvalas' i revela 'Neva all night Was striving seaward against the gale. The next morning along her shores The people were crowding The Neva Turned back, angry, turbulent And flooded the islands, The weather went on raging, The Neva was swelling and roaring'

In accordance with the place of aspectual EC's in the system of diagram 4, the construction is concentric, i.e. its subject may or may not be a person: in fact, Evgenij's actions contrast with those of the Neva. Moreover, there is only one true hero, Evgenij; both Neva and Peter's monument, the bronze horseman, are concentric entities (at least in our text). Thus the backgrounding of the Collective EC representing the eccentric Evgenij in his environment involves the deletion (suspension) of a double case line, i.e. of two position markers; these are compensated for by the two single connectives of the concentric aspectuals in foregrounded function (7ii). The above data, together with the final part of MV, in which Evgenij's madness is depicted as a lasting state (lOi), contrasting with the equally last­ ing, permanent gesture of the bronze horseman (lOii), conduce us to inter­ pret the EC's at issue as DURATIVE EC's, of the numerative rank. (10) i.

I s toj pory, kogda slucalos' Idti toj ploscad'ju emu, V ego lice izobrazalos' Smjaterie. ... Kartuz iznosennyj symal

ASPECT IN TEXTUAL DEEP STRUCTURE

377

Smušcennyx glaz ne podymal I sei storonkoj. 'And from that moment, whenever he happened To cross that square, His face would express Confusion... His threadbare cap he would raise, His troubled gaze he didn't lift, Slinking aside' ii. Kumir s prostertoju rukoju Sidel na bronzovom kone. ... On uznal Kto nepodvizno vozvysalsja Vo mrake mednoju glavoj T h e Idol, with one arm stretched out, Was seated on the brazen horse ...He knew again The one who rose there motionless Into the dusk with brazen head' So there is every reason to adopt the conclusion that Evgenij's 'madness' is the result of two incompatible, and indeed irreconcilable event strings of 'durative' type, each consisting of two irreducible substrings of 'punctual' and 'linear' type. The ensuing structure of the message theme is (11):10 (11)

DUR(where DUR → sum total of factors giving rise to preferred use of perfective or imperfective surface aspect form)

COL2+ DUR-

Referring to what was pointed out above about grounding (section 3), it should be observed that the thematic construction (11) is the result of regrouping the components of the themes which enter the compositional mechanism of our text. By slightly revising the familiar Aristotelian con­ cepts of setting, conflict, resolution and moral (cf. Van Dijk 1978: 153) we set up the compositional scheme shown in diagram (12) below:

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ANDRÉ G.F. VAN HOLK

(12)

moral initial TC + motor TC → message TC

final TC

, setting: conflict resolution (inner plot) character in a situation setting

I

conflict outer plot A resolution

outer plot: (i) evaluation (ii) emotional state (iii) 0 In the message theme the semiotic tension between 'foregrounded' and 'backgrounded' states is suspended, resulting in a construction with zero net 'grounding' function. The message theme, on the one hand, is the outcome of a regrouping process triggered by the dynamics of plot development (esp. the repeated input of plot-advancing factors of the textual surface, such as motion through space, goal-directed action, sudden decisions, etc.); on the other hand, the message is always associated with the narrative's moral. For these reasons, it can be expected that it is through the message theme that a narrative contributes to that portion of a culture's "an­ thropological content" which epitomizes its moral values.

NOTES 1.

The condition of literaturnost' (lit.'literariness') is convenient because in a literary text the use of grammatical and lexical features is likely to be more varied and linguistically reve­ aling, whereas the presence of a narrative structure gives us a better insight into the inter­ nal composition and combinatorics of literary themes.

2.

Cf. Vet's review (1984: 300) of Hopper (ed.), Tense-Aspect:Between Semantics and Pragmatics.

3.

It may be added that the reflexive suffix closes any construction at the level of the verb phrase: hence a form like moetsja 'x washes himself may appear in non-finite forms like myt'sja 'wash oneself,' mojuscijsja 'washing oneself,' etc.

4.

Thus a plot line in my approach unites both 'static' background and 'dynamic' foreground factors.

ASPECT IN TEXTUAL DEEP STRUCTURE

379

5.

By this term Abraham (1978: 696) refers to the well-known claim that "each case relation­ ship occurs only once in a single sentence" (Fillmore 1968: 21); cf. Apresjan's criticism (1974: 27-31). I consider this principle to be valid only for the internal composition of an EC, while allowing the combination of two or more identical EC's within a compound construction.

6.

Cf. the well-known diagrams in Pfister (1978: 20- 21).

7.

In the limiting case, the nominal component may be missing; this amounts to a text whose source is part of the context, as in an elegy, whereas the communicated text then carries the two excess connectives, implemented by vocative, exclamative, and interrogative expressions.

8.

The contents of MV are concisely summarised by Stender-Petersen: Im Ehernen Reiter, dessen Handlung in seiner eigenen Zeit spielte, liess PUSKIN das berühmte, von Falconet geschaffene Reiterstandbild Peters des Grossen während der historischen Überschwemmung St. Petersburgs auf seltsame Weise lebendig werden und in dröhnendem Ritt den vermessenen Eugen verfolgen, der vor Gram über das Schicksal seiner Geliebten den Verstand verloren und trotzig das strenge stolze Werk des Zaren, die Hauptstadt im unruhigen, gefährlichen Delta der Neva, verflucht hatte. Was bedeutete das Glück oder Unglück eines kleinen verliebten Beamten vor der historischen Notwendigkeit, die den Bau der neuen Hauptstadt als Bollwerk gegen blinde Elemente und fremde Feinde gefordert hatte? (1957, I: 123) For the significance of the statue in Puskin's "poetic, mythology" the main source is of course Jakobson's fascinating paper (Jakobson 1979, 1981). For an English translation of The Bronze Horseman the reader is referred to Arndt (1984).

9.

For a discussion of this EC the reader is referred to my papers (Van Holk 1980, 1984).

10.

It would seem that Thelin's treatment of aspect is at least one of those approaches which can bridge the gap between the semantic features of cultural content (Dolezel's "motifeme level") and the morphology of linguistic expression, such as the Russian text of MV. While aspect and procedural (Aktionsart) are indistinguishable from the standpoint of universal cultural content, a semantic analysis of the morphologic categories of aspect and aktionsart in Russian along the lines set out by Thelin (1980, 1984a, 1984b) appears to show (i)

(ii) (iii)

the fundamental place held by the feature "+TIME" which corresponds to my using "successiveness" (or phase) as a crucial criterion for determining aspectual EC's; the interaction in narration of perfective and imperfective verb phrases to convey a DURATIVE EC; the rank of this EC (n=3) to capture the feature of "+ITERATIVITY" in its con­ trast to "+TOTALITY," which proved to be crucial for the narrative structure of MV.

Further research will have to show the way aspectual constructions manifest themselves in the semantic constraints between the sentences of aspectual plot lines, presumably in the way set forth in Van Holk (1986).

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REFERENCES Abraham, W. 1978. "Valence and case: remarks on their contribution to the identification of grammatical relations." Valence, Semantic Case and Grammatical Relations, ed. by W. Abraham, 695-729. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Alberg Jensen, Peter. 1984. "Imperfektives Erzählen: Zum Problem des Aspekts in der späten Prosa Cechovs." Russian Short Story, ed. by Rainer Grübel, 261-280. Amsterdam: Rodopi. Apres jan, Jurij D. 1974. Leksiceskaja semantika. Sinonimiceskie sredstva jazyka. Moskva: Nauka. Bloomfield, Leonard. 1933. Language. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. Chvany, Catherine V. 1985. "Foregrounding, 'Transitivity,' Saliency (in Sequential & Non-Sequential Prose)." Essays in Poetics 10:2.1-27. Dijk, T.A. van. 1978. Tekstwetenschap. Een interdisciplinaire inleiding. Utrecht/Antwerpen: Het Spectrum. Elam, Keir. 1980. The Semiotics of Theatre and Drama. London: Methuen. Fillmore, Charles J. 1968. "The Case for Case." Universals in Linguistic Theory, ed. by Emmon Bach and Robert T. Harms, 1-88. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. 1969.

"Types of Lexical Information." Studies in Syntax and Semantics, ed. by F. Kiefer. 109-130. Dordrecht: Reidel.

Groot, A.W. de. 1949. Structurele syntaxis. Den Haag: Servire. Grübel, Rainer (ed.) 1984. Russische Erzählung-Russian Short Story-Russkij rasskaz (Utrechter Sym­ posium zur Theorie und Geschichte der russischen Erzählung im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert). Amsterdam: Rodopi. Holk, André van. 1984a. On the Semiotics of Literary Themes. Publications of the Slavic Institute in the University of Groningen, Minor Series Nr. 11. Groningen: UP. 1984b. The Key Scene in Ostrovskij's 'The Thunderstorm' (On the Analysis of Modal Profiles). Publications of the Slavic Institute in the University of Groningen,

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Minor Series Nr. 14. Groningen: UP; has also appeared in IJSLP 31-32 (1988), 481-494. 1986.

"On the Semantics and Syntax of Discourse (A Text-Linguistic Approach)." Dutch Studies in Russian Linguistics, 201-233. Amsterdam: Rodopi.

Hopper, Paul J., (ed.) 1982. Tense-Aspect: Between Semantics and Pragmatics (=Typological Studies in Language, 1.). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Jakobson, Roman. 1979. "The Statue in Puskin's Poetic Mythology." Selected Writings V.237-280. The Hague-Paris-New York: Mouton. 1981.

"Poèzija grammatiki i grammatika poèzii." Selected Writings III. 63-86. The Hague-Paris-New York: Mouton.

Lotman, Ju.M. 1970. Struktura xudozestvennogo teksta. Moskva: Nauka. Lyons, John. 1969. Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics. Cambridge: UP. Metzeltin, M. und H. Jaksche. 1983. Textsemantik: Ein Modell zur Analyse von Texten. Tübingen: Günter Narr. Pfister, Manfred. 1978. Das Drama. München: Wilhelm Fink. Propp, Vladimir. 1958. Morphology of the Folktale, ed. with Introd. by S. Pirkova-Jakobson, transi. by L. Scott. Bloomington: Indiana University Research Center in Anthropology, Folklore, and Linguistics. Renicke, H. 1950. "Die Theorie der Aspekte und Aktionsarten." Beiträge zur Geschichte der deutschen Sprache und Literatur 72.151-193. Seiler, Hans-Jakob. 1985. "Invariance and Variation: The Dimensional Model of Language Univer­ sals" (paper for the First International Roman Jakobson Conference at New York, October 10-13). Stender-Petersen, Ad. 1957. Geschichte der russischen Literatur I-II. München: C.H. Beck's Verlags­ buchhandlung. Thelin, N.B. 1980. "Die aktionale Semantik der Verbalpräfigierung im Russischen und Bul­ garischen im Lichte einer komponentialen Aspekttheorie. Zur Revision des Begriffes 'Aktionsarten'." Scando-Slavica 26.175-190.

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1984a. "K tipologii glagol'noj prefiksacii i  semantiki v slavjanskix jazykax." RES 56/2.225-238. 1984b. "Komposition, Perspektive und Aspekt in Puskins Prosa: Entwurf einer poetisch-linguistischen Methode." Signs of Friendship ed. by J.J. van Baak, 257-294. Amsterdam: Rodopi. Vet, Co. 1984.

Review of Hopper (1982). Studies in Language 8:2.296-303.

Xolodovic, A.A., ed. 1969. Tipologija kauzativnyx konstrukcij. Morfologiceskij kauzativ. Moskva: Izd. "Nauka".

LITERARY SOURCES Arndt, W. 1984. Alexander Pushkin. Collected Narrative and Lyrical Poetry. Translated in the Prosodie Forms of the Original by Walter Arndt. Ann Arbor: Ardis. Hebbel, Friedrich. 1981. Judith. Eine Tragödie in fünf Akten. Stuttgart: Reclam. Puskin, A.S. 1977. Polnoe sobranie socinenij v desjati tomax. Leningrad: Izd. "Nauka." Witkiewicz, Ignacy. 1985. Dziela wybrane. Warszawa: PLW.

Narrative description or descriptive narration: problems of aspectuality in Cechov Peter Alberg Jensen University of Stockholm

Preliminary remarks Fifty years ago Viktor Vinogradov stated that the character of a narra­ tive text in Russian was dependent on the relationships between perfective and imperfective verb forms (1980(1936):232; quoted by Zolotova 1975:251). Earlier Vinogradov had formulated the task for what he termed a historical typology of compositional categories (Vinogradov 1980 (1930):70, quoted by Zolotova 1975:253). In accordance with these sugges­ tions Galina Zolotova more recently has attempted to differentiate types of discourse according to their different temporal and aspectual patterns (1975:251). With the growing insight into the fundamental role played by aspectu­ ality in narrative texts (cf. Hopper 1979, Hopper and Thompson 1980), it seems likely not only that different kinds of narrative differ in aspectuality, but that differences in aspectuality are co-constitutive of different text types (cf. Gasparov 1979:126). That there are different types of literary narrative can be seen in most European literatures from the last two centuries, and, indeed very clearly, in Russian prose. Here, it can also be seen that aspectuality was at the forefront of the changes that occurred. From 1830 to 1930, i.e., during its first centenary, modern Russian prose changed its aspectuality from a narrative, 'perfective' type to a diametrically opposed descriptive, 'imperfec­ tive' type. Aleksandr Puskin's "Tales of Belkin" presented an apparently classical narrative aspectuality, with a sequence of pf. action verbs con­ stituting the 'figure' of the text on the '(back)ground' of imperfectively

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rendered descriptive and explanatory material (cf. Thelin 1984; on 'figure' and 'ground,' cf. Wallace 1982, Chvany 1985). A hundred years later pf. verbs no longer constitute the 'figure' in Russian literary prose; now ipf. description has been foregrounded (cf. Hansen-Löve 1978, Björling 1981, Jensen 1982:111). The fact that the character of literary narrative texts has changed so drastically within a hundred years testifies that they cannot be regarded just as 'narrative in print.' If we want to study aspect in narrative discourse we cannot use literature as our primary material; in literary texts language is used to create works of art, and since the ends and means of narration in itself have long been under scrutiny in creative writing, the same applies to narrative aspectuality (cf. the notion 'poetic foregrounding' in Chvany 1985). Text linguistics cannot regard literary texts as "reliable" data, and what I have to say in the following, therefore, must necessarily be taken as a statement about aspect in literary discourse, and only indirectly as a state­ ment about aspect in discourse as such. Preliminarily, I would further stress that narrative texts, whether nonliterary or literary, are not identical with 'language in use,' 'discourse,' etc.. Narrative competence is not identical with linguistic competence. Narrative competence is secondary, and although it is often trained in our schools, only a minority of people acquire this competence. (In the early 1920s the "Serapion brother" Lev Lunc even claimed that, apart from a few excep­ tions, writers in Russia had not yet acquired it!). If we want to study 'as­ pect' in discourse as opposed to aspect in isolated clauses, we cannot regard 'narrative' as identical with 'discourse.' Narrative is a special use of lan­ guage. Cechov and aspect In the development of Russian prose mentioned above Cechov occupies a central place; in his stories narrative codes meet, and this is one reason why the study of this author is rewarding for the text-theoretician. One of Cechov's major concerns was the ability of people to under­ stand life in general and their own lives in particular, and Cechov was keenly aware that this ability was dependent on the potentials of language and on people's handling of them. This writer explored the possibilities of his characters to conceive the meaning of their life-situations, as well as his possibilities to conceive this in narrative discourse. Thus, he focused lan-

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guage as a phenomenological and interpretative means so to say 'bi-focally,' i.e., on the level of the characters and on his level as the author of their stories. Since aspectuality is of prime importance to the structuring and to the semantic import of narrative in Russian, it is to be expected that Ćechov's use of it contributes essentially to his achievement. In fact, the use of aspect in Ćechov's stories has attracted the attention of both literary and linguistic scholars (Zolotova 1975, Pomorska 1976, Shukman 1977:35-37, Filatova-Hellberg l981). In two recent articles I have attempted, firstly, to describe Cechov's narrative mode as 'imperfective telling' And to reflect on its semantics (Jen­ sen 1984a), and, secondly, to examine the connection of this specific aspec­ tuality with the problem of 'represented thought' and 'represented con­ sciousness' (Jensen 1984b). The use of aspect in Ćechov is bound up with the problem of 'subjectivization' of prose, i.e., the process in the course of which the relative weight of the fictive character(s) increased in the perspective of a story. Ćechov himself termed it oppositely 'objectivity/ by which he understood to tell "v duche gerojä" ('in the character's spirit,' cf. Ćudakov 1971:70-71). However, to tell 'in somebody's spirit' implies a contradiction, since a spirit does not really tell anything. As has been pointed out by Ann Banfield (1982), the mode of 'represented consciousness' is not communicative, at least not in the same sense as non-literary narration proper. This makes it clear that the decisive thing about 'subjectivization' is not only that the idiosyncrasies of an individual are expressed, but also that the text is some­ thing other than 'telling' and therefore does not live up to standards of nar­ ration. Accordingly, in this mode aspectuality plays a role which differs from the role it plays in classical narrative. Before I proceed to concrete analysis, I will briefly present the view of aspect underlying my analysis. This view does not contradict current definitions, but differs from them by being more abstract and formal. I regard aspect as a fundamental phenomenological category that serves as a means to organize phenomena on different phenomenological levels. The difference between the marked member of the category, the perfective aspect (henceforth PA), and the unmarked imperfective aspect (IA) is that PA states a relation, which IA does not. PA is relational, whereas IA is sim­ ple. 1 The simple IA posits the phenomenon such as it is in itself without respect to anything else, whereas the relational PA posits the phenomenon

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as it is not only in itself, but also with respect to something else. According to this view, the invariant difference between the forms pisal (ipf. 'wrote'), on the one hand, and, napisal, spisal, popisal (pf. 'wrote,' 'wrote out,' 'wrote a bit'), etc., on the other, is that the IA states the activity 'writing' as it is in itself, whereas the PA states the activity 'writ­ ing' not only as it is in itself, but also in relation to something else. I regard the relational form as the invariant 'meaning' of the PA, whereas I am hesitant as to defining the substance of it. 2 Current definitions of the 'perfective feature,' such as 'resultativeness,' 'delimitation,' 'punctu­ ality' etc., seem to me to mix up lexical substance with form, for which reason they are mostly appropriate with some verbs, but less with others. They also tend to locate the aspect-meaning "within" the verb-meaning, as it were, whereas to my view the aspect adds a clearly distinguishable phenomenological form to the verb-meaning. The attempt by Fortunatov, Koschmieder, Zolotova, Thelin et. al. to define the decisive feature inherent in PA as 'time' is more acceptable to me than the semantic definitions mentioned above; we must 'fill in' the relational form stated by pf. verb forms according to the basic categories which lay the ground for our apprehension of the world, and, as we know, 'time' designates one of them. It is, however, not clear to me, whether we should prefer 'time' to 'space' here. The relation infused by aspect into our description of phenomena is, I believe, one more instance where 'time' and 'space' are inseparable. This relation models 'time,' but in so doing, it pro­ jects a 'semantic space'; it closes and opens sequences in time, which are, however, also the 'cells' of the semantic space of the text, the micro-cells of its possible world. This world is cast in time and space conjointly, and in imposing this order on the phenomenal world aspect plays a crucial role. (I will return to this problem in the discussion below.) "A Dreary Story": An aspectual minus-device Čechov's poetics were to a considerable degree founded as a 'counterfacture' (Russ. kontr-faktura) to tradition. This is most apparent in his vau­ devilles and plays, but it applies no less to his 'serious' prose. 'Tradition' is organically bound up with narration; in fact, some authors define the Aris­ totelian term for the content of narrative, 'mythos,' as 'tradition' (Scholes & Kellog 1966:12), i.e., that which is narrated is tradition. Čechov did not believe in tradition. 3 A number of his stories show how stories are told in

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vain; they do not fulfill their task — to establish a meaning. It appears from many of Čechov's stories that people's stories about their lives are tradi­ tional, superficial patterns imposed on them which one must get rid of in order to understand anything. Čechov framed his whole mature oeuvre by two stories in which this topic was programmatically presented, "Skucnaja istorija" (A Dreary Story, 1888) and "Archierej" (The Bishop, 1902). In both stories the pro­ tagonist attempts to grasp the meaning of his life, in neither does he suc­ ceed. The problem at stake can be discussed (and has very often been) in terms of content, but it can also be seen as a matter of narrative form: nei­ ther the old Professor Nikolaj Stepanovic (A Dreary Story) nor the bishop Pëtr are able to conceive their lives in narrative form. Now, what makes them particularly interesting is the fact that the idea of "The Bishop" dates back to the same time as that of "A Dreary Story," but the text did not get down on paper until 14 years later (cf. X:454). 4 What changes occurred in Čechov's treatment of the topic during this span of time? And what is the role of aspectuality in the two stories? In the following I shall deal with these two questions. First, I define the dilemma in "Skucnaja istorija" in terms of 'narrativity'; thereafter I describe "The Bishop" as a restatement of the problem in a new aspectual cast. Finally, I turn to the oeuvre between the prologue and the epilogue and take as my example the povest' "Tri goda" (Three Years), which provides ample evidence of Čechov's imperfective telling. "A Dreary Story" is dreary to its author (the form is 1st person, the text being subtitled "Iz zapisok starogo celoveka," i.e., "Excerpts from the notes of an old man") because there is no story in it. One reason for this is apparent: Nikolaj Stepanovic is stuck in 'protracted imperfectivity.' The model with the help of which he tries to set up his life-story prevents it from becoming one. This model is dominated by two levels, a "Now" as opposed to a "Before." "Now" (teper') and "before" (prezde) are indeed the key­ words in the first part of his notes; they, or equivalent adverbial construc­ tions, appear in a number of instances. Cf. Appendix 1. The construction is very unusual. Nikolaj Stepanovic (henceforth NS) describes his present situation by describing the course of 24 typical hours, from one evening to the following. This whole section, which takes up 40 pages out of 60, is told in the present tense with 'habitual' meaning. It is this reiterated day that is referred to as 'now' and characterized by way of con­ trasting it to a 'before.' The 'before,' of course, also refers to a situation

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and a very general one; the verbs describing it are past tense ipf. forms with habitual meaning. The reason why NS describes his 'now' in such detail is that it is unbearable and incomprehensible to him; by way of con­ trast, his 'before' was different and comprehensible. Part of his problem is that he is unable to connect the two different stages in his life; since they are so different something must have changed, but he does not know what or when it happened. Thus, the 'given' consists of two imperfectively rendered, disconnected situations; the 'wanted' is the change that occurred in between. In other words, the framework of a story is laid bare, but the "missing link," i.e., the answer to the question 'what happened?,' is exactly the story proper, a rela­ tion about the change that occurred. On close inspection, "A Dreary Story" is, in fact, the "reverse," the negative counter-part, of a story with a frame. In a normal frame-story ('Rahmenerzählung'), there is also a relation between a 'now' of the framesituation and a 'then' (togda) of the story proper; but there, firstly, the focus on the past dominates over the present, and, secondly, what is 'told' is a sequence of events/changes in the past. Here, the 'now' of the 'frame' totally dominates over the 'before,' and what is "told" is the 'trivia' of the present frame-situation, whereas the 'story' is missing. It appears that the demonstrative lack of 'narrativity' (a 180° turn of it) is intimately bound up with the subject-matter of the text. And the hero's often quoted statements about his dilemma in terms of content can, in fact, be read as extremely precise statements in terms of narrativity. Cf. : (1)

Ja gljazu na obeich, i tol'ko vot teper' za obedom dlja menja soversenno jasno, cto vnutrennjaja zizn' obeich davno uze uskol'znula ot moego nabljudenija. U menja takoe cuvstvo,  budto kogda-to ja zil doma s nastojascej sem'ej, a teper' obedaju v gostjach  ne nastojascej zeny i vizu ne nastojascuju Lizu. Proizosìa v obeich rezkaja peremena, ja prozevai tot dolgij process, po kotoromu èta peremena soversalas', i ne mudreno, cto ja nicego ne ponimajn. Otcego proizosla peremena? Ne znaju. (VII:278, emphasis added, here and elsewhere.) 'I watch them both, and only now at lunch does it dawn on me that their inner life has long since vanished from my field of vision. Once I lived at home with a real family, I feel, but now I'm just the lunch-guest of a spuri­ ous wife, looking at a spurious Liza. A great change has taken place in them both, but I have missed the long process by which it occurred, so no wonder I can't make sense of anything. What caused that change I don't know' (V:55).5

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And later, when NS concludes that his life consists of disconnected stuff, what he is missing is in fact the elements that could have turned all of it into a narrative, or a story: (2)

V  pristrastii  , v  želanii zit', v ètom siden'e na cuzoj krovati i v stremlenii poznat' samogo sebja, vo vsech mysljach, ëuvstvach i ponjatijach, kakie ja sostavljaju obo vsem, net cego-to obscego, cto svjazyvalo by vsë èto v odno celoe. Kazdoe cuvstvo i kazdaja mysV zivut vo mne osobnjakom... (307) 'My passion for science, my urge to live, my sitting on this strange bed, my urge to know myself, together with all my thoughts and feelings, and the conceptions which I form about everything — these things lack any common link capable of bonding them into a single entity. Each sensation, each idea of mine has its own separate being' (V:80).

The non-relatedness of life-situations, the latter being demonstratively denoted by 'now' vs. 'before,' correlates with the total lack in the old man's "story" of narrative predicates. On the first 58 pages out of 59 in "A Dreary Story" there is not one verb in the past tense perfective form With aorist meaning denoting an action on the part of the hero! By way of contrast, there are several denoting actions on the part of Katja, his stepdaughter. Katja's story is a story-line which not only in con­ tent, but also formally, i.e., by virtue of being a story-line, serves to bring out NS' dilemma in full. This is very marked from the moment it is intro­ duced, and even more in the end. After 16 pages of "telling" in the present tense with habitual meaning, i.e., of "non-telling," the introduction of Katja's story is demonstratively marked by a change to a narrative mode: (3)

Zvonki mogut sledovat' odin za drugim bez konca, no ja zdes' ogranicus' tol' cetyr'mja. 'et cetvertyj zvonok, i ja slysu znakomye sagi, šoroch plat'ja, milyj golos... 18 let tomu nazad unter moj tovarisČ Okulist i ostavil poste sebja semiletnjuju doč' Katju i tysjac sest'desjat deneg. V svoem zavescanii on naznacil opekunom menja. Do desjati let Katja zila v moej sem'e, potom byla otdana v institut i zivala  menja toVko v letnie mesjacy, vo vremja kanikul. Zanimat'sja  vospitaniem bylo mne nekogda, nabljudal ja  tol'ko uryvkami, i potomu o detstve  mogu skazat' ocen' nemnogo. (268) 'Sometimes the bell never seems to stop ringing, but I shall confine myself here to four visits only. With the fourth ring I hear familiar footsteps, the rustle of a dress and a well-loved voice. Eighteen years ago an oculist colleague of mine died, leaving his sevenyear-old daughter Katya and about sixty thousand roubles. He appointed me guardian in his will, and Katya lived with us as one of the family till she was ten, after which she went to boarding-school and spent only the summer

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PETER ALBERG JENSEN holidays in my home. Having no time to attend to her upbringing, I only observed her sporadically, which is why I can't say much about her child­ hood' (V:46).

The change is abrupt and marked. And although we notice that only the two first predicates are fully 'narrative,' since naznacil has pluperfect meaning, and NS thereafter slips into an imperfective mode, Katja's story is eventually carried on on the following pages by further perfective pasts, thereby constituting a story-line on her part. From then on "A Dreary Story" can be viewed as the attempt, or the "offer," made by Katja to infuse NS' 'minus-story,' i.e., his disconnected, imperfectively rendered life-situations, with the story-line of her life. The flashback to Katja's childhood and youth leads up to the dreary present situation, and after that, for 34 pages, there are no past tense narrative verbs. But on two occasions Katja urges NS to do something, to act or react, and on the second occasion perfective pasts with immediate reference to the 'now'-level occur for the first time in the whole story: (4)

Ona padaet na stul i nacinaet rydat'. Ona zakinula nazad golovu, lomaet ruki, topocet nogami; šljapka  svalilas' s golovy i boltaetsja na rezinke, priceska rastrepalas'. (309) 'She collapses on a chair and starts sobbing. Her head thrown back, she wrings her hands and stamps her feet. Her hat has fallen off her head and dangles by a piece of elastic, her hair is ruffled' (V:81).

The present tense context still dominates; but its meaning is no longer habitual: this is present historic narration. Shortly thereafter we find the first and only perfective past on the 'now'-level of the story with NS as the agent: (5)

Ja rasterjalsja, skonfuzen, tronut rydanijami i edva stoju na nogach. (Ibid.) T am at a loss, embarrassed, moved by her sobbing, and I can hardly stand' (V:82).

Here, then, on the last page of "A Dreary Story," Katja succeeds in infus­ ing NS' story-less 'Now' with her life-story. Here NS' fragmenting imperfec­ tive view is forcibly shifted into that which has been missing, i.e., into nar­ ration. 6 Although NS refuses to act, and although rasterjalsja ('I was at a loss') remains his only 'action' narrated (!), the final lines of "A Dreary Story" very markedly expose the change that has occurred in his mode: (6)

Mne chocetsja sprosit': "Znacit, na pochoronach  menja ne budes'?" No ona ne gljadit na menja, r  nee cholodnaja, slovno cuzaja. Ja molca

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provozaju  do averej... Vot ona vyšlaot , idet po dlinnomu koridoru, ne ogljadyvajas''. Ona znaet, cto ja gljazu ej vsled, i, verojatno, na povorote ogljanetsja. Net, ne ogljanulas9. Černoe piafe v poslednij raz meVknulo, zatichli sagi... Proscaj, moe sokrovisce! (310) '"So you won't be at my funeral?" I want to ask. But she doesn't look at me. Her hand is cold and seems alien. I accom­ pany her to the door in silence. Now she has left me and is walking down the long corridor without: looking back. She knows I'm watching her, and will probably turn round when she reaches the corner. No, she hasn't turned. Her black dress has flashed before my eyes for the last time, her steps have died away. Farewell, my treasure!' (V:83)

For the first and only time NS is here able to relate a fragment of a story about himself. Although Katja leaves him, because of his refusal to act, and, accordingly, it might seem as if nothing has come out of it all, this impression is deceptive. On the level of discourse an all-important change has occurred: NS has been forced to narrate, i.e., to establish a coherent meaning in a sequence of actions and states. If we look back on his lament quoted above in (2) — the lack of a common link capable of bonding his life into a single entity — this does not apply anymore to the final scene of the story. Here, NS did unite his last meeting with Katja into a whole. And the uniting force, then, is stated with exclamation mark in the last words of the story. This 'narratologico-aspectual' interpretation of "A Dreary Story" is indirectly sustained in the text itself by what NS has noted earlier about the trusty porter Nikolaj. This Nikolaj can relate: (7)

On chranitel' universitetskich predanij. Ot svoich predsestvennikovsvejcarov on polucil v nasledstvo mnogo legend iz universitetskoj zizni, pribavil  ètomu bogatstvu mnogo svoego dobra, dobytogo za vremja sluzby, i esli chotite, to on rasskazet vam mnogo dlinnych i korotkich istori]. On mozet rasskazat' o neobyknovennych mudrecach, znavsich vsë, o zamečatel'nych truzenikach, ne spavsich po nedeljam, o mnogocislennych mucenikach i zertvach nauki; dobro torzestvuet  nego nad zlom, slabyj vsegda pobezdaet siVnogo, mudryj glupogo, skromnyj gordogo, molodoj starogo... Net nadobnosti prinimat' vse ètì legendy i nebylicy za čistuju monetu, no procedite ich, i  vas na filtre ostanetsja to, cto nuzno: nasi chorosie tradicii i imena istinnych geroev, priznannych vsemi. V nasem obscestve vse svedenija o mire ucenych iscerpyvajutsja anekdotami o neobyknovennoj rassejannosti starych professorov i dvumja-tremja

392

PETER ALBERG JENSEN ostrotami, kotorye pripisyvajutsja to Gruberu, to mne, to Babuchinu. Dlja obrazovannogo obšcestva ètogo malo. Esli by ono ljubilo u, ucenych i studentov tak, kak Nikolaj, to ego literatura davno by uze ¿mela celye èpopei, skazanija i zitija, kakich,  sožaleniju, ona ne imeet teper'. (259) 'He's a custodian of academic tradition. From his predecessors as por­ ter he has inherited many university legends, to which treasures he has added stocks of his own amassed in the course of his career. Many are the tales, long and short, which he'll tell you should you wish. He can speak of fantastic pundits who knew everything, about tremendous workers who went without sleep for weeks on end, about scholarship's many victims and martyrs. In his stories good triumphs over evil, while the weak, the wise, the modest and the young always vanquish the strong, the stupid, the proud and the old. There's no need to take all these legends and fantasies at face value, but sift them carefully and you'll be left with something vital — our fine tra­ ditions and the names of real paragons who are generally recognized. Society at large knows nothing of the academic world beyond anec­ dotes about the grotesque absentmindedness of elderly professors, and two or three witticisms variously ascribed to Gruber, me or Babukhin. For an educated community this is rather poor. If society loved learning, scholars and students as Nicholas loves them, its literature would long ago have included whole epics, legends and chronicles such as it now unhappily lacks' (V:38-39).

Again "A Dreary Story" appears to be a fictional 'meta-discussion' on narrativity. Now the main thing is that NS is not in doubt as to the uniting force behind such a narrative competence; it is love. NS states it very simply in the line that precedes the above quotation:  pomnit' mozet tol'ko tot, kto ljubit. (Ibid.) 'No one can have a memory like this unless he loves his subject'. (Ibid.) As we have seen, NS himself, by way of contrast, does not remember the decisive links between different life-situations.7 And from the above remark we may infer the reason why. In the final scene, however, NS is brought to relate. Accordingly the feeling which is forcibly called forth and enables him to relate, i.e., his repressed affection for Katja, makes its way further to the surface and bursts out of him in his unexpected exclamation. The latter has been much discussed in the literature on Čechov; a common view has it that it is a weak finale, because NS' outburst is not motivated in the story. I contend that my present argument proves the opposite; in "A Dreary Story" Čechov explores problems of 'narrativity', and the "Farewell, my treasure!" is a cogent ending to his findings.

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"The Bishop": An aspectual surplus-device "A Dreary Story" programmatically opens Čechov's "serious" treat­ ment of the intricacies of life-stories, "The Bishop" closes it. Compared with the program, the closing statement displays conspicuous similarities and differences. The subject-matter has remained the same; on the eve of his death the protagonist tries to grasp the meaning of his life. But now Čechov has cast the story in a new way. "The Bishop" also counters tradi­ tion, or traditional narration, but the 'counter-features' are shaped differ­ ently. Again, however, as in "A Dreary Story," the aspectual cast of the text, the patterning of relations in time and space, contributes markedly to the meaning of the story. Like "A Dreary Story," "The Bishop" focuses the present situation of the protagonist; this time it is not the last months of his life, but his last week. From his present situation the hero looks back on his past. In the new story the scheme has been blurred due to a shift from 1st person to 3rd person narration, which entails that the present situation is no longer rendered by a 'Now' and by verbs in the present tense, but by past tense forms. But, although blurred, the basic scheme is still there — of an actual situation framing flashbacks, and of the attempt on the hero's part to unite the segments of his life into a whole. In both stories the present situation is depicted as a series of 'trivia,' and in both stories this is accomplished through a demonstrative use of aspect and tense. Above we have seen the distorted aspectuality of "A Dreary Story," i.e., the absence of narrativity proper. Here Čechov under­ scores the triviality of the bishop's situation by the opposite means, i.e., by what we can call 'hypertrophied narrativity.' Čechov carefully records every move on the bishop's part with the help of perfective pasts. But what is scrupulously recorded appear to be non-events, and the result is a 'counterfacture' to traditional narrative just as much as was the case in "A Dreary Story"; there we saw a demonstrative "abuse" of 'imperfectivity,' here we meet a demonstrative "abuse" of 'perfectivity'; there the lack of a story proper was demonstrated by a deficit of narrative predicates, here by a surplus of them. In short, the 'minus-device' of "A Dreary Story" has been replaced by a 'surplus-device' in "The Bishop." Cf. the examples listed in Appendix II. These examples are representative of the recurrent clusters of perfec­ tive pasts which stipulate a linear progression in "The Bishop." They

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accomplish this in cooperation with equally scrupulous adverbial recordings of hour and day, in clerical and secular terms. It turns out, however, that to "over-embroider" a narrative "thread" is no less effective than to omit it as a means of demonstrating the lack of a story-line proper. The thread of narrative predicates in "The Bishop" apparently fulfil their traditional task, i.e., to relate the 'events' in a seem­ ing order. But they do not fulfil the accompanying traditional task of 'grounding' the story as a whole, i.e., of bringing out its 'figure' as a gui­ dance to coherence and meaning. On the contrary, the line of carefully chronicled events leads astray: it leads into extinction. The bishop eventu­ ally dies, and shortly thereafter his chronicle is simply forgotten by everyone except his mother. Further, just as in "A Dreary Story" the role of the 'narrative' verbs, this time a deceptive role, is markedly exposed at the end of the story: (8)

Čerez mesjac byl naznacen novyj vikarnyj archierej,   preosvjašcennom Petre uze nikto ne vspominal. A potom i sovsem zabyli. I toVko starucha, mat' pokojnogo, kotoraja zivet teper'  zjatja-d'jakona, v gluchom uezdnom gorodiške, kogda vychodila pod vecer, ctoby vstretit' svoju korovu, i schodilas' na vygone s drugimi zenscinami, to nacinala rasskazyvat'  detjach, o vnukach, o torn, cto  nee byl syn archierej, i pri ètom govorila robko, bojas', cto ej ne poverjat... I ej v samom dele ne vse verili. (X:201) 'A month later a new suffragan bishop was appointed. No one remem­ bered Bishop Peter any more. They forgot him altogether except for the old lady — the deceased's mother — who went to live with her deacon son-inlaw in a remote provincial town. Going out of an evening to fetch her cow from the meadow, and meeting other women there, she would talk about her children and grandchildren, and about her son who had been a bishop. She spoke nervously, afraid of being disbelieved. Nor did everyone believe her, actually' (IX:204).

Čechov's irony is unmistakable. The last verb denoting an 'action' on the hero's part was prikazal dolgo žif (i.e., 'had died,' cf. Appendix II, the last example). Its literal meaning 'ordained to live long' is put in ironical relief by the last perfective past in the story, zabyli, i.e., 'forgot him.' Thus the final mark on the narrative line tells us right out that on this line, i.e., the level of 'chronika,' of historical progressive time, the bishop did not get any story at all. The irony is enhanced if we review the perfective predicates that constitute this level: zabyli ('forgot him') is the last in a regular chain in which razdelsja ('undressed') and leg ('lay down') are prominent, and zasmejat'sja ('laugh') emerges as the dominant verb (with 5 occurrences + 1

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rassmejalsja). This chain, the narrative surface-structure of the text, is effaced in its last link. The irony invested in it is, of course, also enhanced by its regularity and its corresponding failure to discriminate the important from the trivial. The death of the bishop is supposedly more important than were his undressing and tea-drinking, but not so in this regular chain of 'acts.' On the 'action-level' of "The Bishop" Čechov demonstrates that there is no sense to be hoped for from mere formal 'historicity.' It leads lit­ erally away from life. Imperfective telling: A new aspectual blend As has been pointed out by a number of scholars, the problem of time and eternity, or of continuity and change, was central in a number of Čechov's stories (cf. Nilsson 1968:66-83, Kramer 1970:134-152, Linkov 1982:101-127, Jensen 1984a:270-276). In the above analysis, as in my previ­ ous articles on the subject, I have attempted to examine this problem in terms of narrative aspectuality. I hope to have shown that "A Dreary Story" and "The Bishop," which were written with an interlude of 14 years, but were both conceived at the end of the 1880s, can be viewed as two halves of a programmatic test of the intricacies of life-stories. In the first of them an imperfective view blocks the protagonist from any understanding; in the second, conversely, perfective narration per se proves equally unable to render the meaning of a life. These two stories expose aspectual extremes. A number of stories writ­ ten between them are characterized by a new "blend" of the aspects, the blend I have elsewhere termed 'imperfective telling.' In this mode the sig­ nificance of pf. predicates denoting 'acts' is restricted, and, correspond­ ingly, the significance of ipf. predicates denoting 'activity' is heightened. Below I adduce a few typical examples. In "Muziki" (Peasants, 1897) the events following the departure of the tax officer from the village are depicted entirely in the ipf. aspect: (9)

Skoro on uechal; i kogda on sadilsja v svoj desevyj tarantas i kasljal, to daze po vyrazeniju ego dlinnoj chudoj spiny vidno bylo, cto on uze ne pomnii ni ob Osipe, ni  staroste, ni  zukovskich nedoimkach, a dumal  cem-to svoem sobstvennom. Ne uspel on ot'echaf i odnu verstu, kak Antip SedeVnikov uze vynosil iz izby Čikil'deevych samovar, a za nim šla babka i krícala vizglivo, naprjagaja grud': - Ne otdam! Ne otdam ja tebe, okajannyj! On sel by stro, delaja sirokie sagi, a ta gnalas' za nim, zadychajas', edva

396

PETER ALBERG JENSEN ne padaja, gorbataja, svirepaja... ("Mužiki," 1X:303) 'He left soon after, coughing as he got into his cheap carriage. Even the set of his long, thin back showed that he had forgotten Osip, the elder and the Zhukovo arrears, and was thinking of his own affairs. Before he had gone a mile Antip Sedemikov was taking the samovar from the Chikildeyevs' hut, followed by Gran, shrieking at the top of her voice, "You shan't have it! You shan't have it, damn you." He walked swiftly with long strides while she panted after him, stumbl­ ing, bent double, furious' (VIII:214-15).

A parallel example from "The Bishop": (10)

Skoro i sluzba koncilas'. Kogda archierej sadilsja v karetu, ctoby echat' domoj, to po vsemu sadu, osvescennomu lunoj, razlivalsja veselyj, krasivyj zvon dorogich, tjazelych kolokolov. ("Archierej," X:187) The service ended soon afterwards. As the Bishop climbed into his carriage to go home a melodious, rich, merry clang of heavy bells flooded the moonlit convent garden' (IX: 197).

Or another example from "Peasants": (11)

Ol'ga posla v cerkov' i vzjala s soboj Mar'ju. Kogda oni spuskalis' po tropinke  lugu, obeim bylo veselo. Ol'ge nravilos' razdol'e, a Mar'ja cuvstvovala v nevestke blizkogo, rodnogo celoveka. Voschodilo solnce. Nizko nad lugom nosiisja sonnyj jastreb, reka byla pasmurna, brodil turnan koe-gde, no po tu storonu na gore uze protjanulas' polosa sveta, cerkov' sijala, i v gospodskom sadu neistovo kricali graci. - Starik nicego, — rasskazyvala Mar'ja, — ... ("Muziki," IX:286) 'Olga went to church and took Marya with her. On their way down the path to the meadow both felt cheerful. Olga liked the open view and Marya felt that her sister-in-law was very near and dear to her. The sun was rising. A sleepy hawk skimmed over the meadow, the river looked gloomy and there were patches of drifting mist, but a streak of sunlight lay on the hill across the river, the church shone, and in the manor garden rooks cawed furiously. "The old man's all right," Marya was saying' (VIII: 199).

Finally, a more complicated, but parallel example from "Tri goda" (Three years, 1895): (12)

Kogda na drugoj den' po priezde v Moskvu, v polden', Laptev prisel v ambar, to artel'sciki, zapakovyvaja tovar, stucali po jascikam tak gromko, cto v pervoj komnate i v kontore nikto ne slysal,  on vosel; po lestnice vniz spuskalsja znakomyj počtai'on s packoj pisem v ruke i morscilsja ot stuka, i tože ne zametil ego. Pervyj, kto vstretil ego naverchu, byl brat Fedor Fedoryc, pochozij na nego do takoj stepeni, cto ich scitali bliznecami. ("Tri goda," IX:31) 'When Laptev arrived at the warehouse at noon on the day after reach­ ing Moscow, workmen were packing up goods and banging crates so loudly

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that no one in the first room or office heard him enter. A postman known to him came downstairs with a bundle of letters, frowning in the din, and he didn't notice Laptev either. First to greet him upstairs was his brother Theo­ dore, who so closely resembled him that they were believed to be twins' (VII: 172).

None of the perfective pasts in the above examples are focused; they are, so to speak, put aside, and instead the imperfective predicates dominate along with the descriptive noun-phrases. However, the situations are not static and do not retard, and they do not owe their inherent movement, or their 'narrative' character, to the pf. forms alone. What actually advances the story is rather the ipf. predicates, whereas the pf. predicates serve as background in the sense of 'situational modifiers,' i.e., they name the mod­ ifications that condition the dynamic situation. In other words, instead of carrying on the narrative by denoting 'events' the pf. pasts function as ad­ verbs which situate the "narrativized" ipf. predicates in time and space. Thus, the traditional roles of the aspects appear to converge: the perfec­ rives tend to de-scribe circumstances or the whereabouts of the agents, the imperfectives tend to 'narrate' their activity. In order to discuss this 'imperfective telling' in a little more detail, we shall need a larger context. The last examples in my exposition are taken from the povest' "Three Years." "Three Years" describes the marriage of the wealthy Moscow mer­ chant Aleksej Laptev and Julija Belavina, the daughter of a provincial doc­ tor. In a discussion among the characters about literature one of them makes the following statement: (13)

Te ze romany i povesti, gde ach da och, da ona ego poljubila, a on  razlju­ bil, — takie proizvedenija, govorju ja, nictozny i cert ich poberi. (IX:55) 'But novels and stories full of moaning and groaning, all about her fal­ ling in love with him and him falling out of love with her — such works are insignificant, say I. To hell with them' (VII: 192).

The character sounds quite serious here, but Cechov does not, since 'ona ego poljubila, a on  razljubil' is exactly what "Three Years" is about, However, this perfective, 'resultative' recipe serves as a neat illustration of what Cechov is not interested in, namely the condensation of changes into 'events' and their 'results.' Poljubila/razljubil ('fell in love/fell out of love') is what "Three Years" is about, but if we try to locate where it happens, we will look in vain; according to the author it happens all the time, such is the impression we gain from his new type of narrative in which, on the one hand, the 'events' are decomposed into series of constitutive moments, and,

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on the other, descriptive material slips into these moments and thereby par­ takes in the movement of the story. Laptev's and Julia's wedding is rendered in the following way: (14)

Svad'ba byla v sentjabre. Vencanie proischodilo v cerkvi Petra i Pavia, posle obedni, i v tot ze den' molodye uechali v Moskvu. (...) Oni echadi v otdel'nom hupe. Oboim bylo grustno i nelovko. Ona sidela v uglu, ne snimaja sljapy, i delate vid, cto dremlet, a on lemìprotiv nee  divane i ego bespokoili raznye mysli: ob otce, ob "osobe, " o torn, ponravitsja li Julii ego moskovskaja kvartira. I, pogljadyvaja na zenu, kotoraja ne ljubila ego, on dumal unylo: "Zacem èto proizošlo?" (IX:30) The wedding was in September, and the ceremony took place after morning service at St. Peter and St. Paul's. Bride and groom left for Mos­ cow that same day. (...) They had the railway compartment to themselves. Both were sad and embarrassed. She sat in a corner without taking her hat off and pretended to be dozing, while he lay on the bunk opposite, perturbed by sundry thoughts — about his father, about the "personage." Would Julia like his Moscow flat? Looking at the wife who did not love him, he despondently wondered why it had all come about' (VII: 171)

It is remarkable that in a love-story of 84 pages even the wedding does not get a single pf. verb, and that it is done with in two lines. The sub­ sequent section is an example of 'imperfective telling.' Although none of the verbs taken in isolation can be said to be 'plot-advancing,' the passage as a whole does advance the plot; although the verbs are not 'sequential' (on 'sequentiality' in 'grounding,' see Chvany 1985), they do not retard the plot. As to 'grounding' the section is equally intricate; Čechov makes the stasis in 'She sat in a corner without taking her hat off,' and in Laptev's 'lay' more significant than actions; not even the syntactically subordinate 'with­ out taking... off' seems backgrounded. 8 As time goes by, however, relations between Laptev and Julija change; while he gets involved in the family business, she gets increasingly involved with him. The death of their baby makes Julija realize just how important Laptev is to her. The story ends with a scene that reveals this new state of affairs. After having spent some days at work Laptev arrives at the daca, where Julija has been waiting for him: (15)

- Otcego ty tak dolgo ne byl? — sprosila ona, ne vypuskaja ego ruki. — Ja celye dni vsë sizu zdes' i smotrju: ne edes' li ty. Mne bez tebja skucno! Ona vstala i rukoj provela po ego volosam, i s ljubopytstvom ogljadyvala ego lico, pieci, sljapu. - znaes', ja ljublju tebja, — skazala ona i pokrasnela. — Ty mne

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dorog. Vot ty priechal, ja vizu tebja i scastliva, ne znaju . Nu, dava] pogovorim. Rasskazi mne cto-nibud'. Ona ob "jasnjalas' emu v ljubvi,   nego bylo takoe cuvstvo,  budto on byl zenat na nej uze let desjat', i chotelos' emu zavtrakat'. Ona obnjala ego za seju, scekoca selkom svoego plat'ja ego sceku; on ostorozno otstranil  ruku, vstal i, ne skazav ni slova, posel  dace. Navstrecu emu bezali devocki. (IX:90-91) '"Why have you been so long?" she asked, not releasing his hand. "I've been waiting here and looking out for you for days on end. I do miss you so." She got up, passed a hand through his hair, gazed at his face, shoulders and hat with lively interest. "I do love you, you know." She blushed. "You're very dear to me. Now you're here, now I can see you, I'm happier than I can say. Let's talk, then. Say something." While she declared her love he felt as if they had already been married ten years. He also wanted his lunch. She put her arms around his neck, tick­ ling his cheek with the silk of her dress. He carefully removed her hand, stood up, went wordlessly towards the cottage. The children ran to meet him' (VII:223-24).

In this passage the acts related by pf. pasts are counter-balanced by ogljadyvala ('gazed'), ob"jasnjalas' ('declared'), bylo cuvstvo ('felt'), and bezali ('ran'). The former denote modifications of the situation on the objective level, the latter present Laptev's subjective apprehension of it as a continuing process. In a traditional story Julija's declaration of love would be an important event, i.e., one of those 'acts' that are basic to the very form which the life-process acquires through narrative. Here, the life-pro­ cess "holds its own" against this form. Clearly, a distinction between dynamic action and static description does not apply here. Instead of 'events' the perfective verbs relate constitutive parts of them, or moments; they modify the situation by demarcating facets of it, whereas these facets, the content of the moments, are named and accentuated by the imperfective predicates (cp. Uspenskij 1970:96f). An objective historical level con­ stituted by the pf. pasts is rivalled and questioned by a subjective phenomenological level constituted by the ipf. view. The final sections of "Three Years" thematicize the problem of con­ tinuity and change. The appearance of his two nieces (cf. (15), the last sen­ tence) makes Laptev wonder: (16)

" oni vyrosli! — dumal on. — / skol'ko peremen za èti tri goda... No ved' pridetsja, byt' mozet, zit' esce trinadcat', tridcat' let... Čto-to esce ozidaet nas v buduscem: Pozivem — uvidim." (IX:91)

400

PETER ALBERG JENSEN "'How they've grown," he thought. "And what changes there have been during these three years. But then I may have another thirteen or thirty years to live. What else has the future in store? Time alone will tell."' (Ibid.)

After that the story ends with a description of Julija and their lunch with Jarcev, a friend of the family who is very fond of Julija. This descrip­ tion is a fine example of 'imperfective movement': (17)

Potom on sidel na terrase i vide!, kak po allee ticho šla ego žena, napravljajas'  dace. Ona  cem-to dumala i   lice bylo grustnoe, oČarovatel'noe vyrazeníe, i na glazach blesteli slezy. Èto byla uze ne preznjaja tonkaja, chrupkaja, blednolicaja devuska, a zrelaja, krasivaja, sil'naja zenscina. I Laptev zametil, s kakim vostorgom smotreí ej navstrecu Jarcev, kak èto  novoe, prekrasnoe vyrazeníe otražalos'  ego lice, toze grustnom i voschiscennom. Kazalos', cto on videi  pervyj raz v zizni. I kogda zavtrakali  terrase, Jarcev kak-to radostno i zastenČivo ulybalsja i vsë smotrel  Juliju,   krasivuju seju. Laptev sledil za nim nevol'no i dumal o torn, cto, byt' mozet, pridetsja zit' esce trinadcat', tridcaf let... I čto pridetsja perezit' za èto vrernja? Cto ožidaet nas v buduscem? I dumal: "Pozivem — uvidim." (Ibid.) 'Then he sat on the terrace and watched his wife sauntering down the path towards the cottage. She looked pensive, she had an expression of bewitching sadness, and tears shone in her eyes. She was no longer the slim, brittle, pale-faced girl, but a mature, beautiful, strong woman. Laptev noticed how ecstatically Yartsev gazed at her, and how her own new, beau­ tiful expression was reflected on Yartsev's face — also sad and entranced. This was like looking at her for the first time in his life, Laptev felt. As they lunched on the terrace Yartsev smiled a vaguely happy, shy smile, and could not take his eyes off Julia and her beautiful neck. Laptev observed him involuntarily, thinking of the thirteen or thirty years which might lie ahead. What experiences awaited him during that time? What has our future in store? "Time alone will tell," he thought.' (Ibid.)

The predicates sidel, videi, sla, dumala, bylo, blesteli, etc. ('sat,' 'watched...sauntering,' 'looked pensive,' 'had an expression,' 'shone'), do not signify events in the usual sense of the term, but they do not retard the story either; rather they constitute it and advance it, i.e., together they form an 'event' in the new sense that this specific type of narrative imposes on the reader. They appear to be 'time-related,' or, strictly speaking, not timerelated, since due to their phenomenological simplicity they do not contain any relation — they are the time here, constitute its elementary flow. They appear to be sequential. But on closer inspection their sequence is not an

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icon of a sequence on the objective level, since sla, dumala, and blesteli are supposedly simultaneous. What they present iconically is a sequence in Laptev's apprehension. This is, I believe, the main point: Čechov promotes the imperfective aspect as the aspect of immediate, non-relational apprehension to constitute the dominant strain in his telling (cf. Jensen 1984b:297ff.). Discussion It is of special interest to note that the ending of "Three Years" (like the title) thematicizes the problem of continuity and change, as was the case in "The Bishop," and that the aspect forms again play a significant role. Laptev reflects on change versus continuity, and at the same time the whole passage exposes this problem through its aspectual organization. In our present example it seems quite obvious that the two aspects per­ tain to different levels; the chain of perfective predicates represents modifi­ cations on the objective 'historical' level by discriminating and relating the 'acts,' whereas the imperfective predicates present a subjective view of life as a continuing activity. Further, it is possible in our examples to see these two complementary aspects on the life-scene as the manifestations of two complementary aspects on time, as they were formulated (in 1888, the year of "A Dreary Story") by Henri Bergson: "Même à l'état de veille, l'expérience jour­ nalière devrait nous apprendre à faire la différence entre la durée-qualité, celle que la conscience atteint immédiatement, celle que l'animal perçoit probablement, et le temps pur ainsi dire matérialisé, le temps devenu quan­ tité par un développement dans l'espace" (Bergson 1976:94). This distinction between life as quality, i.e., time as it is immediately given to our mind, and time as quantity, i.e. time as we symbolize it by pro­ jecting it into space, is appropriate to what we have seen in our examples. 9 I suppose that this is part of what verbal aspect grammaticizes. Bergson suggested that we should learn to draw this distinction; in my view, the grammaticalization of aspect in a language like Russian testifies that man had started to learn it long ago. But it is no wonder that Bergson made this suggestion in 1888, because during the past centuries European man had emphasized the exterior progressive time and neglected the other time, which according to Bergson was the real ('la durée réelle'). Nor is it sur­ prising that Bergson's contemporary Cechov in his 'mature' oeuvre

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examines the problem of continuity and change in terms of narrative 'aspectuality'; Cechov too reacted against the historical "one-eyedness" of the 19th century. Our examples have shown how he does it. As Bergson writes we can­ not symbolize time, i.e., 'exteriorize' it, without projecting it into space. Accordingly, Cechov does this by situating his story in space by means of perfective pasts and adverbs. However, his poetics serve to counteract the dominance of a traditional narrative skeleton and, correspondingly, to pro­ mote the 'narrative' role and significance of a qualitative experience of life. To this end, he puts a check on the perfective discrimination of 'acts' by backgrounding it and reducing it to a modifying function. As we have seen the main means of doing this is syntactico-intonational de-focusing, or sub­ ordination. A great many perfective pasts in Cechov appear in subordinate clauses beginning with 'Kogda...' (when). 10 They can be paraphrased to adverbials.11 The main function of perfective pasts is restricted to cir­ cumstantial modification, i.e., the 'narrative' verbs become descriptive. Correspondingly, the imperfective description, which hitherto in narrative prose has had a backgrounded and static role, is put forward and set in motion as a flowing co-constituent of the narrative development, i.e., the 'descriptive' verbs become narrative. The result of Cechov's innovation is not a reversal of 'figure' and 'ground'; rather it is an aspectual convergence. He sets back the perfective 'quantification' and promotes the imperfective qualification, thus avoiding the rigour of traditional historical patterns and thereby giving shape to life as a moving continuity. In Cechov's prose the aspects are used so that their functions converge; the aspects blend into a narrative mode which the author himself very appo­ sitely termed telling "v duche geroev." This oxymoronic definition catches precisely what is at stake: to tell, but to tell, as it were, 'in a character's spirit.' Now the character is no teller (in a 3rd person narrative); he does not have to relate phenomena to anybody else; the 'events,' the small changes that modify his existence, are not a primary category or concern to him as long as he is not 'exteriorizing' his experience. On the other hand, his interpretative effort, and all of Cechov's heroes make one, is a step in the direction of symbolizing his experience; he must necessarily register 'what happens.' He has to register the modifications, but at the time when they occur, he cannot estimate their relative importance and is prone to 'defocus' or 'background' them, since what is important to him is his existence as continuity.

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Now the dilemma of Čechov's characters, e.g., Nikolaj Stepanovic in "A Dreary Story," the bishop, and Laptev, is that their imperfective view of their lives is confronted with perfective historical chronicity; history, quantified time, is moving in on them, in "A Dreary Story" and "The Bishop" in the shape of the deaths of the protagonists, in Laptev's case in the shape of changes that he notices but cannot account for. And, as was the case in our two former exemplary stories, the final words of "Three Years" pinpoint the problem of the story in an aspectual device. After the beautiful imperfective 'motion-picture' of Julija and the lunch Laptev's worries about relating this to an impending 'future' are stated in the striking formula "Poživëm — uvidim" (lit., "We'll live and see"). This finale is reminiscent of NS' exclamation "Farewell, my treasure" in that it is a very surprising direct quote. Both have irritated critics who found them irrelevant and strangely postulated. I hope that the discussion above has shown that they were anything but irrelevant. Čechov exposes a central problem of the stories in their last words, as well as its foundation in narrative aspect.

NOTES 1.

I prefer these terms to 'relative' — 'absolute,' because the latter seem to have too many distracting connotations.

2.

Cp. A. Boguslawski's formulation (1981:38): "PFs, i.e., the two-tense verbs of Polish or Russian and their equivalents in Slavonic languages with other tense systems, have only one, very general and purely structural, common semantic feature: They indicate SOME situation extending up to A CERTAIN MOMENT and some other, partially contrasting, situation which affects the same object and extends from that very moment on. This fea­ ture is absent from IMPFs" (italics added, PAJ).

3.

Thus the concept of rod, rodnoj ('family') etc., was negative in Čechov, cf. stories like "V rodnom uglu" (At Home), "Moja žizn'" (My Life).

4.

References in this form throughout to: A.P. Cechov, Polnoe sobr. soc. i pisem v tridcati tomach, M. 1973-, Roman numerals thereby signifying volume, Arabic page number.

5.

English translations from: The Oxford Chekhov. Translated and edited by Ronald Hingley, Vols. V, VII, VIII, IX, London 1965-1978.

6.

As has been mentioned Čechov was an opponent of 'tradition' and accordingly sceptical towards narration. Therefore it should be underscored that the narration which "is forced" on NS by Katja is by no means 'traditional.' On the contrary, the traditional story of NS is present throughout the text as the official biography of the hero, from which he totally distances himself. What he touches on in the end is another, individual story of his own.

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7.

Cf. example (1). This concerns not only NS' relationship to his wife and daughter, but also to Katja. About a decisive development in her life he has the following to say: "Zaleju, cto u menja ne bylo vremeni i ochoty prosledit' nacalo i razvitie strasti, kotoraja vpolne uže vladela Kateju, kogda ej bylo 14-15 let. Ja govorju ob  strastnoj ljubvi  teatru" (VII:269). T regret that I lacked the time and inclination to observe the origin and development of the great passion which engulfed Katya when she was fourteen or fifteen. I mean her passion for the stage' (V:47).

8.

On the relationship 'importance' — 'grounding' Chvany (1985:250) writes that "...while a correlation of "human importance" with foregrounding is the expected norm, the two notions are independent." The statement is provoked by an example from Čechov's story "Sleepy." The present examples further illustrate that in Čechov the use of aspect does not 'ground,' neither is it correlated positively with 'importance.'

9.

Bergson's distinction corresponds to Ch.S. Peirce's phenomenological categories 'firstness,' which is 'quality,' and 'secondness,' 'the hereness and nowness of a quality,' or 'just when and where it takes place.' Cf. T.S. Knight, Charles Peirce, N.Y. 1965, pp. 74-77.

10.

Cf. some examples from "Three Years": "Kogda vysli  zastave, na nebe cut' brezžilo" (IX:70), (When they came to the city gate the sky was faintly paling, VII:206); "Kogda dosli do Krasnogo pruda, uže svetalo" (ibid.), (Dawn was breaking when they reached Krasny Prud, ibid.); "Kogda on vosel  sebe v komnatu, to bylo uže svetlo" (ibid.:72), (When Yartsev entered his room it was light, VII:207).

11.

In some instances Čechov himself substituted an adverbial for a defocused pf. past. In "Three Years," for instance, the clause "Kogda na moskovskich ulicach raspustilis' topoli i berezy" (When the poplars and birches were out on the streets of Moscow) of the origi­ nal version was later changed into "V mae" (In May, cf. IX:67, 387).

REFERENCES Banfield, A. 1982. Unspeakable Sentences: Narration and Representation tion. Boston/London/Melbourne/Henley.

in the Language of Fic­

Bergson, H. 1976. Essai sur les données immédiates de la conscience. Paris. Björling, F. 1981. "Verbal Aspect and Narrative Perspective in Olesa's 'Liompa'." Russian Lit­ erature IX: 133-162. Boguslawski, A. 1981. "On describing accomplished facts with imperfective verbs." In P. Jacobsen and H. Krag (eds.), The Slavic Verb: An Anthology presented to Hans Chris­ tian S0rensen 16th December 1981 (=Copenhagen University. Institute of Slavonic Studies. Studier 9), 34-38. Copenhagen.

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Chvany, C.V. 1985. "Backgrounded Perfectives and Plot Line Imperfectives: Toward a Theory of Grounding in Text." In M.S. Flier and A. Timberlake (eds.), The Scope of Slavic Aspect, 247-273. Columbus, Ohio. 1985a. "Foregrounding, 'Transitivity,' Saliency (in Sequential and Non-sequential Prose)." Essays in Poetics 10:2, 1-27. Čudakov, A.P. 1971. Poètika Cechova. Moskva. Filatova-Chell'berg, E. 1980. Opyt sopostavitel'nogo aspektologiceskogo analiza teksta (na osnove svedskogo i russkogo jazykov). Göteborg. Gasparov, B.M. 1979. "O nekotorych funkcijach vidovych form v povestvovatel'nom tekste." In Kategorija vida i  funkcionaVnye svjazi. Voprosy russkoj aspektologii IV (=Ucenye zapiski tartuskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta, Vypusk 482), 112-127. Tartu. Hansen-Löve, A.A. 1978. "Lev Lunc' Erzählung "Nenormal'noe javlenie" als 'literaturtheoretische Parabel'." Wiener Slawistischer Almanack 1:135-154. Hopper, P.J. 1979. "Aspect and Foregrounding in Discourse." In Givón T. (ed.), Syntax and Semantics 12:213-241. New York. Hopper, P.J. & S. Thompson 1980. "Transitivity in Grammar and Discourse." Language 56:251-299. Ivancikova, A. 1976. "Vido-vremennoj kontekst v chudožestvennom povestvovanii." In Sintaksis i stilistika, 272-282. Moskva. Jensen, P.A. 1984a. "Imperfektives Erzählen: Zum Problem des Aspekts in der späten Prosa Cechovs." In R. Grübel (ed.), Russian Short Story, 261-279. Amsterdam. 1984b. "Zwischen "Tick-Tack" und "Tack...Tick": Die aspektuelle Konvergenz in der späten Prosa Cechovs." In J.R. Döring-Smirnov, P. Rehder, W. Schmid (eds.), Text. Symbol. Weltmodell. Johannes Holthusen zum 60. Geburtstag, 291-308. München. Koževnikova, N.A. 1976. "Iz nabljudenij nad neklassiceskoj ('ornamental'noj') prozoj." Izvestija AN SSSR, Serija literatury i jazyka, T. 35, no. 1:55-66. Kramer, K.D. 1970. The Chameleon and The Dream. The Hague-Paris.

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Leinonen, M. 1982. Russian Aspect, "Temporal'naja lokalizacija," and Definiteness/Indefiniteness. Helsinki. Levin, V. 1981. "'Neklassiceskie' tipy povestvovanija nacala XX veka v istorii russkogo literaturnogo jazyka." Slavica Hierosolymitana V-VI:245-275. Linkov, V.Ja. 1982. Chudozestvennyj mir prozy A.P. Cechova. Moskva. Nilsson, N.Â. 1968. Studies in Čechov's Narrative Technique, 'The Steppe' and 'The Bishop.' Stockholm. Pomorska, K. 1976. "On the Structure of Modern Prose. Čechov and Solzenicyn." PTL 1:459465. Scholes, R. & R. Kellog. 1966. The Nature of Narrative. London, Oxford, N.Y. Shukman, A. 1977. "Ten Russian Short Stories: Theory, Analysis, Interpretation." Essays in Poetics, Vol. 2, no. 2:27-95. Thelin, N.B. 1984. "Komposition, Perspektive und Verbalaspekt in Puskins Prosa: Entwurf einer poetisch-linguistischen Methode." In J.J. van Baak (ed.), Signs of Friendship. To Honour A.G.F, van Holk, 257-293. Amsterdam. Uspenskij, B.A. 1970. Poètika kompozicii. Moskva. Vinogradov, V.V. 1980. O jazyke chudozestvennoj literatury. Moskva. Wallace, S. 1982. "Figure and Ground: The Interrelationships of Linguistic Categories." In P.J. Hopper (ed.), Tense-Aspect: Between Semantics and Pragmatics, 201223. Amsterdam/Philadelphia. Zolotova, G.A. 1975. "Aspekty izucenija kategorii glagol'nogo vremeni." Izvestija AN Serija literatury i jazyka, T.34:248-258.

SSSR,

PROBLEMS OF ASPECTUALITY IN ČECHOV

407

APPENDIX I. "A Dreary Story" - Teper' družit' emu ne s kern, no esli govorit'  proslom... (VII:251) - Čitaju japo-preznemu ne chudo;  i prezde, ja mogu... (252) - Cto kasaetsja moego teperesnego obraza žizni (...) Esli by menja sprosili: Cto sostavljaet teper' glavnuju i osnovnuju certu tvoego suscestvovanija? Ja otvetil by: bessonnica. Kak i prezde... (252) - ...neuželi èta ženscina byla kogda-to toj samoj tonen'koj Vareju (255) - Ja (...) iscu v nej svoju Varju, no ot proslogo u nej ucelel (255) - V detstve ona (...) I teper', po staroj pamjati,.. (256) - Vot bol'soj seryj dom s aptekoj; tut kogda-to (...) Vot bakalejnaja lavocka; kogdato chozjajnical v nej židok (...) teper' sidit ryžij kupec... (257) - Èto byloprezde. Teper' že na lekcijach... (263) - Kak 20-30 let nazad, tak i teper', pered smertiju, menja interesuet odna tol'ko nauka. (263) - novye mysli, kakich ne znal ja ran'še, otravili poslednie dni moej zizni... (264) - V molodosti ja casto posescal teatr, i teper' raza dva v god (...) teatr ne stal lucse, cem on byl 30-40 let nazad. Po-preznemu ni v teatral'nych korridorach, ni v foje (...) Po-preznemu kapel'dinery strafujut menja (...) Po-preznemu v antraktach (...) Popreznemu mužciny v antraktach (...) na menja ot sceny veet toju že samoj rutinoj, kotoraja skucna mne byla esce 40 let nazad (269-270) - Teper' Katja živet v poluverste ot menja (273) - I v èto vremja ja zamecaju, cto na lice  uže net preznego vyraženija dovercivosti. Vyraženie teper' (...) Odeta ona po-preznemu krasivo (...) I už ona ne ljubopytna, kak byla prezde. (274) - Prezde ja ljubil obed ili byl  nemu ravnodusen, teper' že... (277) - Vmesto tech prostych bljud,  kotorym ja privyk, kogda byl studentom i lekarem, teper' menja kormjat (...) Už net preme] veselosti (...) Net uže bol'se umen'ja p'janet' ot odnoj rjumki (...) Opisyvat' teperesnij obed tak že nevkusno,  est' ego (277) - Ja gljažu na obeich, i tol'ko vot teper' za obedom dlja menja soversenno jasno, cto vnutrennjaja žizn' obeich davno uze uskol'znula ot moego nabljudenija. U menja takoe cuvstvo,  budto kogda-to ja žil doma (...) a teper' obedaju v gostjach (278). - Nikogda ran'še ja ne byl korotko znakom s soslovnym antagonizmom, no teper' menja mucaet... (278) - Teplo, ujutnaja obstanovka i prisutstvie simpaticnogo celoveka vozbuždaet vo mne teper' ne cuvstvo udovol'stvija,  prezde, a sil'nyj pozyv  žalobam i brjuzžaniju (281). - Vsju svoju zizn' ja staralsja tol'ko  torn, ctoby (...) No teper' už (...) Daže to, cto prezde davalo mne povod tol'ko skazat' lisnij kalambur (...) rodit vo mne teper' tjaželoe cuvstvo. (...) Prezde ja preziral tol'ko den'gi, teper' že pitaju zloe cuvstvo ne  den'gam (...) prezde nenavidel nasilie i proizvol, a teper' nenavižu ljudej, upotrebljajuscich nasilie... (282) - ja už ne podsucivaju dobrodusno,  prezde, a ugrjumo bormocu:.. (296) - Prezde ja terpel ego prisutstvie molca, teper' že... (296)

408 -

PETER ALBERG JENSEN Temy dlja razgovorov u nas ne novy, vsë te že, čto byli i zimoju. (300) Kogda mne prežde prichodila ochota ponjat' kogo-nibud' ili sebja, to... (...) I teper' ja... (306-307) Pri takoj bednosti dostatocno bylo ser'eznogo neduga (...) čtoby vsë to, cto ja prezde scital... (...) Nicego že poètomu net udivitel'nogo, (...) cto teper' ja ravnodušen... (307)

APPENDIX II. "The Bishop" Preosvjašcennyj posidel nemnogo v gostinoj (...) Otdochnuv, on posel  sebe v spal'nju i zdes' toze posidel, vsë dumaja o materi. (...) Monastyrskie časy probili cetvert'. Preosvjascennyj pereodelsja i stal ëitat' molitvy na son grjadusčij. (...) Konciv molit'sja , on razdelsja i leg, i totčas ze, kak tol'ko stalo temno krugom, predstavilis' emu ego pokojnyj otec, mat', rodnoe selo Lesopol'e... (X:188) Preosvjasčennyj perekrestilsja i povernulsja na drugoj bok, čtoby bol'se ne dumat' i spat'. - Moja mat' priechala... — vspomnil on i zasmejalsja. (189) V polovine vtorogo udarili  zautrene. Slyšno bylo, otecSisoj zakasljal, cto-to provorcal nedovol'nym golosom, potom vstal i prošesja bosikom po komnatam. (190) A tarn zazvonili  vecerne, solnce opustilos' za lesom, i den' prosei. Vernuvsis' iz cerkvi, preosvjaščennyj toroplivo pomolilsja, leg v postel', ukrylsja poteplej. (192) - A potom cto? — sprosil Sisoj v sosednej komnate. - A potom caj pili... — otvetila Mar'ja Timofeevna. - Batjuška, u vas boroda zelenaja! —progovorila vdrug Katja s udivleniem i zasmejalas'. Preosvjascennyj vspomnil, cto u sedogo otca Sisoj a boroda v samom dele otdaet zelen'ju, i zasmejalsja. (193) Priechav domoj, preosvjascennyj Petr napilsja čaju, potom pereodelsja, leg v postel' i prikazal kelejniku zakryt' stavni na oknach. (196) -

, Katja? — sprosil on. — Kto èto tam vnizu vsë otvorjaet i zatvorjaet dver'? Ja ne slysu, — otvetila Katja i prislušalas'. Vot sejčas kto-to prosei. Da èto u vas v zivote, djadečka!

On rassmejalsja i pogladil  po golove. (197) Kogda služba koncilas', bylo bez cetverti dvenadcat'. Priechav  sebe, preosvjas­ öennyj toteas že razdelsja i leg, daže bogu ne molilsja. (198)

PROBLEMS OF ASPECTUALITY IN ČECHOV

409

Preosvjascennyj ne spal vsju noč'. A utrom, časov v vosem', u nego nacalos' krovotecenie iz kisok. Kelejnik ispugalsja i pobezal snacala  archimandritu, potom za monastyrskim doktorom lvanom Andreicem, zivsim v gorode. (200) Ot krovotecenij preosvjascennyj v kakoj-nibud' čas ocen' pochudel, poblednel, osunulsja, lico smorsčilos', glaza byli bol'sie, i  budto on postarel, stal men'se rostom, i emu uze kazalos', cto on chudee i slabee, neznacitel'nee vsech, cto vsë to, cto bylo, uslo kuda-to ocen'-ocen' daleko i uže bolee ne povtoritsja, ne budet prodolžat'sja. (200) Priezžali tri doktora, sovetovalis', potom uechali. Den' byl dlinnyj, neimoverno dlinnyj, potom nastupila i dolgo-dolgo prochodila noč', a pod utro, v subbotu,  staruche, kotoraja ležala v gostinoj na divane, podosel kelejnik i poprosil  schodit' v spal'nju: preosvjascennyj prikazal dolgo zit'. (200)

Index of proper names A Abraham: 379 Achmanova: 215 Adam: 161, 183 Agrell: 6 Anderson: 134 Apresjan: 379 Aristotle: 6, 91, 93, 97, 215, 219, 377 Armstrong: 49, 123 Arndt: 379 Âqvist: 18, 40  Bach: 30, 32, 40-41 Bache: 46, 52, 132-133 Banfield: 385 Barwise: 55, 319 Beaugrande: 64 Beedham: 213, 222, 229, 232 Bennett: 6, 14, 37-40, 43-44, 46, 49 Benthem: 39, 104 Benveniste: 65, 73, 161, 230, 238 Bergson: 32, 101, 116-118, 401-402, 404 Berlin: 349 Birkenmaier: 62, 122 Björling: 71, 384 Bloomfield: 368 Boguslawski: 31, 65, 69, 403 Bolinger: vii Bondarko: 6, 30, 63, 94, 191, 315 Borodic: 137-138 Borras: 269, 276 Boyer: 160, 182-183 Brecht: 18, 31, 219, 282, 288, 298, 304, 309, 318

Breiger: 182 Bryzgunova: 230 Bull: 19 Bulygina: 259 Bunina: 142 Bybee: viii, 131-136, 139, 149  Callahan: 92, 97 Carlson G.N.: 49 Carlson L.: 7, 32-33,40-41 Cassirer: ix, 91, 116, 118-119 Chaput: x, 6-7, 69, 285, 289, 313 Chatterjee: 6, 60, 132, 153 Chomsky: 232 Christian: 269, 276 Chrysippus: 97 Chung: 281 Chvany: vii, ix, xi, 23, 27, 34, 61-62, 68, 73, 94, 183, 193, 201, 211, 222-223, 229-230, 232, 281, 319, 372, 384, 398, 404 Cohen: 165, 182 Comrie: 7, 30, 46, 95, 160, 163, 239, 259, 298, 304 Contini-Morava: 281 Cooper: 3, 5, 7, 36, 54-59 Coyner: 259 Cresswell: 40 Čudakov: 385 Culler: 230 D Dahl: 46, 60, 106, 131, 139, 147, 349, 353, 356-358, 360 Davies: 103

412

INDEX OF PROPER NAMES

de Both-Diez: 160 Dejanova: 245 DeLancey: 20, 23, 132, 153 Dem'jankov: 150 Desclés: x, 50-51, 66, 68, 114, 123, 238-239, 243, 254 Dewald: 182 Dijk van: 64, 369, 377 Dobrev: 138 Dolezel: 379 Dorfmüller-Karpusa: 5, 22 Dostál: 30, 140 Dowty: 3, 5-10, 13-15, 17-19, 22, 24, 33,36-41,44,48-49,56,58,73 Dressler: 64 Dry: 6, 10-11, 23-27, 50, 62, 67, 71, 73 Durin: 256 E Einstein: 103 Eisenstein: 182 Elam: 373 F Fabbri: 182 Fielder: x, 7, 47, 52-53 Filatova-Hellberg: 385 Fillmore: 371, 379 Firbas: 312 Fleischman: 183 Flier: vii, 10, 12, 23, 29, 231, 288, 298 Forsyth: x, 7, 30, 46, 61-63, 69, 95, 150, 152, 193, 264-265, 274, 285, 290, 297, 300, 302, 305, 308 Fortunatov: 386 Fraenkel: 326, 344 Frumkina: 231 G Gabbay: 7, 40-42 Galet: 182 Galton: 63, 69, 133, 142, 145, 147, 242-243, 246, 248, 252253 Garey: 304

Gasparov: ix, xv, 6, 19, 34, 53, 68, 192, 204, 210, 383 Genette: 71, 124 Givón: viii, 7, 23, 63, 68, 132, 134, 138, 148-151, 153 Goffman: 312-313 Gregory of Nyssa: 92, 97 Grevisse: 160 Grice: 309, 316, 318 Grimes: 5,7,61,64, 183 Groot de: 368 Guentchéva: x, 50-51, 66, 68, 114, 123, 238, 243 Guenther: 160 Günthner: 18, 40 H Hajicová: 69 Halliday: 345 Haltof: 315 Hansen-Löve: 215, 384 Harmer: 165, 182 Havránek: 138 Heidegger: ix, 116, 119 Heinämäki: 353 Hermann: 10, 131 Herrmann: 32 Hinrichs: 24, 59 Hirtle: 32 Hobbs: 71 Hockett: 36, 110 Hoepelman: 15, 32, 40-41, 49 Holden: viii, 108, 113, 231 Holk van: vii, xiv, 369, 379 Hopper: vii, ix, 5, 20, 22, 53, 61, 63, 68, 125, 150, 154, 182-183, 193, 217-218, 220, 222, 229-231, 238, 244-245, 263, 265, 276, 358, 378, 383 Howden: 180 I Imbs: 163, 182 Inoue: 74 Isacenko: 30, 191 Itkonen E.: 352

INDEX OF PROPER NAMES Itkonen T.: 355 Ivancev: 257 J Jackendoff: 50, 76, 230, 319 Jakobson: xiv, 77, 124, 182, 191, 218, 222, 238, 307, 346, 379 Jaksche: 367, 370, 372 Jakubinskij: 210 Jensen vii, xiii-xv, 71, 116-117, 193, 368, 384-385, 395, 401 Jespersen: 14, 33, 73-74 Johansson: 32, 101 Johnson-Laird: 32, 101 Johnson: 45 Jones L.B.: 183 Jones L.K.: 183 Joos: 49  Kabakciev: 361 Kalmár: 62, 66-68 Kamp: 5, 22-24, 35, 42, 45, 61-63, 76, 160 Kant: 118 Karlsson: 353, 356-358, 360 Kasher: 50 Kay: 349 Keenan: 349 Keijsper: 69 Kellog: 386 Kenny: 6, 8-9, 17, 44, 49, 93 Kiparsky P.: 121-124 Kitajgorodskaja: 210 Klein-Andreu: 125 Knight: 404 Köhler: 32 K0lln: 139 Koffka: 32 Kopecny: 50 Koschmieder: 94, 386 Kramer: 395 Kramsky: 94 Kristeva: 93 Kucera: 7, 12, 40, 46, 49, 65, 69, 192, 219, 231, 259, 288, 304

413

Kukuskina: 146 Kuno: 345 Kuryłowicz: 113, 136-137, 238 Kurz: 138 Kuznecov: 143 L Labov: 61, 230 Lakoff G.: viii, 8, 132, 134 Langacker: 31-33, 39, 41-42, 45, 259 Leibniz: 118 Leino: 352, 356 Leinonen: 62, 153, 271, 361 Lindstedt: 6, 245, 257, 259 Linkov: 395 Lopatina: 346 Lotman: 367 Lyons: 286, 368 M Mailloux: 182 Majewicz: 131, 150 Manaheim: 259 Manor: 50 Martin: 256 Maslov: 30, 63, 94, 138-140, 194, 254, 259, 276, 362 Mayo: 149 McCawley: 8 Meillet: 136 Menges: 94 Merrill: xi, 7, 19, 26, 48, 51-52, 69, 74, 318 Metslang: 362 Metzeltin: 367, 370, 372 Milewski: 136 Miller G.: 32, 101 Miller J.: 232 M0nnesland: 54 Molendijk: 160 Montague: 36, 38-41 Monville-Burston: 165, 176, 179, 181183, 244-245, 248 Moravscik: 7, 40-42 Morin: 105, 117

414

INDEX OF PROPER NAMES

Mourelatos: 21, 32, 41, 43, 49, 151, 239, 243, 309 Mustajoki: 231 N Newton: 47 Newtson: 32, 101 Nichols: 192, 231, 325-326, 336, 344, 346 Nikiforov: 147, 149 Nilsson: 395 P Paduceva: 230, 338 Panini: 92 Pankhurst: 17 Parret: 20, 103, 119 Partee: 14, 37-39, 50 Paul: 93 Peirce: 76, 404 Perry: 55, 319 Pettersson: 95 Pfister: 379 Pike: 68 Plato: 92, 114 Plotinus: 92, 114 Pomorska:71, 116,385 Potebnja: 140 Prince: 215, 230 Prokopovic: 146-147 Propp: 368 R Rafferty: 74 Rajandi: 362 Rappaport: 231, 315 Rassudova: 62, 68, 94, 122, 124, 192, 294, 302-303, 305 Reichenbach: 50, 240 Reid: 70, 161, 182-183 Reinhart: 182, 230 Renicke: 372 Renou: 92, 123 Ricoeur: 92, 95, 97-98, 115-116 Ritvo: 182

Robertson: 125 Rohrer: 15, 32, 40-41, 49, 160 Rothstein: 345 Rudy: 124 Rugaleva: 231 Rundgren: 94 Ruwet: 182 Ryle: 6, 93, 219 S Safariewicz: 238 Salnikov: 62 Saunders: 163, 165, 177, 179, 182 Saussure: 30 Scholes: 386 Schooneveld van: 143, 147 Scott: 38 Searle: 230, 308, 318-319 Seiler: 106, 122-123, 368 Sgall: 69 Shukman: 215, 223, 385 Silverstein: 99 Simonin-Grumbach: 161, 182 Smith: 6-7, 10, 12, 19-21, 23, 25, 2932, 38, 50 S0rensen: 30 Sperber: 309-310, 313, 316, 318-319 St. Augustine: 92, 95-102, 115-116 Stalnaker: 304 Stang: 138 Stankov: 122-123, 256-257 Steedman: 43, 47, 50 Stempel: 61 Stender-Petersen: 379 Stepanov: 136-137 Strom: 281 Stubbs: 286 Swan: 7, 281 Sirjaev: 210 Svedova: 315-316 T Tedeschi: 37 Thelin: ix, xiii, 6-7, 9-10, 16, 20-21, 2627, 29-36, 38-39, 41-43, 45-47, 49-50,

INDEX OF PROPER NAMES 53-54, 60-61, 63, 65, 68-69, 71, 73-77, 92-96, 99, 101, 105-107, 109, 111-116, 120-125, 137, 193, 223, 237, 265, 281, 294, 311, 315, 318-319, 367, 379, 384, 386 Thompson: ix, 5, 22, 61, 68, 150, 154, 182, 217-218, 220, 229-231, 359, 383 Timberlake: vii, xii, 6, 10, 12, 20, 23, 25-26, 33, 35, 39, 42, 47, 50-51, 53, 63, 69, 114, 211, 231, 263, 281, 286287, 304, 315, 318, 355 Tomasevskij: 61 Tommola: xiii, 101, 109, 350-351, 353355, 362 Townsend: 31, 305 Trofimova: 315-316 Tynjanov: xiv, 77 U Ul'yanov: 136, 138 Uspenskij: 338, 399 V Vaillant: 138 Vater: 48 Vendler: 6, 17, 29, 49, 93, 139, 151, 194, 219, 239, 287-288, 309, 367

415

Verkuyl: 17, 232 Vet: 160, 378 Vinogradov: 61,383 Vlach: 33, 36, 47 Vondrák: 141-142 W Waletzky: 61 Wallace: 20, 23, 32, 41, 61-62, 65, 68, 182-183, 384 Waugh: ix, 66, 73-74, 124, 160-161, 165, 176, 179-183, 244-245, 248 Weinrich: 61, 64, 70-71, 161, 183, 238, 245 Wijk van: 131, 136, 140 Wilmet: 164, 182 Wilson: 309-310, 313, 316-319 Wongkhomthong: 345 Wright von: 8 X Xolodovic: 372 Z Zemskaja: 210 Zezula: 182 Zolotova: 61, 383, 385-386

Index of languages A Albanian 244

Greek (Homeric) 121-124 Greek (Modern) 106, 122-123

 Baltic 137 Baltic-Finnic 349, 362 Balto-Slavic 136-137 Bulgarian viii, x, 60, 68, 122-123, 213, 226, 228-229, 237-259

H Hungarian 60

 Common Slavic 136, 138 Czech 49, 54, 60, 124 E English viii, 5, 7, 13, 18-21, 24, 26-27, 29-31, 34, 40-41, 45-47, 53, 55, 59-60, 65, 73, 75, 99, 101-102, 107, 113, 121, 143, 213, 221, 223, 228-229, 231-232, 310, 316, 360 Estonian 60, 349, 357, 362 F Finnish viii, xii-xiii, 60, 101, 105, 271, 349-362 French viii-x, 15, 20-21, 32, 35, 49, 6162, 66, 71, 93, 102, 106, 147, 159-183, 215, 237-259 G Georgian 244 German 59, 102, 360 Germanic 210, 351 Greek (Ancient) 49, 105-107, 111, 121123, 244

I Indo-European viii, 94, 105, 111, 113, 120-123, 136-138, 141, 143, 147, 151152 Indonesian 74 Inuit 67 Inuktitut 62, 66, 68 J Japanese 60  Kathlamet 99 L Latin 5, 102 Lithuanian viii, xii, 325-346 M Middle English 102  Old Church Slavonic 136-139, 141-144 Old Russian 143-144, 147 P Persian 60 Polish 54, 368, 403

INDEX OF LANGUAGES R Romance 147, 210 Russian vii-xiii, 10-12, 17, 27, 29-30, 34, 47, 51, 54, 61-62, 68, 74, 121-122, 124, 131-134, 136, 147, 149, 151-154, 183, 191-210, 213-232, 240, 263-282, 285305, 307-319, 345-346, 349-357, 359362, 367-379, 383-404 S Semitic 94

417

Slavic vii, 9, 17, 20-21, 34, 46, 50, 53-54, 57, 60, 65, 69, 72, 74, 94, 99, 101, 105107, 111-113, 117, 120-122, 124, 131134, 136-137, 143, 147-148, 153, 219, 221, 223, 230, 237, 239, 361-362, 403 Slovene 54 Swedish 16, 59, 351,360 U Ural-Altaic 94 V Vedic Sanscrit 92, 111, 121, 123, 137

Index of topics A ablative 352 absorptive 150 accomplished action 198-199 accomplishment-culmination 217, 219 accomplishments 6-14, 17-20, 36ff., 44, 58, 139-141, 151, 219, 228, 239, 264, 288ff.,298ff. BECOME-treatment of 36 imperfective 289 progressive 19 reportive 58 with activity phases 299 accomplishment sentences 37 accomplishment verb (phrase) 8, 13, 217, 219 accusation forms of 305 accusative xiii, 325ff., 349-362 (passim), 370 accusative/partitive direct object oppo­ sition (Finnish) 349-362 achievements xi, 6ff., 10-13, 20, 27, 30, 45, 58, 69, 139-141, 151, 219ff., 222, 228, 239, 258, 288ff., 304, 367 end-in-sight 289, 293, 299 inceptive 289, 293ff. instantaneous 140 true 289, 293ff., 303 achievement verbs 17, 217 act/s perfective discrimination of 402 perfective predicates denoting 395 regular chain of 395 vs. activity 395

action/s annulled 302 annulment of 293 completed 9, 198,286, 294, 354 completion of 290 concrete/non-concrete 265, 267ff., 270, 272, 280 dissociated 294, 298-301 dynamic 399 focus on 296, 303 generic 353 goal-directed 378 habitual 296ff., 353 inadvertent 291 inherently bounded/unbounded 287 inherently controlled 299 iterative 354 narrated 390 non-completedness of 353 on-going 353 partial control over 299 perspectives on 285 (see perspec­ tive) punctual vs. linear 374 recurrent (recurring) 198, 298 repeated 353 resultative 354, 356 telic/atelic 296, 298 uncompleted 265 (see process) unique(ly occurring) 264, 300 vs. result 213, 222, 224ff., 228ff. actionality 131 action-event string main 374 action-level 395

INDEX OF TOPICS action/non-action 231 activity/ies 6-9, 11-14, 17, 19ff., 20, 24, 34, 43-46, 56-58, 139-141, 151, 219ff., 228, 239, 264, 288ff., 296, 298ff., 303 actual 40 completion of 297, 357 delimitation of 297, 301 delimited vs. non-delimited 112 habitual 290 imperfective predicates denoting 395 initiation and termination of 298 lexical 297ff. life as continuing xv, 401 on-going 352 reportive 58 temporally restricted (delimited) 46, 288 volitional/avolitional 300 activity confirmation 298, 301 activity delimitation 297, 301 activity sentences 37 activity shift 298 activity verb phrase 43, 44 activity verbs 14 actual activity 40 actual background 11, 26ff., 30, 33, 47ff., 54, 64-66, 68-70, 72ff., 77, 107, 116 actual time frames 286 additivity 32, 41 adjectives 326 descriptive 332, 335 short and long forms of (Russian) xii admonition 285 adverbial expressions of time (aspect and tense) 15, 49, 102, 370, 387, 394, 402 adverbs durational 15 modal 256 of frequency 49 affirmative/negative 231 affirmative-negative parameter 220, 232 affirmative sentences xiii, 353, 357, 362

419

agent vs. object shift in emphasis from to 301 agreement 217ff. Aktionsart/en 5, 24, 112, 131, 134, 140, 350, 361, 379 aktualizace 215 aktualizacija 215 ambiguity 47 lexical 18 anaphora 217, 232 anaphoric reference 62 {see theme/ rheme) Anglo-Saxon aspectology 93 annulment of the action 293 anteriority 259 {see also taxis and per­ fect) vs. posteriority 372 antiaspectualization (Timberlake) 333ff.,343 interclausal 337 antimodalization (Timberlake) 335, 343 interclausal 340 antitemporalization (Timberlake) 339ff.,343, 346 aorist (aoristic meaning/use) 63, 99, 106, 121, 139, 141, 244, 251, 287, 359, 389 {see also totality) aorist (Ancient Greek) 49, 105ff., 122, 124, 244 imperative 105 indicative 105ff. infinitive 105 optative 105 participle 106 subjunctive 105 aorist (Bulgarian and/or French) x, 123, 229, 237-258 aorist forms augmentless (Vedic and Homeric Greek) 123ff. imperfective-based 144 perfective (Bulgarian) 123 prefixless/imperfective (Bulgarian) 123 sigmatic vs. root (Slavic) 138ff.

420

INDEX OF TOPICS

aorist-imperfect opposition (Indo-Euro­ pean) 112, 121, 123, 138-153 (pas­ sim), 354, 361 discourse functions of 141ff. aorist perfective configuration 12 aorist-present dichotomy (Indo-Euro­ pean) 111, 113 as primary carrier of temporalization/tensification 112 aorist-present-imperfect trichotomy (Indo-European) 111-114, 121 apophony 136ff. appositive mode (Inuktitut) 62, 66ff. (see verb modes) article/s 351,360 and aspect 210 lack of 35ïff. aspect choice (selection) xff., 19, 297, 314ff.,316ff. in questions (Russian) 285-305, 307-319 stylistic influence on 276 aspectless predications 52 aspectless sentence 35, 37, 41 aspectless (temporal) analysis 50 aspect locus 35, 63, 268, 270, 276, 281 exterior 63 aspect markers 46 superficial 46 aspect marking in the direct object (Fin­ nish) 349-362 aspect semantic components 53, 60, 63, 76 vs. time-semantic components of tense and taxis 76, 120 aspect semantic features vs. tense semantic features 36 aspect semantic opposition/s 30 equipollent 30 aspect semantics componential understanding of 5 aspectual analysis 21 integration of situation analysis and 21, 31, 52, 71, 75-77 aspectual blend xv, 395

aspectual case (differentiation) xiiff., 325-362 aspectual classes of verbs 6, 24, 40 aspectual competition 26, 69 aspectual components 20 aspectual context 15, 16 aspectual convergence 402 aspectual decoding xi, 27-30 aspectual delimitation 45, 99, 100, 117 (see delimitation and totalization) aspectual development 136 aspectual distinctions expressed by syntactic means (case differentiation) xi, 325-362 non-deictic nature of 35 perspectival nature of 35 aspectual encoding xff., 139, 145, 151, 154, 263, 270, 272, 280 aspectual encoding/decoding xiii, 27-30 aspectual event (vs. aspectual process) 25, 27, 32, 46ff., 50, 53, 64 implication of 27 iterated 50 aspectual extremes xv, 395 aspectual heterogeneity vs. homo­ geneity 70 aspectuality xv, 6, 131, 134, 136ff., 146, 150ff.,326, 331 distorted 393 narrative 383-385, 387, 395, 402 perfective (narrative) vs. imperfective (descriptive) type of 383-404 prototypical 136, 151 verb-semantic 20 aspectualization 18ff., 27, 29, 35, 103, 150, 329, 343 clausal vs. interclausal 329ff., 340ff. external-contextual 27 level of 18 truth-conditional 42 vs. antiaspectualization 333ff. aspectual operator BECOME (Dowty) 8, 9, 14, 18, 36, 37 descriptive adequacy of 17 aspectual operator STAT (Vlach) 33

INDEX OF TOPICS aspectual oppositions the neccessity of a discourse approach to 163 aspectual organisation 401 aspectual parameters overt x aspectual-perspectival operations 31 aspectual polysemy 46 {see polysemy) aspectual predicates 47ff. embedded in hierarchically com­ plex propositional structure 47ff. aspectual primitives 326 aspectual process (vs. aspectual event) 25, 27, 38ff., 42ff., 46ff., 50, 53, 59, 63 iterated 50 partial meaning of 25, 33ff., 63 aspectual restriction 325 aspectual usage predictive rules for x, 285 aspectual value 25 aspectual zero treatment of simple forms 7, 57, 75 aspectus 5 assertion/s 311ff. informative 313 past tense 315 strings of 312 vs. predication 308, 318 assertion/non-assertion 308 assertive mood 311ff. assertive narration 317 assumption schemas 316ff. atelicity 44 {see telic/atelic) atelic predicates 12 atemporality 65 atomic event 33, 42 atomic sentence 14, 35-37, 42 attention focus (center) of 183,197, 329, 339, 345 shift of 335 speaker's 198 attention-getter 170, 173ff. attenuative 150

421

attributes (Kucera) 288 augmentation 112 author personal statement by 162 authorial intervention 164ff., 180ff. author/narrator 208 autobiographical accounts 160 avant-garde uses (of French tenseaspect) ix, 164-179 (passim)  background xff., 20, 60-73, 116-117, 145, 171, 173, 177ff., 213ff., 241ff., 252, 372, 383 actual 11, 26ff, 30, 33, 47ff., 54, 6466, 68-70, 72ff.,77, 107, 116 as complex conceptual-semantic hierarchy of temporal-perspecti ■ val distinctions 73 as situational modifiers 397 differentiated concept of 65-71 following 247 initial descriptive 242 preceding 247, 255 preparatory 208 proper 21, 26ff., 30, 33, 47-49, 54, 64ff., 68-70, 72, 77, 107 referential 247 static 200ff., 242, 244ff., 247, 253255, 257ff.,328, 378 vs. foreground {see foreground/ background) backgroundability 218 backgrounded flashback 222 background(ed) perfectives (Chvany) 73, 222, 224 background function of defocalization 68 of elaboration 62, 67 of motivation 67 of setting 67 of thematization 67ff. temporally definite 66 background implicature 319 background information 61, 152, 178

422

INDEX OF TOPICS

backgrounding 21, 52ff., 61, 143ff., 251, 402 perspective of 21 proper 68 vs. foregrounding (see foregrounding/backgrounding) bare plurality 49 BECOME 8 BECOME-sentences (Dowty) 13 becoming concept of 15, 18 gradual 18, 19 beginning (opening) of text (section, paragraph) ix, 165, 166-173, 174, 176183, 209 Besprechung/Erzählung (Weinrich) 238 besprochene Welt (Weinrich) 61 binarity 76, 134, 191ff. vs. multi-factor scale 220 vs. non-binarity 183 biography 162 body of text ix, 165, 178 boundaries (of interval; Desclés & Guentchéva) 240-259 distance between 241, 244 left/right 240ff., 242, 254, 257-259 open/closed 240ff., 242, 254, 257259 boundedness propositional 292 bounded/non-bounded 7, 287, 289ff. (see terminative/non-terminative) bounded/unbounded intervals (periods) x, 51,241ff.,253, 356 bounding (Jackendoff) 50 branching 37  cardinal count 49 adverbs of 49 case ablative 352 accusative xiii, 325ff., 349-362 (pas­ sim), 370 agreeing vs. instrumental (Lithua­ nian) 325ff.

aspectual semantics of 325-346 correlation between (interaction of) lexical semantics and 330, 333, 336 dative 326 general local (Finnish) xii genitive 218, 231,352, 358 instrumental vs. nominative in pre­ dicative nouns (Lithuanian) xii, 325-346 nominative xii, 326 nominative as index of foreground­ ing 217ff. of the controller 344 partitive (Finnish) xiii, 101, 105, 349-362 vocative 379 case alteration (Finnish) the pragmatics of 356 case choice (selection) 231, 344 aspect-semantic correlates of 325346 covert semantic values of 339 case grammar xiv, 369 case marking 217ff., 349-362 oblique 217ff., 219, 221 categorial slots 368 discrete degrees of closeness be­ tween 368 causality 136, 220, 224, 372 explicit/implicit 215 causation 66 causative/s l37ff.,372 causative/telic verbs 142 cause-effect ix, 19, 141, 145, 179ff., 217 cessation 45 change/s absence of 336, 345 actual/virtual 335 actual vs. resistance to 336 as missing link between different situations 388-391 attention to 319 concept of 18 condensation of 397

INDEX OF TOPICS continuous vs. discontinuous 328, 345 ending point of 243 factual 27 failure of actual 336 implication of 24 implied 27 intended 44 of current state of affairs 44 of (situational) state 27ff., 64, 70, 103 {see also situational state and change-of-state) permanent 117 possible 336 process of 18 relation between state and 70 specification/nonspecification of xiii successive 252 through time 42 vs. continuity 395, 399, 401ff. vs. non-change 254 change-of-state conditions 6, 13ff.,18, 23ff., 70, 103, 138, 200, 240, 242ff., 247, 252, 299, 305, 327ff., 332, 335337, 342ff.,360 aspect-dependent x, 21, 29 change-of-state-embedded 23, 27-30 {see situational state) change-of-state/foreground 21, 27-30, 47ff.,64, 70 situational/perspectival feature of xi change-of-state-logic 8 change-of-state-related 23, 27-30, 47ff. {see situational state) changing states 9 chronological sequence 178 circumstantial modification 402 classification (generic presentation) 66 class markers xiv, 370, 373ff. clausal level xii, 327-332, 334ff., 339341, 343, 361, 368 {see also sentence level) clause {see also sentence) affirmative 217

423

backgrounded 214 durative 330 foregrounded 214, 222, 227, 230 indicative 217 interrogative 362 irresultative 358 modal 217 negative 217, 358 perfective 224, 227, 229 plot-advancing 222, 224, 230 stative 218 subordinate 253, 402 closing of text {see ending of text) closure situational 289 closure/non-closure x, 10, 25, 63, 112114, 268, 270, 276, 280ff. closure/openness 114 cognitive environment 309 of speaker/hearer 311ff., 314 cognitive faculties 20 perceptual and 20 cognitive-pragmatic conditions viii, 98 coherence 19, 215, 391 and meaning 394 in reality and discourse 29 paradigmatic (mediate) 64-71 perception of 71 syntagmatic (immediate) 64ff., 70 temporal-causal 70ff., 215 temporal-logical 19 temporal-perspectival 70ff. textual 64, 77 vs. incoherence 71 coherent (dynamic)/non-coherent (sta­ tic) motives 61 coincidence 343 colloquial communication 193 colloquial speech 210 colour terms 349 COME ABOUT 8 command 311 imperfective 276 perfective 277 comment(ary) 62, 161, 178, 192, 201, 213, 224, 227, 245, 248

424

INDEX OF TOPICS

explanatory 225 optional 217 communication act of 271, 273 as a process of inference 309 colloquial 193 pragmatic conditions of narrative or dramatic 373 uncompleted act of 280 ungrammatical speech in 357 communicative needs 367 competence narrative 392 narrative vs. linguistic 384 competing forms of aspect 198 complementation conditions of 17 completed actions/events 9, 198, 250, 286, 294, 354 vs. non-completed 249, 251, 271, 276, 280, 282, 291, 353 complete/incomplete 163, 293 completeness lack of 292 completion 9, 20, 43, 74, 134, 145ff., 148, 194, 219, 249-251, 258, 276, 290, 297, 301, 316, 357 perfective meaning of xiii relevance of xi successful 316 time frame of expected 290 vs. incompletion (continuation) 199ff. vs. non-completion 251, 271 completion-failure 285 completive 15, 150 composition literary xiv narrative xiv compositional aspect 222, 232 compositional categories historical typology of 383 compositional structure 61 relationship between aspect and 61, 377ff.

compound (composed) past (French) ix, 159-183, 237 conative meaning/use 53, 150, 152, 275ff.,282 conception 19 universal mechanisms of 19 conceptual-deductive interpretation 27 conceptual schemes 23 conceptual-semantic distinctions xiii, 21 hierarchy of 29 perceptually based 21 conceptual-semantic neutralization 54 concluding sentence 178 conclusion 307 implicated 317ff. conclusive verbs imperfectivized 60 conclusivity xi, 7, 17ff., 112 concrete-factual meaning x, 94ff. {see perfective forms) concrete/non-concrete 265, 267ff., 270, 272, 274, 280 conditional (French) 163 conditional (Lithuanian) 326ff., 334, 344 conditionality 66 concessive 333ff., 343 conditionalized narrative 343 conditional perfect (French) 163 configurational aspect 10 conflict 377ff. conjunction reduction Kiparsky's thesis of 121ff., 124 context concrete 274 durative 264 evaluation of 276 immediate 165 iterative 264, 281 narrative 272ff. of background 51 of foreground 51 perfective vs. imperfective 352 progressive 354 syntactic 343 unique 264, 276, 280ff.

INDEX OF TOPICS contextual algorithms xi conventional 309 contextual descriptivization xii, 343 contextual effect 319 contextual factors x contextual foreground 23, 27ff., 30, 34 contextual foreground delimitation/to­ talization 27, 30, 34, 38, 60 contextualization of aspect usage ix, 165ff., 180ff. contextual restrictivization (temporalization) xii, 343 contextual variation 308 continuation 45, 200 implied 207 toward goal 45 continuative-frequentative 350 continuing activity life as xv, 401 continuity 69, 118, 196-198, 209 good 220, 230 durative 254 permanent and indivisible 117 vs. change/discontinuity 345, 395, 399, 401ff. continuous forms (see progressive forms) contracts 289 conventional-pragmatic conditions 41, 59 conversational discourse 62, 73ff., 77, 122 as dialogues embedded in narrative discourse 74 narrative fragments of 73 narrative vs. 73ff., 77 convertive 150 count-mass approach to the progressive 41 count/mass distinction 32, 41 count nouns xiii culminations 217, 219, 222, 228 cultural content xiv, 370 semantic features of 379

425

culture anthropological content of 378 archetypal elements of 367 description of 367 current relevance 74, 146 past event with/with no 165 cycle (temporal) 104, 106ff., 110 entire 106 natural 106ff. partialization of 104, 106 cyclicity (temporal) 104, 106ff., 110 D dative case 326 decoding vii, xii, 27-30, 309ff. (see also encoding/decoding) situational-perspectival 29 textual 75 deduction 19 conventional-pragmatic patterns of 19 deductive principles of analysis 5, 22ff., 75 deductive situation/discourse-based an­ alysis 22ff., 75 deductive speaker/narrator-based ana­ lysis x, xii, 20, 23, 52 deductive stage of analysis xi deductive theory of aspect 64 deep case 5-7, 17 definite 26, 145 spatially and temporally 26 temporally (see temporal definiteness) definite/indefinite 91, 137, 210, 218 character of the verb 93, 139 definiteness 31, 109ff., 349, 361 (see temporal definiteness) temporal perspective of 31, 77 definiteness/indefiniteness 94, 123, 209ff.,351 applied to events and situations 62, 94, 111, 114, 137 applied to subjects, objects, partici­ pants 218

426

INDEX OF TOPICS

in verbs of motion 136ff., 145 pre-aspectual 108, 123 temporal {see temporal do.) defocalization 66, 404 relative 68 syntactico-intonational 402 deictic function 237 deictic/non-deictic 35 delimitation 63, 101, 104, 181, 297, 301, 386 aspectual 45, 99ff., 117ff. contextual 27, 38 perfective 298 spatial 7 spatial and temporal 10, 112 temporal l0ff., 16, 38, 63ff., 101, 104, 107, 110, 112, 117ff.,298 delimitative/delimitive (Russian) 10, 12, 134, 298 delimited vs. non-delimited activities and non-delimitable states 112 {see closure/non-closure) delimitive perfective 297 denial/s 285,289, 356 strong 149 denouement 207 descriptio/description 29, 49, 60-62, 70, 107, 116, 124, 161, 173, 176, 178, 192, 205, 217, 247, 255, 286 classificational 210 dynamic action vs. static 399 imperfective 384, 402 narrative 383 of culture in terms of literary themes 367ff. of heros 252 static background 328 vs. narratio /narration {see narratio and narration) descriptive material 384, 398 descriptive noun phrases 397 descriptive vs. plot-advancing compo­ nents 373 descriptivization xii, 328, 332, 335, 338, 341, 343, 345

detachment 181, 244, 248 {see also de­ limitation) development {see foreground) development of temporal distinctions viii, 104-116 conceptual-genetic stages of 109ff., 118 development vs. punctual occurrences 239 diachrony of aspect (Russian) viii dialogue (dialogic speech) ixff., 74, 147, 161ff., 164ff., 180, 182, 193, 210, 216, 252, 297, 373 the temporal system of 238 vs. narrative 162, 164ff., 220ff., 286 diathesis 136ff., 368,370 media 138, 146 diathetic transformations 372 dimensionalization 244 direct object (Finnish) specification/quantification of 353 total vs. partial affectedness of 352354 direct object opposition between ac­ cusative and partitive case (Finnish) xiii, 349-362 direct speech 216, 221-223, 230ff., 342 discontinuity 240, 244 discontinuous change 328 discourse conversational 62, 73-74, 77, 122 different types of 383 fictional ix folkloric 193 including/not including next 55 journalistic ix literary xiii, 384 narrative 23, 48, 63, 70, 71-74, 77, 91, 93, 95, 107, 115ff., 120, 124, 141, 213-232, 362, 383- 404 modes of 311,317 situations of 367 temporal organisation of 6, 21, 24, 47-49, 116, 120 temporal-perspectival functions in 25

INDEX OF TOPICS temporal-perspectival levels of 70 discourse-based understanding of aspect viiff. discourse construction 22 discourse embedding xiii, 27 discourse functions of aspect 20, 23, 132 discourse level 313 discourse location 55, 58 discourse motivation (for aspectual en­ coding) x, 5 discourse-organizing functions of aspect 5, 21, 66, 76 discourse-perspectival functions 23 (see foreground, contextual foreground, actual background, proper back­ ground) discourse-pragmatic conditions 4, 152 discourse prominence 218ff. (see saliency) discourse saliency (of sentences; see saliency) 213-232 degree of ix measure of 229 discourse-semantic foundation of aspect 5 discourse sequencing 152 discourse/situation functionality viii, 75 discourse/situation level vii, 148 discourse vs. history 238 discours vs. histoire 238 distance concept of 103 distant (remote) past 50, 149, 248 distentio animi (St. Augustine) 96-101 (see extension) drama background situation in 372 epic 373 dramatic performance 373 dramatic present x (see present tense and simple present) dramatized narrative 373 duration 12, 32, 39, 45, 96-111 (passim), 116-118, 140, 241, 244, 288, 294, 298ff.,300, 368

427

as metrical parameter 32 concrete 117 limited (finite)144, 241, 253 primitive measurements of 105 durational adverbs 15 durative meaning/durativity xi, xiv, 10, 39, 43, 107, 143, 145, 150, 218ff., 231, 264, 286-288, 296, 309, 329, 339, 343, 376ff.,379 vs. progressive meaning 39 durative-processual use 282 durative understanding of the progres­ sive 40 durée-qualité (Bergson) 116ff. E ego-hic-nunc 216ff., 220 elaboration 62, 66 discourse function of 62 elegy 379 elementary constructions (EC's) xiv, 369-379 aspectual 371ff., 374, 376ff. class-marking vs. position-marking 373f. collective 376ff. concentric vs. eccentric 371, 376 durative 376ff., 379 foregrounded/backgrounded function of 373ff., 376 internal composition of 379 modifier of xiv, 370ff. nominal vs. verbal 371, 373ff. plot-advancing 374 rank/extension of 370ff. semiotically neutral function of 373 embedding xi, xiii, 17, 22, 27, 33ff., 50, 52-54, 77, 106, 124, 221 conceptual-semantic 77 foreground 33 of anterior events 72 (see perfect and taxis) of aspectual predicates 47, 48, 106, 124 textual 77

428

INDEX OF TOPICS

emphasis 264 difference in 333 on action (vs. result/completion) 303, 354, 357 on result 303 on simultaneity 343 shift in 301 encoder vs. decoder 344 encoding vii, xii, 19, 135, 145, 159, 213, 218, 222, 229, 263, 270, 272, 280, 288 continuum of 136 gradual ix, 154 narrative 27 of percepts 263 procedure of 29 textual 75 encoding/decoding xiii, 265 textual 75 ending (closing) of text (section, para­ graph) ix, 165, 174-178, 179-181, 183 endpoint/s 12, 20, 22, 31, 38 expected final 12 implied 31 inferred 38 initial and final 25 endpoint treatment of aspect 6, 19, 20 end state (see also final state) new 361 non-specific 360ff. specificness of 362 enunciation types of 161, 180 enunciative (actual) vs. non-actual (ref­ erential) system 237ff., 248-251, 257 epic drama 373 error-correction 285 erzählte Welt (Weinrich) 61 eternal truth 7, 114 eternal (use of) present 92, 99 eternity 91-92, 114-115 vs. time 91-92, 114-116, 395 evaluation 69, 271ff., 276 point of 34, 40, 42, 45 subjective nature of 279 superior point of 34

event (Aristotle, Chvany, Desclés & Guentchéva) x, 219, 222, 237-258, 367 (cf. aspectual event) concomitant vs. disjoint 245 decomposition of 246ff. punctual/non-punctual 244, 246 event/s actual background 68 actual(ly on-going) 34, 99 anterior 72 (see perfect and taxis) aspectual (vs. aspectual process) 25, 27, 32, 46ff., 50, 53, 64 atomic 33, 42 autonomous temporal structure of 35 background(ed) 61, 143ff. chain of 197, 201, 208 change-and-conflict-causing 217 characterized by indivisibility 32, 41 closed 50 complete/incomplete 152, 293 completed/non-completed 199, 249251, 291 completion of 301, 316 conclusion of 63, 307 conclusive 197 consequential 146 currently relevant/irrelevant 182 decomposed into series of constitu­ tive elements 397 delimitation of 63 delimited 27, 45 descriptive 143ff. discrete 194ff., 200, 209, 254 durative 309 dynamic 373 embedded 52, 54 evaluation of 271 foreground(ed) 12, 20, 27ff., 45, 49, 61, 65, 68, 72, 232, 373 foregrounded vs. backgrounded 141, 147 general occurrence of 316 habitual 26 inception of 63

INDEX OF TOPICS inherent physical properties of 23 initial/last 257ff. in process 54 instantaneous 45 integral 196 interior of 12 internal structure of 55 iterated 51 iterative 26, 63 limit of 63 line of chronicled 394 main line 147 major 178ff. minor 161, 178 next 64 non-71, 116,393 non-localized temporally 67 non-prototypical views of 141 non-stative 31 non-stative actual background 28 non-stative contextual foreground 28, 255 non-stative proper background 28 on-going xiii, 26, 34, 40, 57, 117, 145 {see process) open 50 oral/written reports of 214 overlapping of 259 perception of ix, 141, 150-153, 195, 309 plot-advancing 232 plot-line 281 potential 26, 109 preceding 255 predictive 146 present 34 prototypical/non-prototypical per­ ception of ix, 151, 153 punctual/non-punctual 244, 246 punctual/linear 374ff. recent/remote 165, 182, 248 reports of 214 resultative/non-resultative 152 result of 293 scheduled 58, 67

429

sequence of 34, 123, 147, 209, 215, 229, 244, 246, 252, 255, 264 series of 269 series of discrete 200 series of individual 198 simultaneous 245 single 52, 197, 255ff., 258 situationally unitary 292 spatial/temporal contours of 131 spatially/temporally definite 26 state-changing (foreground) 21, 26, 29, 38, 57, 64, 117 stative 31ff. stative actual background 28 stative contextual foreground 28 stative proper background 28 subordinate 72 subsequent chain of 201 succeeding 64 succession of 26ff., 107, 202, 245ff., 256 successive 12, 20, 68, 192,194, 249, 252, 254ff. supra-sentential status of 21 surrounding foreground 27 telic/atelic 152, 310 temporally extended 45 temporally indefinite 63 {see tem­ poral indefiniteness) temporally restricted 59 terminus of 293 topological properties of 42 total 17, 26 totalized 27 uniqueness/non-uniqueness of 108 visual enacting of 373 volitional 232 vs. non-event/s 71, 116, 393 event-achievement 228 event-defining functions of aspect vii, x, 5,76 event-external description of aspect 37 event focus/non-event-focus 66, 68, 208ff. event frame 263

430

INDEX OF TOPICS

event-internal structure 42 event location 55, 58 event-modus ix, 200ff., 210 event-reconstruction 293ff., 298-303 event semantics 309, 316 amalgamation/interaction of aspect and 309, 311,317-319 event sequence vs. narrative sequence 224 event-shift 298 event strings xiv, 374 of durative type 377 event structure construction rule (Hinrichs) 24 event time 10 evolutives 138 exclamative expressions 379 exemplification ix, 179 existence process of 200 existence-modus ix, 200 existential interpretation 199 existentialist philosophy 118 existential meaning 210 existential modality 200, 202 existential perspective 209 existential quantifier 48 expectation 317 experience descriptive part of 208 event interpreted as indeterminate part of past 199 existential 209 segmentation of continuous 195 shared 293, 296, 298, 301ff. situation perceived as part of con­ tinuous 195 speaker's previous 199 stream of past 199 temporal 115 view of life as continuous 195, 208 explanation 161 of general statement 179 explanatory material 384 explicature vs. implicature 310

explicitness degree of 310 extended temporal perspective 50 extension (in space) 103 extension (in time) 96ff., 101-103, 110 line of 104 mental (of mind) 96-101 relative 100 totality as delimited 106, 110 extension/non-extension 96 eye-witness account 162 F fabula 215 vs. sjuzet 224 factitive-resultative reading 8 fautemps (Kristeva) 93 fiction 162 fictional-narrative manipulations 71 figure/ground 23ff., 161ff., 165, 182, 383ff., 394, 402 {see also foreground/ background) visual perception of 214, 223, 230 finality marker of 291 final state 243 {see also end state) finiteness 326, 344 firstness/secondness (Peirce) 404 first-person hero 332 internal point of view of 341 first person narrative 183, 341, 387, 393 flashback 224ff., 228ff., 390, 393 backgrounded 222 flashforward 224 focal material 312, 317 focal/non-focal information 310, 312 focus 68-69, 77, 141, 152, 167, 173, 196, 209, 222, 286 290, 293ff., 299ff., 302ff., 310, 312, 315, 332ff., 339, 343, 345, 397 event vs. non-event 66, 68, 208ff., 222 intonation 315 narrowing of 179 of information 329

INDEX OF TOPICS on action alone 296, 354, 357 on past vs. present time 388 on process 303 on state resulting from an event 222 participant 68, 296, 303 shift in 293 vs. defocalization 66, 68, 402, 404 focus of attention 197, 249 high vs. low 183 foreground x, 11, 30ff., 45, 49, 54, 60, 66-70, 72, 247, 255, 257 actual relevance of anterior events for 72-73, 77 {see perfect and taxis) contextual 23, 27ff., 30, 34 simultaneity with 66 succession in 10, 12, 20, 50 foregroundability of sentences degree of ix descending expectation of 221 high 218 relative 213 foreground/background ixff., 20ff., 24ff., 27, 51, 61, 63, 69, 77, 94, 116, 161, 196ff., 200ff., 213-232, 247ff., 378 blurring of 223 context of 51 discourse-perspectival distinction of x, 24, 77, 94, 116 in terms of temporal definiteness/ indefiniteness 69 perception of 217 relevance of negation scope for 69 temporal-perspectival nature of 23, 77 foreground(ed)/background(ed) events (states) xiii, 12, 20, 26ff., 61, 65, 68, 141, 143ff., 181,274,378 foregrounding correlation of human importance with 404 normal vs. poetic 230 poetic 215, 384

431

foregrounding/backgrounding xii, xiv, 142, 152, 183, 192, 200ff., 238, 244ff., 264ff.,281,319, 367ff. on the stage 373 foreground development/movement 63, 66 foreground/narratio 107, 116 vs. background/descriptio 116, 124 foreground perspective 26 foreground-related state 64 foreground sequencing 63, 147, 224, 255 foreground succession 10, 12, 20, 50 foreground unification (of iterated events) 53 foreground vs. background tenses (Weinrich) 70-71 transitions within and between 70 frame-situation 388 frame-story 388 free indirect style 163 frequency 49 adverbs of 49 aspectual nature of 49 frequentatives (Estonian, Finnish) 349ff. functional sentence perspective 373 futurate progressive (English) 34 future perfect 72 future tense 27, 311, 327, 334, 344 future time 34, 60, 73, 91ff., 96, 98ff., 105-107, 144-146, 195, 326, 403 as prospective present 74 distant 34 immediate 34 fuzziness in aspect semantics 149-153 G gaps 40ff.,55 necessity of 41 possibility of 40 general local case (Finnish) xii general statement ix, 179 exemplification of ix, 179ff. explanation for 179 proof of 179

432

INDEX OF TOPICS

general(ized)-factual/factive meaning/ use x, 94ff., 152, 198ff., 263-280, 315317, 354 {see also imperfective forms and simple denotation) general truth 145 generative semantics 237 generic aspect (Joos) 49 generic interpretation 48, 49 genericity 7, 34, 56, 99, 353 generic meaning/use 66, 99, 115, 146 of simple present 99 generic quantifier 48 generic readings 48 generics 27, 48 genitive of negation 231 of partiality 352 vs. accusative in negated objects 231 Gestalt psychology 32, 105, 117, 214, 220, 224, 230 gestures 373 gnomes 123ff. gnomic meaning/use 66, 99, 114 of simple present 99 goal 17 {see also terminus) failure to achieve 293 goal-orientation 7 grammatical categorization viii grammaticalization degrees of 135 grounding 61, 213-232, 372, 377, 394 {see foreground/background) as perceptual phenomenon 229 as textual phenomenon 217 degrees of 161 grammatical correlates of 218 icons/indexes of 214, 220ff., 229 importance and 404 intuitions of 214, 222, 230 (language-independent) measure of 223, 231 levels of 161 relative 214, 216, 225, 229 role of anaphoric elements in 232

sequentiality in 398 theory of 61 grounding functions opposite 373 H habit 219, 255, 288 as an open class of events 255 habit-state 228 habitual context 34 habituality xiii, 7, 48, 50, 54, 77, 109, 113, 117, 196, 219, 296ff. temporally indefinite meaning of xv 7, 26, 34, 50, 56, 77, 99, 109, 113, 117, 122, 290, 296ff., 301, 353ff. remote 149 strongly asserted 149 superior 54 habitual meaning/use 66, 99, 115, 122, 124, 146, 149, 150, 290, 387-390 of simple present 99 habitual-potential meaning/use 66 habituais 20ff., 24-27, 48ff., 50, 54, 60 discourse-perspectival status of 4854 endpoint characteristics of 20 Habitual vs. Unitary (Chaput) x, 289305 habituation 49 hierarchical-componential analysis of aspect 94 hierarchical-processual analysis 23 histoire 215 vs. discours 238 historical chronicity perfective 403 historical present {see present tense and simple present) historicity formal 395 history/ies xiv, 54ff. aspectualized 328ff. as set of states of affairs 54 continuously changing (process) 327 descriptive 328

INDEX OF TOPICS modalized 328ff. patterns of 327ff. state-changing (perfective) 327 temporalized 328 uniform (stative) vs. changing/re­ strictive 327ff., 345 vs. discourse 238 homophony 18 hors-temps (Kristeva) 93 hypothetical 220, 256-258 I iconicity 138, 151, 153, 216ff., 220ff. icons vs. indexes of grounding 220 ideological position 22 illocutionary act 318 vs. locutionary act 319 vs. propositional act 318 immediate future transposition 34, 59, 74 immediate relevance of past action for the moment of speech 74 {see perfect) immediate situational state 27, 30, 64, 70 {see situational state) imparfait 15, 20ff., 32, 35, 49, 93 non-time-related use of 93 imparfait journalistique 256 imparfait judiciaire 256 imparfait pittoresque 66, 163ff., 167ff., 171-173, 179ff., 182-183,256 imperative (Lithuanian) 344 imperative (Russian) 69, 121, 152 imperfective 276 under negation 285 imperfect (Ancient Greek) 105, 122 imperfect (Bulgarian and French) x, 122ff., 237-258 descriptive 247 invariant meaning of 237, 253, 257 imperfect (French) ix, 159-183 as the unmarked tense-aspect 161, 171ff., 178 contextually marked uses of 173 imperfect (Indo-European, Slavic) 111ff., 141,354

433

genesis of 111, 138ff. iterative value of imperfective 254 perfective-based 143ff. progressive meaning of 142 imperfectiva tantum (Russian) 359 imperfective ix, xi, xiii, 13, 18, 20, 46, 150 {see also perfective/imperfective) as simple aspect (vs. the relational perfective) 385ff. as the aspect of immediate, non­ relational apprehension 401 iterative 223, 286 plot-line 183, 223 sequential 223 imperfective aspect represented by the progressive 33 imperfective forms (Slavic, Russian) xi 20ff., 28, 34, 47, 50, 52, 54, 62, 67-69, 94, 99, 107, 117, 121ff. {see also per­ fective/imperfective forms) as expression of the unmarked member of aspectual binarity 191ff.,222, 307ff.,315,385 contextual dependency of the fore­ ground function of x general(ized)-factual/factive use of x, 94ff.,152, 198ff., 263-280 {see also simple denotation) non-processual use of 65 polysemic nature of 47 primary vs. derived 250 processual use of 69 sequential 223 simplex 264 temporally definite (time-related) use of 101, 107 temporally indefinite (non-timerelated) use of 62, 121 unpaired 264 imperfective movement 400 imperfective paradox (Dowty) 13ff., 36, 44,58 imperfective/perfective {see perfective/ imperfective)

434

INDEX OF TOPICS

imperfective/perfective forms {see perfective/imperfective forms) imperfective predicates 399 as presenting a subjective view of life as continuing activity 401 denoting activities 395 narrativized 397 imperfective/progressive (Dry) 25, 26 imperfective-progressive operator BecomingMoreAndMore (Åqvist & Günthner) 18 imperfective sentences 13, 25 imperfective telling (Jensen) 385, 387, 395, 397ff. imperfective view 395, 399, 403 fragmenting 390 imperfectivity abuse of 393 protracted 387 imperfectivization 10, 60, 112 processual 10 imperfectivizing suffixes 350 impersonal account 162 impersonal construction (sentence) 192, 210, 220ff. implicated conclusion 317ff. implicated premise 316, 318 implicature (Grice) 309, 317-319 nature of 318 vs. explicature 310 importance 216, 224, 230 and grounding 404 relative 216 inceptives 289, 293ff. inchoatives {see also inceptives) 137ff., 140 inchoativity 57, 136 inclusive present/present perfect 74 indefinite 26 spatially and temporally 26 temporally 62 {see temporal indefiniteness) indefiniteness 351 spatial 65

temporal {see temporal indefinite­ ness) indefinite quantity 358 indexes vs. icons of grounding 220 indirect narration (Bulgarian) 221 individuation (of participants) 220ff. the role of anaphoric elements in 232 indivisibility 32, 41 inductive-deductive stage of analysis xii intermediate x inductive modes of analysis 5, 20, 52 inertia 196 state of 198 inertia worlds 37 inference contextual 313 process of 309ff., 313ff., 317ff. infixation 112 information 55, 177, 216, 307, 310, 312314, 317 background 61, 152, 178, 218 complete 55 control of the flow of 312 corrective 312 crucial 174, 178 essential/non-essential 66ff., 264 focal/non-focal 310, 312 focus of 329 implied 206 new (novel) 62, 67, 176, 373 non-denotative 132 non-focused 152 non-sequenced 152 non-topical 152 old/new 63, 68-69, 77, 176, 310, 312 partial 55 propositional-semantic 154 receipt of 312 shared 317 subsidiary 177 time-oriented 61 unexpected 373 information processing 314ff. ingressive 150

INDEX OF TOPICS initiation 45 injunctive (Indo-European) 121ff. instant/s 118, 238, 240 (see also moment/s) contiguous 240 first/final 242, 254, 259 starting instant of change 242 instantaneity 7, 112 instantaneous achievement of terminus 12 instantaneous/conclusive verb phrases 45 instant structure 42 transformation of event structure into 42 instrumental case vs. nominative in predicative nouns (Lithuanian) xii, 325-346 integrated situational-perspectival an­ alysis 23, 31 interclausal level xii, 327-330, 335, 339, 341, 343 interpretive-inductive stage of analysis xi interrogative constructions (sentences, utterances, expressions) 192, 313, 356, 362, 379 (see also question/s) interval/s (of time) 14, 22, 32ff., 35-37, 39, 41-44, 46, 55, 95, 98,114, 240-258, 289, 304, 327, 368 (see also subinterval/s) bounded/unbounded x, 51, 241ff., 253 concept of x, 38, 40, 42ff., 50 delimited 50 descriptive role/adequacy of 13, 35 focused 345 indivisible 345 interior vs. exterior of 240 intersection of two 242 large 50 moment-interpretation of 42 of different sizes 51 open/closed 36, 43, 45, 240-242, 244, 253ff.,259

435

relationship between expression and 32 single 304 surrounding 39 temporally definite concept of 51 total set of moments of 41 vague 50 interval semantic assumptions viii, 10, 22, 32, 39, 48, 55, 58, 76, 114 interval semantics 5, 14, 18, 33, 36, 48 shortcomings of 48-51 intonation 68, 230, 297, 315 intonation focus 315 invariance 47, 237, 307-309, 314, 317 invariant meaning subordinative 317 irrealis (see realis/irrealis mode) iteration 11, 50, 53,ff., 69, 140, 249ff., 255, 288, 354 as an open class of discrete events 254 bounded 66 discourse-perspectival dependency of 51 restricted 51 uncounted 219 iteration-completion 146 iterative events 26, 63 iterative/habitual structures xi iterative/iterative-processual structures 17,73 superior 17 iterative/non-iterative 302 iterative progressive (English) 47 processual interpretation of 47 iteratives 24ff., 27, 48, 60, 63, 138, 286 discourse-perspectival status of 4854,63 integrated in foreground succession 50 perfective 50 resultative- 140 singularized 281 stative interpretation of (Czech) 49 temporally definite approach to 50

436

INDEX OF TOPICS

iterativity xi, xiii, 7, 17, 50ff., 53ff., 77, 113, 122, 143ff., 146, 150, 223, 254, 264, 281, 288ff., 290, 294, 296, 309, 316, 350, 354, 379 as an open class of events 257 exemplary 152ff. in terms of quantified states (Kucera) 49 superior 53 J journalistic usage 162, 164, 182ff. journalistic writing 160 just activities 11ff., 46  Kenny's test 8, 44 knowledge shared 319 possessed by participants 309 konstatacija fakta (dejstvija) 263-280, 285, 315 (see general-factual mean­ ing) L language processing (see also encoding and decoding) vii length measurement in terms of 103 level/s action- 395 clausal xii, 327-332, 334ff., 339-341, 343, 361, 368 discourse 313 discourse/situation vii, 148 interclausal xii, 327-330, 335, 339, 341, 343 lexical 343 motifeme (Doležel) 379 nested 263, 327ff. objective historical vs. subjective phenomenological xv, 399, 401 of author vs. characters 385 of narrative 200 (see also narrative level)

of perspective xii, 327, 343 of realization xi predicative 327-332, 335 propositional x, 51ff., 132, 148, 263, 268, 292 sentence vii, 217, 361, 368 situation semantic 18 utterance xi, 308 lexical ambiguity 18 lexical aspect 6, 10, 136 vs. propositional aspect 287ff. lexical level 343 life as continuing activity 401 as moving continuity 402 as quality vs. time as quantity 401 imperfective view of 403 qualitative experience of 402 subjective view of xv, 399 life-process 399 life-scene aspects on 401 life-situations decisive links between 392 disconnected, imperfectively rendered 390 meaning of 384 non-relatedness of 389 life-story 390, 393 limit (see also terminus) 242, 253 inherent 12 limitation 194 (see also telicity and terminativity) linear progression 393 linguistic vs. narrative competence 384 linkage (Reid) 70 literary-aesthetic needs 367ff. literary code 368 literary composition xiv literary conventions 202 literary devices 214, 229 literary discourse xiii, 384 literary effect 213, 224ff. contextual 229 secondary 229

INDEX OF TOPICS literary narrative different types of 383 literary themes 367, 378 categorial slots of 368 description of culture in terms of 367ff. literaturnost' 378 local expressions of aspect 102 localist approach to aspect 42 localistic (stationary) perceptual strate­ gies 117 localization 62 temporal 62, 94, 104 localized aspect 94 location 55-58 concept of 58 definite 104 discourse 55-58 event 55, 58 space-time 55 time 55 M macro-action (Gasparov) 196 macro-event (Timberlake, Gasparov) 50, 198 closed 50 open 50 macro-situation (Gasparov) 196 markedness 46ff. contextual 222, 319 its application to discourse 47 privative 314ff. subordinative 314 tradional concept of 46 markedness/unmarkedness 192, 351-353 marked/unmarked aspect meaning xv, 46,143, 222, 307ff., 315, 385 marking case 217ff., 221, 349-362 subordinative 308 mass noun 352 mediate relevance of past action for the actual situation 74

437

mediate situational state (proper back­ ground) 27, 30, 47, 64, 70 {see situa­ tional state) matter concept of 102-103 memory 316ff. assumption schemas in 317 message theme xiv, 377ff. metaphorical extension viii, 132, 138, 142, 148, 151, 153 mimics 373 minus-story 390 miscommunication 312 mise-en-relief 183, 215 modal adverbs 256 modal connotations as superior states 74, 77 modality 26, 37, 74, 77, 105, 124, 153, 192, 217, 256-258, 311, 319, 326ff., 333, 345 implicit 345 non-eventive (Wallace) 65 (perspective of) existential 200, 202 superior feature of 54, 105, 124 modalization 66, 329, 343 modal relations between agent and co-actants 369 model-theoretic semantics 40 momentaneity xi, 350 moment/s (in/of time) 14, 35, 38-42, 76, 304, 356, 399 conceptual-pragmatic 38ff., 46, 76 definite 73 final 38 potentially relevant 39ff., 42 single 288 total set of 41 momentatives (Estonian, Finnish) 349ff. moment of speech 34, 72, 96, 99, 106, 108ff., 198 temporal meanings based directly on 73 superior 34 monologue (monologic speech) 193, 210, 373

438

INDEX OF TOPICS

mono-phasals 27, 30 (see achievements) Montague Grammar 40, 41 mood 121ff., 135, 326, 349 (see also modality) aspect and 311 assertive 311ff. moral 377ff. narrative's 378 moral values 378 morpheme order 368 morphological neutralization 47, 124 morpho-syntactic bias 5, 46, 93 motifeme level (Doležel) 379 motion 22, 38, 41, 45, 96-111 (passim), 378 and stops 100 definite/indefinite perspective of 110 determinate/indeterminate verbs of 140, 145 past/present 110 perceptual-conceptual processing of 32, 38, 41 phases of 45, 101 verbs of 102, 125, 136ff., 140, 145 visual perception of 39 vs. rest 22,103 motivation 70 by way of accumulation 70 intra-level connections of 70 relations of 64 motives 61 coherent (dynamic) vs. non-coher­ ent (static) 61 movement/s 45, 216 delimited 45 foreground 62 imperfective 400 initial and final point of 100, 102 of celestial bodies 97 surrounding states 102 multiplication (bounded iteration) 66 multiplicity 26, 50-52 in verbal arguments 51 referred to the predicational

level 51ff. referred to the propositional level 51ff. single-event-representation of 52 mutually manifest facts 309, 319 N narratio 29, 49, 60ff., 70, 107, 116, 124 balance between narratio and descriptio 70ff. transitions between descriptio and 70 narration ix, 61, 92, 107, 161-165, 247ff., 269, 311ff., 329, 373ff., 390, 403 (see also narrative) activities of 96 assertive 317 descriptive (mode of) 69, 383 ends and means of 384 first person 393 imperfective (Jensen) 71 indirect (Bulgarian) 221 non-literary 385 past tense indicative 307, 311 perfective 395 plot line of 238, 248 present historic 390 process of 373 progress in 244 sequential(ized) 329, 336 shift from first to third person 393 spatial perspective in 61 strategies of 116 temporal sequencing of 146ff. third person 393 traditional 393 vs. description 61, 397 vs. dialogue 180 narrative 160-165, 192ff., 204-209, 244, 250ff., 268-270, 341, 383-404 (passim) (see also narration) background situation in 372 classical 385 conditionalized 343 contrastive 343

INDEX OF TOPICS degré zéro 215, 224 development of 163 different kinds of 383 dramatized 373 first person 183,341,387 foregrounding in 368 general perspective of 195 historical 162 historical present 223 level of 200 {see also narrative level) literary 383 non-literary oral 230 past tense 223, 229 play with 193 sequentialized 343 third person 160, 402 traditional 393 unfolding of 181 vs. description 205 vs. dialogue 162, 164ff., 220ff., 286 vs. drama 373 narrative aspect 403 narrative aspectuality 383-385, 387, 395, 402 narrative codes 384 narrative competence 392 vs. linguistic competence 384 narrative composition xiv narrative context 272ff. narrative conventions 77 changes of 77 narrative description 286 narrative development 402 narrative discourse 23, 48, 63, 70, 71-74, 77, 91, 93, 95, 107, 115ff., 120, 124, 141, 213-232, 362, 383-404 organisation of temporal perspec­ tive in 93, 116, 120 vs. conversational discourse 73ff., 77 narrative dynamism 61 narrative encoding 27-29 narrative exposition subjective meanings associated with 137

439

narrative form 387 narrative frame implied 207 narrative functions 24, 367 narrative genres 193, 203 narrative goals 312 narrative inversion 71, 116 narrative level x, 200, 263, 270, 276 as opposed to lower nested levels 263 vs. propositional level 263, 270, 276, 280 narrative norm correlated with linguistic norm 213, 215, 217ff.,224 departures from 224 narrative perspective 192ff. basic 203 switches of 203, 208 temporal and conditional change of 208 narrative (plot) line 181, 213, 394 narrative predicates thread of 394 total lack of 389 narrative progression 123 narrative prose 77 narrative purposes ix narrative sequence vs. event sequence 224 narrative strings successiveness relation in 372 narrative structure 24 the formation of 193 narrative styles 193 narrative superstructures (van Dijk) 369 narrative surface structure 395 narrative system (vs. descriptive sys­ tem) 61 narrative tempo 223 narrative texts composition of xiii narrative thread 394 narrative time 10 movement of 24, 25, 63 shift of 25

440

INDEX OF TOPICS

narrativity 215, 217, 230, 387ff. absence of xv, 393 demonstrative lack of 388 fictional meta-discussion on 392 hypertrophied xv, 393 narratologico-aspectual interpretation 391 narrator xiv, 161, 192, 194ff., 207ff., 249, 335 narratonal intervention 181 narrator/observer 202 negation 11, 66, 69, 77, 149, 192, 217, 219, 220, 232, 291, 295, 356-358 and modality 69, 149, 152 correlated with background 232 expressing discourse-perspectives of different scope 77 genitive of (Russian) 218, 231 in the imperative 69, 121, 285 question under 291 presupposed 362 subordinate 69 superior 69 negation scope 69, 77, 121 and its relevance for the fore­ ground/background distinction 69 restricted to subordinate time-re­ lated structure 121 superior to prohibited action 121 Neo-Kantian philosophy 118ff. nested levels 263, 327ff. new-event-confirmation 290-292, 297ff., 300-303 new (novel) information 62, 67, 176, 373 news l68ff., 171 news reporting 177 next (connector; Cooper) 55 next stage 271 nextualization 63ff. discourse function of 63 nominative case xii, 326 as index of foregrounding 217ff. vs. instrumental in predicative nouns (Lithuanian) xii, 325-346

non-actuality 50 non-event/s 71, 116, 393 non-eventive modality (Wallace) 65 non-performance confirmation of a continuing state of 295 non-phasal (see phasal) non-progressive present (see simple pre­ sent) non-prototypical functions ix non-reportive reading (Bennett) 49 non-state/s 27, 29, 30ff., 33, 41, 45, 59, 65, 70, 72, 76 (see also phasal situa­ tions) foreground-embedded 65 internal phasal structure of 45 plot-retarding 65 progressive 33 non-stativity 31 non-terminative (see terminative/nonterminative) non-terminativity 44 (see terminativity/ non-terminativity) nouns xii, 93, 326 agentive 329, 340 aspectual case of predicative xii, 325-346 count xiii descriptive vs. restrictive xii, 330343 functional 329, 331 lexically classificatory 329 (lexically) descriptive vs. restrictive xii, 328, 330-343 lexically phasal 328 lexical semantics of xii, 330ff. mass 352 predicative (see predicative nouns) weak vs. strong restrictive 338-340 now/before 387-390 now/not-now as pre-tense distiction 119 nuclear expression 370 nucleus xiv class marker of 370 position marker of 370

INDEX OF TOPICS nucleus-modifier relation 370ff. characteristic 370 number 351, 370  objective historical level xv vs. subjective phenomenological 399, 401 object-level vs. subject-level predica­ tions (Carlson) 49 object reference 349 quantitatively definite/indefinite 353, 358 (quantitatively) specific 353, 358 total vs. partial affectedness of 352354 oblique case marking 217ff., 219, 221 as index of backgrounding 217ff. observer/experimenter 103 observer roles 68 observer/speaker 38, 64 external 195 occurrence/s development vs. punctual 239 expected 296 past 296 sequence of 254 state vs. (Mourelatos) 239 unitary 289 old/new information 63, 68-69, 77, 176, 310, 312 on-going event (process) xiii, 26, 34, 40, 57, 117, 145 opening of text ix, 180 {see also begin­ ning of text) opening sentence 209 overlap/non-overlap 24, 63 P paraphrastic expressions of aspect xi, 59 part/s (of events) 16, 25, 30ff., 42, 99, 101 {see also phase) wholes and 32, 105, 107, 110 partial affectedness of object reference 352

441

partial aspectual meaning 16, 21, 25, 30ff., 46,105 {see also partiality) equipollent status of (in relation to total aspectual meaning) 41 partiality 22, 29, 32-34, 38, 40ff., 53, 94125 (passim), 352ff. pre-aspectual concept of 107, 110, 112 temporal perspective of 31ff., 46, 72 vs. totality 29ff., 34, 41, 53ff., 72, 94-125 (passim) partialization 38, 41, 56, 117ff. perceptual strategy of 38, 117ff. participant/s 220ff., 231ff., 238 focus on 296, 303, 308ff. indefinite 217 individuation of 220ff., 232 knowledge possessed by 309 missing 217 universal quantification of 52 participation in situations/narrated events immediate 194, 202 limited (marginal) 218 participial mode (Inuktitut) 66-68 {see verb modes) participle/s 326, 344 adverbial 326, 344 predicative 344 semi- 332ff. particle/s pragmatic (Finnish) 356ff. partitive case 101,105 (Finnish) direct object opposition between accusative and xiii, 349-362 passé composé 237, 243 {see also com­ pound past) passé simple 15, 32, 35, 49, 62, 237-258 {see also simple past) chain of 246 invariant meaning of 244, 246 passive constructions 232 past definite 244 {see aorist) past experience part of 199

442

INDEX OF TOPICS

past perfect 71-73 (see also pluperfect) past/present distinction rise of 108-111 past/present time 105, 108-111, 388 pre-tense distinction 109-111, 119 past tense x, 73, 138ff-, 141ff., 147ff., 223ff., 229, 264ff., 285-305, 307, 311, 319, 327, 338ff., 355, 388-390, 393ff., 397, 399, 402, 404 narrative functions of (Slavic) 362 sigmatic aorist as marker of (Slavic) 138ff., 144ff., 147 simple (English; see simple past) past time 34, 43, 61ff., 73, 91ff., 96, 98, 107-111, 121-123, 144ff., 195, 198ff., 222, 237, 242, 244, 258, 296, 326, 388 distant (remote) 50, 149, 248 fictional 71 recent 167 past time perspective as conceptually marked feature of temporal order 110 pre-tense 110 pause 40 (see also gaps) perception 19, 118, 150, 152, 195 actual 22, (as distinguished from memory and expectation) 96 and interpretation of states of affairs 286 event of 355 external objects of 117 of figure and ground (see figure/ ground) of foreground/background 217 of reality in relation to time 95, 117, 286ff. spatial 230 state of 355 temporal 230 universal (psychological) mecha­ nisms of 19, 114, 118 perception of events 150, 152, 195, 309 prototypical/non-prototypical ix, 151, 153 perception psychology 32

perceptual and cognitive faculties 20 perceptual-conceptual analysis distinctions of 22 of reality 97 represented by the instrument of aspect 64 strategies of 4 perceptual objects 32 in terms of parts and wholes 32 perceptual psychology 103 perceptual strategies 214 of segmentation 101 perdurative (Slavic, Russian) 10, 12, 140 perfect (system) x, 41, 43, 71-74, 76 existential 354 in discourse 71-74 of result 213, 222, 293, 317, 355ff. stative meaning of 72, 243 taxis analysis of 27, 41, 43, 71-73, 76 temporal-perspectival status of 71 vs. non-perfect 354 perfect (Bulgarian) 243 imperfective 123 perfect (English) 310 perfect (French) 147 perfect (Sanscrit) 92ff., 121 perfect (Slavic, Old Russian) 143-148, 152 imperfective-based 146ff. perfective-based 146ff. the loss of 147ff. perfect aspect 43 perfective ix, xiii, 9-12, 15, 34, 53, 60, 63, 74, 150, 194ff., 213, 231, 327 as index of foreground 224 as relational aspect (vs. the simple imperfective) 385ff. background(ed) 183, 222, 224 delimitive 297 invariant meaning of 386 perfective aspect 62 marked xi, 192 marker of 18

INDEX OF TOPICS perfective forms (Slavic, Russian) xff., 28, 30, 34, 46ff., 50, 53ff., 61, 69, 99, 105ff., 108, 121, 124, 213, 222 as expressions of the marked member of aspectual binarity 192, 315, 385 chain of 224 concrete-factual meaning/use of x, 94ff. flashback-initial 224 in habitual expressions of Czech 124 prefixed 264 present 34, 99, 124 with aorist meaning 389 perfective/imperfective xv, 11, 18, 20, 60, 131, 142-148, 152ff., 191-211, 219, 239 (see also imperfective) as language-dependent notions 240 as relational vs. simple aspect 385ff. invariant meanings of 132, 307-319 perfective:imperfective (Mourelatos) 49 perfective/imperfective forms (Slavic, Russian) xiv, 17, 28, 30, 51, 123, 139, 183, 191-211, 213-232, 239-258, 263-282, 287-305, 307-319, 349-362, 367, 377, 379, 383-404 (see also im­ perfective forms) as expressions of a binary (priva­ tive) opposition 60, 192 negated 69 perfective inclusion of initial and final endpoints 25 perfective predicates denoting acts 395 perfective quantification vs. imperfec­ tive qualification 402 perfective reading 13, 18 perfektives vs. imperfektives Erzählen (Jensen) 368 perfectivity 18, 25, 194ff., 264 abuse of 393 as the view of a situation as a single whole 239 perfectivizing prefixation 351 perfectivizing suffixes 350 perfect progressive (English) 41, 73

443

perfect state 29ff., 70 of actual relevance for the fore­ ground 70, 72 superior 29, 72 perfect tense-taxis system 27, 41, 43 performance 43-46 perfective-resultative analysis of 46 vs. non-performance 295 performance verb phrase 43ff., 46 performance verbs 8 performative use of simple present 34, 99 period (of time) 33, 35, 39 extended 40 of actual goings on 40 potentially relevant moments over 40,42 personal statement by the author 162 perspectival analysis in terms of wholes and parts 105, 108, 110 perspectival functions of aspect vii, ix (see temporal-perspectival functions) perspectival manipulations 77 aesthetics of 77 perspectival meaning 17 perspectival organisation of discourse 55 (see temporal-perspectival do.) perspectival treatments of aspect ix perspective/s xiii, 11, 341 alternative ix change of 179, 201ff. definite/indefinite 110 differentiation of 342 existential 209 experiential xv external l0ff., 31, 194 foreground 26 homogeneous vs. differentiated 343 in terms of wholes and parts 105, 107ff., 110 internal 10ff.,39, 195 level of xii, 327, 343 narrative 192ff., 203, 208 narrative (=Erzählperspektive) xiv (see also point-of-view) narrator's subjective 208

444

INDEX OF TOPICS

of a story 385 of existential modality 200 of the text-internal vs. text-external speaker 342ff. on actions 285 (see temporal per­ spective) partial 107ff. past time 110 poetic xiv pre-aspectual 105-111 presupposed situational 297 pre-tense past 110 processual 110 proper background 26 relative spatial 103 relative temporal 103 situational (temporal) 289, 300, 304 temporal (see temporal perspective) temporally definite/indefinite 72, 77 (see temporal definiteness/indefiniteness) total 11, 18, 31,107ff.,110, 196 unitary (situational) 300ff. phasal argument 47 non-perspectivized 47 phasality/non-phasality 21, 23, 31, 33, 42,56 phasal/non-phasal situations 21ff., 2729, 70, 76ff. phasal reference 117ff. (see also partial­ ity) phasal structure 29, 45 internal 29, 45 of non-states 45 phase/s 16, 30ff., 33, 39, 41ff., 45, 99, 101ff.,239ff.,289, 379 activity 299 analysis in 46 conceptual-pragmatic 45 event-inherent 31, 39 initial 38 of motion 31, 41 perceptual-conceptual 38 preceding 38ff., 293, 303 preceding terminus 298 volitional 303

phase interpretation of aspect 372 phase-shift 293 phenomenological philosophy 118ff. plot 71, 107, 192ff., 200-203, 208ff., 398 development of 202ff., 208, 378 vs. background 193 within a plot 224 plot-advancing components vs. descrip­ tive components 373, 378 plot line xiv, 213-215, 238, 248ff., 255, 257ff.,281,378ff. backgrounding of 251 expression of 369ff. perception of 230 underlying elementary construction of 370 vs. archetypal raw material 369 plot line imperfectives 223 plot summary 223 pluperfect 71-73, 224, 228, 337, 390 (see also past perfect) perfective (Slavic) 72ff., 224 progressive (English) 73 simple (English) 73 pluperfect (French) 71, 163 pluperfect use of preterite (Slavic) 72, 224ff. poetic functions xiv poetic-functional analysis xv point (in/of time) 25, 30, 55, 101, 104, 107, 198ff. internal 39 specific 265, 267, 289 terminal 304 point of departure (relative to result) 179 point of evaluation 34, 40, 42, 45 superior 34 point of orientation 72 point of perspective 35 (see aspect locus) interior 35 point/s of reference 24, 33, 38, 96, 107, 143, 145ff.,148, 240ff. exterior 33 obligatory primary 96

INDEX OF TOPICS omission/anomaly of definite past 72, 107 starting vs. ending 240 point-of-view xiv, 5, 209ff., 346 external 201ff., 204, 209 internal (hero) vs. external (author) 341 of an immediate participant 205 retrospective 205 polysemy xiii, 18, 20ff., 26, 46, 49, 59, 113, 121ff., 124 language-specific conditions of 5, 20, 46ff.,60, 75 morphosyntactic constellations of 75 position markers xiv, 370, 373, 376 possible world semantics 14, 18 possible world/s 10, 14, 19, 35, 37-40 micro-cells of 386 modalization through 13 posteriority 259 (see also taxis) potentiality (of events) 26, 66, 109 pragmatic-communicative conditions xi, 22, 373 pragmatic level x, 276 pragmatic meanings xi pragmatic needs 367ff. pragmatic particles (Finnish) 356ff. pragmatic-situational context 21 pragmatic vs. semantic notions 309 predel'nost' (terminativity) 194 predicate/s aspectual 47ff. aspectual functions of 52 chain of perfective 401 deficit vs. surplus of narrative 393 habitual 296ff. imperfective (see below perfective vs. imperfective) lexico-semantic content of x narrative 390 narrativized imperfective 397 non-terminative 15 perfective vs. imperfective (denot­ ing acts vs. activities) 394ff., 397, 399, 401ff.

445

phasal/non-phasal 42, 293 semantic 325 sequential 400 telic/atelic 12, 289-292, 296ff. thread of narrative 394 total lack of narrative 389 typologies of 287ff. unitary vs. habitual (Chaput) 290305 world-creating 342 predicate history 327 (see history) predication additional (aspectual) 315 aspect as a component of 308 event of 307 process 315 telic 315 vs. assertion/non-assertion 308, 318 predicational level 51ff., 263 predicative/s aspectualized 329 case of 326 descriptive (use of) 328, 332, 339, 345 descriptivized 343 durative 343 focused 343 inverted 337 level of (see predicative level) lexical semantics of 331 modalized 329 part of speech of 326ff. temporalized 328 predicative level 327-332, 335 predicative nouns as opposed to adjectives 327 aspectual case of 325-346 classificatory 343 descriptive vs. restrictive 343 equational vs. characterizational 345 functional 343 lexical semantic properties of 343 phasal 343 predictive perspectival distinctions of situation/discourse xi, 22-29

446

INDEX OF TOPICS

predictive rules for aspectual usage x, 285 prefixation 112, 125, 140, 350, 368 as perfectivizing process 351 prepositional expressions of aspect 102 prepositional phrases with in and for 14 presentation conceptual mode of 210 conditional 66 different modi of 200ff. eternal truth 66 generic 66 gnomic 66 habitual/potential 66 irreal 66 modes of 66 of action 198 operational mode of 210 opposite modi of 194ff. potential 66 present forms (Slavic, Russian) 34, 144ff.,152 imperfective-based 145 non-future use of perfective 124 perfective 34 present/future tense system 27 present/past distinction rise of 108-111 present perfect 72-74, 182, 316 as retrospective present 73 imperfective (Slavic) 74 its superior meaning of prevailing state in the present 73 perfective (Slavic) 74 present perfect progressive 43, 73 present perfect tense 43 present perfect use preterite in (Slavic) 74 present progressive 43, 56ff., 59 present stem (Ancient Greek) 49, 105, 107, 122 present tense 34, 56, 59, 73, 113, 121124 (passim), 167, 172, 181, 194, 216, 221, 223, 229, 327, 387, 389ff., 393 dramatic use of 34, 59, 201-203, 211.223ff.

eternal 92, 99 historical use of 34, 59, 121ff., 123, 165ff., 179, 201-203, 208, 211, 223, 304, 390 reportive use of 34, 49, 54-60, 99 semantics of 55, 59 simple (English; see simple present) timeless (Ancient Greek) 121 present time 34, 73-74, 91, 96-99, 108111, 144ff., 181, 195, 198, 326, 388 actual 99, 111 metatextual 181 permanent psychological 96ff. (see moment of speech) processual/non-processual 113 vs. past time 105, 108-111 present time/past time 109 competition between 72 (see per­ fect) presupposition x, 285, 304, 315 incorrect 315 of expectation 292, 295, 298, 300ff., 312 of obligation 292, 295, 298, 300ff. of volition 303 presupposition problems 308 preterite 27, 72, 74, 112, 143, 163, 182, 228ff.,244, 370 prevailing (resulting) state 72 (see state and perfect) superior meaning of 73 prevision 96 (see future time) privative/markedness understanding of aspect xv, 31, 46, 63 (see also markedness) procedural (= Aktionsart) 379 procedural verbs (Finnish) 350ff., 354 process (Desclés & Guentchéva) 237258 (passim; cf. aspectual process) completed/non-completed 243 in progress 257ff. interrupted 243 involved in the predication 242ff. non-progressive 243 utterance 242

INDEX OF TOPICS process x, xv, 21, 32ff., 39, 53, 73, 106, 141, 242ff., 253, 268, 288, 300, 327 actual, non-iterated 46 anterior event seen in 73 (see per­ fect progressive and taxis) aspectual meaning of 26, 101, 105ff., 113ff. characterized by additivity 32, 41 continuous unfolding of 195 denominal 139 durative understanding of 36 external boundaries of 195 imperfective meaning of xiii, 18 potential partial reference to 33, 73 preceding 107 simultaneous 107 process statement 315 processual application of the imperfec­ tive 10 processual aspectual meaning (see also aspectual process) 16-18, 21, 40, 47, 63, 101ff., 105, 107, 110, 117, 123 partial nature of 33, 101ff., 106ff., 110 processual-iterative use of the progres­ sive 73 processuality 107, 111 (see also proces­ sual aspectual meaning) processual perspective 110 (see also pro­ cessual aspectual meaning) process vs. event (Mourelatos) 239 PROG (operator) 37, 40, 42, 46 as a mixed modal-temporal opera­ tor (Dowty) 37 progression coherent logical 179 linear 393 progressive 35-48 (passim), 286-289, 293, 296, 313, 350, 352, 354 actual 58 as a partitive operation in the time domain 33 as the marked aspect 143 durative understanding of 38, 40 imperfective 18

447

interval definition of 24, 33, 38 modal treatment of 37 moment-based treatment of 39, 40 non-final-moment treatment of 38 non-interval treatment of 33 non-topological analysis of 36 of activities in terms of the simpler progressive operator Being (Åqvist & Günther; cf. imperfectiveprogressive operator) 19 paraphrastic (Swedish) 16 perfect (English) 41, 73 present 43, 59 privative aspectual understanding of 14, 41 processual meaning of 37ff., 101 stative interpretation of 33 truth conditions for 13ff., 37, 42 progressive aspect 25 progressive forms (English) 13, 15-17, 19, 24-26, 28, 30ff., 33, 47, 53, 59, 101ff., 107, 143, 242ff. futurate 34 progressive predicate ING (Langacker) 33 progressive tense 13, 25, 35 progressive time exterior 401 progressivity 10, 33, 107, 150 topological parameter of 33 prohibition 121, 285 pronouns dropping of personal 231 overt 231 proper background 21, 26ff., 30, 33, 47ff.,50, 54, 68ff.,77 proper background/descriptio 107 propositional level x, 51ff., 132, 148, 263, 268, 292 propositional structure hierarchically complex 47 prose a poet's 193 explicative 193 subjectivization of 385 prospective 150

448

INDEX OF TOPICS

prototypical aspectuality 136, 151 prototypicality 149-154 degrees of 149 prototypical meaning/use 134, 138, 182 prototypical/non-prototypical percep­ tion of events ix, 151, 153 prototypical view 349 proverbs 123ff. psycholinguistics 32 psychological reality 12, 19, 39, 318 punctuality 106, 136, 150, 218-220, 231, 244, 386 punctual occurrences 239 punctuals 137ff. punctual vs. linear 372, 377 pure aspect 94, 105, 119 Q quantification 51, 351 of participants 52 of temporal occasions 52 universal 52 quantified states (Kucera) 49 quantifiers 48 existential 48 generic 48 universal 48 quantity indefinte 358 specific 358 quantum mechanics 103 question/s 311ff. appropriateness conditions for 289 focal issue (focus) of 313, 315 neutral 301 situational influences in 313 under negation 291 yes-no (Russian) xff., 285-305, 307-319 who-285ff.,303ff. question interpretation the logic of 313 question intonation focal point of 315 quoted material 175 quoted speech 161

R Rahmenerzählung 388 rank (De Groot, Seiler) 368 rank/extension of elementary construc­ tions 370ff. realis-hypothetical-irrealis parameter 220 realis/irrealis mode 66, 231, 256-258 reality analysis of (in terms of situationsemantic structure) 19 extratextual 342 incoherent perception of 71 intellectual interpretation of the mobile and indivisible 117 opposite modi of presentation of/ Weltanschauungen (Gasparov) ix, 193ff. perception and conception of 6, 37, 75, 97, 150 perception of (in relation to time) 95, 117, 286ff. situational-perspectival analysis of 29,47 temporal-causal conditions of 64 textual representations of xiii reality/discourse analysis and evaluation of 66 realization level of xi récit 215 recurrent situations (actions) 196-198, 298 infinite progression of 198 redundancy contextual xiii elimination of 148 strategies of 75 reference point/s 24, 33, 38, 96, 107, 143, 145ff., 148, 240ff. present 145 reference time relevance of the events to 146 referential axis 240 referential system enunciative (actual) vs. non-actual

INDEX OF TOPICS 237ff., 248-251, 257 speaker's/writer's vs. narrative 248ff. relational (marked feature of the per­ fective; Jensen) xv as invariant meaning of the perfec­ tive 385ff. vs. simple (the unmarked feature of the imperfective) 385ff. relevance current 74, 146, 165 mediate/immediate 74 principle of 310ff., 313ff., 316ff., 319 promise of 316 remote (distant) past 50, 149, 248 repetition (see iteration) focus on 300 unlimited 254 reported speech 344, 346 reportive use of present tense (see pre­ sent tense and simple present) reports of events oral/written 214 represented consciousness 385 represented thought 385 resolution 377ff. rest vs. motion 22, 103 result/s 16, 74, 179, 264, 271, 277 action vs. 213, 224ff., 228ff., 296, 303, 319 assertion of 357 condensation of change into events and their 397 emphasis on 303 expected 296 lack of desired 293 negation of 357 negative 299, 303 perfect of 213, 222, 293, 317, 355ff. point of departure relative to 179 vs. non-result 281 resultative construction 355 resultative reading 13, 225, 229 resultatives/non-resultatives 140, 148

449

resultativity 148-152, 264, 350ff., 354357, 361, 386, 397 specific xiii, 353 vs. irresultativity 355, 358ff., 362 resultativity marker 357 resulting state (see state and perfect) result-state 13 S salience 141 hierarchies of 69 saliency (Chvany) 213-232, 319 relative 219ff. vs. non-saliency 94 saliency hierarchy (Chvany) ix, 61, 213, 219ff. saliency measure 222 sentence-internal 213 scenario/s choice of possible 314 hypothesized 317 scene/stage-setting 166, 169 scope 69 semantico-syntactic bias 23ff., 93 semantico-syntactic conditions 5ff., 17, 43,58 semantico-syntactic distinctions xi, 7, 15 semelfactives 60, 113, 138 semelfactivity/non-semelfactivity 350ff. sentence (see also clause) accomplishment 37 affirmative xiii, 353, 357, 362 aspectless 35 atomic 14, 35-37, 42 concluding 178 decomposed 35 foreground/background function of 61ff. imperfective 13, 25 impersonal 220ff. interrogative 356 negated 356, 362 opening 209 perfective 353, 358

450

INDEX OF TOPICS

quasitransitive 359 simple 33 stative 24 tenseless 14, 35, 41 timeless 35 transitive/intransitive 351, 359 sentence functions of aspect 20 sentence grammar/level approaches viiff.,x, 58, 213,221ff. inadequacy of 224ff. sentence level vii, 217, 361, 368 sentence level semantics 263 sentence operator PAST (Dowty) 13ff. sentence operator PROG (Dowty) 14 sentence-semantic assumptions 5, 20, 24, 48, 50, 75 sentence-semantic conditions 24 inductive 24 sentence-semantic restriction of aspect analysis 20 sentential aspect 20, 23, 25, 49 sentential temporal reference 50 sequence 24, 34, 63, 123ff., 215, 229ff., 252, 264, 337, 386, 400ff. axis of 362 cause-effect 217 chronological 178 coherent meaning in 391 event 224 (see also event: sequence of) event vs. narrative 224 icon of 401 narrative 224 of actions and states 391 of events embedded in habitual context 34 of foreground events 255 of occurrences 254 of perfective action verbs 383 story 215, 229 sequencing 24, 34, 70, 142, 146ff. discourse function of 153 of upcoming events 145 present 34 sequencing rule (Dowty) 24

sequentiality xi, 34, 230, 309, 398, 400 vs. non-sequentiality 229 sequentiality constraint 61 sequentialization 99 sequential(ized) narration/narrative 329, 336, 343 setting 61, 377ff. background function of 67 of actual background states/nonstates (non-phasals/phasals) 65 shared-experience 293, 296, 298, 301ff. shared knowledge 319 simple (unmarked feature of the imperfective; Jensen) xv vs. relational (the marked feature of the perfective) 385ff. simple assertion 276 simple denotation xff., xiii, 7, 66, 115, 122ff., 198ff., 264, 285, 288, 290, 295ff., 298, 300ff., 304ff., 308 (see also simple statement and generalfactual meaning) simple forms (English) 5, 7, 9, 14, 20ff., 24-26, 28, 41, 47, 99, 143 aspectual properties of 24 perfective use of 34 polysemic aspectual nature of 7, 9, 26, 34, 47 presupposed aspectual neutrality of 14 simple past (English) 25, 26 simple past (French) ix, 159-183 (see also passé simple) as attention-getter 170ff. simple present (English) 34, 55ff., 65, 99, 121 as designation of a state without any temporal limitations (Kucera) 65 dramatic use of 34, 59 historical use of 34, 59 performative use of 34, 99 reportive use of 34, 49, 54-60, 99 simple statement 7, 9, 15, 53, 66, 74, 123 (see also simple denotation)

INDEX OF TOPICS simultaneity xi, 27, 66, 70, 245, 259, 309, 316, 334, 372 axis of 362 reading of 309 situation/s 6, 194-209, 219ff., 239, 308, 315, 329, 333, 387, 397 background 372 bounded/unbounded 242, 259 components of 196 current vs. future 332 disconnected 388 dynamic x, 298, 397 endpoints of 25 existential fluidity of 200 frame- 388 habitual 297ff., 301 idealized 6, 19 identical 12, 21 (immediate) participation in 194, 202 in different modi of presentation 200 initial/final static 242 internal structure of 25 interpretations of 200 modifications of 399 new 64 non-perspectivized types of 6 of discourse 367 open 242 participation in 194, 200, 208 phasal/non-phasal 21ff., 27-29, 70, 76ff. recurrent 196-198 static vs. dynamic x, 240, 252ff., 257, 259 succession of 203 taxonomy of 285 telic 304 temporal constituency of 25 temporally definite 72 types of 5ff., 19ff.,31,286ff. typology of 219ff., 232 uneventful 207 unitary 290ff.,297ff., 301

451

viewed as a whole 20 viewed from the inside 20 view of 195, 239 situational-aspectual meaning 26 situational conditions in terms of change-of-state 14, 22 situational locus 289 situational modifiers 397 situational-perspectival analysis 21ff., 29, 31,75-77, 289ff. a universal approach to 46 as decoding 29 as integrated feed-back procedure of encoding 29, 47, 75-77 of reality 29, 47 situational roles 68 situational state/s 27-30, 76, 247 change/s of 27-30, 47ff., 64, 70, 76, 103 change-of-state/foreground-embedded 27ff.,30, 64 change-of-state/foreground-related 27ff., 30, 47ff.,64 immediate (foreground/actual back­ ground) 27, 30, 47ff., 64ff., 70 mediate (proper background) 27, 30, 47ff.,64ff.,70 old/new 27, 247 situational structure 19, 20 temporal-perspectival analysis of 19,76 situational (temporal) perspective x, 289ff.,304 presupposed 297 unitary 300ff. situation analysis 19, 21 basic 19, 22, 35, 71, 75-77 situation and aspect (temporal-perspec­ tival) analysis 24, 31, 52, 71, 75-77 integration of 21, 31, 52, 75-77 interrelations of 24, 71 situation aspect 6, 10, 20ff. situation/discourse and aspect semantics 18ff. the blurred relationship between 19 the interdependence between 18

452

INDEX OF TOPICS

situation/discourse knowledge 65 situation/discourse semantics 77 situation hierarchy the effect of negation on 232 situation semantic analysis 19, 36 situation semantic classes ix situation semantic level 18 situation semantics 13, 36, 54-60, 76 situation type 219ff. sjužet 215 vs. fabula 224 skaz 193 social psychology 32 sociolinguistic factors 278 soversennyj/nesoversennyj vid (see perfective/imperfective) 349 Soviet aspectology 93 space concept of 102-103 space grammar 42 space-independency of statives vs. spaceof activities non-independency (Cooper) 56ff. space-time location (vs. just time loca­ tion) 55 spatial perception 230 spatial perspective 103 speaker 38, 64, 193-196, 198, 238, 285, 290, 293, 296, 327, 345 primary vs. secondary 346 temporal referential system of 238, 243 text-internal vs. text-external 342ff. speaker-based analysis xff., 20, 23, 193ff.,285ff. speaker/hearer 309-319 cognitive environment of 31 Iff., 314 interaction between 141 process of inference of 309 shared knowledge of 148 speaker's attention 198 specificness/non-specificness 349, 351, 361 speech 55 colloquial 210

dialogic 193, 210 (see also dialogue) direct 216, 221-223, 230ff., 342 moment of 34, 72, 96, 99, 106, 108ff., 198 monologic 193, 210 (see also mono­ logue) place of 55 quoted 161 reported 344, 346 standard vs. colloquial 210 time of 55 ungrammatical 357 written vs. oral 210 speech act 75, 248 types of 317 speech event 216 speech situation 193 state (Aristotle, Chvany, Desclés & Guentchéva) 219ff., 237-258 state/s x, 6, 20, 24, 27, 33, 38, 41, 56, 64, 104, 118, 138-141, 151, 219ff., 222, 228, 239, 264, 288ff., 327ff. actual 356 actual background (see situational state) after change 138 as non-phasal situations 29, 38, 41, 65, 70, 76-77, 102 background 70 (see situational state) cause of 138 change of (see change-of-state and situational state) changing 9 coincidence vs. sequence of 337 contiguous 243 contingent x, 242ff., 253 ff. delimited temporally by surrounding events 38 descriptive 252, 255, 257 directly foreground-related 64 embedded 72 emotional 56, 359 final 243 (see also end state) following 253ff.

INDEX OF TOPICS foreground-embedded 65 genuine 99 immediate {see situational state) inception of 288 initial 247 instantaneous 253ff. intermediate (perceptual) 101, 118 lasting 253, 375ff. lexical 293 new 361 non-bounded 252 non-time-relatable meaning of 113 of affairs 161, 178, 286, 289, 297, 300, 314 of attitude 359 of mediate/immediate relevance (of an anterior event) for the fore­ ground 72 of the world 310 old/new 101, 103, 247, 255ff. perfect {see perfect state) permanent (backgrounded) x, 241243, 254 plot-retarding 65 pragmatic-lexical 27, 29, 76 pragmatic vs. perceptual 101ff. preceding 64, 100ff., 107, 247ff., 253ff. prevailing 72 {see perfect) propositional 293 quantified 49 relational 359 resulting 64, 72, 99, 101, 222, 225, 243, 337, 355ff. {see also perfect) secondary 355 semiotic tension between fore­ grounded/backgrounded 378 simultaneous 107 situational {see situational state) successive 24 superior 72 {see perfect and perfect state) temporally indefinite 27 transient 373 visual enacting of 373

453

state-changing foreground events 26, 57, 64, 117 statement process 315 simple {see simple statement) telic 315, 319 state perspective 138 state/process/event (Desclés & Guentchéva) 237-258 as basic aspectual-temporal opposi­ tion 238 as fundamental conceptual opposi­ tion 258 states/non-states 22, 29-31, 33, 35, 56, 65, 72, 76 state vs. occurrence (Mourelatos) 239 stative meaning 26, 72, 113, 143, 150, 354 characteristic of modals 26 stative/non-stative verbs (English) 55 stative sentence 24 statives (English) 31ff., 40, 56, 58, 102, 143 progressive 31, 32 inferred dynamism of progressive 32 statives (Russian) lexical 287ff. propositional 287ff., 295 statives/duratives vs. non-statives/nonduratives (Slavic) 113, 138ff. stativity 21, 136, 147, 228, 232, 254, 327 pragmatic-lexical 21 vs. non-stativity 31 story 61 as coherent unit 203 background of 252 beginning of 209 conventional 208 development of 201, 205, 252 for children 214 frame- 388 framework of 388 lack of 393 life- 390

454

INDEX OF TOPICS

main course of action of 61 minus- 390 movement of 398 narrative focus of 208 narrative outline of 203 perception of 202 perspective of 385 plot of 192ff.,201ff.,257 progress(ion) of 107, 201ff. skeleton of 252 unfolding of 193 story line xv, 63, 389ff. actual 61 conventional xv lack of 394 story sequence 215, 229 style blunt vs. rich 312 style indirect libre 163 stylistic conditions/effects 193, 202, 276280 stylistic markedness 276 subevents (Timberlake, Gasparov) 50ff.,53 closed 50 open 50 series of 197 subinterval/s 37-39, 44, 46 closed 44ff. final 37-39 moment-interpretation of 39, 42 non-final 38 open 44-46 subinterval property 56 subjecthood 349 subjective phenomenological level xv, 399, 401 subjectivization of prose 385 subject-level vs. object-level predica­ tions (Carlson) 49 subperiods 33 internal 33 substrings linear xiv punctual xiv

succession 12, 20, 26ff., 38, 63, 107, 202, 245, 248, 254-256 successiveness 372, 379 suffixation 112 imperfectivizing 112, 350 perfectivizing 350ff. semelfactivity 350ff. suggestion discourse function of 356 summary 175 supportive material 61 surface-morphological conditions 46 traditional bias towards 46 synchronic variability ix, 159ff. syntactic-intonational defocusing 402 syntactic (-intonational) subordination 27, 216, 221, 398, 402 T taxis (anteriority) 27, 41, 72ff., 76, 111, 120 aspect-neutral category of 43 category of 111 operating on tense 72, 120 (see per­ fect) telic/atelic 7, 10, 112, 138ff., 140ff., 142, 148, 150, 152, 218, 289-293, 296-298, 304, 310, 315, 319 (see also terminative/non-terminative) spatially 10 telicity 10, 137, 139, 146, 150, 194, 219ff., 231 (see also terminativity) prototypical 140 realized 307, 309, 316 telos 12 (see also terminus) temporal abstraction 114, 119, 294 process of 118 temporal adverb(ial)s 253, 255-257, 345ff.,387, 394, 402 temporal axis 35, 241 (see also time axis) temporal-causal conditions 23, 29, 64, 77 temporal cycle 104, 106ff., 110 entire 104, 106

INDEX OF TOPICS natural 106ff. partialization of 104, 106 temporal definiteness xi, 12, 16, 22, 25, 31ff., 44, 49, 53, 59ff., 64, 66, 68, 72ff.,77 approach to iteratives based on 50 dictated by foregrounding 52, 61 exclusive assumptions of 52 inferior 54 reading based on 17, 58 understanding of aspect based on 69 temporal definiteness/indefiniteness xiiff., xv, 7, 9, 15, 20ff., 26-29, 33ff., 48ff., 56ff., 60ff., 64-70, 72, 94, 111 {see also time-relatedness/nontime-relatedness, temporal definite­ ness and temporal indefiniteness) descriptive adequacy of 60 system-inherent superiority of 109 temporal delimitation {see delimitation) temporal determination 91 temporal distinctions development of viii, 104-116, 118 temporal experience intensification of 115 temporal extension 100 {see also exten­ sion) relative 100 temporal grammar 4, 34 temporal ill/well-foundedness (Cooper) 56, 58 temporal indefiniteness 25, 29, 48, 50, 52-54, 61-70, 77 dictated by backgrounding 52ff., 61 superior 54 temporal indefiniteness/habituality 54 temporal indefiniteness/iterativity 54 temporalization 328, 335, 342ff., 345 actor-oriented (Parrett) 103 clausal 332, 334 interclausal 329 operation of 343 temporalization (of pure aspect) 94, 106, 108ff., 111-114, 121-123 as genesis of aspect proper 108

455

temporal limit {see terminus) inherent 287 temporal localization 62 temporal-locational variability 36 temporal logic 14, 46 temporal-logical coherence 19 temporal order 23, 61, 96, 110, 111 abstract concept of 119 perception and conception of 100 temporal organisation of discourse 6, 21, 24, 47-49, 116, 120 inductive, aspectless treatment of 22 in terms of the foreground/back­ ground distinction 48 temporal orientation 259 inherent 287 temporal perception 230 temporal-perspectival analysis 19, 21, 23 temporal-perspectival analysis as inte­ grated part of situation analysis 19, 29, 47, 64, 76 temporal-perspectival coherence 70 temporal-perspectival distinctions complex conceptual-semantic hier­ archy of 73 temporal-perspectival functions 36, 42ff. in discourse 18-30, 48-54, 60-74 of states and non-states 33 temporal-perspectival organisation of discourse 23, 52, 60, 93 understood as a speaker-based pro­ cedure 23 temporal-perspectival status of proposi­ tions in discourse xi temporal-perspectival variability 36 temporal perspective 5, 13, 16, 22, 24, 42ff.,45, 76, 120, 285,287 aspect oppositions of 17 extended 50 in situation/discourse x, xiii, 93 integrated with situation analysis 64,76 manipulation of xiii, xv

456

INDEX OF TOPICS

meanings of 6 of definiteness 31, 72 {see temporal definiteness) of indefiniteness {see temporal indefiniteness) of partiality 31, 32 poetic-narrative analyses of xiiiff. relative 103 situational 289ff. temporal perspectivization 19, 22, 35 temporal points 25 temporal projection 42 temporal qualification 106, 113 temporal quality 110-111 {see also tem­ poral qualification) temporal quantification 106, 110 temporal quantity 111 {see also tem­ poral quantification) temporal reference 50 extended 50 sentential 50 temporal-referential distinctions xiii temporal schemata 10, 25, 28S temporal structure in discourse 23 hierarchical-processual understand­ ing of 23 objective component in 23 subjective element in 23 temporal transposition 34, 57ff., 99 temporarity 27, 32 temporary aspect (Joos) 49 temps réel vs. temps materialisé (Bergson) 116ff. tense viii, 27, 35, 41, 57,ff., 71, 76, 91, 93, 95, 102, 104ff., 115, 120-122, 135, 192, 237ff., 240, 286, 310, 326, 333, 345, 349, 370, 393, 403 as deictic means 35 aspect between diathesis and 368 aspect vs. 314 complex 344 rise of 109-113 tense-aspect/T-A (French) ix, 159-183 avant-garde usage of ix, 164-179 (passim) classical usage of ix, 161-164, 178

discourse functions vs. referential meanings of 160, 165 narrative 164 orientational vs. disorientational functions of 173 tense-aspect (Slavic) 143 tense-less sentences 14, 35, 41 tense logic 36 tense semantics 59, 76, 105, 120, 121 tense suffixes 368 tense-taxis 27, 41, 43, 72-73, 120 teorija predeVnosti {see terminativity theory) terminal 10 terminal point process leading up to 304 terminative spatially 10 terminative interpretation 12 terminative/non-terminative 6ff., 9-12, 15-17, 44 {see also telic/atelic) terminative-resultative reading 15, 18 terminativity factitive-resultative understanding of 15 terminativity/non-terminativity xi, 10ff., 16-18, 44 {see also telic/atelic and telicity) (con)fusion of aspect and 11, 13 terminativity theory 6, 11, 93 terminus xiii, 11ff., 17, 44, 288-290, 292ff.,298, 300ff.,315 achieved xiii, 11, 18 implied 44 inherent 290 natural (inherent) 7 obligatory achievement of 17 process towards xiii, 15 propositionally denoted 300 spatially or temporally definable 10 terminus accessibility/inaccessibility 12 text aspectual cast of 393 beginning (opening) of {see begin­ ning of text)

INDEX OF TOPICS body of ix, 165, 178 development of 165 ending (closing) of (see ending of text) literary 213ff. main thread of 213ff., 230 non-literary 214, 230 non-sequential (prose) 213, 225ff. oral 193 pre-literary 214 relation of opening to body/body to closing of 180 semantic space of 386 sequential 230 theme of 173 unfolding of narrative 200 written 193 text construction 75 text reception 75 text theory xiv textual coherence 64 aspect as carrier of 64, 77 textual consistency 64, 70 textual deep structure xiv, 367-379 vs. textual surface xiv, 367, 378 textual encoding/decoding 75 textualizer 64 aspect fulfilling the role of 64 textual organization 214 thematic constructions (TC's) xiv, 369379 thematic position 358 thematization 66-68 theme development of 179 exposition of 179 theme/rheme xiii, 62ff., 94, 122, 310, 312, 319, 358 theory of relativity 103 third person account 162 third person narrative 160, 393, 402 three-time-theory (St. Augustine) 96ff., 101 time absolute understanding of 96ff., 99, 103

457

abstracted 294 actual 105 and the character of its constitutive role in narrative discourse 116 as complex hierarchy of semantic components 120 as complex perspectival differentia­ tion (aspect and tense) 110ff., 120 as duration of motion between states 100-103 as image of eternity 114 as measure 96-111 (passim) as pre-aspectual perspectival dif­ ferentiation 110 as relative measure of duration 99ff., 103ff., 109 cognitive-pragmatic (aspectual) con­ ditions of 98, 386 complementary aspects on 401 concept of 91-120 concrete vs. abstract forms of 119 (continuous) flow of 194ff., 209, 400 definition of 101 event-in-discourse-based approach to the concept of 35 existential properties of 119 extension of (see extension) exterior progressive 401 genesis of viii historical progressive 394 immediate perception of 118ff. in its sentence-external manifesta­ tions 35 interrelations of space and 230 interval of (see interval) intuitive vs. intellectual (materiali­ zed, spatialized) 118 measurement in terms of chronolo­ gical 103 moment of (see moment) monadic understanding of 118 mythological concept of (Cassirer) 118 Neoplatonic concept of 92 non-final 38

458

INDEX OF TOPICS

now-oriented concept of 119 ontological dispute about 96 perception and conception of 92 perception of relity in relation to 95, 117, 286ff. perceptual-conceptual hierarchy of matter, space and 102 period of {see period) physichal and psychical ontology of 95 point in/of {see point) primitive concept/features of 104, 120 psychological dimension of 96 quantified 403 real 289 relational concept of 119 vs. eternity 91-92, 114-116, 395 vs. non-time 92 time axis 45, 61, 93ff., 106-109, 111, 123, 238, 252, 267ff. abstraction of events from 65, 93, 115 location along 267 total removal of events from 65, 93, 115 time frame (relevant) 289ff., 292, 294, 300ff. of expected completion 290 time-frame theory (Jespersen) 14, 33 time interval 34, 368 {see also interval of time) timeless proposition 65 time limit 289 time movement 26, 62 time-relatedness/non-time-relatedness 7, 60, 91-124 (passim) 265, 281, 400 {see also temporal definiteness/indefiniteness) time semantics xiv, 29, 36, 48 cognitive-pragmatic understanding of 103 conceptual-genetic hypothesis of 114, 118 hierarchical over-all system of 111

in terms of trajectory conditions (Langacker) 42 perceptual-conceptual and pragma­ tic constituents of 99 topic 141, 152 topic/comment 310 {see theme/rheme) topological-figurative metalanguage x, 239ff. total aspectual meaning 9, 15ff., 26, 30, 44, 99 {see also totality) privative/markedness treatment of 31 total association with time 106 {see totality) totality xi, xiii, 7, 9, 22, 28, 50, 52-54, 57, 59ff., 63, 72ff., 94-125 (passim), 300, 304, 351-354, 379 as delimited extension 106 dictated by foregrounding 52 pre-aspectual concept of 106, 109ff., 113, 123 totality/non-totality 112ff., 281 totality/partiality 29ff., 32, 34, 41, 53ff., 72, 94-125 (passim), 351-354 {see also partiality) conceptual-genetic priority of 109 pre-aspectual 110 totalization 27, 56, 117, 118 contextual foreground 27, 30, 34, 60 trajectory 45 repetitive reflexive 45 simultaneous 45 transformational syntax 230 transitive-impersonal sentence parame­ ter 220ff. transitivity 137, 150, 222 reduced 358-360 vs. intransitivity 139, 231ff., 302, 351 transitivity hypothesis (Hopper/ Thompson) ix, 154, 220, 231 truth conditional aspectology 39ff., 42, 55ff.,76 sentence-based 58 truth conditional aspectualization 42

INDEX OF TOPICS truth conditional interpretations 22, 33, 42ff. truth conditional (time) semantics 7, 35ff.,57 descriptive adequacy of 13 truth conditions 13-15, 35, 37, 42ff., 55 deemphasis of the role of 36, 76 of sentences 35, 76 of utterances 318 turn-taking 300 typological studies of aspect 46 U unique action 264, 300 unique context 264, 276, 280ff. unitary (situational) perspective 300ff. unitary situations 290ff., 297ff. Unitary vs. Habitual (Chaput) x, 289305 universalization 66 universal quantification 52 of participants 52 of temporal occasions 52 universal quantifier 48 utterance/s future tense 311 interrogative 313 modal status of 311 truth value of 318 types of 311 utterance level meaning xi, 308 utterance process 242ff. utterance value xi, 308ff., 317 components of 309 contribution of aspect to 315 V velocity 97, 100ff., 103 verb/s accomplishment 8, 13, 217, 219 accomplishment-culmination 217 achievement 217 action 383 active 217 activity 14 annulled action 302

459

aspectual classes of 6, 9, 17 causative/telic 142 cognitive/philosophical classifica­ tions of 151, 239 compound 351 conclusive 60 continuative-frequentative 350 definite/indefinite 93, 139 determinate/indeterminate 140, 145 durative 217 emotional 353, 359 imperfectivized (conclusive) 60 lexical-semantic classes of 112 modal 221 momentaneous 350 narrative (vs. descriptive) 390, 394, 402 of communication 302 of creation 303 of creative authorship 303 of discovery 303 of (loco)motion 102, 125, 136ff., 140, 145 of meeting 369 of negative result 303 of perception 355 of saying/speaking 216, 221, 264, 360 performance 8 phasal 221 plot-advancing 398 prefixed 351 present stem (Ancient Greek) 49 procedural 350ff., 354 punctual 218 quasiresultative 355 resultative (actional) 148, 355 semantic classes of 154 sequential 398 stative 217, 359 stative/non-stative (English) 55 telic/atelic 142, 148, 217ff. thematic function of 62 transitive/intransitive 139, 302, 353 types of 286 zero-forms of 122 (see injunctive)

460

INDEX OF TOPICS

verba dicendi 163 verb classes 349 verb classification 13 verb complement 351 verb meaning vs. aspect meaning 386 verb modes (Inuktitut) 66ff. appositive 62, 66ff. main 66ff. participial 66-68 relative 66ff. verb particle constructions 18 verb phrase/s 40 instantaneous/conclusive 45 state 40 temporal analysis of 40 terminative (telic)/non-terminative (atelic) 44-46 verb (phrase) semantic assumptions viiiff., 7, 23ff., 37, 40, 48ff., 76, 93 verb (phrase) semantic classes ix, 5, 9, 20 verb (phrase) semantics 5, 17, 43 verb prefixation (Slavic) 140ff. verb-semantic approach to aspect 49, 55, 58, 93 verb-semantic distinctions 5ff., 43 verb-semantic/situational properties 25 Verzeitlichung der Verbaldetermination (Koschmieder) 94 vid 131, 352, 361ff. view external 12 (fragmenting) imperfective 390, 395 internal 12 partial 12ff., 45, 53, 117ff. temporally definite 34, 56 total 12ff., 17, 20, 25, 34, 45, 49, 53ff.,56, 58, 63, 105 total preaspectual 105 view of life imperfective 403 subjective xv view of situation 195 as a single whole 239 viewpoint/s 19 exterior (outer) 63, 153

imperfective 20ff. individual 19 interior (inner) 153 perfective 20ff. progressive 12 viewpoint aspect 10, 20ff., 23 viewpoint aspectology 10, 20 vocative expressions 379 volitional/avolitional 300, 303 volitional control 29, 31, 299ff. volitionality-agentivity 220 volition/non-volition 231ff., 303 VP-semantic aspectology 8-18 vydelenie 215 W Weltanschauungen 194, 209 wholes and parts 32, 105, 107, 110 pre-aspectual differentiation in terms of 105, 110 who-questions {see questions) word order 68, 210, 230, 358, 362, 368 world/s actual 38ff. apprehension of 386 as continuum 200, 209 as total experience 209 complete 55 existential view of 195, 210 inertia 37 information about the state of some 312 possible 10, 14, 19, 35, 37-40, 386 real 150 set of partially ordered 327 states of 310 world experience 210 world knowledge 22, 37, 66 world outlooks (views) 194, 209 world/situation knowledge 75 Y yes-no questions (see questions) Z Zeitwort 92