The role of perfective aspect in the interpretation of NPs |
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Ewa Rudnicka-Mosiądz (Wrocław ) |
In natural languages noun phrases (NPs) may refer to
kinds as well as to particular objects or individuals. Carlson (1977) was the
first to argue for the universal (generic) interpretation of NPs in the former
case and the existential (non-generic) one in the latter. The growth of
interest in these issues has been at least partially due to many cases of
ambiguity between the two readings. Therefore, linguists have always struggled
to discover and formulate criteria that would allow to distinguish between the
two uses of the same NP. It has been noticed from the very beginning that the
reading of NPs is as much dependent on the features of their morphosyntax, like
case or definiteness, for instance, as on the morphosyntactic properties of
their verbal predicates such as tense, progressivity, and aspect (cf. Carlson
1977, Dahl 1995, Krifka 1995, Delfitto 1998).
In this paper we are going to demonstrate that there
are systematic correlations between temporal and aspectual properties of
predicates and the universal vs. existential interpretations of their
subject NPs. Krifka et al (1995: 12) note that the progressive form of the
English VP gives rise to the existential interpretation of the subject NP
(cf. (1), their (27c)).
(1) Italians are drinking wine.
(x;y[x are Italians; y is
wine & x drink y]
We will claim that in Polish it is the perfective
aspect that forces the existential reading of subject NP (cf. (2) and (3)).
(2) Włosi
wypiją
wino .
Italians drink-FUT-PERF wine
'Italians will drink wine.'
(x;y[x are
Italians; y is wine & x will drink y]
(3) Włosi
wypili
wino.
Italians drink-PAST-PERF wine
'Italians have drunk wine.'
(x;y[x
are Italians; y is wine & x have drunk y]
We are going to defend the hypothesis of minimal
marking tendency first postulated by Dahl (1995: 415), and then also argued for
by Delfitto (1998: 1), who asserts that "...natural languages exhibit a
sort of minimal marking tendency in generic contexts, that is, temporal and
aspectual markers tend to be reduced to a minimum when predicates are
interpreted generically." Progressive is clearly the marked member of the
progressive /non-progressive pair in English, while it is generally assumed
(cf. Binnick 1991: 52) that it is perfective which is the marked
member of the aspectual pair in Slavic. Our data support the minimal marking
tendency, since in both English and Polish marked forms of VPs restrict the
interpretation of their subject NPs to the existential (that is non-generic)
one. On the other hand, the minimal marking tendency explains otherwise highly
unexpected pairing of progressive and perfective forms. Semantically
progressive shows the affinity with imperfective, while perfective with
non-progressive.
Our observation brings in additional piece of evidence
in favor of the belief that the interpretation of NPs depends as much on their
own properties as on the ones of their VPs. It also supports the idea of
the cross-linguistic minimal marking tendency in generic contexts
encouraging further studies of the interpretation of NPs at the
syntax-semantics interface.
References:
Binnick, R.I. 1991. Time and the Verb. A Guide to
Tense and Aspect. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Carlson, G. 1977. "A Unified Analysis of the
English Bare Plural." Linguistics &Philosophy.
Dahl, O. 1995. "The Marking of the
Episodic/Generic Distinction in Tense-Aspect Systems." In G. Carlson and
J. Pelletier. eds. The Generic Book. Chicago.
Delfitto, D. 1998. Aspect, Genericity and Bare
Plurals. Utrecht Institute of Linguistics OTS.
Krifka, M. et al. 1995."Genericity: an
introduction." In G. Carlson and J. Pelletier. eds. The Generic Book. Chicago.