Aspect: Problem of lexicon and morphology

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Chapter

Aspect: Problem

of lexicon and

morphology

In this chapter

we

outline several

of the

influential l inguistic analyses

of

aspect in the literature, and examine how these analyses treat grammatical

aspect, lexical aspect, and the interaction between the two. We will begin

by looking at Comrie s analysis of perfective and imperfective aspect,

an d then proceed to Ven dler s categorization of verbs and times, Smith s

two-component theory

of

aspect,

and Kle in s view on

aspect

in

terms

of

the relationship between topic time an d situation time. W e end

with

a

discussion

of how

these various linguistic analyses bear

on

ch i ld ren s

acquisition of aspect.

2 1 rammatical aspect

2.1.1. Perfective an d imperfective

The grammatical encoding of aspectual notions, which we call grammati

cal

aspect is

realized

in

different

languages

in

different

ways,

for

exam-

ple, throug h the use of inflectional morphology, derivation al m orp ho l-

ogy, auxiliary,

or

periphrastic constructions. This variation does

not

mean, however, that grammatical aspect

is

wholly idiosyncratic

and

language-specific in the way it is encoded. Typo logical studies of how

languages

of the

world encode aspectual notions have uncovered recur-

ring patterns of aspectual marking (Comrie 1976; Bybee 1985; Dah l

1985; Bybee and Dahl 1989; Bybee, Perkins, and Pagliuca 1994). In this

section,

we

characterize these grammatical aspectual patterns

and

show

how

they are related

to

each other.

The

most basic aspectual opposition that

is

often

encoded grammat i -

cally is that of perfective an d imperfective. As noted in Chapter 1,

perfective

aspect presents

a

situation

as an

unan alyzed whole (external

view), whereas imperfective aspect presents a situation from within

(internal view). In the following example from English,

(1 )

John built a house.

(2 ) John was building a house.

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12 Aspect

sentence (1) is aspectually perfective, whereas sentence (2) is aspectually

imperfect ve. In

sentence

(1), the

perfective aspect

of the

verb

reports th e

situation in its entirety, w ith the speaker presenting the situation in clu d-

ing

it s initial and terminal points. Thus, sentence (1) entails completion:

John

finished

building a house. In contrast, the

imperfective

aspect in

sentence (2) communicates the internal structure of the event, without

regard

to its

beginning

and end

points. Thus

th e

meaning

of the

sentence

is

non-committal

as to

whether

or not

John

has

finished building

th e

house .

Comrie

(1976: 25) proposed th e follow ing hierarchical classification

of aspectual categories.

Perfective Imperfective

Habitual

(Continuous)

(Non-progressive) Progressive

Figure 2.1. Classification

of

aspectual opp ositions (adapted from Comrie 1976:

25 )

Comrie

divided imperfective aspect into habitual

and

continuous,

and

further

subdivided continuous into progressive

and

non-progressive.

Let

us characterize these categories from th e bottom up, following Comrie

(1976).

Progressive aspect is a category of imperfective that has the properties

of dynam icity and change as its defining features: typically it denotes a

dynamic, continuously changing action in progress, and is generally

incompatible with Stative predicates *He is knowing th e answer).

Habitual

aspect denotes

a

situation that spans

an

extended period

of

time, typic ally inv olv ing repetition of an action over multiple occasions.

English

has a

habitual aspect marker used to) which

is

used

in

past-time

reference only.

Imperfective aspect, some times referred to as general imperfective,

denotes both habitual

and

continuous i.e., progressive

and

non-

progressive) qualities.

For

example, Romance languages grammatically

encode

th e

perfective-imperfective distinction

in the

past,

and the

imper-

fective past can describe a past action in progress (i.e., progressive), a

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Grammatical aspect

13

past state i.e.,

non-progressive),

6

and a past habit. For instance, the

Spanish imperfective past form can express the equivalents of

he was

dancing

he

loved Mary

and he

used

to

dance?

It

is interesting to note here that

Comrie

failed to explicitly character-

ize the categories of continuous and non-progressive. He defined con-

tinuousness

in the

negative, that

is, as

imperfectivity that

is not

habitual ,

and he did not define non-progressive Bybee, Perkins, and Pagliuca

1994: 138). T his m ay be related to the fact that the aspectual markers

that

specifically denote these categories

are

extremely

rare.

8

For

this

reason, the two categories appear in parenthesis in Figure 2.1.

2.1.2. Grammaticization

of

aspect markers

A s

noted

in

Chapter

1,

there

is a

tendency

for the

meanings

and

func -

tions of tense-aspect markers to change over time. For example, it is

claimed that progressive aspect markers can develop into more general

imperfective aspect markers by generalizing their applicability to habit-

ual

and

non-progressive situations.

In

this subsection,

we

discuss gram-

maticization of tense-aspect markers to explain how different tense-

aspect

markers

are

related

to

each other, both semantically

and

histori-

cally.

Building on

research

from

historical

linguistics and

crosslinguistic

survey of typologically diverse languages, Bybee, Perkins, and Pagliuca

1994) proposed hypotheses concerning the gram m aticization of tense-

aspect-m odality markers. Pa rticularly relevant to our research are two

hypotheses concerning the universal paths of the developm ent of tense-

aspect markers. According to these authors, first, there is a unive rsal

tendency for resultative and completive markers to grammaticize into

perfect

markers, which

in turn

become perfective

or

simple past markers.

Second, there is a tende ncy for a progressive ma rker to de velop into a

general imperfective marker

by

expanding

it s

reference

to

habi tual

and

stative

situations; in terms of Comrie's hierarchy see Figure 2.1), imper-

fective

aspect markers develop from th e bottom

up.

9

Here,

we

would like

to

discuss

th e

perfective path

in

more detail,

primarily to explicate the nature of the category perfect. Bybee, Perkins,

and

Pagliuca 1994) claimed that comp letive and resultative aspect

markers grammaticize into perfect markers. Completive markers denote

an action performed completely

and

thoroughly ,

and

resultative

denotes

a state that has been brought about by a prior action. These markers then

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14 Aspect

extend their meaning and become perfect markers, which denote

past

action with

current relevance . English perfect have + past participle) is

a typical example of this category (Dahl 1985), wh ich has such uses as

perfect of result , perfect of

experience ,

etc. Perfect further g ram-

maticizes and loses its curr ent releva nce restriction, and becomes a

perfective

aspect marker

and/or

a simple past tense marker.

It is often the case that a past tense marker also has an aspectual value.

For example, many European languages (e.g., French, Spanish, German,

Dutch) have th e perfect form gramm aticizing into a past

tense form

which also has a perfective value, although the degree of grammaticiza-

tion differs. Thus,

in

these languages, they have

two

past tense ma rkers

-

older past forms

(often

referred to as preterite), and more recent past

forms

(auxiliary plus participle). As noted in Chapter 1, what we see

here

is a continuous development of tense-aspect markers, which often makes

it very

difficult

to explicitly determine whether a grammatical form is a

tense marker or an aspect marker.

Interestingly, this historical developm ent charted for tense-aspect

markers has been found to have a parallel in language acquisition. In

Chapters 3 through 6, we will discuss in more detail the claim that chil-

dren use

past tense marking

first as a resultative

aspect marker

and

then

as a pure past tense marker, and that progressive markers are initially

restricted to the action-in-progress meaning and only later develop more

varied meanings

(e.g.,

Antinucci

and

Miller 1976; Bloom, Lifter,

and

Hafitz

1980; Shirai

an d

Andersen 1995). This claim about

the

acquisi-

tion of tense-aspect morphology has also been discussed within the

larger issue of how and why there are parallel processes in language

acquisition and historical change (Slobin 1977, 1997; Ziegeler 1997).

Lexical Aspect: Vendler Smith and Comrie

Gram m atical aspect provides a certain am ount of inform ation for the

interpretation of the aspectual meaning of verbal predicates, but most

linguists

accept that

we

need

to

consider another type

of

aspect

-

lexical

aspect. Lexical aspect (also known as inherent aspect, situation aspect, or

Aktionsart) refers to the semantic characteristics inherent in the lexical

content of words, usually verbs or verb phrases, that are defined in terms

of the temporal properties of given situations that the verbs describe.

Because lexical aspect deals with lexical semantics,

it is

generally re-

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Lexical aspect

15

garded

as a

lexical category

as

opposed

to the

grammatical category

of

grammatical

aspect .

As a starting point for our illustration, Ve ndler s (195 7) four -w ay

classification represents an early attempt to

categorize

lexical aspect.

10

He

classified

verbs or verb phrases into

four

categories

with

respect to the

temporal properties that they encode:

activities, accomplishments,

achievements, and states. According to Vendler,

activity

verbs

encode

situations as consisting of successive phases over tim e w ith no inh ere nt

endpoint, for example, walk, run, an d swim. Accomplishment verbs also

characterize situations as hav ing successive phases, but they

differ

f rom

activity verbs

in

that they encode

a

natural endpoint

and

often

a

change

of state, for example, paint

a picture, build a house,

and

run a mile.

Vendler illustrated the contrast between activities and accomplishments

by

the difference between ru n and run a mile The sentence John w as

running

entails that John ran, whereas

the

sentence

John

w as

running

a

mile does not entail that John ran a mile, that is, John m igh t have stopped

halfway. Like accomplishments, achievement verbs also encode a natural

endpoint, but they

differ

from accomplishments and activities in that

they

encode events

as

punctual

and

instantaneous, that

is, as

having

no

duration, such as in

fall,

win the

race,

and

reach

the

summit.

Strictly

speaking, every event occupies time. But speakers can construe given

verbs as denoting situations having no time duration. Finally, state verbs,

in

contrast

to the

other three

categories,

encode situations

as

homogene-

ous, with

no

successive phases

or

endpoints, involving

no

dynamici ty ,

such

as

know

and

love Thus, state verbs cannot

usually be

combined

with progressive aspect that marks change and development from one

phase to the next (e.g.,

John is know ing the story

is odd).

1 1

These

categories can be schematically represented as follows (Andersen

1990).

State

love, contain, know

Activity run,

walk, swim

Accomplishment

paint

a

picture, build

a

house

Achievement X fall,

drop, win the race

In this

schematization, a

solid line

is

used

to

represent states, because

states have no apparent beginnin g point or endpoint and endure ind efi-

nitely unless some external force changes them. The wavy lines for

activities and accom plishments indicate the dyn am ic d uratio n of an

action, while ÷ for accomplishments and achievements represents a

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16 Aspect

punc tua l point

of

change

of

state, signa ling telicity (i.e., na tura l en d-

poin t ) .

Ve nd ler s analysis, now proba bly the most w idely accepted and the

best know n, has become an imp ortant starting point for subsequen t

research

on

lexical aspect.

For

example, Smith

(1997)

recently modified

this

system

and

applied

it to an

analysis

of

English, French, Chinese,

Russian, and Navajo. Smith s modification involved main ly th e addition

of semelfactive verbs, such as

cough

tap and knock in English and

their equivalents

in

other languages.

She

argued that semelfactives

resemble achievements in being punctual , but differ from achievements

in that seme lfactives encode no endpoint. In particular, semelfactives and

achievements behave differently with progressive aspect ma rking: when

semelfactives are ma rked with progressive, they are interpreted as

speci-

fying

a repeated even t (e.g., coughin g or knoc king several times); wh en

achievements are marked with progressive, they are interpreted as ind i-

cating preliminary, detachable stages

of the

event rather than

a repeated

event (e.g., John was reaching the summit means that John was at a stage

just prior to being at the summit, not that he arrived at the summit several

times).

In

addition

to

Sm ith, other researchers hav e extended V en dle r s

analysis

in other ways. For exam ple, instead of u sing a categorical fo u r-

way classification, some linguists have classified verbs

as

pairs

of

con -

trasts, such as stative versus dynamic verbs, telic versus atelic verbs, and

punctual versus durative verbs

(Comrie 1976). These

pairs

of

contrast

have

th e

advantage

of

making

the

semantic features

of

lexical aspect

explicit

and

transparent. These contrasts

can be

reanalyzed

as

features,

for example, [±dynamic], [±telic],

and

[±punctual] . Table

2.1

presents

such

an analysis, adapted from Smith

(1991),

to characterize

Vendler's

four

categories plus semelfactives.

Table 2.1. Semantic

features

for the

five

categories of

lexical

aspect

(adapted

from

Smith 1991: 30)

states

activities acc om plishm ents semelfactives achievements

dynamic

+ + + +

punctual

telic

+ - +

W e

should point

out a confusion

that

has

been

in the

literature

on

lexical

aspect since Vendler (1957). Vendler did not use the terms lexical

aspect, Aktion sart, situation aspect, or inherent aspect. He w as sp eaking

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Lexical aspect 17

of time

schemata .

However, it is not clear whether time schemata are

part of the lexical semantic contents of verbs, or part of the temporal

properties of situations to which the verbs refer. Admittedly, it is not

always

easy to separate lexical semantics from the objects and situation s

to

which

th e

lexical items refer.

But we

would like

to

make this distinc-

tion here, for reasons that will become clear later on. Our intention in this

book is to treat lexical aspect as lexical categories according to the kinds

of temporal properties that the lexical items inherently encode, not as

situational categories according to the temporal properties that the

situations typically display. W e contend

that

situatio nal properties are not

necessarily reflected directly in lexical semantics, and that the confusion

between the two often leads to negative consequences in the study of

language acquisition (see

further

discussion in Chapter 3).

The ab stract concepts of, for ex am ple, states and activities can be

viewed

as

universal semantic notions, independent

of

particular lan-

guages. In other words, every languag e may have lexical means to

encod e states and activities. How ever, w hic h verbs encode states and

which encode activities

i s

languag e-specific,

and can be

determined only

within the context of a given language. Acc ordingly, children have to

learn to identify wh ich verbs encode w hich tempo ral properties of a

situation in the language being acquired. An example from Comrie

(1976) clearly demonstrates the need to disting uish between in her ent

verb m eanings and temporal p roperties of situations. Acco rding to

Comrie, English

and

Portuguese treat perception verbs (e.g., see

hear}

differently. English treats them

as

stative,

an d

these verbs consequently

do not accept progressive marking , while Portuguese treats them as no n-

stative, so they can n atura lly accept progressive m ark ing . Take Japanese

fo r another example. Japanese does not have a stative verb correspo nd-

ing to the

Engl ish

know. In

order

to

express

a

notion like

/ know him

Japanese speakers use the verb

siru

which means 'come to

k n o w

and

attach to it the durative aspect m arker -teiru to denote the resultative state

after

coming

to

know him. Thus,

in

Japanese,

siru

is an

achievement

verb. These examples show that verbs

in

different languages

m ay

differ

with respect to their lexical characteristics even tho ug h they refer to the

same situations. Such crosslinguistic differences show that there is no

one-to-one mapping between given types of situations and given types of

lexical

items.

Having emphasized

the

importance

of

this distinction,

w e

must

ac-

knowledge that

correspondences

between lexical contents

and

situational

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18 spect

properties are not totally arbitrary. There are clear cases where languages

do not differ. For example, there is pro bab ly no lang uag e that treats the

verb referring to killing someone as stative, and the verb jump in any

language has to somehow encode the pu nctu ality of the action as part of

its

meaning. Thus, while

it is

important

for

theoretical

an d

empirical

reasons to disti ngu ish classifications of situations from classifications of

lexical aspect categories, in practice, they

often

coincide.

2 3 Lexical aspect

and

gramm atical aspect

As discussed above, it is clear that interpretation of the aspectual proper-

ties

of a

sentence cannot

be

determined without considering

the

contri-

bution of the lexical aspect of the verb. It is also clear that the aspectual

meaning

of a sentence can, by and large, be predicted on the basis of

which gram m atical aspect is com bined with wh ich lexical aspect cate-

gory.

One

explicit proposal

in

this regard

is

that

of

Smith

(1991,

1997).

In this section, we present our view of how aspectual m eaning is dete r-

mined as a function of the combinatorial properties o f lexical aspect and

grammatical aspect

on the

basis

of

Smith's theory

of

aspect

and the

grammaticization theory

of Bybee,

Perkins,

an d

Pagliuca (1994).

Smith

(1997)

proposed a comprehensive theory of aspect, which she

labeled

as a

two-component theory .

The two

components

are

what

she calls situation type

and viewpoint

aspect , which roughly

correspond to what we have described so far as lexical aspect and

grammatical

aspect ,

respectively. Smith's theory attempts to account

for diverse aspectual phenomena related to the interaction between

situation type (achievement, accomplishment, activity, state, and

semel-

factive) and viewpoint aspect (perfective, imperfective, and neutral)

12

.

W e have been using

the

term

lexical

aspect

of

verbs ,

but

strictly

speaking, the lexical aspect valu e is determ ined by both the verb and its

arguments, which Smith

(1997)

calls

th e

verb constellation. Ex am ples

include [John love Mary] (state), [John run] (activity), [John run a m ile]

(accomplishment), [John reach the summit] (achievement), and [John

jump] (semelfactive). Note that what is inside [ ] is not a linguistic form

but th e

proposition underlying

it,

wi thout

any

verb morphology

to

signal

the viewpoint aspect. In such instances, we are talking about the semantic

structure of

verb-plus-arguments without

an y

value imposed

by

gram-

matical aspect.

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Lexical and grammatical aspect 19

Another component of the two-component theory is viewpoint aspect.

Smith

used the

term viewpoint

since it is essentially the speaker 's

choice as to which aspectual perspective should be used. To describe the

fact

that John ran a mile yesterday, the speaker can choose to present it

from either

a

perfective viewpoint John ran a mile)

or an

imperfective

viewpoint John w as running a mile). If the story is about what happ ened

while

John w as jogging y esterday, imperfective viewpoint wo uld be used.

If th e story is about what John did

after

he ran a mile, then perfective

viewpoint would be used.

13

The speaker chooses to use a certain combi-

nation of lexical items (with lexical aspect value) and m orph ology

(with

gramm atical aspect v alue), wh ich results in a part icular intended mean-

ing, such as action-in-progress, completion, stative, etc.

2 3 1 Interaction

between lexical aspect

and grammatical

aspect

How do particular comb inations of lexical aspect and gram ma tical aspect

result

in

particular interpretations

of a

sentence? What

are the

principles

behind

it? In

this subsection,

we

present

an

account

of how the

interac-

tion

between the two levels of aspect works. O ur account differs f rom

Smith 's in minor details, but the principles are essentially the same.

Imperfective

and progressive aspect

As

discussed in

2.1,

both general im perfective and progressive m arkers

have the same viewpoint aspect value, except that the progressive view-

point is [+dynamic]. Therefore, they show very similar distributions in

their interaction with lexical aspect. Since imperfective viewpoint presents

a situation from

within,

disregarding it s beginning or endpoint , it re-

quires duration upon which the internal view can be imposed. If there is

no duration, it is impossible to treat the beginning point or endpoint

separately. This requirement predicts that some achievements are incom-

patible with imperfective aspect,

as

seen

in the

ungrammatical i ty

of

*H e

is noticing a friend.

To see the properties of lexical aspect clearly, we repeat the

fol lowing

diagram

from

section

2.2

here,

with th e

addition

of

semelfactives.

The

punctual poin t of ac tion for seme lfactives is represented by ·, since it is

not

telic,

but atelic.

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20 Aspect

State love contain know

Activi ty run walk

swim

Accompl ishment ~ — „ ~ ~ X

paint

a

picture

build a house

Achievement X fall drop win the race

Semelfactive

jump knock cough

Although achievements do not normally allow for an internal view of

imperfective

aspect, it is sometimes possible to impose an inte rna l view

on an achievement verb by focu sing on the preliminary stages of an

event (i.e., th e process leading up to the endpoint). To elaborate, John

was reaching the summit means that John was at a stage jus t prior to

being

at the

summit,

not

that

he was in the

middle

of

reaching

the

sum-

mit. As another example, Joh n is winning the race is appropriate when

Jo hn s horse is ahead of all other horses in the race, even tho ug h he has

not a ctua lly reached the finishing l ine.

Semelfactive

is

another pu nctu al, instantaneou s category that imp lies

no

durat ion.

In

this case,

th e

speaker

can

only impose

an

internal view

on

the situatio n wh en the du ration is created by repetition. Thus, John

is

jumping normally refers to

John's

repetitive acts of jum ping , that is,

multiple jum ps in a single activity, which Smith (1997) called Multiple-

event Activity.

14

In

contrast to achievements and semelfactives, categories that have

duration, i .e., activities, accomplishments, and states, can readily accept an

internal view. Both general imperfective a nd progressive ma rkers y ield

the

action-in-progress

meaning w hen attached to activity and accom-

plishment

verbs, focusing

on the

dynamic durat ion

of the

si tuation

denoted

by the

verbs.

With respect to

stative

verbs, the pic ture is a little diffe rent. Stative

verbs do not usual ly combine with progressive aspect: a large set of

English stative verbs and their translation equivalents in other languages

do not norm ally accept progressive marking, includin g psyc hologic al

and cognitive verbs such as wan t need like love believe and know

perception verbs such as see hear and feel and relational verbs or verbs

of existence such as resemble possess have and be. The incompat ibi l i ty

seems

to be

that since progressive aspect presents

a

situation

as

ongoing,

it requires that

th e

situation have successive phases, i.e., that

i t be dy-

nam ic, whereas the cogn itive, perception, and relation or existence verbs

indicate only undifferentiated

and

hom ogeneou s situations. Progress

presupposes

th e

dynamic development

of a

situation. Thus, progressive

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exical and grammatical aspect 21

aspect comb ines natu rally with activity and ac com plishm ent verbs, but

not w ith stative verbs. How ever, unde r ce rtain circu ms tances some Stative

verbs do appear in the progressive, w hich we will call stative progres-

sive . For example, Smith (1983) showed that progressive aspect can be

used with stative verbs to present a state as an event, such as in John is

believing in ghosts these days.

Another example is

John is being stupid

in

wh i ch

th e

stative progre ssive refers

to a

part icular behavior

of

J o h n '

s

at

th e

time

of

speech,

in

contrast

to

John is stupid which refers

to a

general characteristic attributed to John. John is being stupid does not

make any claim about John's intell igence before or after the moment of

speech, but rather that John is behav ing s tupidly.

General imperfective aspect, in contrast to progressive, is na tur all y

com patible with stative verbs and does not yield special

m e a n ings .

15

Note that general im perfective has the features of [+intemal view ] and

[ -dynamic] , and therefore, it can easily find durat ion in a state, and it

does not trigger the action-in-progress m ean ing because stative verbs

also have the feature

[-dynamic] .

The obtained meaning of general

imperfective with stative verbs

is

thus 'state co n t i n u i n g ' ,

as in La

mer

etait calme

'the sea was c a lm ' in

Frenc h (Sm ith 1997: 197)

or Wuli-de

deng kai-zhe 'the light in the room is on in Chinese.

Perfective aspect

Perfective aspect combines naturally with achievement verbs, because by

def ini t ion, perfective aspect presents a si tuation as a single whole, and

achievement verbs provide ideal instantiation

of

such

a

v iewpoin t

in

t h a t

they depict pu nctual s i tuat ions a s single points wi thout internal s t ructure.

Because achievements involve an endpoint , thei r combinat ion with

perfective aspect denotes

the

complet ion

of a

si tuat ion, al though

in

this

case

th e

beginning point

of the

situation coincides with

it s

poin t

of

complet ion.

Perfective aspect also na tural ly combines wi th accom plishments and is

norm ally interpreted as indica ting the com pletion of a si tuation, since by

definition accomplishments incorporate an endpoin t , and perfect ive

aspect views

the

situation

as a

single whole external ly , with both init ial

and

terminal points.

For

example,

John built a

house

not

only presents

the building process as a single whole, but also indicates that the house

w as

indeed finished.

The not ion of complet ion is not appl icable to uses of the perfec t ive

with activity verbs, since activit ies encode situatio ns with

no

i n h e ren t

Unauthenticated




22

Aspect

endpoints (Comrie 1976; Lyons 1977). For example, John ran cannot

indicate

that John completed

his

running.

To ask Has John finished

runnin is not

appropriate unless

th e

speaker

has in

mind

in

advance

some delimiter to the distance or time John ran.

John ran,

then, indicates

simply

that John engaged

in the

activity

of

running

for a

while

an d

that

at

some arbitrary (unsp ecified) point this activity terminated.

In the

same

vein, pe rfective aspect with semelfactive verbs conveys

a

termination

and

not

a

completion

of the

situation (e.g.,

John coughed).

Earlier

we

pointed

out

that

the progressive aspect is not compatible

with

stative verbs because of the verbs lack of dyn amic me anin g.

Perfective

aspect

is not

c ompatible with stative verbs, either. This

is

because stative verbs

do not

include either

a

beginning point or

an

endpoint in

their temporal structure. Therefore, perfective aspect, which

includes

both

the

beginning

and end

points

of a situation in its

focus,

cannot normally combine with stative verbs.

In

rare cases when

th e

combination is

possible,

it

indicates

an

entry into

a

state

as in Then

suddenly I knew it

by

focusing

on the

punctual point

of

entry into that

state. This

in

effect translates

a

stative verb into

an

achievement verb.

The interaction discussed in this subsection is summarized in Table

2.2, wh ich covers the most common grammatical aspect types, alth ou gh

it is not

meant

to be

exhaustive

or

without exception. Excluded from

our

analyses here

are the

more marked cases

of

habitual reference (e.g.,

He is

walking to school these days) an d

futurate (e.g.,

W e are eating out

tonight), which

can be

obtained with

any of the

dynamic verb classes.

Table

2.2. Intera ction

of

lexical

aspect

with grammatical

aspect

State Activi ty

Accomplishment

Achievement

Imperfective

Progressive

Perfective

state

??

stative prog

prog

prog

?? termination

inchoative

prog

prog

completion

prel im, stage

prelim, stage

99

completion

Semelfactive

iterative prog

iterative prog

termination

prog

=

progressive

prelim,

stage

=

prel iminary

stages of

event

?? =

questionable combination

Our discussion in this subsection, as summarized in Table 2.2, shows

clearly that there are combinatorial constraints or compatibility between

certain grammatical

aspect and

certain lexical aspect. Comrie (1976)

Unauthenticated




Lexical and gramm atical aspect 23

discussed this kind of lexical-grammatical relationships with the n a t u -

ralness

of com binat ion principle . According to

Comrie,

perfect ive

aspect combines natu rally with pu nctu al verbs, for exam ple, because

perfective aspect presents a situation as a whole wi thout regard to its

internal structure and punctual verbs

encode

a s i tuat ion as a s ingle point

lacking internal structure. Conversely,

imperfective

aspect is not com-

patible with punctual verbs (except semelfactives, which

can be

const rued

iteratively), because imperfective aspect presents a situation as having an

internal structure while

a

punctual verb

encodes it as a

point lacking

internal structure.

Activi ty

verbs lend themselves naturally to the internal

perspective of impe rfective aspect because they encode the successive

phases of an event over t ime. Such interactions between lexical and

grammatical aspect presumably originate in certain natural relationships

between events in reali ty. For exam ple, w hen w e know that a si tuation

comes

to its end

with

a

clear result, this situation

has

probably al ready

become

a past event, and we are therefore l ikely to commen t on its

completion by means of perfective aspect (Brown

1973).

Many s i tua-

t ions with

an end

result last

for

such

a

brief time that they

are

almost

certain to have ended before one can comment on them, such as si tua-

tions denoted

by

verbs like drop fall

and

crash. These situations almost

exclude the internal perspective of imperfective aspect. In sum, there are

likely

to be

strong associations

in the

real world between resultat ivity

or

telicity and the use of past and perfective verb forms, and between atelic

activities and the use of

present

and

progressive verb forms.

3 Variation cross l ngu ges

in gr mm ticiz tion

o f

aspect

As noted earl ier, there is variation across lan guag es in how aspec tual

notions

are

grammaticized. There

are two

types

of

variation

to

consider:

in the pattern of grammaticization and in the degree of grammaticiza-

t ion.

First,

different languages develop

different

types of grammat ica l as-

pect,

and

some languages

do not

have grammatical aspect (e.g., Hebrew,

Finnish).

In

terms

of

combinatorial properties

of

aspect

and

tense,

Ro m ance langua ges have a perfective-imperfective d ist inction only in the

past tense. Many Slavic languages , al though grammatical ly marking both

tense and aspect, do not have perfective aspect in the present tense

(e.g.,

Polish, Russian). In terms of combinatorial properties of grammatical

aspect and lexical aspect, the Japanese imperfective marker -te i- c a n n o t

Unauthenticated




24

Aspect

focus

on the prel iminary stage of an event as in English; instead it

focuses on the duration after th e terminal point of a situation, and has the

perfect

and

resul tat ive me aning.

The

Chinese perfective le does

no t

necessarily yield th e meaning o f completion wi th telic verbs (see Chapter

5 for details). These variations are not rando m. Typological research

(Dahl

1985;

Bybee,

Perkins, and Pagliu ca 1994) has sho w n that

some

of

these tendencies reflect common patterns of grammaticization. For

example, i t has been suggested that the reason ma ny languages do not

have perfective aspect

fo r present is

that

th e

most natural

way of talking

about situations existing

at

speech time

is

imperfective (state, progressive,

or

habi tual)

and not

perfective, because perfective indicates something

has

been completed or terminated. This pattern indicates the importance

of

funct ional motivat ion

in

shaping systems

o f

grammatical aspect

in

natural language.

Second, grammatical aspect markers

in

different languages also vary

in their degree

of

grammaticization, which

is in

turn reflected

in

their

different combinatorial patterns with lexical aspect. As noted earlier, it

has

been suggested that progressive markers grammaticize into general

imperfective markers (Bybee, Perkins, and Pagliuca 1994: 140-149 . In

English,

th e

progressive aspect

is

highly grammaticized.

In

addition

to its

unmarked progressive meaning (i.e., action in progress), it can also be

used for stative progressive, prelimin ary stages, habitu al, and fu tura te .

Progressive markers in other lan gu ages m ay be less gramm aticized, and

practically limited

to the

typical action-in-progress meaning,

for exam-

ple, in Chinese, Malay, and Thai. Thus, in these languages, progressive

mark ers cann ot be used for other occ asions (e.g., with states or achieve-

ments). Similarly, perfective aspect is also sensitive to the

degree

of

grammaticization in its

interaction with lexical aspect.

As

discussed

above, perfective aspect

is

either incompatible

wi th

stative verbs,

or has an

inchoat ive meaning with some stative verbs.

A s

perfective aspect gram-

maticizes, however, it can be used as past tense marker, that is, to

describe

a

state that existed

in the

past (e.g.,

The book was there yesterday; see

Bybee, Perkins,

and

Pagliuca 1994: 92).

For

example,

th e

English past

tense is aspec tually perfective (Smith 1997), signaling com pletion or

termination with dynamic verbs or inception with some stative verbs (e.g.,

Then I knew // ). But as a highly grammaticized form in the func t ion of

simple

past tense,

it can

also

be freely

applied

to

stative verbs

to

locate

states

in the

past time.

The

Japanese past tense marker ta

has a

similar

Unauthenticated




Lexical and grammatical aspect 25

property, and is considered to be in a gramm aticization t ransi t ion fr om

perfect to perfective and furth er to simple past (Horie 1997).

Finally,

a

theoretically imp ortant variation concerns that

of

lexical

aspect. As we hav e discussed, some lang uage s (e.g., En glish) accept

imperfective/progressive with achievement verbs

to

focus

on

p re l i m i n a ry

stages of an event (e.g.,

He is reaching the summ it

whereas others

(e.g.,

Chinese and Japanese) do not. On the basis of this observation, Smith

(1997) suggested that achieveme nts in Chinese do n ot inc lude prelim i-

nary

stages

of an

event, whereas those

in

Engl ish

do. An

alternative

interpretation of this phen om enon is that the Chinese progressive m ar k-

ers zai or the

Japanese marker

-te i-

simply cannot focus

on

p r e l im i n a r y

stages of an event . In other words, it is not the lexical aspect of the verb

that

does

not include preliminary stages, but the grammatical aspect

marker that cannot denote such stages (Shirai

1998a).

This interpretat ion

attributes

the

difference between Engl ish

and

Chinese

to

variat ion

in

grammatical aspect, not in lexical aspect. O f course, this issue - wh e t h e r

th e different ial behavior of progressives in different languages is due to

grammatical aspect or lexical aspect needs further empirical invest iga-

t ion.

2.4. A time relational analysis of

aspect

Most l inguistic analyses, including ours, have adopted

the

def ini t ion

of

grammatical aspect given in

Comrie (1976).

That is , gram ma tical aspect

involves di fferent ways

of v iewing th e

temporal contour

of a

s i tua-

tion: perfective aspect presents

an

external view

of the

situation

as a

single whole in its entirety without reference to its internal s t ructure, and

imperfective

aspect

an

internal view

of the

inner const i tuency

of the

situation without regard for the situation's init ial or final b o u n d ar i e s .

Smith (1983) treats this definit ion

of

aspect

as

v iewpoin t

aspect , in

contrast

to

si tuat ion

aspect

(see 2.3). Much

th e

same

def ini t ion of

aspect has been used in research by other l ingu ists (e.g.,

D ah l

1985;

Bybee 1985; Bybee, Perkins,

and

Pagliuca 1994).

This approach to aspect has been challenged recently by Klein (1994 ,

1995,

in

press). According

to

Klein,

th e

def in i t ion

of

aspect

as

d i f f e ren t

ways of v iewing a situation is entirely metaphorical , and thus vague: what

does it

mean exactly

to

view

a

s i tua t ion

in its

entirety,

or as a

s ing le

whole,

or

with

or

witho ut reference

to its

in terna l cons t i tuency?

For

example, the difference between

John stood on h is toes

and

John was

Unauthenticated




26 Aspect

standing

on his

toes is

characterized

as

that between

th e

perfective

and

th e

imperfective,

yet it is difficult to

grasp

th e

metaphorical differen ces

of

entirety, wholeness,

or

reference

to

internal structure

in

these

in -

stances. In view of this problem , Kl ein proposed that aspect should be

examined on a par with tense, strictly in terms of temporal relations, such

as prior to

(>), contained in (c),

or

posterior

to

(<), between

the

time intervals that

are

described

by

aspectual markers.

In

particular,

Klein argued that three types

of

time intervals

are

involved

in

this time-

relational theory of analysis and aspect:

TU:

t ime

of

utterance, i.e.,

the

time

at

which

an

utterance

is

produced;

T-SIT:

time of situation, i.e., the time at w hich the situation described by

th e

utterance obtains;

TT: topic time, i.e., the time span abou t wh ich something is said or for

which

an

assertion

is

made.

For exam ple, for the sentence

John was

writing

a letter

TU is the time

at

which

th e

speaker produces

th e

sentence,

T-SIT is the

time

at

which

the

situ ation of Joh n's writing a letter obtains, and TT is the time span

about w h ich the speaker makes an assertion. In this sentence, all that is

claimed

is

that there

was

some time span within which John

was

per-

forming

th e

action

of

writing

a

letter; whether John completed

th e

letter-

writing action

is left

open. Thus,

the

tense function

of the

sentence

is

represented by TT < TU (topic time preceding time of utterance), while

the aspect function is represented by TT c

T-SIT

(topic time contained

in time

of

situation).

16

In

other w ords, tense

is

concerned with

the

tempo-

ra l

relations between

TT and TU,

while aspect

is

concerned with

the

temporal relations between TT and T-SIT. In this analysis, the same

kinds of temporal relations (<, >, c) operate on both tense and aspect.

This analysis thus eliminates

th e

vagu eness associated w ith traditio nal

metaphorical interpretations of aspect in terms of ways of viewing a

situation. The

follow ing diagram shows

how the

major tense

and

aspect

categories

are

represented

in

this fram ew ork (see Kle in 1994, 1995 fo r

a

detailed analysis):

TENSE: Past TT < TU

Present TT D TU

Future TT > TU

Unauthenticated




Time relational analysis 21

ASPECT:

Imperfective

TT

T-SIT

Perfective TT

T-SIT

What does this time-relational analysis have to say about the acquisi-

tion of

aspect?

Although currently no studies have used this framework

to

directly examine

th e

acquisition

of

tense

an d

aspect,

one can

imagine

that

a

whole

new set of

interesting empirical questions would arise from

the standpoint of this perspective. For example, which temporal relations

are entertained by children at which time? When and how do children

separate TU from

T-SIT,

TU

from

TT, and

T-SIT

from TT?

What

underlies children's development in their understanding of the various

relations between th e three temporal intervals, fo r tense and

aspect,

respectively? What language-universal and language-specific patterns do

children display in the acquisition of these temporal relations?

7

While there

is a

great deal

of

theoretical motivation

an d

empir ical

evidence for the time-relational analysis of tense and aspect, and answe rs

to the above questions are important in addressing developmental and

crosslinguistic issues, our analysis of aspect in this book rem ains t rad i-

tional, for several reasons. First, our original language acquisition studies

were conducted

within

the framework of a viewpoint aspect type of

linguistic analysis. Since the kinds of research questions in the time-

relational framework

are

very

different,

it

would

be

difficult

to

test these

question s with our existing data. Second, im portan t to our study is the

relationship between grammatical aspect and lexical aspect in adult as

well as child language, as discussed throughout this chapter. It is not yet

entirely clear how the time-relational analysis of aspect captures the

intricate relationships between lexical and grammatical aspect (see Klein,

Li, and Hendriks, in press, for an attempt to

study

this issue in Chinese).

Finally, since almost all previous studies hav e exam ined the acq uisi tion

of

aspect on the basis of the traditional definition of aspect, it would be

imp ortant as well as conv enient for us to evaluate and com pare our

studies against previous

findings on the

same theoretical

an d

empir ica l

bases, using the same termino logies. Nevertheless, researchers in lan -

guage acquisition will find the time-relational analysis of aspect relevant

an d

useful,

as such new linguistic analyses could have considerable

significance

fo r

reconceptualizing issues

of

acq uisi tion.

Unauthenticated




28 spect

2.5.

ummary

In th is

chapter, we hav e provided an int roduct io n to theories of aspect by

discuss ing

two kinds of aspect, grammatical and lexical, with respect

par t icular ly to l inguis t ic an d

typological considera t ions.

W e

examined

Comrie s

c lassic definit ion of perfective and imperfective aspect,

V e n d le r s

four c ategories of lexical aspect (activities, states, acc om plish -

ments, an d achievements) , an d Sm ith s two-componen t theory of aspect

( the s i tuat ion type and the v iewpoint aspect). W e also presented K lein s

approach

to

aspect

in

terms

of

tempo ral relat ions, wh ich challeng es

classic

defini t ions of aspect.

In

this chapter, we have placed a strong emp hasis on the intera ction

between grammatical aspect and lexical aspect in the interpretat ion of the

sentence s aspectual meaning .

W e

looked

at the

combinatorial propert ies

of given aspectual markers with given types of verbs, and the differen t

implicat ions

tha t a given grammatical aspect conveys when i t combines

with verbs of different lexical aspect. As is the case with most studies in

language acquisi t ion, a c lear l inguist ic analysis of a part icular domain

serves as a

good

s tart ing

poin t

for understanding the acquisi t ion of tha t

domain. Thus, we have la id the basis here for the s tudy of the acquisi t ion

of aspect.

Grammatical aspect, lexical aspect,

and the

interaction between

the two

have important theoret ical implicat ions for language acquisi t ion. As we

will see in later chapters, in both child language and adult

second

lan-

guage learning, there

is a

c lear interaction between gramm atical aspect

and lexical aspect in the acqu isi t ion of tense-aspect m orphology, and this

interaction occurs across diverse languages. Moreover, a s we have

stressed

in

this chapter, aspect stands

at the

interface between lexicon

an d

mo rpholog y, and th us aspect not only emerges as a gramm atical task for

learners,

but

also serves

as a

ca ta lyst

for

the i r acquisi t ion

of the

lexicon.

For example, th e morphological marking of

aspect

is a dist inct feature of

verbs and not nouns or other grammatical categories of the sentence.

Chi ldren

may use

aspect markers

as a

means

to

he lp them di s t ingui sh

verbs

from

n o u n s ,

in

w hic h case aspect serves

as a

k ind

of

syntact ic

bootst rapping device.

18

To ful ly un dersta nd the relat ionships between

grammatical aspect and lexical aspect, not only descriptively for the

language, but also developmental ly for the language learner, we now turn

to the acquisi t ion of aspect.

Documents

Aspect: Problem of lexicon and morphology