No title

JOURNAL

OF

SEMANTICS

AN INTERNATIONAL j OURNAL FOR THE INTERDISCIPLINARY STUDY OF THE SEMANTICS OF NATURAL LANGUAGE MAN AGING E J) I TOR: REVIEW EDITOR:

EDITORIAL BOAIU):

PETER BoscH ( IBM Gamany) IJARTGEURTs(JI3M Gamany) PETER BoscH ( IBM Gamany)

SiMON C.GARROD (Univ. of Glasg ow)

BARTGEURTS (JUM Germany)

PAUL HoPPER (Carnegie Mellon Univ .. Pimburgh) LAURENCE

H.

HoRN (Yale University)

STEPHEN lsARD (Univ. of Edinburgh) HANS KAMP (Univ. of Stuttgart) LEO G. M. NoORDMANN (Univ. ofTilburg) Ron A. VAN DER SANDT (Univ. of Nijmcgcn) P1ETER A.M . SEUREN (Univ. ofNijmcgen)

CONSULTING EDITORS : It BARTSCH (U niv. of A ms te r d am)

SJR JoHN LYONS ( U niv. of Cambridge)

J. VAN BENTHEM ( U n iv. of Amstn dam)

D.

S. IJREE (Univ. of Manchester)

G.

BROWN (Univ. of Cambridge)

H. H.

E.

W. MARSLEN-Wn.SON (MRC. Cambridge) J.

A. J. SANFORD (Univ. of Glasgow)

H.

ScHNELLE (Huhr Uni v. Uochum)

A. VON Sn:cHow (Univ. of Konstanz)

G. FAUCONNIER (U niv. of California, San I)iego )

M. STEEDMAN (Univ. of Pennsylvania)

D. VANDERVEKEN (Univ. of Quebec)

J. HonBS (SRI, Menlo Park)

D. ISRAEL (SRI, Menlo Park) P. N.JoHNSON-LAJRn (MI{C, Cambridge) E. L. KEENAN (Univ. of Calif(mJia.

Z.

VENDLER (Univ.

of California, San Diego)

B. L. WEBBER (Univ. of Pcnnyslvania)

Y. WILKS

Los Ange ll' s)

(

of Chicago)

ll. RICHARDS ( Imperia l Colle ge, London)

H. CLARK ( Stan f(> rd University) 0. DAHL (Univ. of Stockho lm) H.-J. EJKMEYER (Un iv. of Biele feld)

E. LANG U niv.

D. McCAWLEY (Univ.

H. REICHGELT ( Univ. of Nottingham)

ilREKLE (Univ. of Regensburg)

(New Mexico State Univ.,

Las Cruces)

D. Wn.soN (Univ.

of Wupper tal )

Collc·gc, London).

E J) IT OR I A L AD J)R E SS: Journal of Semantics. IBM Germany Scientific Centre. IWBS 7000-7). Postfach XooXXo, D-7000 Stuttgart Xo. Germany. Phone: �y-71 1- My)-SW Telcfax: �y-71 1 My)-jOo.lliTNET: bosch@ds.,Jilog.

(

)

(

)

New Subscribers to the journal of Semantics should apply to the Journals Subscription Department, Oxford University Press. Pinkhill House. Southfield Road. Eynsham. OXX 1 . For further information see the inside back cover.

jj

Volumes 1-6 arc available from foris Publications Holland. PO Box soy. Netherlands.

© Copyright by NIS

3300

Am Dordrecht. The

Foundation

All rights rest·rved; no pan of this publication may

be

rt· pr odun·d . srort·d in a rt:tricval sysrc.·m. or rransmi ned in any

form or by any llll'ans. elt·crronic. mech;mical. plwr ocopyi n g. recording. or orherwiSt· wirhour t•irher rhl· prior wrirren

permission of thl· Publisht.·rs, or a lict•nce pl·rmining resrricrnl copying issul·d in rhe UK by the Copyright Lin· nsing

Agency Lrd. l)O Torr l·n ham Coun Hoad. London W 1 P 9HE. or Congress Srn.·cr. Salem. Mass OH)70.

Tht· Journal ofSemanrics is publislwd yuarrcrly hy Oxford p•:nding at N,·wark. N,·w Jersey. JSSN 011>7-5 1 JJ.

POSTMASTER send addrt·s�

in

rhc USA by

University

corrl·ctions to Tht• Journal of St.·manrics.

1 )O, Nc:wark International Airporr. Nl·wark. New Jcrst·y 071 1..._, U SA .

dw

Copyright Clearance Ce mcr. 2.7

Press. Subscription is $l)O pt•r year. St·ctllld class c/o Virgi n Mailing and Disrriburion. Building

JOURNAL OF SEMANTICS Volume 8 Number 4

CONTENTS

]. RIJKHOFF Nominal Aspect ]. P. McDowELL Quasi -assertion

311

C. ScHWARZE Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space to French

333

M. HERWEG

Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

Journal ofSemanlics 8: 291-309

© N.l.S. Foundation (1991)

Nominal Aspect J. RIJKHOFF University ofAmsterdam

Abstract

I NT R O D U C T I O N1 In a general way the notion 'aspect' can be defined as the way in which a property or relation is represented in some dimension. Two kinds of aspect can be distinguished: verbal and nominal aspect. The study of verbal aspect has a long tradition, but nominal aspect has only been introduced recently, at least in the sense in which it is used here (Rijkhoff 1 989b, 1990a, 1 990b).2 After a brief look at the more familiar verbal aspects, each of the nominal aspects is discussed in some detail. Then the relevance of nominal aspect will be considered in connection with (i) certain 'number markers' (which will be analysed as nominal aspect markers below), (ii) noun-incorporation, and (iii) predicate nouns. I

A S PE C T

I.I Verbal aspect

Properties and relations in the temporal dimension, which are designated by verbs (sit, walk, read, etc.), can be characterized in terms of the typically temporal features BEGINNING and ENDING. This gives us four ways of representing such properties and relations, i.e. four verbal aspects (Figure I ) . Although at least within some of these aspects finer subdivisions can be made (such as ±progressive in the imperfective and ±momentaneous in the perfective; see Comrie I 976), and despite the fact that some verbs are inherently

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

In this article I argue that besides verbal aspect, which concerns the way a property or relation is represented in the temporal dimension, there is also nominal aspect, which relates to the way a property is represented in the spatial dimension. I will contend that certain elements, which are often believed to be number markers, are in fact nominal aspect markers. Evidence to support this will be taken from several genetically unrelated languages. Additionally it is suggested that nominal aspect plays a role in connection with incorporated and predicate nouns.

292

Nomi nal Aspccr

TIME ending

unmarked ending

marked

beginning

beginning

IMPERFECTIVE

INGRESSIVE

EGRESSIVE

PERFECTIVE

marked

u nmarked

Figure 1

Verbal aspects

1 985), we may say that generally any property or relation designated by a verb can be represented in any of these four ways. Notice that these aspectual distinctions may not only be expressed grammatically, i.e. by means of inflectional morphology, but also by lexical elements or in a periphrastic con­ struction. For a more extensive discussion of verbal aspect I refer to Verkuyl ( 1 972), Comrie ( 1 976), Lyons ( 1 977: ch. 1 5.6), Hopper (ed.) ( 1 982), Tedeschi & Zaenen (eds) ( 1 98 1 ), de Groot & Tommola (eds) ( 1 984), Chung & Timberlake ( 1 98s).

1 .2

Nominal aspect

Nominal aspect is defined as the way in which a property, as designated by a noun, is represented in the spatial dimension with respect to the features SHAPE a.nd STRUCTURE. Nominal aspect is usually coded covertly, i.e. it is a lexical feature of the noun as it occurs in the lexicon. For example, there is nothing that explicitly marks the English noun car as a count noun or

water

as a

mass noun. The fact that generally nouns (but not verbs) are inherently coded for some aspectual meaning may be related to the idea that spatial orientation is primary in human cognition (Anderson

1980:

ch.

1 2; Lyons 1 977= 7 1 8 £).

1 973; Traugott 1 978; Lakoff & Johnson

This is also reflected in the fact that in some

languages the spatial origin of verbal aspect and tense markers is fairly obvious (Comrie

1 976: 98 £, 1 29-30; 1 98 s: I s).

In its turn

temporal elements may

provide the material from which modal elements may develop (Fleischman

1 989)· At this point it may be useful to emphasize that referents of noun phrases (NPs) are not entities in the external physical world; hence we speak of 'intended referent' rather than 'actual referent' (McCawley

1 968: 1 3 8;

Dik

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

coded for the aspectual features ENDING (telic verbs such as 'recover') or BEGINNING +ENDING (momentaneous verbs such as 'hit'; c£ de Groot

J. Rijkhoff 293 I989a: I I I

f).

This may be demonstrated by the fact that we can discuss

referents that cannot be perceived in the immediate extra-linguistic context (Lake Titicaca, the Armada) or never existed (unicorns). Referents of NPs are mental entities, which are construed on the basis of linguistic material. Hence properties of referents of linguistic expressions are due to properties of the elements on the basis of which they are construed (quantifiers, nouns, adjectives, etc.). In other words, there may be discrepancies between referents of NPs and their real-world equivalents (if they exist).3 In this view a referent may be regarded as a collection of facts about participants and props as they (i.e. the facts) are mentioned in ongoing discourse and which are stored in the minds of the speaker and hearer. Using a computer

participants and props that figure in a particular discourse. Every time a new participant or prop is introduced a new record is created (that is, another referent is a construed), which may be updated and which helps the speech participants to keep track of the referent (cf Heim I 982; Rijkhoff I989a). The records in the temporary referent file must have access to various types of long­ term knowledge. For instance, to the knowledge about the situations, events, etc. that some referent was involved in earlier (non-linguistic episodic knowledge; Dik I989b: I I-12). Properties in the spatial dimension can be characterized in terms of the spatial features SHAPE and STRUCTURE. If a property as designated by a noun is marked as having STRUCTURE, this means that the referent that was construed on the basis of such a noun is characterized as being divisible. That is, if the space for which such a property obtains were to be divided, that particular property would still obtain. If a property as designated by a noun is marked as having SHAPE, this means that the referent that was construed on the basis of this noun is characterized as having a definite outline. Thus, in the spatial dimension, too, there are in principle four ways to represent a property. In other words, there are also four nominal aspects (Figure 2). Thus, basically the same property may be represented in different ways. One finds, for example, that one language employs concept nouns where another language uses individual nouns in connection with the same object in the real world. Mandarin Chinese

shu

'book/books', for example, can be regarded as a concept noun (see below). This means, among other things, that it cannot be pluralized and that the referent of the NP headed by this noun may involve one or more individuals (Li & Thompson I98 I: I I; see section I .2.1 below). The English noun

book,

on the

other hand, denotes a singular, spatially bounded entity (i.e. an individual). This implies that it must be pluralized when the speaker wants to indicate that he is referring to more than one book (see section 1.2.2).

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

database system as a metaphor, a referent can be compared with an indexed record in a special referent file. This temporary file keeps records on all

294

Nominal Aspect

SPACE

structure unmarked

structure marked

shape unmarked

CONCEPTUAL

MASS

shape marked

INDIVIDUAL

COLLECTIVE

Figure 2

Nominal aspects

coded covertly, <,:onstituting part of the intrinsic, lexical information of the noun. In certain languages, however, one or two nominal aspects (viz. individual and collective aspect) are explicitly expressed; some such languages are discussed in the section

1.2.1

3 below.

Conceptual and mass aspect

What unites nouns with conceptual and mass aspect is that the properties they designate are unmarked for the aspectual feature SHAPE. This means that referents construed on the basis of such nouns represent spatial entities which are not characterized as being spatially bounded, which makes them unsuitable for direct quantification: both concept and mass nouns require special constructions in the case of cardinality. This common characteristic of concept and mass nouns is the reason that they have sometimes erroneously been regarded as a single type. This has been opposed by Hundius

&

(

Kolver I 98 3:

168-71), among others, who have convincingly argued that there are both semantic and syntactic differences between constructions involving a measure phrase (which is used with mass nouns) and those involving a numeral classifier phrase (which is used with concept nouns; see the Burmese example below). 1.2.1. 1

Conceptual aspect

A noun with conceptual aspect, a concept noun, designates a property in the spatial dimension, but this property is unmarked with respect to the features SHAPE and STRUCTURE. Consequently, the referent of the

NP headed by a

concept noun is not characterized as being divisible or as having a definite outline. Therefore the real-world equivalent of the referent of the

NP headed

by a concept noun (if it exists) could in theory be anything essentially characterized by the property designated by a concept noun.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

It has already been mentioned that these aspectual distinctions are usually

J. Rijkhoff

295

Concept nouns are rather common in South East Asian languages. Accord­ ing to Hundius

&

Kolver

( 1983: 166), for instance, most Thai nouns 'purely

denote concepts and, for this reason, are incompatible with direct quantifica­ tion'. Indeed, one of the diagnostics to identify concept nouns is probably that they cannot be pluralized or occur in a direct construction with a cardinal numeral. Since the designated property is unmarked for a spatial boundary (see also mass aspect below), the space for which the property in question holds cannot be counted, at least not directly; only discrete space can be counted. For this reason a separate construction is used: the numeral classifier phrase. In such a phrase the cardinal numeral is in a direct construction with a numeral classifier, which often seems to function rather like an anaphoric element Oones In Burmese, for example, one might speak of a river

(myi?) in at least eight

contexts, as is indicated by the choice of the numeral classifier following the numeral

t:J 'one' (Becker 1975: 11 3):

myi? t;} ya?

'river one place' (e.g. destination for a picnic)

myi? t;} tan

'river one line' (e.g. on a map)

myi? t;} hmwa

'river one section' (e.g. a fishing area)

myi? t;} 'sin

'river one distant arc' (e.g. a path to the sea)

myi? t;} 8wE

'river one connection' (e.g. tying two villages)

myi? t;} 'pa

'river one sacred object' (e.g. in mythology)

myi? t;} khu'

'river one conceptual unit' (e.g. in a discussion of rivers in general)

myi? t;} myi?

'river one river' (the unmarked case)

Because the property designated by

myi? is unmarked in

features SHAPE and STRUCTURE, the referent of the

terms of the spatial

NP

headed by this

concept noun can be all sorts of things essentially characterized by the spatial property of 'rivemess' (

- pseudo-English equivalent of the concept noun myi?).

1.2. 1 .2 Mass aspect A noun with mass aspect, a mass noun, designates a spatial property which is characterized as having STRUCTURE, but is unmarked as regards the feature

)

SHAPE (c£ Drossard 1982 . Consequently, the referent of the

NP headed by a

mass noun is not characterized as having a definite outline, just like the referent of a

NP headed by a concept noun, but it is

divisible. In effect this means that

the property also holds for any part of the entity (water , a glass ofwater ,

of water; gold, a bar ofgold, half a bar ofgold).

measured as regards size, weight, or volume.

haifa glass

Consequently masses can be

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

1970: 7; Derbyshire & Payne 1990: 243 ).

296

Nominal Aspect

1.2.2 Ind ividual and collective aspect

Nou ns with individual and collective aspect des ignate a property that is characterized as having SHAPE; in o ther wo rds , these no uns hel p to co ns true a referent that represents one or mo re entities with a definite outline. This implies that such no uns can occur in a direct cons tructio n with a cardinal numeral. 1.2.2.1

Individual aspect

1.2.2.2

Collective aspect

Finally, a no un with collective aspect, a collective no un, des ignates a property that is characterized as having SHA PE and STRUCTURE. Hence the s patial entit y that is co ns tru ed o n the bas is o f a collective noun is divis ible and has a defin it e o utl ine. In o ther wo rds, the property designated by a collective no un (e.g. bunch ) defines a number of dis tinct individuals , which all s hare the s ame property (grapes ,flowers , etc.). If the bunch, the collection o f individual grapes or flowers, were to be divided, we co uld s till speak o f grapes or flowers .

2

SET A S P E C T A N D T H E EX P RE S S I O N O F I N D I V I D UA L A N D C O L L E C T I VE A S PECT4

Cert ain languages have grammatical elements that may be regarded as the direct expression of a no minal aspect.5 It s eems, however, that o nl y the two no minal as pects involving the spatial parameter SHAPE, i.e. individual and collecrive aspect, are explicitly expressed by means o f inflectio nal mo rphology. This would link up nicely with Friedrich ( 1 970: 380), who s tated: 'The catego ry o f shape appears to be a typological univers al in grammar . . . and o f no t incons iderable s ignificance fo r a theo ry o f semantics in grammar.' Further­ more, my data sugges t that COLLECTIV E aspect is explicitly expressed more o ften than INDIVIDUAL aspect.6 The no uns that can occur with an individual or collective aspect marker are

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

A noun with individual aspect, an individual no un, designates a property that is characterized as having SHAPE, but is unmarked as regards the feature STRUCTURE. Hence the referent o f the NP headed by an individual noun has a de fi nite o utline, but it is indivisibl e. Many European languages (Dutch, Englis h, German, French, etc.) typically have a l arge number of individual no uns in their lexico ns . For ins tance, the Englis h no un car is an individual no un. If we wo uld divide the space fo r which the property 'car' holds in half, we wo uld no t have two cars; half a car is no t a car.

J. Rijkhoff 297

SPACE

structure unmarked

structure marked

shape unmarked

CONCEPTUAL

MASS

shape marked

SET

Figure 3

Set aspect

When individual or collective no uns are in cons truction with a numeral , the latter quantifies the des ignated (bounded) space, w hich results in mor e individuals or collectives, w hich is reflected in so me fo rm o f plural marking (two carS , three bunchES); in o ther wo rds , the numeral functions as a multiplier. However, when a numeral is in a direct cons tructio n with a set no un, it will function rather as a diviso r o f the (bo unded) des ignated space, in that it indicates the number o f individuals WITHIN the set that has already been defined by the set no un (in pseudo-Engl is h e.g. 'two car' or rather 'a two-car set'; for a true ex ampleo fa set noun in co mbinat ion with a cardinal numeralsee e.g. the Fijian example below). It is no t the numbero fsets that is indicated here (we do no t get mo re sets), but rather the number of individuals t hat make up that set. Given the ex is tence o f set no uns , how can we determine w hether o r no t no uns are inherently coded for s et aspect? There are three criteria. The firs t and (probabl y) the third criterion mus t hold in all ins tances; the second is language­ specific, i.e. it may or may no t hold.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

inherentl y co ded for a particular aspectual value, ';Vhich makes it poss ible fo r these no uns to help co ns true referents that are ambiguous with respect to individual and collective as pect. Fo r ins tance, Asmat cern 'ho use/ho us es ' can refer to one OR more ho us es (Voo rho eve 1 965: 1 28, r 30; see also s ectio n 4). I w ill call these nouns SET NOU NS, s ince the referent of an NP headed by s uch a no un may be view ed as representing a set which may contain any number o f individuals (one-two-three . . .; c.£ Brown 198 5). If we were to give set no uns a place in the diagram o f no minal as pects, we would arrive at the picture in Figure 3· This makes clear that pro perties des ignated by set nouns are characterized as having SHAPE, but that they are ambiguo us as far as the feature STRUCTURE is concerned. Because the property designated by the set no un is characterized as having a definite outline, the set noun can s till be in a direct co ns truction with a cardinal numeral. But there is a difference w ith individual or collective no uns here.

29!1 Nominal Aspccr

3

S O ME EXA M P L E S O F A S P E C T MA R K I N G

I n the following s ubs ections I will adduce evidence fro m various so urces to s upport the claim that certain elements are in fact individual or collective aspect markers o fset no uns . Much o f the evidence will be pres ented in the form o f quotations so as to permit the reader personally to assess the o riginal wo rds of the various authors in the light o f my claims. J.I

Fijian {Austric, Austro-Tai, Austronesian}: vei- as a collective aspect marker8

Fijian co mmon no uns, as they occur in the lex ico n, can be us ed to cons true referents that represent one or more individuals. Or, as Chur chward (1941: 141 s) put ir: There is n othing in Fijian corresponding to the English plural terminati on. For example, na ibe may mean either the mat or the mats, as indicated by the context.9

There are s everal ways to make clear jus t how many individuals are involved, one of which is to us e cardinal numerals. For ins tance, e dua na ibe 'one mat, a mat'; e rua na ibe ' two mats'. No te that except fo r the different cardinal nu meral (dua 'o ne', rua 'two') the expressio ns are fo rmally identical; i.e. there is no 'plural' marker.10

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Firs tly, a noun is coded for set as pect if the referent o f an NP that is headed by such a no un (and which does no t co ntain elements indicating number or cardinality) may represent one OR mo re individuals . Furthermo re the language should no t employ numeral class ifiers (so as to excl ude co ncept no uns, which may also head NPs whos e referents may involve one o r mo re individuals; c£ Mandarin shu 'book/books' above). Seco ndly, a set noun may be aspecrually dis ambiguated by means o f an individual or a collective aspect marker, which indicates whether the set co nsis ts o f one or mo re individuals (hence individual and collective as pect markers tend to be mis taken fo r singul ar and plural number markers, respectively). Below I will give examples from several genetically unrelated languages that employ s uch nominal aspect markers ? Thirdly, no minal as pect markers do no t occur when the noun is i n a direct co ns tructio n with a cardinal numeral. This is because the no un as s uch designates a s ingle set and the numeral merely indicates the number o f individuals contained i n that s et (see also above). Adding a n individual or a col­ lective as pect marker is bas ically redundant.

J. Rijkhoff

299

In relation to the problem of number marking in Fijian, Churchward ( I 94 I ), Maner (1956: 16 £) and Dixon ( 1988: 73 £) devote considerable space to discuss the function of the prefix vei-, and in their grammars it is explicitly mentioned that thls prefix is not an ordinary plural marker, Mmess e.g. (Churchward 1941: 15-16): Some nouns-not a great many-have a special plural formed by the prefixing vei-. Common examples are ... koro village, vale house; were garden; vatu rock; kau rree . . . Note, however, that in some cases at least, this prefix makes the noun collective rather than strictly plural. The word veikau, for instance, means •forest' rather than 'trees'. Moreover, when the plurality of the noun is shown by the use of a cardinal numeral . . . the vei- is not used. Thus, 'two years' is note rua ne veiyabaki, but e rua nayabaki. True, one may say e rua na veikau, but this would mean 'two forests'; 'two rrees' is simply e rua na kau. [note omitted]

It would appear, indeed, that the original or fundamental meaning of vei-, with verbs as with nouns . . . is just that of plurality, or rather collectivity (a number of things forming a collection or a group).

Consider also the folloMng statement by Dixon (1988: 175): Vei- can be prefixed to some nouns and rime words, most kin terms (together with a suffix ni ), and to many verbs (sometimes with and sometimes without the passive suffix); in each instance it has a collective sense.

From these quotations it appears that vei- also occurs Mth verbs (compare also Galela (Indo-Pacific) and Hixkaryana (Amerind) below). According to Dixon (1988: 177): When vei- is added to a verb it derives an inrransitive form, and the subject may be the sum of A and 0 [-transitive subject and object function, resp.-JR], i.e. the complete collection ofcore participants. The important point to note is that these core participants are grouped together as a single set, with no indication of who is A and who is 0.11

In sum, given the assumption that Fijian common nouns are, as a rule, inherently coded for set aspect as they occur in the lexicon, vei- can be regarded as the expression of a collective aspect marker. 3.2

Gale/a (Indo-Pacific, West Papuan, Northern Halmahera}: bi as a collective aspect marker

Galela is another language in whlch the noun as such can be used to head an NP that refers to one or more individuals (van Baarda 1891: 12- 13; see also van Baarda 1908: 32-3): If one uses the noun without further specification as regards number, then one may imply both the singular and the plural of the designated entity [my rranslarion-JR].

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

A little further in his grammar of fijian, Churchward is even more explicit on the (original) function of vei- (ibid.: 7 3):

300 Nominal Aspect

Optio nally the no un may be preceded by the particle bi , as when the speaker wants to emphasize that mo re than one individual is involved. However, this particle may never occur with a cardinal numeral (ibid.): Should one wish to speak explicitly in the plural, then the particle bi is placed immediately before the noun, e.g. obi ngoppa: children; obi gotta: trees; obi doemoele: weeds {of all kinds); ani bi doeba: your sheep; rnabi soppo: its fruit; ai bi deroe: my boats, etc. . . . If a definite or indefinite numeral follows [the noun], the plural is omitted, e.g. o ngoppaja temidungi -seven children; o tahoe motolzha five houses; o wange moroewo naga some days; ani doeba sino/to two of your sheep [my translation-JRJ.

3·3

Hixka ryana (Amerind, Ge-Pano-Carib, Macro-Carib): the particle komo 'collective'

Hixkaryana is repo rted no t to have a regul ar s ingular-pl ural oppos ition. It does, however, have a way of marking ' collective' when the focus is on a group . . . Collective is marked primarily only with 'human' class nouns; this class includes, in addition to human beings, animals and items regarded as an integral part of the culture and environment of the people . . .12 With nonhuman nouns the number-marking system is obligatorily absent. With human nouns it is optional in the sense that the speaker can decide whether he wishes to focus on the group or not. In both cases there is often not any clearly disambiguating factor present. {Derbyshire 1979: 1 26)13

It is not clear whether komo 'collective' is also obl igatorily absent if the head no un is in co ns tructio n with a numeral. According to Derbys hire ( I 979: I 54) there are o nly three bas ic numerals (towenyxa 'one', asako 'two', and osorwawo 'three'), which functio n rather as adverbs . Also ,Portugues e numerals have co me to be employed recently, which are regarded as no uns. In order to functio n as adverbials these numerals are followed by me, which Derbys hire calls a 'denominalizer'.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Van Baarda ( r 89 I : I 4-I s; I 9o 8: 3 3-5 ) calls the element o an article (A RT), but it seems to functio n rather like a no un phras e marker (see also no te 9). No tice that with the human no uns, such as ngoppa 'child(ren)', the numeral can only be express ed in a predicative construction (van Baarda I 89 I : I 9; 1 908: 43; s ee also no te IO on Fij ian numerals); hence the presence o fja , which is a pro no minal element that is part o f the verbal (o r better: predicate) co mplex. The phras e o ngoppaja temidungi may be glossed as 'A RT child(ren) they [are] seven'. As in the cas e o f Fijian vei-, Galela bi also occurs with verbs . Fijian and Gal ela appear to differ, however, in that in the fo rmer language the element in ques tion indicates the cardinaliry o f 'the complete collectio n o f core participants ' (Dixo n I 988: I 77), whereas in Galela it relates to the number o f individ ual s ubject OR object entities that are involved in a particular s ituatio n, actio n, etc. (van Baarda I 891 : 58- 9; I 908: I 28-9).

j. Rijkhoff 301

What is s triking is the fact that, jus t as in Fij ian and Galela, the purported collective as pect marker in Hixkaryana can also be part of the verbal complex. Subject to certain constraints '[t]he collective forms relate to the person of the s ubject and/or object . . .' (ibid.: 145). Finally it may be interes ting to note that Hixkaryana has two sets of pronouns for referents involving animate entities. One has w hat the author calls the 'individual' or 'noncollective forms ', the other the 'collective forms ' (ibid.: P· I 27)· 3-4

Stoomer ( I 987: 7 4) states that the majority of nouns in the three Oromo dial ects Boraana, Orma and Wata (-BOW) are unspecified for number. Before him Andrzejews ki ( I 960: 7 1 ) had w ritten that these nouns are in a 'general form': The vast majority of General Forms are associated with NEITHER PLURALITY-NOR­ SINGULARIT Y, i.e. the forms themselves g ive us no information as to whether what is denoted by them is one or more than one. When such forms are used, ony the context can provide us with information about the number of what is denoted.

How ever a BOW noun can be provided with a s o-called 'pl ural' or 's ingulative' suffix, w hich I regard as instances of a collective and an individual aspect marker, respectively. As regards the so-called plural suffix, Stroomer ( 1 987: 76) obs erves : In general, nouns with plural suffixes refer to a counted or countable group of items, whereas the possible plural meaning of nouns u nspecified for plural is more general and vague. If a noun is counted by means of a numeral, then there is no plural suffix.

As to the so-called singulative suffix Stroomer s tates: BOW nouns denoting animate beings, in particular ethnonyms, can rake the singulative suffixes -(t)ica (masculine), and -(t)ittii (feminine). In BOW ethnonyms these suffixes are productive. (ibid.: 8 3) In BOW these suffixes basically have rhe meaning ofind icating an individual out ofa group . . . (ibid. : 87)

It may be appropriate to mention at this point that in his chapter on non­ class noun sys tems in African languages , Welmers ( 1 97 3: ch. 9) argues that forms w hich traditionally have been regareded as mere pl urals require a far more subtle interpretation. He notes that in certain languages of the Mande family the s te m form of a non-human noun .. . has a generic reference, nor specifically singular or plural, but . . . it is possible to express individuated pluralization. (Welmers 1 973: 2 1 9)

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Oromo (Afro-Asiatic, Cushitic, Cushitic Proper}: individual and collective aspect markers

302

Nominal Aspect

In sum, a distinct group of nouns in four genetically unrelated languages (Fijian (Austric), Galela (Indo- Pacific), Hixkaryana (Amerind), and Oromo (Afro-Asiatic) ) appear to share a number of particular rraits. This can be understood if we accept that these nouns are inherently coded for set aspect (meaning that the property they designate is characterized as being spatially bounded and may or may not be divisible), and that certain elements are actually explicit expressions of collective or individual aspect.

4

S I Z E A N D NOMINAL A S P E C T M A R K ING

between the perceived size of the referent and nominal aspect marking, for which I have no immediate explanation.14 Some such languages will be briefly discussed below in a similar fashion as the languages treated in the previous secnon. In Asmat (Indo- Pacific, Trans-New Guinea, Main Section) '[t]here is no way

I 9 59: s s ), which probably cern 'house/houses', pok 'thing/things', nan{ 'heap/heaps' (Voorhoeve I 96s: 1 28, I 30). However, the language has two suffixes -nakap and -naktis , which seem to function both as diminutive and individual/collective aspect marker. The first, -naktip , is reported to indicate both smallness and singular number; the second, -nakas , smallness and plural number. Thus, cimnakap 'small house', poknakas 'little things', nan{nakas 'little heaps' (ibid.). of determining the plural of substantives' (Drabbe

means that these substantives have set aspect. For instance,

In Koasti (Amerind, Northern, Penutian) '[a]s a general rule, plurality is not marked on the noun itself ' (Kimball

I 98 5: 380).

Only human nouns may

optionally be provided with what is called a plural suffix indicate that nouns are coded for set aspect and that

-ha

( ha ). This could -

is actually a collective

aspect marker. It appears that diminutives, which are formed with the suffix

si I-osi, are always

singular (ibid.:

394;

see also pp.

380- 92).

-

This suggests that

the diminutive suffix marks individual aspect as well. Ngiyambaa (Ausrralian, Pama-Nyungan, Wiradhuric) nominal roots 'are intrinsically neutral as to number' (Donaldson

1 980: 99). One of the ways

to

specify what Donaldson calls number is by means of a suffix, which is said to indicate both size and number (ibid.):

If a noun is to be marked as singular with such a suffix, it must also be marked for size, large or small, and vice versa. If small, the suffix employed will show whether this is because of immaturity or not. Note also that definite NPs contain a third person pronoun marked for number.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

In a number of languages employing set nouns, there is a formal relation

J. Rijkhoff

303

Finally, it is reported in Stroomer ( 1987: 87) that the ' singu lative afflx' -ittii , w hich I consider an individual aspect marker in BOW (see above), also has a diminutive meaning in Wellegga Oro mo (Gragg 1976). In a recent article Dryer (1989) discu sses the category o f ' plural words', which pro babl y also inclu des instances o f w hat I would regard as no minal aspect markers. Fo r instance, in so me languages the so-called 'plu ral word' canno t co-occu r with a numeral . Interestingly, Dryer fou nd that in a number o f cases his category o f plural words also includes words meaning 'small' or ' big'.

Although it may be dangerou s to hypo thesize about the origin o f l inguistic elements, there is so me evidence to suggest that no minal aspect markers may have developed fro m at l east three different sources. One has already been mentioned in the previou s sectio n: words meaning 'small' and ' big' (cf Kimball 198s: 394) . As to individual aspect markers, Greenberg (1981: 109 ) has suggested that in certain Nilo-Saharan languages an erstwhile non-classifying stage III article (o r: nou n marker; see also Greenberg 1978) ' has received an apparentl y seco ndary interpretation as singular, or perhaps better singu lative in relatio n to a collective. This was already no ted by Lu kas [ 1928] in regard to Kanuri kam perso n , am peop1e . . .' .15 Plu ral pronou ns may be the sou rce from w hich collective aspect markers have o riginated. No te that in so me o f the langu ages mentioned in Dryer (1989) (yoru ba, Chamo rro, and Ngarinjin), the catego ry o f 'plural words' also arose fro m pronouns (Dryer 1989: 875-6; see also DeBose 1974 onPapiamento ). "

"·

"

"

6 I N C O RP O RA TE D A N D P RE D I CA TE N O U N S It has often been o bserved that w hen nou ns are inco rporated to beco me part o f a derived verb, this involves so me so rt o f semantic change in that the incorporated noun is said, fo r instance, to be no n-individuated or to have lost its individu al salience both semantical ly and syntactically (e.g. Dik 1980: 38 £; Mithun 1984). This (admittedly vague) semantic difference betw een inco r­ po rated and no n-inco rporated nou ns may be u nderstood better if we accept that verbs canno t designate properties or relations that pertain to bo th the tempo ral and the spatial dimensio n. If this premise is accepted, then it must follow that any incorpo rated nou n canno t be coded for a no mi nal aspect.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

s S O ME SP E C U LA T I O N O N T H E O R I G I N O F N O M I NA L A SP E C T MA RKERS

304 Nominal Aspect

Obviously, if an incorporated noun does not designate a property in the spatial dimension, it is impossible to indicate how such a property is represented in that dimension. Thus, the semantic difference between an incorporated and a non-incorporated noun is due to the fact that incorporated nouns lack nominal aspect, which in turn is a consequence of the fact that incorporated nouns do not designate properties in the spatial dimension. The same probably holds for predicate nouns, which, at least in Dutch, are said 'not to individuate' (Geerts et al. 1984: 145). Compare: ( I ) Jan is soldaat Qan is soldier) (2) Jan is een soldaat Qan is a soldier)

7 C O N C L U SI O N In this article I have tried to demonstrate the relevance of nominal aspect. First, of all, the recognition of nominal aspect as a grammatical category may help us to get a better understanding of the differences between the various kinds of nouns. Secondly, it may shed some light on the properties of certain apparent number markers, which are often probably better categorized as nominal aspect markers. Nominal aspect, or rather the lack of aspectual meaning, could also explain the special character of incorporated and predicate nouns. Last but not least, the establishment of nominal aspect as a distinct grammatical category also allows us to analyse NPs and sentences in a similar fashion, as I have already demonstrated elsewhere (Rijkhoff 1989b, 199ob). JAN N. M. RIJKHOFF Dept. ofGeneral Linguistics University ofAmsterdam Spuistraat 2 1 o 1 0 1 2 VT Amsterdam Tile Netherlands

N OTES

2

Thanks are due to two anonymous referees for helpful comments. I am aware of at least one author who also used the phrase 'nominal aspect', though

in a different sense, viz. Heath in his chapter on Nunggubuyu noun morphol­ ogy (Heath 1984: 172). Compare in this context also Leech ( 1969), Greenberg

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

In the second sentence soldaat 'soldier' heads an NP, as is indicated by the indefinite article een . In the first sentence soldaat seems to have been deprived of its nominal (i.e. individual) aspect.

J. Rijkhoff 305

6

7

8 9

IO

II I2

noun (much sleep ), arrival a count noun (two arrivals ). Possibly this IS another manifestation of the Principle of Formal and Semanric Adjusrmenr (PFA and PSA, resp.), accordi ng to which complex con­ structions tend to adjust rheir formal expression and semantic properties ro rhose of rhe prototypes (Dik 1985; Lehmann 1 990). Interestingly, COLLECTIVE aspect IS al so semantically the most marked nomi­ nal aspect (SHAPE and STRUCTURE). If indeed collective aspect is rhe aspect rhar is explicitly expressed most often, rhis is another case of iconicity: formal com­ plexity would correspond ro conceptual complexity (see Haiman 1 985: 2, 1 47-5 1; also Haiman (ed.) I9Xo). lr would be inreresring ro investigate if the same correlation obtains in relation ro perfec­ tive aspect, the verbal aspect rhar IS marked for either aspecrual fearure (BEGINNING and ENDING; for some positive evidence see e.g. Bybee & Dahl I9H9: 95). lr seems rhar ser nouns are also arrested in pidgin and creole languages; I am grateful ro Peter Bakker (personal communica­ tion) for drawing my arrention ro rhis (see also Holm I990). Generic classifications are according ro Ruhlen (I9X7); in each case only rhe first three nodes of rhe generic rree are given. Dixon ( I 988: I I 4 £) calls na an article, although ir functions differently as com­ pared ro articles in e.g.Du rch or English. Compare also Crowley (I9XS) on noun phrase markers. Numerals (dua 'one', rua 'rwo', ere.) behave like verbs, so rhat rhe expression of cardinality involves a kind of relative construction. The element e precedi ng rhe numeral in rhe examples above is the unmarked form of a subject pronoun (Dixon I988: ch. I3). Hence rhe 'reciprocal' notion rhar is often arrached ro vei- in rhis context (Church­ ward I94 I: 73-4; bur c£ Dixon I988: I78). Besides rhe particle komo 'collecti ve',

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

4

(1 972: 30), Seuren (1 974: 4), Mourelatos ( 1 98I: 2 02 f£) and Langacker (I987). The same hold s for referents of sentences, i.e. situations, which are crucially defined by verbs. The fact that in the temporal dimension the same relation or property can be represented m different ways makes it possible for an English sentence such as I stood there for an hour ro be translated i nto Russian either wirh rhe verb in the imperfective form (ja stojal tam cas) or in the perfective form (ja postojal tam cas; from Comrie I976: 4, I6- I7). That i s, the same real-world situation may or may not be represented as tem­ porally bounded. According ro Comrie the second sentence-with postojal­ suggests a (subjectively) short period, while the first sentence-with stojal -is quite neutral. So what this example illustrates is that we do not refer ro situations in the external, p hysical world, but rather ro mental constructs that may bear only little (structural) resemblance to their real-world counterparts, if they exist; the fact that we refer to mental constructs also enables us to refer ro entities that do (did/will) not exist in the real world, such as desired or feared situations. See Kuhn (I9X2) for an extemive discus­ sion of the way the notion ' collective' (and, to a lesser extent, rhe notion 'singulative') i s expressed, borh gram­ matically and lexically. In rhis article I am only concerned with grammatical expres­ sions of the notion 'collective' (see also e.g. Anderson I9X 5). It must be emphasized rhar I am only i nter­ ested in nomi nal aspect markers that are expressed by means of inflectional mor­ phology. Thus, I am ignoring derived forms such as knightHOOD orFiendSHIP. It seems that nouns that designate non­ spatial properties, such as abstract nouns (like love) and derived nouns (like destruc­ tion ), are modeled after existing aspectual types as they occur in the lexicon of a particular language. Thus sleep is a mass

306 Nominal Aspect which is the usual collective marker with nouns, there is also the suffix -yamo 'collective', which is used mainly with a subclass of d erived nouns (Derbyshire I979: I26). I3 As to American Indian languages in general, Boas ( 1 9 1 1 : 37-8) wrote: 'It would seem that, on the whole, American languages are rather indifferent in regard to the clear expression of plurality, but

that they tend to express much more rigidly the ideas of collectivity or distri­ bution.' I4 C( also Dryer {1 989: 879). I5 See also Newman (I990: I8). Another possible source for the individual aspect marker may be ' one'; c£ Lorimer {I935 : 47 £) on the so-called singular suffix in Burushaski, a language isolate (Ruhlen I9H7: 377).

of the world', Studies in Language, 13: I·53Anderson, ]. M. (I973), An Essay Concerning Aspect, Mouton, The Hague. I03. Anderson, S. R. (I98 5). 'Inflectional morpho­ Chung, S. & A. Timberlake (I98 5), 'Tense, logy', in T. Shopen (ed.), Language Typology aspect, and mood', in T. Shopen (ed.), LanJ?UaJ?e Typology and Syntactic Description and Syntactic Description Ill: Grammatical Categories and the Lexicon , Cambridge III: Grammatical Categories and the Lexicon , Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, University Press, Cambridge, pp. I 50-20 1 . pp. 202-58. Andrzejewski, B. W. (I96o), 'The categories of n umber in noun forms in the Borana Churchward, C. M. ( 1 94 I; I97 3 reprint), A d ialect of Galla', Africa , 30:62-75. New Fijian Grammar, Government Press, Baarda, M.]. van (I89 I), Beknopte spraakkunst Suva (Fiji). van de Galillareesche taal , Kemink & Zoon, Comrie, B. (I976), Aspect , Cambridge Uni­ Utrecht. versity Press, Cambridge. Baarda, M. ]. van (I908), Leiddraad bij het Comrie, B. ( I98 5), Tense , Cambridge Univer­ bestuderen van 't Gale/a'sch dialekt, op het sity Press, Cambridge. eiland Halmaheira , Nijhoff, The Hague. Crowley, T. (I98 5), ' Common noun phrase Becker, A. L. ( 1 975), 'A linguistic image of marking in Proto-Oceanic', Oceanic Lin­ nature: the Burmese numerative classifier guistics , 24: Ih.I35-93· DeBose, ChE. ( 1 974), 'Papiamento plurals', system', Linguistics, 165: 1 09-2 1. Boas, F. {I9 1 I, photomechanic reprint 1 969), Studies in African LinJ?uistics, Supplement 5: 'Introduction' in F. Boas (ed.), Handbook of 67- n American Indian languages: Part 1 Bulletin Derbyshire, D. C. (I979), Hixkaryana , Lingua 40 of the Smithsonian Institution, Bureau Descriptive Studies, Volume I, North­ of American Ethnology, Anthropol ogical Holland, Amsterdam. Publications, Oosterhout (The Nether­ Derbyshire, D. C. & D. L. Payne {1 990), lands), pp. 5-8 3· 'Noun classification systems of Amazon­ ian languages', in D. L. Payne (ed.), Ama­ Brown, D. R. (I98 5), 'Term operators', in zonian Linguistics: Studies in Law/and South A. M. Bolkestein, C. de Groot & ]. L. Mackenzie (eds), Predicates and Terms in American LanJ?UaJ?eS , University of Texas Functional Grammar , Functional Grammar Press, Austin, pp. 243-7 I. Series 2, Foris, Dordrecht, pp. I27-45 · Dik, S. C. (I98o), 'On predicate formation', in S. C. Dik, Studies in Functional Grammar, Bybee,]. L. & 0. Dahl ( 1 98 9), ' The creation of tense and aspect systems in the languages Academic Press, New York, pp. 25-52. ,

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

REFERE N C E S

J. Rijkhoff 307

Occasional Papers Series, Committee on Ethiopian Studies, East Lansing­ Carbondale, African Studies Center, Michigan State University, pp. 166-95. Greenberg, J. H. ( 1972), ' Numeral classifiers and substantival number: problems in the genesis of a linguistic type', Working Papers on Language Universals , 9: 1-39. Greenberg,]. H. (1978), ' How does a language acquire gender markers?', in J. H. Green­ berg (ed.), Universals of Human Language , Volume J: Word Structure , Stanford Uni­ versity Press, Stanford, pp. 47-82. Greenberg,]. H. ( 198 1), 'Nilo-Saharan move­ able-k as a Stage Ill article (with a . Penutian typological parallel)', Jmmwl
Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Dik, S. C. (198 5), ' Formal and semantic adj ustment of derived constructions', in A. M. Bolkestein, C. de Groot & J. L. Mackenzie (eds), Predicates and Terms in Functional Grammar, Functional Grammar Series 2, Foris, Dordrecht and Providence, Rl, pp. 1-28. Dik, S. C. (1989a), The Theory of Functional Grammar , Part I: The Structure ofthe Clause , Functional Grammar Series 9, Foris, Dordrecht and Providence, RI. Dik, S. C. (1989b), ' FG* C* M* NLU: Func­ tional Grammar Computational Model of the Natural Language User', in J. H. Connolly & S. C. Dik (eds), Functional Grammar and the Computer , Functional Grammar Series 1o, Foris, Dordrecht and Providence, Rl, pp. 1-2X. Dixon, R. M. W. (1988), A Grammar ofBou­ maa Fij'ian , University of Chicago Press, Chicago. Donaldson, T. (19Xo), Ngiyambaa: The Lan­ guage of the Wangaayb�wan of New South Wales, Cambridge University Press, Cam­ bridge. Drabbe, P. ( 1959), Grammar
308 Nominal Aspect

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Hundius, H. & U. Kolver ( 1 98 3), ' Syntax and Zaenen (eds), Syntax and semantics, Volume semantics of numeral classifiers in Thai', 1 4: Tense and aspect, Academic Press, New Studies in Language, 7: 2.164-2 14. York, pp. 1 9 1 -2 1 2. Jones, R. B. ( 1 970), ' Classifier constructions in Milner, G. B. ( 1 956; 1 972 edn), Fijian Gram­ southeast Asia', Journal of the American mar, Government Press, Suva (Fij i). Oriental Society, 90: J . I- 1 2. Mithun, M. ( 1 984), 'The evolution of noun incorporation', Language, 6o: 4.847-94. Kimball, G. D. ( 1 985 ), 'A descriptive gram­ mar of K oasati', doctoral dissertation, Newman, P. ( 1 990), Nominal and Verbal Plu­ rality in Chadic, Publications in African Tulane University. Kuhn, W. ( 1 982), 'Formale Verfahren der Languages and Linguistics 1 2, Foris, D or­ Technik K ollektion', in H. Seiler & F. J. drecht and Providence, Rl. Stachowiak (eds), Apprehension: das Sprach­ Rijkhoff, J. ( 1 989a), 'The identification of referents', in J. H. Connolly & S. C. Dik liche Etfassen von Gegenstanden, Teil II: Die Techniken und ihr Zusammenhang in Einzel­ (eds), Functional Grammar and the Computer, Functional Grammar Series 1 o, Faris, sprachen, Gunter Narr Verlag, Tiibingen, Dordrecht and Providence, RI, pp. 229-46. pp. 55-8 3· Lakoff. G. & M. Johnson ( 1 98 0), Metaphors We Rij khoff, J. ( 1 989b), ' Parallels in the structure of terms and predications', paper presen­ Live By, University of Chicago Press, ted at Colloquium on NP structure, Chicago. University of Manchester, 1 8- 1 9 Septem­ Langacker, R. W. ( 1 987), 'Nouns and verbs', ber 1 989. Language, 63: 1 .53-94. Leech, G. N. ( 1 969) , Towards a Semantic Rijkhoff,J. ( 199oa), 'Explaining word order in the noun phrase', Linguistics, 28, 5-42. Description ofEnglish, Longman, London. Lehmann, Chr. ( 1 990), 'Towards lexical Rijkhoff, J. ( 1 990b), 'Toward a unified analysis of terms and predications', in J. typology', in W. Croft, K. Denning & S. Nuyts, A. M. Bolkestein & C. Vet (eds), Kemmer (eds), Studies in Typology and Layers and Levels of representation: A Func­ Diachrony: Papers Presented to Joseph H. tional View, Benjamins, Amsterdam and Greenberg on his 75th Birthday, Typological Philadelphia, pp. 1 6 5-9 1 . Studies in Language 20, Benjamins, Amsterdam and Philadelphia, pp. I6 1-85. Ruhlen, M . ( I 987), A Guide to the Languages of tire World, Volume I : Classification, Edward Li, Ch. N. & S. A. Thompson ( 198 1 ; paper­ Arnold, London. back edn 1 989), Mandarin Chinese: A Func­ tion al Reference Grammar, University of Seuren, P. A. M. ( I974), 'Introduction', in P. A. M. Seuren (ed.), Semantic Syntax , California Press, Berkeley. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 1 -27. Lorimer, D. L. R. ( 1 935-38 ), The Burush aski Language, Vols 1, 2, 3, Harvard University Stroomer, H. J. ( I 987), ' A comparative study of three southern Oromo d ialects in Press, Cambridge, Mass. Kenya (phonology. morphology and Lukas, J. ( 1 928), 'Transition und lntransition in Kanuri', Wiener Zeitsclrrift fur die Kunde vocabulary)', doctoral d issertation, Uni­ des Morgen/andes, 35: 2 1 3- 1 4. versity ofLeiden. Lyons, J. ( 1 977), Semantics, Vols I , 2, Cam­ Tedeschi, Ph. J. & A. Zaenen (eds) ( 1 9 8 1 ), Syn tax and Semantics, Vol. 14: Tense and bridge University Press, Cambridge. Aspect, Academic Press, New York. McCawley, J. D. ( 1968), ' The role of seman­ tics in a grammar', in E. Bach & R. T. Traugott, E. Closs ( 1 978) , 'On the expression of spatio-temporal relations in language', Harms (eds), Universals in Linguistic Theory, in J. H. Greenberg (ed.), Universals of Holt, Rinehart & Winston, New York, Human Language, Volume J: Word Structure, PP· 1 24-69. Stanford University Press, Stanford, Mourelaros, A. P. D. ( 1 98 1 ), ' Events, proces­ pp. 369-400. ses, and states', in Ph. J. Tedesch i & A.

J. Rijkhoff 309 Verkuyl, H. J. ( 1 972), On the Compositional Nature ofthe Aspects, Reidel, Dordrecht. Voorhoeve, C. L. ( 1 965), The Flamingo Bay Dialect of the Asmat Langua ge , Verhande­ lingen van her Koninklijk Insrituut voor

Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde, deel 46, Nij hoff, The Hague. Welmers, W.E . ( 1 973), African Language Structures, University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

© N.I.S. Foundation (1991)

Journal ofSrmantia 8: 3 I 1 -3 3 I

Quasi -assertion JOY C E P . M C DOW E L L Intelligent Text Processing, Inc.

Abstract

r

I NT R O D U C T I O N

Speech act theory1 recognizes several different illocutionary acts which make the assertive point, among them assert, report, predict, claim, deny, argue, remind, etc.2 These are distinguished from one another by differences in the strength with which they make the assertive point and in the felicity conditions imposed on successful performance of the particular illocutionary act, while at the same time they all make the assertive point. In this paper we propose a new illocutionary act which also makes the assertive point and which differs from other assertives in specific ways. We call this quasi-assertion.3 Some examples follow. (r) The Maori must have come from Tahiti. It must be raining in Chicago. Bluebeard must beat his wife. Clark Kent may be Superman. The President may have known what North was up to. These are commonly referred to as epistemic sentences or modal sentences which receive an epistemic interpretation. An informal characterization of

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Speech act theory recognizes several illocurionary acts which make the assertive point. This paper proposes a new member of this group, quasi-assertion. Epistemic modal sentences are examples. The force of quasi-assertion differs from full assertion with respect to the felicity conditions on these illocurionary acts. The propositional content condition on assertion is empty, but the propositional content condition on quasi-assertion is that the propositional content P represent a state of affairs in the actual world at utterance rime. The preparatory condition on P requires that the speaker have grounds for the truth of P, but the preparatory condition on quasi-assertion only requires that the speaker infers or deduces P. The sincerity condition on assertion requires that the speaker believes that P, but the sincerity condition on quasi-assertion allows that the speaker's commitment to the truth of P is less than for full assertion. Under the hypothesis of conscructability (Searle & Vanderveken 198 s), we show how quasi-assertion can be constructed out of assertion by the operations [�]. (E>] and (-]. Finally, truth conditions are given for quasi-assertion.

312

Quasi-asscrrion

what a quasi-assertion is can be suggested by noticing that the quasi-assertions4 in ( I ) are all hedged5 or weakened versions of the assertions in (2). (2) The Maori came from Tahiti.6 It is raining in Chicago. Bluebeard beats his wife. Clark Kent is Superman. The President knew what North was up to.

2 C O N D I T I O N S O N I L L O C U T I O N A RY A C T S S & V state: an illocutionary act of the form F(P) is successfully and nondefectively performed in a context of utterance iff: (•) The speaker succeeds in achieving in that context the illocutionary point of F on the proposition P with the required characteristic mode of achievement and degree of strength of illocutionary point of F. (2) He expresses the proposition P, and that proposition satisfies the propositional content conditions imposed by F. (3) The preparatory conditions of the illocution and the propositional presuppositions obtain in the world of the utterance, and the speaker presupposes that they obtain. (4) He expresses and possesses the psychological state determined by F with the characteristic degree of strength of the sincerity conditions of F .

We must distinguish between conditions for successful and nondefective performance of an illocutionary act and truth conditions on the propositional content P of that act, which are part of the propositional content conditions.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Searle and Vanderveken ( I 985, henceforth S & V) advance the hypothesis of constructability, by which all illocutionary acts which make a particular point can be recursively constructed by a limited set of operations from the primitive illocutionary act associated with that illocutionary point. These operations are ( I ) the addition of propositional content conditions; (2) the addition of preparatory conditions; (3) the addition of sincerity conditions; (4) the restriction of the mode of achievement of the illocutionary point; and (5) the operations of increasing or decreasing the degrees of strength of the illocu­ tionary point and of the sincerity conditions. The major portion of this paper will be to show how quasi-assertion can be so constructed from the primitive illocutionary act of the assertive point, assertion. We begin by quoting S & V (p. 22) with respect to the general conditions on an illocutionary act. We follow with the specific conditions for assertion, and then proceed to specify and justify the operations which construct quasi­ assertion from assertion.

J. P. McDowell 3 I 3

2. 1

Characteristic degree ofstrength ofthe assertive point

The characteristic degree of strength of assertion, the primitive illocutionary act of assertive type, is moderate, or on a numeric scale, the neutral zero. By this it is meant that to assert is a weaker act than to swear, for example, but a stronger act than to hypothesize, both swearing and hypothesizing being acts which make the assertive point. But it is clear that assertion is a stronger act than quasi-assertion. For example (3) illustrates a continuum of assertive strength frotn full assertion through 'strong' quasi-assertion to 'weak' quasi-assertion.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

The specific conditions for the successful and nondefective performance of an assertion F(P) and the truth conditions imposed on P by F are as follows: there is no characteristic mode of achievement. For example, the characteristic mode of achievement of testifying is as a witness, but there is no corresponding characteristic mode of achievement for assertion. Since assertion is the primitive illocutionary act which makes the assertive point, its characteristic degree of strength in making that point is moderate. By 'moderate', S & V mean something like 'neutral' and they arbitrarily assign the value zero to the primitive force assertion. The propositional content condition on assertion is empty, that is, it imposes no additional conditions beyond those of the assertive point in general, that in asserting P the speaker presents P as representing an actual state of affairs in the world of utterance. The preparatory condition for assertion is that the speaker has grounds or reason or evidence that support the truth of P. The characteristic psychological state associated with assertion is belief and in asserting P the speaker signals his belief that P is true or his commitment to the truth of P. Finally, the truth conditions which F imposes on P is that P holds in the actual world. The truth conditions which S & V actually associate with assertion are unclear. But it is implied that P may be evaluated with respect to any state of the actual world, past, present, or future. Now it is clear that neither the felicity conditions for assertion, nor the truth conditions for the propositional content of an assertion are exactly right for quasi-assertion for the sentences in (1), as they are for the corresponding full assertions in ( 2). If I say It is raining in Chicago I am signaling a different sort of commitment to and belief in the truth of the proposition that it is raining in Chicago than if I say It must be raining in Chicago . Furthermore, in using the modal, I am signaling that the sort of evidence that my statement rests on is of a different kind than I need for full assertion. Indeed, epistemic modal sentences are the closest thing that English has to grammaticalized evidentials? In the remainder of this paper we intend to show how the conditions on quasi­ assertion differ minimally from those on assertion and how the force of quasi­ assertion can be constructed from the force of assertion by no more than the standard operations proposed by S & V.

3 1 4 Quasi-assertion

(3) a. The Maori came from Tahiti. b. The Maori must have come from Tahiti. c. The Maori may have come from Tahiti. Sentence (3a) makes the assertive point stronger than (3b) which in rum makes the assertive point stronger than (3c). This is a fact that has long been recognized and which is dubbed by Kartrunen ( I 97 I ) 'the episternic paradox', illustrated in the following example. (4) a. Necessarily two plus two equals four. b. Two plus two equals four. c. ??Two plus two must equal four.

2.2

Propositional content condition

The propositional content condition on assertion is empty, that is, it imposes no additional conditions beyond those of the assertive point in general, that in asserting P the speaker presents P as representing an actual state of affairs in the world of utterance. By this S & V mean, we assume, an acrual state of affairs at some stage of the world of utterance, past, present, or furure, since both reports of past events and predictions of furure events make the assertive point. But the propositional content condition on quasi-assertion is more restrictive. To begin with, the complements of episternic modal sentences are always stative, a fact first noticed by Steedman (I977). For example, while every sentence in (s) is a felicitous assertion, only some correspond to felicitous quasi-assertions in (6).

(s) a. John is bearing the dog. b. John beats the dog.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Sentence (4a) expresses op (P is true in all logically possible worlds), where (4b) expresses P (P is true in the actual world). Ifwe designate the modal operator in (4b) as something like MUST then (4c) expresses MUST(P). The epistemic paradox, in Karttunen's terms, is that (4c) which ought to express some kind of necessity (i.e. episternic necessity) is nevertheless weaker than (4b) which only asserts P and expresses no necessity at all. There is, however, a sort of covert necessity in asserting a proposition P. As Karttunen (I 97 I) points out, whatever is (i.e. P) cannot possibly be otherwise.8 (4c) is at least odd and possibly unincerpretable, a fact which follows from the properties of quasi-assertion, in this case that the characteristic degree of assertive strength of quasi-assertion is less than that of assertion. Since 'two plus two equals four' is an undeniable fact, (3c) is trying to make the assertive point less than moderately with a propositional content which demands greater assertive strength. This leads to the observed anomaly. We will return to this point below.

J. P. McDowell

31S

c. John has beaten the dog. d. John beat the dog. e. John lives in Chicago. £ John has lived in Chicago. g. John lived in Chicago. (6) a. b. c. d.

That is, the complements of epistemic modal sentences must be grammatically stative or stative in interpretation.9 Complements with progressive or perfec­ tive form (like (6a), (6c), and (6f) ) satisfy the requirement by virtue of their form. What this means in terms of interpretation for other complements is that nonstative verbs in these complements always receive the habitual! characteristic interpretation and, conversely, stative verbs in these comple­ ments never receive the 'coming to' or 'becoming' interpretation. The examples in (7)-(8) illustrate the point (where • indicates unacceptability of the epistemic interpretation). In (7) beat is nonstative. An epistemic reading results in the habitual interpretation for the verb. Version (c) is starred as an epistemic interpretation, but of course is perfectly acceptable as a deontic interpretation (an embedded command). (7) a. b� c. •

=

=

Bluebeard must beat his wife. Probably Bluebeard habitually beats his wife. Bluebeard is required to beat his wife.

Similarly, in (8). be is stative and the 'becoming' sense is starred as an epistemic interpretation (c), but of course perfectly acceptable as an embedded command. (8) a. b. c.*

= =

Walker must be a spy. Probably Walker is a spy. Walker is required to become a spy.

Quasi-assertion then differs minimally from assertion with respect to the propositional content condition in that quasi-assertion presents a proposi£ion P as representing an actual state of affairs in the world of utterance at the moment of utterance1 0 and cannot represent a past state of affairs (without the present relevance supplied by the perfective) or a future state of affairs.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

John must be beating the dog. John must beat the dog. John must have beaten the dog. *John must beat the dog. (*past-tense interpretation for beat) e. John must live in Chicago. £ John must have lived in Chicago. g. *John must lived in Chicago.

3 1 6 Quasi-asserrion

2.3

Preparatory condition

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

The preparatory condition on assertion is that the speaker has grounds or reason or evidence for the truth of P. There are many kinds of grounds, reason, and evidence. As support for the truth of a proposition P, they occupy a continuum from the direct evidence of first-hand eyewitness observation at one end, through various, less direct second-hand sources of greater and lesser reliability, on to deduction and inference on the basis of more or less reliable indirect evidence at the other end. For example, I can have reason to believe that John kissed Mary if I saw John kiss Mary (direct first-hand eyewitness observation), if John or Mary told me that John kissed Mary (fairly reliable second-hand direct evidence), if I read in the newspaper that John kissed Mary (fairly reliable second-hand direct evidence), or ifl see lipstick on John's cheek, Mary's lipstick smudged, and both John and Mary holding hands (deduction or inference on the basis of indirect evidence). At some point on this continuum there is a dividing line, a watershed, on one side of which the evidence is strong enough for me to accept the proposition as unconditionally true and assertable, and on the other side of which the evidence is so weak that I can only accept the proposition as probably true, or conditionally true. We suggest that assertability corresponds to a naive concept of knowledge. People don't assert propositions unless they 'know' them, i.e. believe them to be defensibly true. If the grounds or reason or evidence for the proposition is less than what is required for assertability, then there are other ways to express the proposition without taking responsibility for its truth, one of which is quasi-assertion. I do not wish to step here into the quagmire of what it means to 'know' that P, but only to make the distinction between cases where a speaker believes that he knows that P and other cases where he believes that he does not know that P bur instead has only deduced that P. The consensus of the literature on epistemic modal sentences is that such sentences are based on an inference by the speaker that P (c£ Antinucci & Parisi 1 97 1 ; Steedman 1 977; Lyons 1 977). Whatever the grounds or reason or evidence the speaker has for P in such cases is indirect and allows only inference that P. As S & V state the preparatory condition on assertion, it would seem that an assertion is felicitous even when the grounds or reason or evidence for P is very weak. We suggest, instead, that assertion is only felicitous on the strong side of the evidential watershed and that quasi-assertion is felicitous on the weak side. HQ;_e is an example. Suppose four men have agreed to gather for a meeting at the home of one of them, say Bill. John arrives at Bill's house. Bill greets him and says, 'Fred is already here'. While John is taking off his coat, Bill goes to get John a drink. Meanwhile Sam arrives, John does the duty of host and opens the door, saying to Sam, 'Fred is already here.' John has not seen Fred, bur has

J. P. McDowell

3 17

(9) a. ?Two plus two must equal four. b. ?The sun must rise every morning. c. ?What goes up must come down. (9a) is odd because the expressed proposition is a matter of definition. In a mathematics other than the familiar one, two plus two might well equal something other than four. Definitions are stipulated and not deduced. (9b) and (9c) are odd because the expressed propositions are truths generalized from long experience. We have seen the sun rise every morning from time immemorial and expect it to do so for eons to come. Everything that we have seen go up eventually has come down. All of the sentences in (9) are acceptable as deontics (embedded commands).

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

sufficient confidence in Bill's truthfulness to simply assert what he now knows, via reliable report. It would be very odd for him to say instead, 'Fred must be here.' Suppose now a different scenario. Bill greets John at the door and then goes to getJohn his drink, saying nothing about Fred's whereabouts. When Sam arrives, however, John points to Fred's well-known rumpled trenchcoat hanging on the coat tree in the hall and says, 'Fred must already be here.' There is, of course, wide variation in people's willingness to assert, given some level of evidence. In the sketch above, some person other thanJohn might take the presence of Fred's rumpled trenchcoat to be sufficient evidence for full assertion and might well say, 'Fred is already here', rather than 'Fred must already be here'. We call the evidential watershed described above the assertability threshold, which varies from person to person (c£ McDowell 1 987). Our theory says nothing about predicting what the assertability threshold must be or under what conditions A may be willing to fully assert, but B only to quasi-assert, some proposition P. In fact, there is variation even for the same person with the same evidence, as Hambourger ( 1 987) has shown. Hambourger's example concerns one person asking another the time of day. A asks B what time it is. B says, 'a few minutes after 5 '. A presses B to be accurate because B wishes to make a long distance phone call and take advantage of lower evening rates. Now that there is some consequence dependent on the truth of A's reply, he is reluctant to confirm his former assertion. Well, maybe his watch isn't entirely accurate. Better to wait a few more minutes and be sure. So the assertability threshold is sensitive not only to the strength of the evidence and the speaker's confidence in it, but also to the seriousness of the consequence, should the speaker turn out to be wrong after all. This is also the reason that certain necessary (from the point of view of the human condition) truths are generally anomalous when stated as quasi­ assertions, for example the epistemic paradox discussed above. The sentences in (9) are all odd as quasi-assertions because it is hard to imagine circumstances in which the propositions expressed could be merely inferred.

31 8

Quasi-assertion

Since (9a) is true by definition, the sum is 'compelled' to come out right by the axioms of arithmetic. (9b) is true by the laws of planetary motion which 'require' the rotation of the earth around the sun and make it appear that the sun rises in the morning. (9c) is true by the laws of gravity, which similarly require objects which 'go up' to 'come down'. Indeed (c) is a well-known aphorism even though there are plenty of things that go up and don't come down until they want to, such as spacecraft, birds, insects, etc. We also find that knowledge of the propositional content cannot felicitously be denied in full assertions (10), but can in quasi-assertions (I I ), and often is to doubly signal the inferential namre of the statement (see Coates I 98 3). *The Maori came from Tahiti, but I don't know it for a fact. *Clark Kent is superman, but I don't know it for a fact.

( I I ) Max must be a spy, but I don't know it for a fact.

The Maori must have come from Tahiti, but I don't know it for a fact. Clark Kent must be superman, but I don't know it for a fact.

2.4

The sincerity condition

The psychological state associated with assertion is belie£ If a speaker asserts P, be believes P. The characteristic degree of strength of the illocu tionary force F of an illocutionary act F(P) is usually equal to the degree of strength of the sincerity condition for the performance of F. If a speaker swears that P (an assertive act stronger than primitive assertion), then his belief in P is stronger than if he had merely asserted P. Similarly, if a speaker hypothesizes P (an assertive act weaker chan primitive assertion), then his belief in P is weaker than if he had in fact asserted P. We gave examples above (3) of a continuum of speaker commitment to the truth of P from full assertion through strong quasi-assertion (sentences with must) to weak quasi-assertion (sentences with may). We might say, then, that the characteristic degree of strength of the sincerity condition for quasi­ assertion is weaker than the moderate zero (the characteristic degree of strength of the sincerity condition for assertion) and has at least two values (strong quasi­ assertion and weak quasi-assertion) corresponding roughly to the strength of the evidence upon which the inference that P is made. In fact the consensus . in the literamre on episternic modals is that the function of the episternic operator is to weaken or qualify the truth value of the asserted proposition (c£ Hofmann I 966 and Lyons I 977)· The modal serves to hedge the assertion that would otherwise be made in the absence of the modal. Fraser ( I 97 5) explains this process of hedging via the use of deontic modals and

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

( w) *Max is a spy, but I don't know it for a fact.

J. P. McDowell

3 19

this analysis can be extended to epistemic modals, although Fraser does not discuss them. The relevant examples follow in ( 1 2) with the corresponding non-modalized utterances in ( I 3). ( 1 2)a. I must ask you to leave. b. I must tell you that your son is dead. (I J)a. Leave! b. Your son is dead.

(14)a. *Clark Kent i s Superman, but then again he is not. b. *Clark Kent must be Superman, but then again he is not. c. *Clark Kent may be Superman, but then again he is not.

( I s)a. *Clark Kent is Superman, but then again he is not. b. *Clark Kent must be Superman, but then again he must not. c. Clark Kent may be Superman, but then again he may not. Sentence ( I 4a) is unacceptable because it is a contradiction. A speaker cannot be committed to the truth of both P and -.p at the same time. Sentences

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

(I Ja) is a direct command (an illocutionary act making the assertive point); (1 3b) is a report (an illocutionary act making the assertive point).The sincerity condition on ( 1 3a) requires that the speaker is sincere in wanting the hearer to leave. Similarly, the sincerity condition on ( 1 3 b) requires that the speaker is sincere in wanting the hearer to be informed that his son is dead. The modalized versions in ( 1 2) soften the effect of the rather blunt utterances in ( I 3) by relieving the speaker of the obligation to fulfil the sincerity condition. In (1 2a) the speaker presents himself as being under compulsion to direct the hearer to leave, and is thus relieved of the obligation to actually want the speaker to leave. Similarly, in (1 2b) the speaker presents himself as being under compulsion to inform the hearer that his son is dead, and is thus relieved of the obligation to actually want the hearer to receive the bad news. The hedging effect of the modal is at work in epistemic modal sentences as well. If the sincerity condition on assertion requires belief in P on the part of the speaker, that is commitment to the truth of P, then the hedging effect of a modalized assertion (i.e. quasi-assertion) is to relieve the speaker of this obligation for total belief and full commitment to the truth of P. In the case of must , the speaker presents himself as being forced to a conclusion, one which he will find easier to back away from than if he had simply asserted P, if it is later learned that P is not true after all. In the case of may, the speaker presents himself as sitting on the fence, so to speak. There may be some slight evidence for the truth of P, or minimally no evidence which contradicts P. The differences between must and may can be teased out by comparing the following sets of sentences.' '

320

Quasi-assertion

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

(1 4b)-(14c) are unacceptable because the second clauses have the force of full assertion. The speaker is committed to the truth of -.. p and therefore cannot also be committed to the truth of P, no matter how weakly. The interesting contrast in ( I 5) is between (b) and (c). ln (b) it is clear that the preponderance of the evidence cannot lead to two contradictory conclusions at the same time (namely P and -.. P ). But the situation changes in (c). Here there may be no evidence either way, or evidence in favor of P that is, however, inconclusive. The evidence could lead to other conclusions, not necessarily -..p , simply other conclusions. Suppose the speaker, on several occasions, has observed Clark Kent leaving a telephone booth just after a successful intervention by Superman. This could be interpreted as evidence that Clark Kent is Superman, or it could be irrelevant to the issue of Superman's identity. The evidence could be interpreted as pointing to P (i.e. Clark Kent is Superman) or to Q (Clark Kent makes a lot of telephone calls), but it can't be interpreted as pointing to (-.. P ). By contrast, the second clause in ( I 4c) presents -.p as an assertable fact for which the speaker presumably has the right kind of evidence. ln all these examples the variation is not in P, the propositional content, but in the speaker's commitment to the truth of P and, by implicature, in the strength of his evidence for P. That is, the modal operates on the illocutionary force and not on the proposition itscl£ The first clauses of the sentences in ( I 4) all have the exact same propositional content, a proposition P which is presented as having certain truth conditions. lt is the nature of the truth conditions which is different, depending on whether the proposition is fully asserted, strongly quasi-asserted, or weakly quasi-asserted. Weakly quasi­ asserting P docs not represent P as an actual state of affairs in the world as known to the speaker, but as a state of affairs that is true in some epistemically accessible world which is in most respects just like the present world. lt is just the fact that the speaker is in a weak epistemic state that makes it impossible for him to make any definitive statements on the relevant issue with respect to the actual world. Wc might say, then, that a weak quasi-assertion does not make the assertive point, insofar as it does not conform to S & V's stipulation that the assertive point presents P as representing an actual state of affairs in the world of utterance. Or we might say that S & V's stipulation here is applicable only co an idcalized12 situation in which speakers are omniscient or at least fully informed on all relevant issues. After all, S & V list prediction as making the assertive point. But it is clear that a prediction of P docs not present P as representing an actual state of affairs in the world of utterance, but in a future world which is an orderly extension of the world of utterance, however chat is co be understood. lf we agree, as [ think we must, chat any number of worlds, differing only slightly from one to the other, might turn out to be the actual world of the future, then the status of weak quasi­ assertion as making the assertive point is no different from the status of

J. P. McDowell

321

prediction. Either both prediction and weak quasi-assertion make the assertive point, or neither docs.

2. 5

Characteristic mode ofachievement

3

O PE R AT I O N S O N A S SE R T I O N

S & V propose a set of operations which, i f applied successively, can transform the primitive illocutionary act with illocutionary force F into other illocu­ tionary acts which make the same point. This is the hypothesis of con­ structability. In this section we show how these operations can transform full assertion into strong quasi-assertion and strong quasi-assertion into weak quast-assernon. 0

0

3.1

Operation e

Operation e is the addition of propositional content conditions. S & V place no propositional content conditions on assertion beyond those of the assertive point in general, that in asserting P the speaker presents P as representing an actual state of affairs in the world of utterance. There is a certain inconsistency, however, in this definition. For S & V go on to state that there is an additional propositional content condition on prediction, namely that the propositional content is future with respect to the time of utterance, and, similarly, an additional propositional content condition on reporting, namely that the propositional content is about the past with respect to the time of the utterance. So it might be more consistent to say that the propositional content condition of the assertive point in general is that the speaker presents P as representing a state of affairs in some realization of the actual world, and then leaving it to the propositional content conditions of the various illocutionary acts which make the assertive point to modify this by addition of propositional content

8

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

There is no characteristic mode of achievement for the pmrunve force assertion, although there is for other forces with the assertive point. For example, the characteristic mode of achievement of testify is as a witness. There seems to be no difference between assertion and quasi-assertion in this respect. For example, there seems to be no restriction on the mode of achievement or any special status adhering to speaker or hearer that could distinguish the illocutionary force of the sentences in (2) (assertions) from the illocutionary force of the sentence in ( I ) (quasi-assertions).

322

Quasi-assertion

conditions. Thus, assertion adds the propositional content condition that P is presented as representing an actual state of affairs in the world of utterance; prediction adds the propositional content condition that P represents a state of affairs which is future with respect to the world of utterance; reporting adds the propositional content condition that P represents a state of affairs that is past with respect to the world of utterance, and so forth. The point is that S & V do make a distinction among various realizations of the actual world in rime. For example, of the sentences in (I 6)(a) is a prediction, (b) is an assertion, and (c) is a report.

Even so, we must perform an additional operation e on the illocurionary force assertion to derive quasi-assertion. Recall from the discussions above that epistemic modals grammatically select for stative complements. This means that where there is more than one interpretation in an assertion, only the stative interpretation can be converted into a quasi-assertion. Let us examine a few cases. Take a sentence in the simple present, like ( I 7). (I 7) Max beats his wife. The s tative interpretation of ( I 7) is Max habitually (or characteristically) beats his wife. There is also the less common, but equally acceptable, 'reportorial' interpretation, as in a sporting event, Andretti crosses thefinish line to win the Grand Prix . It is the stative interpretation only that emerges in the epistemic reading of (I 8), It must be the case that Max habitually beats his wife . (I 8) Max must beat his wife. Some sentences in the simple present, or present progressive seem to have a future interpretation, as in (I9).13 ( I 9) a. The bus leaves tomorrow. b. The bus is leaving tomorrow. At first blush, these seem to be predictions, so that the sentences in (2o) would be hedged predictions and not quasi-assertions. (2o) a. The bus must leave tomorrow. b. The bus must be leaving tomorrow. The question is whether the sentences in ( I 9) are genuine assertions or in fact predictions. The argument against treating them as assertions is that they can't have the intentional or planning interpretation because a bus, being an artefact,

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

( I 6) a. Max will be late for the meeting. b. Sam is the funniest man I know. c. Alice nearly missed the train.

J. P. McDowell

323

can't plan or have intentions. The only alternative, so the story goes, is that these are predictions. But we would argue against the view that such sentences can get the planning or intentional interpretation only if the subject is a sentient being with desires and goals. Certainly it is possible to interpret the sentences in (1 9) as meaning that there is a schedule or plan in effect made by some sentient individual. By the same token it is still possible to interpret the sentences in (21 ) as reported commands even though the subjects o f the sentences are not capable of carrying out the command. (2 1 ) a. Azaleas must have loose, well-drained soil. b. All firemen must be at least 5 10 tall. c. The bowl and beaters must be well-chilled. '

•

(22) The prisoner dies tomorrow. And (23) is odd except within some context for John's step-by-step conquest of Mary (John holds hands with Mary today,john kisses Mary tomorrow), but even so it seems strange. (23) *John kisses Mary tomorrow. So if a 'future' interpretation for sentences in the simple present or present progressive is available only when a context can be constructed where plans or schedules are a common feature, then it seems that such sentences are not predictions at all. What licenses the present tense is that the proposition is presented as a fact about the world of utterance and what licences the 'future' interpretation is that plans and schedules are, by their very nature, about future events. Thus, we would argue, the examples in (2o) are not predictions embedded in quasi-assertions, but simple quasi-assertions. In these cases the speaker does not have the bus schedule at hand and can only infer from other clues what the schedule is. The operation 0 then adds a propositional content condition that the propositional content of a quasi-assertion be stative. 3 .2

Operation I

Operation � is the addition of preparatory conditions. The preparatory condition for full assertion is that the speaker has grounds or reason or evidence

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Furthermore, when we leave the realm of travel where schedules and plans are familiar features, it becomes less and less possible to interpret similar sentences as either predictions or as reporting plans and intentions. Example (22) can only be interpreted as a judicial sentence or the report of a judicial sentence, that is, the plan of some judicial entity.

3 24

Quasi-asscrrion

for the truth of P, the propositional content of the assertion. It should be clear from our discussion above, however, that not any level of evidence is sufficient for felicitous assertion. While S & V don't say so, we assume this preparatory condition implies that the grounds or reason or evidence are at a sufficiently reliable level to justify assertion. Under this understanding of the preparatory conditions for assertion, in order to derive quasi-assertion, we must apply operation L to assertion and add the preparatory condition that the speaker docs not have strong enough evidence for P so that he 'knows' that P but only infers or deduces that P. Once again, we refer to the naive concept ofknowledge discussed above.

Operation [-]

The application of operations e and � to assertion, deriving quasi-assertion, do not distinguish strong from weak quasi-assertion. For these we need the operation [-] which decreases the degree of strength of the illocutionary point and of the sincerity conditions. We may arbitrarily assign the value r as the increment by which assertion differs from strong quasi-assertion and strong quasi-assertion from weak quasi-assertion. Thus, if the illocutionary force F has the characteristic degree of strength of assertion, (-r ]F has the characteristic degree of strength of strong quasi-assertion and (-2]F of weak quasi-assertion. 3 ·4

Derivation ofquasi-assertionfrom assertion

In terms of application of all the operations, we derive strong and weak quasi­ assertion from assertion as follows: (24) Assertion: F Strong quasi-assertion: (0](L] (-r ] F Weak quasi-assertion: (E>] (L] (-2]F

=

=

MUST(P) MAY(P)

where (0] adds the propositional content condition that the propositional content is stative and (L] adds the preparatory condition that the speaker does not know that, but only infers or deduces that, the propositional content is true.

4 T R U T H C O N D I T I O N S F O R Q U A S I - A S S E RT I O N We have seen above that the truth conditions for a simple assertion F(P) are that P E w • where w • is the actual world. w • can be characterized by a set of

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

3·3

J. P. McDowell

325

propositions P; which are true in w •. Informally this set of propositions can be viewed as a complete description of the actual world at a time t .

(25)

w

•

=

{P;/P; i s true in

w

•

}

=

•

•

·

·

where p '; is the i th proposition in the set which describes and determines the world w 1 and p '; is true in w 1.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Clearly the same truth conditions cannot hold for quasi-assertion. It is of course possible that where P is quasi-asserted, P E w •. That is, it is always possible to check on the truth of P in w • and find that P is in fact true in the actual world. But the propositional content condition of an illocutionary act F(P) requires that the speaker acknowledge and accept the truth conditions imposed on P by F. And when a speaker quasi-asserts P by performing F(P), he is explicitly and overtly signalling that he does not know that P is true in w • but only infers or deduces that P is true. Furthermore, he believes that P is true in w • only with the degree of strength that is justified by the strength of the evidence on which he has inferred P. Now there is a strong intuition in the literature on the English modals that epistemic modal sentences say something about the possibility or necessity that the proposition expressed in such sentences is true in the actual world (c£ Boyd & Thorne r969 and Steedman I 977). But as it turns out, logical necessity (o) is too strong for sentences with must and logical possibility (<>) is too weak for sentences with may . To elaborate, we cannot translate a strong quasi-assertion (Must(P)) as oP because, as we have seen above in the discussion on the epistemic paradox, oP(P is true in all logically possible worlds) is stronger than P (P is true in the actual world), but MUST(P) is weaker than P. Similarly <>P (P is true in at least one logically possible world) makes far too weak and nonspecific a prediction about the interpretation of MAY(P). The truth conditions are simply wrong. What we need is to retain the quantificational properties of o (correspond­ ing to V) and <> (corresponding to 3) with respect to some subset of the set of all logically possible worlds. The trick is to restrict the domain of quantification to a subset of possible worlds which is related to rhe actual world systematically via the inferential or deductive process. We designate this restricted domain w •, the set of epistemically accessible worlds (where accessibility is to be understood in the manner of Lewis I973 ). We construct w•, the set of epistemically accessible worlds which can be deduced from w •, by imposing an ordering of the sort proposed by Kratzer ( 198 1 ) on W the set of all logically possible worlds, as follows. We begin by repeating our assumption that a possible world w is a set of propositions which are true in it. (2 6) W I {p i I • P I Z• ., P Ii• ., P I n}

326 Quasi-assertion

The actual world w* is also a set of propositions true at utterance time:

(27) w * = {p "' 1, p *2,

.

.

•

, p \ . . ., p "'n)

For any speaker s, s knows only some of the propositions tht are true in w*. P* is the set of propositions which are true in w• and known by s, such that p *i) . Then Q "' is the set of propositions which P * � w•. Suppose p • = {p *1 arc true in w* but not known by s, here Q * � w * and Q * = {p *j . . . p *n)· Together P* and Q * completely determine w *, p• 11 Q * = o, P* u Q * - w •. While Q • is a completely determined consistent1 4 set of propositions, so far as s knows, Q * could be any set of propositions X; such that P* 11 X; = o and p• u X; is a consistent set, i.e. X; is compatible 1 5 with P* and nonintersecting. There is a very large if not infinite set of sets of propositions X; which meets these conditions. •

•

•

A world W; = P * 11 X;, is a possible state of affairs for w * so far as s knows. That is, W; may be identical to w • so far as s knows. P*, the set of propositions known by the speaker s to be true in w * , imposes an ordering on W ( W = 11 W; in the manner ofK.ratzer ( I 98 I ). The ordering ranks each W; E W in accordance with its probability of being the actual world in the eyes of the speaker. W* is the set of all and only those members of W which meet the probability test in the eyes of s. We call w• the set of all such Wi• (29) w• = ( W;I W; = p• u X; and W; is highly probable for s) where P* and X; are as defined above.

W* is the set of epistemically accessible worlds. 1 6 Truth conditions for strong quasi-assertions MUST(p) and weak quasi-assertions MAY(P) can then be stated using standard quantifiers operating over w•. (3o) MUST(P) = I iff \fw E W*.., P E w P is true in every possible world that is episternically accessible to s MAY(P) = I iff 3w E w·•. P E w P is true in at least one possible world that is episternically accessible to s An informal interpretation of these truth conditions is this. When a speaker strongly quasi-asserts P, he is saying, 'I am reasonably confident that P is true in the actual world because P is true in every possible state of affairs that could reasonably be the actual world and which is, at the same time, highly probable according to the evidence available to me.' Similarly, when a speaker weakly quasi-asserts P, he is saying, 'I am able to accept that P is true in the actual

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

(28) X 1 : P* 11 X1 = o, P* u X1 is consistent X 2: P* 11 X 2 - o, P* u X2 is consistent Xn: P* 11 Xn = o, P* u Xn is consistent

J. P. McDowell

3 27

s

C O N CL U S I O N

We return briefly now to some points raised above. We suggest that the felicity conditions on quasi-assertion and the truth conditions on the propositional content imposed by the illocutionary force or quasi-assertion provide some diagnostics for determining what is or is not an epistemic modal sentence and what arc the subtle differences between true epistemics and other utterances which have an epistemic flavor. We will not go into the details here because it would take us far afield from the topic of this paper. But we will sketch the lines of argument and leave the details to other expositions (and c£ McDowell 1987). One point is that sentences with will and can are only epistemic to the extent that their truth conditions involve sets of possible worlds which are related inferentially to the actual world w *. But these sets of possible worlds are not related to w • in the same way as W* the set of epistemically accessible worlds. Recall that every w in W* includes P* the set of propositions that the speaker knows to be true in the actual world w •. This is clearly not the case for FUT, the set of future worlds which is the domain of prediction (will ). FUT will intersect with w• minimally to the extent of timeless truths (the laws of physics, etc.) and facts about the past. All the other propositions which determine a

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

world because P is true in at least one possible state of affairs that could reasonably be the actual world and which is, at the same time, highly probable according to the evidence available to me.' Notice that w • e W* and P is true iff p e w *. It is important at this point to distinguish between truth conditions for quasi-assertions and felicity conditions. For example, under the truth condi­ tions presented above, both MUST(P) and MAY(P) are true if P e W*P This agrees with intuition. If I 'know' that Clark Kent is Superman (i.e. I am committed to the truth of the proposition expressed by the sentence Clark Kent is Superman ), then it follows that Clark Kent must be Superman (whatever is cannot possibly be otherwise) and that Clark Kent may be Superman (whatever is is possible). Whether I choose to fully assert, strongly quasi-assert or weakly quasi-assert some proposition P, however, depends on a host of social and practical factors which have nothing to do with truth conditions. In ordinary conversation we have to assume that speakers are being cooperative in the Gricean sense (Grice 1975) and that they agree to the truth conditions for the propositional content of their utterances that are appropriate to the illocu­ tionary act they are performing with their utterances. Indeed speech act theory explicitly includes the satisfaction of propositional content conditions (among these truth conditions) as a condition for satisfying felicity conditions (see section 2, above).

J2X

Quasi-assertion

(3 I) a. The sun should come up right over that tree. b. ??The sun must come up right over that tree. JOYCE P. MCDOWELL Intelligent Text Processing, Inc. tJt o Montana Av. Suite zot Santa Monica, CA 904 03 USA

N O TE S 1 Throughout this paper we follow the exposition of speech act theory to be found in Searle & Vanderveken ( 1 98 5). 2 In most cases in English there is a performative verb which can be used to perform some particular illocutionary act. In many cases there is also a noun which names the act. For example, ifl say Walker is a spy, I am performing an act which I might also perform by saying I

hereby assert that Walker is a spy and which goes by the name of assertion. Assertion is the primitive act which makes the asser­ tive point, and sentences like I hereby assert that Walker is a spy are redundant because Walker is a spy is sufficient to make the assertive point. That is, any declarative sentence is implicitly or by default an assertion. Other assertive performatives are more felicitous, particularly the more

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

world in FUT will have to be inferred by considering what is a reasonably orderly extension of those members of P* which are not timeless truths or facts about the past. Thus, for every world w E FUT, only some of the propositions in P* are true in w. The domain of possibiliry expressed by ca n , call it K, on the other hand, is a set of possible worlds which is compatible with the speaker's knowledge of the actual world, in other words, compatible with P*. Each world in K is just P* plus some other proposition p , K - (w: P* v (q} where q is a proposition). One of these worlds includes the proposition p expressed by the sentence containing ca n . This domain is epistemic just to the extent that any domain is epistemic which contains P*. Thus, for every world w E K, every proposition P* is true in w. Sentences with should are best thought of as reports of norms Uust like sentences with deontic must are reports of commands). Norms differ minimally from commands in that the issuer of the norm has no authority in the relevant domain to command the expressed proposition. What sometimes gives these sentences an epistemic flavor is that norms include not only moral precepts but knowledge of what is or is not usually the case, what Kratzer (I 98 I) calls a normative ordering source. Once again this involves a generalization on P *. This latter point can be easily seen by comparing the perfectly natural ( 3 I a) with the anomalous (3 I b).

J. P. McDowell

indicate a starive interval because the action described by a progressive precedes speech rime, carries on through speech rime, and continues afterward. Similarly, a perfective such as John has read a book indicates a srarive interval because ir describes a properry of an individual in the sense of Carlson ( 1 977). Properties of individuals hold before, during, and after speech rime. I o There is some cross-linguistic evidence for this from Chinese. In Chinese the episremic operator is a pure adverb (i). (i) Zhangsan yiding shi ge yisheng Zhangsan certainly be MEASURE doctor Zhangsan must be a doctor Starive verbs in Chinese, like shi 'be' and zhidao 'know' can receive present tense interpretacion and can co-occur with the episremic operator (i, ii). (ii) Zhangsan yiding zhidao zenmo zou. Zhangsan certainly know how go. Zhangsan must know how to get (there). Nonstarive verbs cannot gee present tense interpretation without the presence of a modal or ocher verb. That is, nonstarive verbs m Chinese cannot recetve rhe habitual or characteristic interpretation. These verbs are also impossible with the episremic operator (iii). (iii) *Zhangsan yiding zi chezi. Zhangsan certainly wash car. Zhangsan must was the car (regu­ larly). Zhangsan yiding yao xi chezi. Zhangsan certainly will wash car. Zhangsan will surely wash rhe car. anonymous reviewer suggested these examples. 12 S & V actually scare char rhe entire structure of illocurionary logic which rhey construct depends on a somewhat idealized view of rhe verbs they discuss (p. 1 8 2).

1 1 An

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

rhey differ from primitive assertion, for example, I claim that Walker is a spy, I deny that Walker is a spy, I suggest that Walker is a spy, ere. There is no English performarive verb which can be used to perform quasi­ assertion and, except for chis label char we have given ir, there is no noun which names rhe ace. 4 We make rhe common assumption char our example sentences represent tokens of urrerances in actual conversation. S c£ Fraser ( 1 97 5) and see below. 6 Srricdy speaking, the nonmodalized ver­ sion of The Maori must have come from Tahiti is The Maori have comefrom Tahiti. However, chis sentence seems a lirde odd because of rhe present relevance supplied by rhe perfective. Contrast TheJonesfamily comefrom Boston wirh TheJonesfamily have come from Boston . The first sentence reports rhe origins of rhe Jones family who may or may nor be present ar rhe rime of utterance, while rhe second reports rhe departure point of rhe recendy arrived and probably present Jones family. Since there is no past tense form of must rhe perfective must have stands m for borh simple past and perfective in the modalized version. The Jonesfamily must have comefrom Boston can either quasi-assert char rhe Jones family has irs origins in Boston or char rhe Jones family is recendy arrived from Boston. Such a contrast is nor actually possible with respecr to the Maori because, although it 1s possible to report rhe origins of rhe Maori, it is not possible for them to be recendy arrived. 7 See Barnes (1 984) for a language with a rich evidential morphology. 8 This is, of course quite different from saying, 'Whatever is could not possibly have been otherwise.' c£ Karrtunen ( I 97 1 ) for a full discussion o f this. 9 We use the term stative to describe a starive interval in rhe manner of Vlach ( 1 98 I). A stative interval is any interval which includes speech rime. Progressives

329

3 30

13

14

Bernard Comrie pointed out these exam­ ples to me and the comments of an anonymous reviewer refocussed my attention on them. Kratzer ( 1 98 1 ) defines a consistent set as follows: 'A set of propositions A is consistent, if and only if, there is a world in W (the set of all possible worlds-JPMJ here all propositions of A are true.' We know, of course, that people can hold inconsistent beliefs. But it seems to me that in spite of this people expect know­ ledge to be consistent That is, given that I must hypothesize what the unknown portion of my world is like ( Q *), I do not expect that both p and �p will be true in it, even though my beliefs about P* may indeed lead to contradictions. Kratzer { 1 98 1 ) defines compatibility of worlds as follows: 'A proposition p is compatible with a set of propositions A if, and only if, A u {p} is a consistent set of

I6

I7

propositions.' We can extend this notion by saying that a set of propositions X is compatible with a set of propositions A iff A u X is a consistent set of proposi­ tions. In general, a proposition p will be compatible with a set of propositions A so long as �p is not in A and �3q in A such that q - �p . This view of epistemic accessibility is not intended as a model of the dynamics of the knowledge state of an individual, but only as a framework for addressing the meaning of epistemic modal sentences. Nevertheless, it is compatible with such a model, such as that presented in Gaerden­ fors ( 1 988), which includes probability orderings on propositions within a pos­ sible world, probability orderings over sets of possible worlds, and rules for dyamic modifications to epistemic states. An anonymous reviewer pointed out these implications.

RE FERE N CE S Antinucci, F. & Parisi, D . ( 1 97 I ), 'On English modal verbs', CLS, T 28-39. Barnes, ]. ( 1 984), 'Evidentials in the Tuyuca verb', Internationaljournal ofAmerican Lin­ guistics ' so: 25 5-7 I . Boyd,]. & J. Thorne ( I 969), 'The semantics of modal verbs', journal ofLinguistics, 5, 5774·

Coates, ]. ( 1 98 3 ), Tlze Semantics of tlze Modal Auxiliaries, Croom Helm, London and Canberra. Fraser, B. ( 1 97 5), 'Hedged performatives', in P. Cole and ]. Morgan (eds), Syntax and Semantics 3: Speech Acts, Academic Press, New York and London. Gaeardenfors, P. ( I 988), Knowledge in Flux, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA Grice, H. ( 1 97 5 ), 'Logic and conversation', in D. Davidson & G. Harman (eds), Tlze Logic of Grammar, pp. 64-74, Dickenson, Encino, CA. .

Hofmann, T. ( I 966), 'Past tense replacement and the modal system', Mathematical Lin­ guistics and Automatic Translation , 17, Harvard Computational Laboratory Report to the National Science Founda­ tion, Cambridge, MA. Hambourger, R. ( 1 987), justified assertion and the relativity of knowledge', Philo­ sophical Studies, 5 1 , 2: 24 1 -70. Karttunen, L. ( 1 97 I ), 'Possible and must', Syntax and Semantics, 1: 1 -20. Academic Press, New York. Kratzer, A ( 1 98 I ), 'The notional category of modality', in H-J. Eikmeyer & H. Rieser (eds), Words, Worlds, and Contexts, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin and New York. Lewis, D. ( 1 97 3 ), Counterfactuals, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA Lyons, ]. ( 1 977), 'Modality', ch. 1 7, Semantics Vol. 2 , Cambridge University Press, Cam­ bridge. .

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

15

Quasi-assertion

J. P. McDowell McDowell, J. (1987), 'Assertion and modal­ ity', Ph.D. dissertation, University of Southern California. Searle, J. & D. Vanderveken (198 s). Founda­ tions of Illocutionary Logic , Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

33 1

Steedman, M. (1977), 'Verbs, rime, and modality', CcgnitiveScience, 1: 216-34. Vlach, F. ( 1 98 1), 'The semantics of the progressive', in Syntax and Semantics 1 4 (Tense and Aspect): 271-92.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Journal ofSemantics 8: 3 3 3-361

© N.LS. Foundation (1991)

Concept Types and Parts of Speech with Special Reference to the Lexicalization of Region Concepts in French C H R I S T O P H S C H W A R ZE

University ofConstance

Abstract

I N T RO D U C T I O N It is a tradition in grammar and linguistics to express overall structures in the lexicon of a language by classifying its words according to their formal as well as to their semantic properties. Formal classifications rest mostly upon inflection and distribution; they yield systems such as the parts of speech (or 'lexical categories'). Semantic classification is less obvious. The methods range from simply postulating common-sense general concepts, such as action, object, quality, etc., to more refined attempts such as the lexical field analysis, the aspectual analysis of verb meanmgs, etc. The problem which this paper addresses is how formal and semantic classes of words relate to each other. I am not going to discuss the general problems which are inherent in the formal and semantic classifications in themselves. For the overall formal structures of the lexicon, I will assume that the traditional system of pans of speech is basically a reasonable classification, at least for the European standard languages. For the overall semantic structure, I do not claim that there is a compara­ tively simple system of classes: there are far more semantic classes than parts of speech. I think, however, that traditional grammar was right in postulating a closed system of general concepts, according to which the single word meanings are organized. I share the belief of many linguists and Artificial

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

It is a tradition to express overall structures in the lexicon of a language by classifying its words according to their formal as well as to their semantic properties. The problem treated here is how formal and semantic word classes relate to each other. The problem will first be discussed on a general level. Then some results of an empirical study on the lexicon of space in French will be presented. It will be shown how the concept of' region' is distributed across the pans of speech of that language. The study confirms and specifies the current assumption that there are typical relationships berween formal word classes and concept types, but it also raises the question of what happens within the domain of atypical lexicalization.

3 34

Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

1 THE P R O B L E M O F H O W P A RTS O F S PEE C H A N D C O N CE P T TYPES R E L ATE T O E A C H O T H E R I.I

Three possible answers

To the question of how parts of speech and concept types relate to each other, there are three possible answers:

( ) There is a regular and full correspondence between parts of speech and 1

concept types. (2) Parts of speech and concept types are entirely independent from each other. (3) Between parts of speech and concept types there are regular correspondences, but they are far from exhaustive. My own position falls within the third answer, to which I deliberately gave a rather vague formulation. The aim of this paper is to make this formulation more precise. I will start out by briefly commenting on the two more radical answers. Thesis ( 1 ) underlies the parts of speech system of traditional European grammar. The single parts of speech were defined simultaneously in terms of formal and conceptual properties. For a language like Latin, traditional grammar makes statements like the following:

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Intelligence scholars who think that concepts such as physical object, natural kind, colour, motion, location, etc. rank high in the hierarchy of conceptual structure and organize the bulk of the single concepts. (This does not exclude, of course, that an elaborate analysis of a given lexicon may show that more and different general concepts have to be postulated.) It follows from this that I view the question of how formal and semantic classes relate to each other more precisely as the problem of the relationship between parts of speech and general types of concepts. I should add that I do not claim that my observations on this problem are universally valid. For those languages in which word classes are formally less distinct, the problem virtually disappears. This paper has two parts. In the first part I am going to discuss the problem on a rather general level. In the second part I will present some results of an empirical study of the French language. I will pick out one concept type belonging to the conceptual domain of space, namely the concept of 'region'. Concepts of this type are lexicalized in words belonging to various parts of speech. I will try to show how this concept type is distributed across these parts of speech and try to draw conclusions about the general problem.

C. Schwarze

335

(4) The verb is inflected according to tense, mood, number and person. It may govern several kinds of objects and complements. It denotes events or states. (s) The noun is inflected according to case and number. It has three genders. It denotes various kinds of objects. (6) The adjective is inflected according to case, number and gender. It denotes qualities. Traditional grammarians did not worry about possible counter-examples, such as: (4 ) The verb resemble certainly does not denote an event, and one may easily find situations in which it does not denote a state either. (s ) The noun departure does not denote an object of any kind. (6 ) The adjective next does not denote a quality. '

'

Structural linguists generally did not accept the intuitive semantic character­ izations of traditional grammar.• The notion of morpheme became more important than the notion of word, parts of speech were replaced with distributional form classes, and linguists generally refrained from attributing general class meanings to these form classes. Thus many structural linguists would probaby have argued in favour of thesis (2), if one had asked them to state their point of view on the topic. The problem seemed to be settled. But, seen from the historical distance, structural linguistics possibly just 'dissolved' the problem, instead of solving it. I .2

Associations between concept types andformally defined parts ofspeech

There are a few linguists who have proposed new ideas about the old parts of speech problem. Lyons ( 1 966, 1 977, 1 989) repeatedly argued for the following general claim: there is a systematic association between parts of speech and ontology. But this association, for each part of speech, only holds for a central domain, outside of which word-class2 membership is only weakly motivated or even arbitrary.3 I fully agree with this general conception,4 which may be regarded as a more precise variant of what I formulated above as thesis (3). I will come to the details ofLyons's conception in the second part of this paper. But it may be said immediately that Lyons leaves open various important questions. These questions are: (i) How is the ontology organized? How do the basic concepts connect to more specific ones? (ii) Is there a motivation for given types of concepts to be typically associated with determinate parts of speech? (iii) If clear associations between parts of speech and types of concepts only hold within a central domain, what do we have to assume about the

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

'

3 36

Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

possibly large number of words that do not belong to the central domain of a given part of speech? Is there some rationale for class membership in the peripheral domains? May a given concept be lexicalized in the central domain of one part of speech and in the peripheral domain of others? And how about word meanings which amalgamate concepts belonging to different types? As an example, take the verb to hunt : it denotes a kind of activity, the objects ofwhich are wild animals. Ifactivities and wild animals belong to distinct types of concepts, how does the complex concept of hunting match with the ontological structure?

1 .2 . 1 Syntactic vs. l ex ical d erivation in Kuryl owicz ( 1 936)

In Kutylowicz ( 1 9 36) the problem of the relationships berween concept types and parts of speech appears as a phenomenon of derivation. The author distinguishes berween a 'syntactic' and a 'lexical function'. The 'syntactic function' of a word is the way in which it appears in the sentence. A word may have more than one 'syntactic function'. The 'lexical function' of a word is the concept associated with it as its lexical meaning. Kurylowicz makes the following claims: (i) The 'syntactic function' of a word may vary, whereas its 'lexical function' may remain constant. If this happens, the word undergoes 'syntactic derivation'. As an example he gives the transition, in Latin, from the finite verb to the present participle: a mat is a verb, whereas amans is an adjective, but their 'lexical function' is exactly the same (Kurylowicz 1 936: 42). (ii) Among the various 'syntactic functions' which a word may have, there is a hierarchy: one of these 'syntactic functions' is primary, the others being secondary and derived from the primary one.5 Secondary 'syntactic functions' can be recognized by their morphological derivedness.6 (iii) The 'primary syntactic function' of a word is determined by its 'lexical function'; in other words, the primary form class of each word is determined by its lexical meaning.7 (iv) The 'lexical function' of a word may vary without a change of its 'syntactic function'. If this happens, we have 'lexical derivation'.8 As

an example, Kurylowicz mentions diminutive formation.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

There are rwo publications, Kurylowicz ( 1 936) and Plank ( 1 9X4), which provide answers to some of these questions. They are probably not as well known as Lyons ( 1 977). I will therefore try to summarize or reconstruct their thoughts (but I will not always respect their terminology).

C. Schwarze 3 3 7

These claims give three important qualifications to the point which had been left vague in our initial thesis (3), namely: (a) There are regular correspondences between parts of speech and concept types, but they are restricted to a domain of primary associations of 'syntactic' and 'lexical functions'. (b) These associations are extremely strong, since, within the primary domain, lexical meaning determines syntactic properties. (c) The secondary domain is connected with the primary one by derivational processes, which cancel the original associations.

-

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

This conception is surprisingly modern. What I summarize under (a) is roughly the same idea which was to be proposed, 30 years later, by Lyons ( 1 966). Point (b) concerns the question of how the prototypical associations are motivated (even if Kurylowicz does not explain how 'syntactic functions' are determined by 'lexical functions'). Point (c) is a statement on the relationship between prototypical and non-prototypical members of a word class; this relationship is based upon derivational processes. This idea is certainly correct. Derivational processes are an important means of changing syntactic word classes without modifying the conceptual meanings. Bur the idea can be generalized: we also have cases where an identical concept is simply lexicalized in different word classes without any derivational relationship. Think of French, where the concept of'falling' is lexicalized in the verb tomber and in the noun chute , where 'hurt' appears in the verbal lexeme faire mal and in the noun douleur, and where for 'cat' you have the noun chat and the adjective Je1in . These examples may not be very typical. But they might suggest that the distribution of a given concept across the different parts of speech should not simply be viewed as a result of derivational processes. Inversely, they make it plausible that derivational processes are just one means for loosening the primary associations between concepts and parts of speech, the other means being given by syntax (cf e.g. the noun chat and the noun modifier de chat ). Therefore Kurylowicz's first thesis about 'syntactic derivation' can be reformu­ lated as follows. A given concept may be lexicalized in several words belonging to different parts of speech. That is, a difference of part of speech is not necessarily connected with a modification of conceptual meaning. But among the various parts of speech, only one is primarily associated to the concept. A similar generaJization may be made with regard to Kury:l-owicz's notion of 'lexical derivation'. There are, of course, processes ofword formation which do not change the word class. Diminutive formation is one of them. But there also are the facts of polysemy, which often may be interpreted as the result of synchronically active rules of semantic shift (Schwarze 1 979: 3 1 3 1 6, Schwarze

338

Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

1 989). In other words, semantic derivation is not necessarily connected with morphological processes. But this generalization does not invalidate Kurylowicz's idea that primary associations between concept types and parts of speech may be cancelled by semantic processes. This may be illustrated by the polysemy of the French verb longer. In one of its readings it denotes a motion event, namely the motion along an object in the dimension of its length, cf: (7) Je longeais Ia grille du pare. 'I (walked, drove, etc.) along the fence of the park'

(8) La voie ferree Ionge le canal. 'the railroad track (goes) along the canal' In the first reading, the association between parts of speech and conceptual type is intuitively primary. The second reading can reasonably be conceived of as derived by a productive rule of conceptual shift, c£ examples like the following: (9) Germ. Das Wasser ging rnir his zum Knie. 'the water went up to my knee' Engl. The trail crosses a road. It. La strada sale fino a 2000 m. 'the road climbs up to 2000 m' Kurylowicz's conception of 'lexical derivation' can thus be reformulated in the following way. If a word has various related meanings, these may be connected by conceptual derivation. In such a case, only one of the meanings is primarily associated with the part of speech the word belongs to. Conceptual derivation cancels primary associations in the same way as formal derivation does. Two further remarks can be made. The first one concerns the effects of derivations. In the cases we have discussed, the direction always went from the primary to a secondary association of a conceptual type with a word class. But this is not always the case. There are conceptual derivations which change secondary into primary associations. As an example, consider the French noun passage. It is morphologically derived from the verb passer 'to pass'. It denotes an event type, the action of passing. Let us assume that the concept type 'event' is primarily associated with

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

In another reading it denotes a static relationship, namely the parallel orienta­ tion of two objects considered in the dimension of their length, as in:

C. Schwarze 3 39

I

.

2 2 Parts of s peech and s eman ti c categ ori es in Plank ( 1 984) .

Plank ( 1 9R4: s o s , s 1 6) argues that parts of speech are nothing else than descriptive generalizations over the grammatical behaviour ('grammatisches Verhaltensrepertoire') of the words of a given language. He explicitly rejects the idea that parts of speech are based upon semantic categorizations. Nevertheless he does not consider as unsound the associations ofsemantic and formal properties by which traditional grammar claimed to define the parts of speech. 1 0 According to Plank ( 1 984: 509), these claims are most easily confirmed by what one finds in the central domain of the lexicon. This central domain is made up of the words which belong to the basic vocabulary ('Grundwortscharz'), in their kemal constructions ('Kernkonstruktionen') and in prototypical usage ('prototypische Verwend ungen '). He would therefore object neither to Kurylowicz's distinction between primary and secondary associations of 'lexical' to 'syntactic functions' nor to Lyons's formulation that parts of speech reflect ontology in their central domains. But he obviously does not share Kurylowicz's claim that 'syntactic functions' are determined by 'lexical functions'. In fact, instead of simply postulating those prototypical associations of grammatical behaviour and semantic categories, Plank tries to explain and to motivate them.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

the verb. Then passage in the present reading shows a secondary association between concept type and word class. In another reading, passage denotes a kind of physical object, namely a small and short covered street, reserved for pedestrians, which connects two larger streets. If we assume that the concept type 'physical object' is prototypically associated with the noun, then this conceptual derivation goes from a secondary to a primary association.9 The second remark concerns the interaction of what Kurylowicz called 'syntactic' and 'lexical derivation'. He had assumed that derivations of both types may apply successively to the same word (Kurylowicz 1 936: 4 5 ) . But his dichotomy of 'syntactic' vs. 'lexical derivation' obscures the fact that a modification on the conceptual level may occur simultaneously with a change of the formally defined word class. If we try to analyse the relationship between the nounfish and the homonymous verb in terms of his conception, we would have to say that the 'syntactic function' and the 'lexical function' change simultaneously. The 'syntactic function' changes from noun to verb, and the 'lexical function' goes from 'a fish' to 'to try to catch fish'. And, what is more important, the conceptual change seems to be necessary. Denominal verbs, in fact, take the concept lexicalized in the noun as an argument of some typically 'verbal' predicate. There seems to be a semantic constraint on purely formal derivations. I will come back to this point in the second part of this paper.

340 Concept Types and Pans of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French The skeleton of his reasoning is as follows.

A given word

has determinate

'communicative functions', which motivate its repertoire of grammatical behaviour. Words which have similar communicative functions will naturally have similar grammatical behaviour. 1 1 Plank gives several examples in order t o explain how communicative functions (and principles of human perception) motivate grammatical beha­ viour.

I will cite j ust one of them, the explanation of why the conceptual types

'animate being' and 'physical object' are lexicalized as nouns. Words which denote animate beings or physical objects 'should be pre­ destinated to be used in referential expressions, the main communicative function of which is to identify the participants of a situation as themes of pre­

I 984: s I 7, my translation). Since 'individuation and possibly

quantification of such lexical meanings is perceptually easy and . . . since there are good chances that they are communicatively necessary', 'the expressability of oppositions of number belongs to the privileged properties of grammatical behaviour of this semantic class of lexemes.'1 3 I f we compare Plank's

I 984 article with Kurylowicz ( I 936) and Lyons ( 1 977),

we see a considerabl e agreement: all three authors distinguish between a prototypical and non-prototypical domain in the lexicon. They all assume prototypical associations between concept types and parts of speech. Further­ more, Plank's article helps us to clarify our position in two important points: (i) Even within the prototypical domain of the lexicon, the association of conceptual types with parts of speech does not have the character of determination, but rather of motivation and preference: (ii) These associations can be motivated on the level of communicative function and of perception. Let us also observe that all of these authors do not say very much about the relationships between the prototypical and the non-prototypical domain of the lexicon. Is anything possible within the latter? We shall pursue this question in the second part of this paper.

1.3

Semantic types and concept types

The traditional thesis of a regular and full correspondence between parts of speech and concept types as formulated above under (r ) has been vigorously ,

renewed by Montague Grammar. This theory associates so-called semantic types to syntactic categories, in such a way that syntax and semantics have a perfectly parallel structure. In this theory, the parts of speech appear as 'basic categories'. Like all categories, each basic category represents a semantic type (Cresswell 1 97 3 :

72). A proper

I 27-

noun represents an individual, an intransitive verb represents a

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

dications'12 (Plank

C. Schwarze 34 I

( 1 0) There is a privileged association between the conceptual type 'transmis­ sion event' (which includes concepts such as giving, bringing, sending, etc.) and the semantic type (o, 1 , I , I ) (which is syntactically represented by three-place transitive verbs). This privileged association is motivated by the fact that three-place transitive verbs open slots for the persons and objects essentially involved in transmission events. But what can be said about the non-prototypical associations? It would be nice if we could confirm an hypothesis like the following: ( I I ) A given concept c can be lexicalized in the parts of speech p 1 , . . ., Pn• iff p 1 , , Pn represent the same semantic type. •

•

•

Let us see whether this hypothesis is defensible. It seems to be supported by the semantics of nominalized verbs, or, more generally, the conceptual correspondences between verbs and event nouns. Consider, e.g., the verb to call and the corresponding noun (a) call . On the level of semantic types, both words represent a property (in standard notation: (o, 1 )). On the level of conceptual

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

property, and so on. One point is of special interest for our problem: there are more parts of speech than semantic types, so that different parts of speech may represent the same semantic type. Thus intransitive verbs and the so-called common count nouns both represent properties (Cresswell 1 973: 1 3 3). This could remind us of the above thesis that a given concept may be lexicalized in different parts of speech. We must keep in mind, however, that the semantic types of Montague Grammar are not identical with the conceptual types we have discussed until now. Semantic types are based upon a general and a far more simple ontology, and they are motivated exclusively by the needs of sentential semantics: the aim of the theory is to explain how sentence meanings are built up from the meanings of words and constituents. If we accept the idea that for the sake of sentential semantics it is reasonable to postulate a set of semantic types, then we must postulate a model of lexical meaning made up of two levels: the level of semantic types and the level of conceptual meaning. 14 We can now come back to the question ofhow conceptual types and parts of speech are related, reformulating it like this: are the contents of both levels of lexical meaning completely independent from each other, or are there constraints of some kind? As far as the central domain of the lexicon is concerned, Plank's claim that there are prototypical associations of concepts and repertoires of grammatical behaviour seems co be a good answer, and it seems easy to add more examples of motivation to the one he gives; cf the following:

342

Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

r .4

Tentative conclusions

The following propositions can be concluded from the above discussion: (i) There are concepts which, in a given language, may be lexicalized m different parts of speech. (ii) There is a central domain in the lexicon, in which prototypical associations between parts of speech and conceptual types exist. In the peripheral domain of the lexicon, those prototypical associations are cancelled. (iii) These prototypical associations are motivated on the level ofcognition and of communication. (iv) But there are semantic derivations which may re-establish prototypical associations even within the peripheral domain. (v) In the lexical meaning of a word there is also a level of semantic types, which accounts for the manner in which the word meaning is integrated

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

meaning, they both denote the same kind of activity. This is what the hypothesis predicts. There seems to be an additional advantage: if the hypothesis is correct, it would also explain why lexicalizing an event as a noun does not imply that the event is changed into a thing. In other words, the hypothesis excludes mysterious processes such as 'reification' of a process. But, unfortunately, the hypothesis proves to be incorrect. Let us consider the relationship between colour adjectives and the corresponding colour nouns. Adjectives and nouns represent different semantic types. (Adjectives are ((o, I ), (o, I )), whereas nouns are (o, I ).). Consequently, the hypothesis predicts that, e.g., the adjective green and the noun green (in expressions such as I like that green ) cannot represent the same concept. But this evidently is not true, the concept 'green' being exactly the same in both words. Another false prediction of ( I I) concerns denominal verbs, such as to fish . Intransitive verbs and nouns both represent properties (their semantic type is (o, I )). The conceptual meaning of the noun should consequently appear unaltered in the verb. But, as we know, it is amalgamated with another concept, and there are strong reasons to assume that this is necessarily the case. Denorninal verbs seem to require an amalgamation of the nominal concept with a concept of the type 'action' or 'behaviour'. It is difficult to tell what follows from the refutation of (I I). One possible conclusion is that the level of semantic types does not constrain the level of conceptual types. Another possible conclusion is that the semantic types of Montague grammar prove to be inadequate if we take into account lexical semantics. More research is necessary, both on sentential and on lexical semantics.

C. Schwarze 343

into sentence meaning. It is an open question whether associations between conceptual types and parts of speech are constrained by semantic types.

2 RE G I O N C O N CE P T S I N T H E F RE N C H L E X I C O N

( 1 2) External regions: the in-region 1 5 the outside-region the unspecified near-region the whole near-region the external front-region the behind-region the external side-regions

the on-region the under-region the above-region the below-region the between-regions

('in x', 'through x') ('outside of x') ('near x') ('around x') ('in front of x') ('behind x') ('on the right-hand side of x') ('on the left-hand side of x') ('on x') ('under x') ('above x') ('below x') ('between x') ('among x')

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Let us now see how the conclusions of the above general discussion will appear in the light of actual language description. As I said in the beginning, I will consider the lexicon of French in order to see how a certain type of spatial concept, namely the general concept 'region', is distributed across the parts of speech. I will first introduce some terminology. Regions are sections of space, which are defined with regard to physical objects. There are two varieties of regions, external and internal regions. An external region is a section of space which is distinct from the section of space occupied by the physical object. An internal region is included in the section of space occupied by the physical object. It can therefore always be used for referring to a part of that object. Regions are typically defined, as is well known, by means of the following concepts: unspecified nearbyness, includedness (with the distinction between within and without) horizontal orientation, from which derive frontality, laterality (with the distinction between right-hand and left-hand), and the vertical axis (with the distinction between above and below). In the fragment of French which I will consider, the following region concepts occur:

344

Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

( 1 3) Internal regions: the interior region the exterior region the internal front-region the rear region the internal side-regions the upper region the lower region the central region the peripheral regions

('the interior of x') ('the exterior of x') ('the front of x') ('the rear of x') ('the right-hand side of x') ('the left-hand side of x') ('the top, the upper part of x') ('the bottom, the lower part of x') ('the middle of x') ('the peripheral parts of x')

( 1 4) External regions Internal regions m-regwn interior region outside-region exterior region internal front-region external front-region rear reg10n behind-region internal side-regions external side-regions upper regwn on-region, above region under-region, below-region lower region

Criteria included ness includedness frontality frontality laterality vertical axis vertical axis

In the following presentation of empirical facts, will begin with the concepts of external region, and I will examine whether and how they are lexicalized as prepositions, adverbs, verbs, adjectives and nouns. The concepts of internal region will come in during this overview. Throughour this section, for each part of speech ':"e will ask the question whether the association with region concepts is prototypical or not. We will start out with a Lyons-type assumption about the prototypical semantics of the specific word class and see what it predicts with respect to region concepts. We will then look at the French inventory and try to verify whether it meets the prediction. The criteria for this will be twofold: (a) the derivational status (simple vs. derived) of the singular items, and (b) the elaborateness of the inventory. The first criterion is a consequence of Kurylowicz's idea that non­ prototypical members of a part of speech are derived. The second criterion is based on the assumption that the lexical items which are in the prototypical centre of a word class represent a differentiated and well­ organized conceptual system, whereas peripheral items may represent just fragments of such a conceptual system.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

External and internal regions are different subtypes of the more general concept of region. But there are partial correspondences between both systems. They are due to the fact that the criteria of definition of the regions are partially the same. These correspondences are summarized in ( 1 4):

C. Schwarze 3 4 5

The combination of the two criteria may yield an interesting result that has not yet been discussed: it may be the case that, within a given word class, there is a group oflexical items which are morphologically derived but which also form an elaborate system. This is a contradictory situation if we postulate a clear-cut dichotomy between a central and a peripheral domain. But if we conceive the word class as a scalar structure, we will be able to admit degrees of typicality. More precisely, we will be able to see a typicality structure even within the peripheral domain of a word class. 2.1

Prepositions

( 1 s) Regions m-regwns

Prep ositions

dans x chez x d travers X hors de x outside-region unspecified near-region pres de x autour de x whole near-region devant x external front-region enface de x derriere x behind-region a cote de x external side-regions a droite de X 1 7 agauche de x on-regwn under-region above-region below-region between-regions

le long de x sur x sous x au-dessus de x au-dessous de x entre X parmi X

'in x' 'in x's home' 'across x' 'outside x' 'near x' 'around x' 'in front of x' 'opposite x' 'behind x' 'next to x' 'on the right-hand side ofx' 'on the left-hand side of x' 'along x' 'on x' 'under x' 'above x' 'below x' 'between X' 'among X'

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Prepositional phrases with lexical prepositions (as opposed to grammatical prepositions, which have a mere case marking or conjoining function) denote properties or special kinds of entities. Local prepositions use region concepts in order to create expressions which denote properties or places. 1 6 We will therefore expect concepts of region to be prototypically associated with the word class of prepositions. The following table shows the inventory oflocal prepositions in French:

346

Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

2.2

Adverbs

As is well known, the term 'adverb' covers a collection of lexical subcategories which are quite different in form and content. But in the present context there is no need to discuss this problem, since we will only be concerned with the so­ called pronominal adverbs. Syntactically, pronominal adverbs are constituents which have the same distribution as prepositional phrases, but, unlike prepositional phrases, they contain no governed noun phrase. Semantically, they are predicates which incorporate an anaphoric argument. They are comparable to transitive verbs used without an object: I'll wait outside is to I'll wait outside the house what I know is to I know the story . Consequently, if a given language has identical forms for ordinary prepositions and prepositions with an incorporated argument, there is no reason to postulate a difference of word class: one would not like to say of that language that it has pronominal adverbs. But the prepositions and the corresponding adverbs may be different in form. It is only in this case that one would postulate different word classes and that the question of association of a word class with concept types arises. So, before any further discussion, let us look at the facts of French. Here is the mventory:

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

The table shows that French prepositions lexicalize a quite differentiated field of concepts of external region. Looking at the items, one might think, however, that the system is morphologically heterogeneous. For some of the concepts there doesn't seem to be a synchronically simple preposition, but only a complex expression with de (hors de, pres de , etc.). But a more thorough formal analysis shows that this impression is inadequate. In fact, French lexical prepositions behave like verbs: their arguments may be direct or indirect. Thus dans , devant , derriere , sur and sous have a direct argument, whereas hors , pres and au tour have an indirect argument, the marker ofwhich is de . There remain some complex prepositions, which are lexicalized phrases: a travers , en face (de), a cote (de), a droit (de)!a gauche (de), le long (de), au-dessus (de) and au-dessous (de). Lexicalized phrases are not morphologically derived, but the central domain of the lexicon typically is made up of (synchronically) simple words. Consequently the complex prepositions above do not belong to the central domain of the lexicon. But this has nothing to do with the question of whether the lexicalization of region concepts as prepositions is prototypical or not; it has to be explained by the marginal position of the respective concepts in the conceptual system. Hence we can conclude that the above prediction is correct: the association of 'external region' to 'preposition' is prototypical.

C. Schwarze

Prepositions

(16) Regions in-region

dans x

chezx d traversx

outside-region unspecified near-region whole near-region external front-region behind-region external side-regions

Adverbs dedans d travers dehors

(tout) pres autour devant enfoce derriere a cOte a droite a gauche dessus dessous

au-dessus au-dessous

The table shows that there are adverbs for most of the region concepts which are lexicalized as prepositions. But the fact that some prepositions have no adverbial counterpart cannot be ignored, especially if we see that the same phenomenon also occurs with non-spatial prepositions; c£ the following list:

( 1 7) preposition avec x sans x pourx contre x envers x chez x parx avant x apres x pendant x jusqu'a x malgre x

'with x' 'without x' 'for x' 'against x' 'towards x' 'at x' place' 'through x' 'before x' 'after x' 'during x' 'until x' 'in spite of x'

pronominal adverb avec 18 'with (it)' sans 'without' pour 19 'in favour (of it)' contre 'against (it)'

avant apres

'before' 'after (it)'

It is not obvious how these data should be interpreted: one might say that there is some kind of word class distinction between prepositions and pronominal adverbs. But an alternative description is possible, namely that there is no word

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

on-regton under-region above-region below-region between-regions

hors de x pres de x autour de x devant x enfoce de x derriere x a cOte de x a droite de X agauche de x le long de x sur x sous x au-dessus de x au-dessous de x entre X parmi X

3 47

34S

Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

class of pronominal adverbs, but merely a distinction within the class of prepositions, some of them being able, and others not, to incorporate an anaphor. But there is a possibility of deciding between these alternatives. Even though in the majority of cases the preposition and the adverb are morphologically identical, the adverb differing from the preposition only by incorporating the argument (including the grammatical marker de), there are some cases where there is (synchronically) no systematic formal reltionship between the pre­ position and the adverb; c£

( I 8) dans 'in' vs. dedans 'inside'. sur 'on' vs. dessus 'on top'.

2.3

Verbs

According to tradition (and also Lyons 1 97T 448 £), verbs most typically refer to actions. There is no way, of course, to consider regions as actions. But shall we conclude that, if a language has verbs which lexicalize concepts or region, these verbs must belong to the peripheral domain? French belongs to those languages which lexicalize path aspects in verbs of motion (Talmy 1 98 5; Schwarze I 985; Wienold & Schwarze 1989). Now a path can be described by specifying the sections of space where it begins, where it ends, and through which it passes. And these sections of space may be identified with respect to some physical object; that is, according to the definition given in section 2, they may be regions. We will thus expect region concepts to be lexicalized in French verbs of motion, and this is actually the case. Of course a path can also be described without reference to a region, e.g. by specifying a direction. So we will not be surprised to see that several French verbs of motion do not lexicalize region concepts. The verbs for coming and going (aller and venir) specify a direction with respect to a point of reference which must be identified by deixis. The verbs for moving up and moving down

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

These cases, which are marked by bold characters in table ( I 6), are numerically a minority, but they are central in the conceptual system of spatial relationships. So the conclusion will be that in the French language, prepositions and pronominal adverbs are different word classes, but with an extremely low degree of differentiation. With respect to the general problem which we are discussing, namely the distribution of concept types across parts of speech, it is legitimate to consider them together as the class of 'prepositions and pronominal adverbs'. Consequently we can reformulate the result we had obtained for preposi­ tions by saying: the association of concepts of external region to prepositions and pronominal adverbs is prototypical.

C. Schwarze 3 49

( 1 8) Regions m-regwn

Self-motion

Transport

entrer, rentrer, rentrer, introduire, traverser , penetrer enfoncer , inserer, enfouir, importer

outside-region

sortir

sortir, extraire, exporter, extrader, expulser

unspecified near-region

accourir , passer

( r )approclzer, eloigner

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

( monter and descendre ) specify directions along the vertical axis. (They are, of course, closely related to the prepositions and adverbs which specify regions with regard to the vertical axis, but the interpretation of mon ter and descendre does not require one to identify a region.) The verbs for arriving, leaving and passing (arriver, partir and passer) do not even specify a direction. They simply characterize a motion event with regard to the origin, the goal or an intermediate section. The lexical meanings of these verbs only require that a section of space be identified from the context. The verbs themselves do not specify any direction or region. But let us return to those verbs which do lexicalize region concepts. The region concepts that are lexicalized in verbs are also lexicalized in prepositions, with one exception.20 Now regions being places, we will expect, in anology to what we have seen regarding afish and tofish , that the region concepts can only appear in the verb when they are amalgamated with some other concept. The facts meet this expectation. The region concepts are amalgamated with the concept of motion.2 1 This amalgamation is not an amorphous one; the amalgamated concepts are organized in a predicate-argument structure. Since the region is used to characterize the path of a motion, it is a partial factor of the global motion event. Therefore we can say that the region has a subordinate position within the complex verb meaning. The verbs which lexicalize region concepts comprise two syntactically and semantically distinct groups, the verbs of self-motion and the verbs of transport. The verbs of self-motion describe the motion event without postulating a cause. The physical object (or animate being) which moves appears as the subject. The verbs of transport describe the motion event as being caused by some external agent. The agent appears as the subject, whereas the moved object appears as direct object. Verbs of both groups, but especially transport verbs, may amalgamate not only region and motion, but additionally a large variety of non-spatial concepts. In the following table I present only some of them; they are printed in bold characters.

JSO Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

Regions whole near-region external front-region behind-region external side-regions on-region under-region above-region below-region between-region

Self-motion

Transport

contourner longer survoler

( 1 9) If a verb meaning has a predicate-argument structure, then the lexical centrality of the verb depends only on the concept type associated to the highest predicate. The incorporated argument is not relevant.

Hence the morphological simplicity of verbs like entrer, sortir and passer actually is an expression of their prototypicality. They are prototypical because they lexicalize the concept of motion. The fact that the motion verbs of French (and of other languages) lexicalize path aspects not only in terms of deictic orientation (like 'come' and 'go'), bur also by means of regions is a very natural consequence from the concept of motion: motions go along paths, and paths can be defined with respect to regions. But in languages which, like French, have an elaborated system oflocal prepositions, there is a tension between the parts of speech system and conceptual structure.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

This overview shows an asymmetry between the verbs on the one hand and the prepositions and pronominal adverbs on the other hand. A considerable part of the region concepts lexicalized by the latter are not lexicalized in verbs. The difference between verbs on the one hand and prepositions and pronominal adverbs on the other hand also appears on the morphological level: there are almost no derivational relationships.22 What can we conclude, from these observations, about the prototypicality of region concepts lexicalized in the meanings of verbs? Kurylowicz's derivational criterion seems to suggest that the association is prototypical. Verbs like entrer, sortir and passer are visibly not derived, and there is no (synchronical) derivation between verbs and prepositions or adverbs. But the criterion of elaborateness seems to suggest the contrary: in comparison to what we saw for the prepositions and adverbs, the conceptual system appears only in fragments. How can this apparent contradiction be explained? We have seen that there is no simple lexicalization of region concepts in verbs, and that the region concepts are assigned to incorporated arguments. We can now formulate the following additional criterion for the prototypicality of associations of concept types with word classes:

C. Schwarze 3 S I

2.4

Adjectives

(2o) Internal regions Adjectives interieur internal region extirieur exterior region internal front region anterieur postirieur, arriere rear reg10n internal side-regions lateral droit gauche superieur upper reg10n infirieur lower region central central region piripherique peripheral regions

'internal' 'external' 'front' 'rear' 'side' 'right-hand' 'left-hand' 'upper' 'lower' 'central' 'peripheral'

The table shows a conceprually well-differentiated inventory, which is regularly related to the prepositions and adverbs, according to the correspon­ dences given in table ( I 7). The criterion of elaborateness, therefore, seems to suggest that the association of region concepts with adjectives is prototypical,

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

According to Lyons's theory of the ontological foundation of parts of speech distinctions, adjectives are prototypically associated with simple concepts of quality (Lyons I 977; I 4 f). Since it would not be plausible to consider regions as qualities, Lyons's assumption predicts that the lexicalization of region concepts in the word class of adjectives, if there is any, is not prototypical. When we consider the lexicon of French, we do find adjectives which lexicalize region concepts. But only very few of them lexicalize concepts of external regions; they are adjacent 'adjacent', contigu 'contiguous', proche 'near', and lointain 'remote'. The remaining majority of region adjectives lexicalize internal regions. It must be added, however, that the adjectives do not denote the regions by themselves. The region as such is denoted by a noun; it is only specified by the modifying adjective. The meaning of the noun often is or implies the concept 'part of something'; typical nouns of this kind are partie 'part', cOte 'side', quartier 'neighbourhood', etc. As a consequence of this, and according to the definition I gave above, there must always be a global physical object, of which the region is, loosely speaking, a part. This global object has no typical syntactic realization, and in general it is actually not realized. Examples are Ia levre superieure 'the upper lip', where the global object is the mouth, or les boulevards exterieurs , 'the outer boulevards', where the global object is the street system of a city. The following table gives an overview of the French adjectives of internal regwn.

3 52

Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

that is, that the above prediction is wrong. Kurylowicz's criterion of non­ derivedness yields the same result. None of the adjectives (except peripherique) is morphologically derived. But intuitively this result needs further discussion. Lyons's claim that adjectives typically denote simple qualities of what he calls first-order entities is absolutely plausible. And there are comparative facts which seem to confirm it: Germanic languages do not have adjectival equivalents for the whole French list. Several of the English translations I gave in table (zo) are not genuine adjectives, and in German most translational equivalents are the first element of compounds; cf Innenwand Oberlippe Mittelschiff

Also Plank's thesis, according to which a word is liable to show a prototypical association of concept type and part of speech if it belongs to the basic vocabulary of the language, might yield an argument in favour of the initial prediction: should it be the case that the adjectives of table (2o) do not belong to the same basic vocabulary of French? None of the adjectives (except arriere) belongs to the historical layer of native Romance forms. And although it is not quite clear how the basic vocabulary of a language is to be defined, one might tend to think that native forms are more likely to belong to the basic vocabulary than the learned words which make up most of the above list. The apparent contradiction berween the a priori prediction and the results suggested by the criteria of elaborateness and derivedness can be overcome if the undeniable elaborateness and underivedness of the inventory of region adjectives can be explained independently from considerations of prototypi­ cality. This is actually the case. Why does French have an elaborated system of region adjectives? In order to answer this question it is useful to observe that there are rwo basic types of adjectives. Besides the adjectives of simple quality, which Lyons had in mind when he formulated his thesis about typical adjectives, there is another type, the relational adjective. Adjectives of this kind also denote simple qualities, but these qualities are not intrinsic: they are characteristic relations. English examples are adjectives which denote an origin or a class membership (e.g. European (settlers), literary (texts ), domestic (animals). Now in French, as in other Romance languages, relational adj ectives are far more numerous than in English or German. The reasons for this are both cultural and grammatical: the standards of modern Western literacy create a demand for words which makes it possible succinctly to characterize entities with respect to their relations. Some languages, e.g. English or German, meet this demand with powerful mechan­ isms for the generation of compounded nouns. Now the Romance languages,

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

(2 1) paroi interieure levre superieure nef centrale

C. Schwarze 3 5 3

2.5

Nouns

Nouns mainly appear in noun phrases.25 According to Lyons ( 1 977: 442 £, 446), noun phrases typically refer to 'first-order entities', i.e. 'persons, animals and things' ('more or less discrete physical objects') which are 'relatively constant as to their perceptual properties', 'located, at any point of time, in . . . a three­ dimensional space', and 'publicly observable'. Now, if noun phrases typically refer to 'persons, animals and things', then there is a prototypical association between the word class 'noun' and the type of concept that Lyons calls 'first­ order entity'. On the basis of this assumption, we will expect that nouns which lexicalize concepts of regions will not be prototypical nouns: regions are no 'first-order entities', because they are not persons, animals or things. But there is an important difference between external and internal regions. External regions are places. Even if places are typically defined with regard to individual physical entities, they are clearly distinct from these entities. We will consequently expect that nouns which lexicalize concepts of external regions are marginal. Internal regions, on the other hand, are less distinct from individual physical objects, since they are parts of them. In fact, if parts are no first-order entities, they certainly are not second-order or third-order entities.26 This will make us

c

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

having only poorly developed nominal compounding, meet that demand by their abundance of relational adjectives. Therefore we can conclude: the French inventory of relational adjectives is elaborate because these adjectives meet a communicative demand. Let us turn now to the criterion of derivedness. When dealing with a language like French, one must have in mind that derivation is not the only means of expanding a word class: there also is borrowing, especially from the extinct, but culturally coexistant languages Greek and Latin. Thus there are no adjectives which are morphologically derived from rei/ 'eye' or eau 'water', the respective adjectives being oculaire and aquatique (or ophtalmologique and aqueux respectively, with a difference of meaning). Now it is interesting to see that these words are morphologically derived on the level of their languages of origin. This also holds for all the learned region adjectives in our list. So the conclusion is: the French region adjectives form an elaborate system because they are needed, and they seem to be underived because they are borrowingsP So there is no reason not to confirm Lyons's thesis: the lexicalization of region concepts as adjectives is not prototypical on the level of a general theory of parts of speech. But, on the other hand, it is typical for the modern French language, and it can be explained on the level of French word formation.24

3 54

Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

expect that nouns which lexicalize internal regions will be prototypical to some extent, especially if the internal region is a salient one. French nouns of region resemble the adjectives we just discussed: most of them lexicalize concepts of internal regions. There are only two nouns which lexicalize a concept of external region: les environs , les alentours , which both mean 'the surroundings'. But the region nouns systematically differ from the region adjectives in their semantic structure. Whereas region adjectives merely identify regions denoted by nouns, region nouns denote (and specify) the internal regions by themselves. The following table shows the inventory of nouns of internal region. Internal regions

Nouns

interior region exterior region internal front region rear region27 internal side-regions upper region lower region central region peripheral regions

/'interieur /'exterieur le devant

'the inside' 'the outside' 'the front'

le cote le haut le bas le milieu le bord Ia peripherie

'the side' 'the top' 'the bottom' 'the middle' 'the edge' 'the outskirts'

The region nouns belong to the larger lexical field 'part of something', which contains the names of the body parts, words like top , bottom , summit , bank (ofa river) , etc. Unlike most other nouns in this lexical field, nearly all the nouns of region are in some way derived, and they stem from quite heterogeneous sources. Two of them (l'interieur, /'exterieur) are nominalizations (without suffixation) from the corresponding region adjectives; two others (le haut, le bas) are norninalized adjectives of dimension; one (devant) is a nominalized preposition; two ( le bord, le cOte) have diachronically been derived by generaliza­ tion of meaning;28 one (milieu ) stems from a noun phrase (Lat. medius locus) meaning 'middle place'. The high degree of derivedness of the inventory is a point for the conclusion that the association of region concepts with nouns is not prototypical. On the other hand the inventory is conceptually well differentiated, which speaks in favour of the prototypicality of the association. The fact that the criteria of derivedness and of elaborateness yield contradictory results is not surprising if we think of the position of internal regions in Lyons's system of entities: they are located between 'first-order entities', which are typical for nouns, and 'second-order entities', which are not. A more refined ontology would be needed for specifying this intermediate position of internal regions and of parts in general. It would probably postulate

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

(2 1 )

C. Schwarze 3 S S

a category of physical entities which resemble persons, animals and things in all respects, except that they are not discrete with respect to some first-order entity, of which they are a part. Salient body parts (the head, the feet, etc.), salient parts of artefacts (a handle, a roof, etc.) and of plants (the roots, the branches, etc.) would be typical members of this category, and internal regions would be derived from these by metaphor or on the basis of general region concepts. A model of this kind could explain why nouns of region, without being prototypical nouns, are not merely to be seen as lying within a domain of ontologically unclear instances.29

Summa ry cfthe empirical part

The overall picture we get is the following. Concepts of external region are prototypically lexicalized as prepositions and pronominal adverbs. The semantic difference between prepositions and pronominal adverbs does not affect the conceptual meaning. Concepts of external region also appear in the meanings of verbs , namely verbs ofmotion. This fact is due to a language-specific property ofFrench. Since the region concepts are only incorporated arguments, their presence is not relevant for the prototypicality of the verbs in which they are lexicalized. Concepts of internal region are lexicalized in adjectives and in nouns. There is a systematic semantic difference between adjectives and nouns, but it does not affect the conceptual meaning. The association of concepts of internal region with adjectives is not prototypical with respect to a general theory of the parts of speech. But it is anchored in the grammatical system of the French language. Nouns which lexicalize concepts of internal regions do not belong into the prototypical domain, but they are very close to it.

3

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS

In order to bring the two parts of the present paper together, let us reconsider the tentative statements that we had formulated at the end of part one.

3.1

One concept type in various parts ofspeech

The first statement was: 'In a given language, a concept may be lexicalized in different parts of speech.' This statement is confirmed by the empirical analysis. Even if not all particular concepts of region appear in the various word classes,

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

2.6

356 Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

the more general concept type is represented in prepositions and pronominal adverbs, verbs, adjectives and nouns. 3 .2

Central vs. peripheral domain ojthe lexicon

The second statement was: 'There is a central domain in the lexicon, in which prototypical associations berween parts of speech and conceptual types exist.' The anaysis of the distribution of region concepts across prepositions, adverbs, verbs, adjectives and nouns has confirmed this thesis. But the following additional statements turned out to be needed.

3·3

Motivatedness ofassociations

Throughout the empirical part, I did not discuss explicitly the third statement, which read: 'These prototypical associations are motivated on the level of cognition and of communication.' The only section in which I could have tried to do so is the one which treats prepositions. What I could have said is this: if a language has prepositions, then prepositional phrases are highly appropriate for denoting external regions for the following reason. We defined external regions as sections of space which are defined by some local relation with a reference point, typically a physical object. Now local prepositional phrases consist of a predicate, the preposition, which specifies the local relation, and an argument, the governed noun phrase, which specifies the physical object. I think that this attempted motivation is plausible and not circular. But it has the weakness that the assumption of a conceptual (or ontological) category 'region' relies on a specific view of the semantics of local prepositions. I think that no general conclusions can be drawn from this difficulty. But a certain amount of scepticism seems to be in order. Even if we can propose plausible motivations in particular cases, it is not certain that the thesis according to which prototypical associations of word class and concept type are

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

(i) If a concept is amalgamated with other concepts, it may occupy different ranks in the word meaning: it may be superordinate or subordinate. Only the superordinate meaning component is relevant for the prototypicality of the association of concept type and part of speech. (ii) The mere dichotomy berween a central and a peripheral domain is not satisfactory. There are intermediate positions, which might be defined by a more detailed ontology. Furthermore, the grammatical structure of a given language may systematically favour associations which are not prototypical on the general level of a theory of parts of speech.

C. Schwarze 357

motivated on the level of cognition and communication can be fully sustained. In all events, finding these motivations is not as easy as it promises to be when discussed in general terms. 3·4

Prototypicality re-established by semantic derivation

to the fourth statement, according to which semantic derivations may re­ establish prototypical associations even within the peripheral domain, our fragment of French did not contain relevant material. But the claim is safe, since it would be easy to multiply examples such as French passage (c£ 1 .2. 1 , above).

As

Semantic types

The fifth statement was about whether the associations of conceptual types with parts of speech is constrained on the level of semantic types. I have not discussed this problem throughout the empirical part. But there are results which, even though they do not resolve the problem, give some relevant evidence. The fact that there is a systematic semantic difference between prepositions and adverbs, as well as between adjectives and nouns, is certainly due to differences in semantic type. But since these differences do not concern the conceptual aspects of word meanings, these facts prove that a difference in semantic type does not necessarily induce a conceptual difference. On the other hand, the possibilities oflexicalizing concepts in verbs seem to be clearly constrained. But, as I suggested above, these facts need further investigation.

4

P O S T S C R I PT

It was only after I finished the present text that I had the opportunity to read William Croft's article, in this journal , on the conceptual and communicative theory of parts of speech (Croft 1 990). As far as the association between parts of speech and concepts is concerned, Croft follows and further elaborates the typicality approach, which, as has been shown above, goes back as far as 1 9 36. His most original idea obviously has been to combine conceptual structure and categories of speech act theory in a theory of the parts of speech. This combination may partly explain why there are so many untypical elements within the major lexical categories. According to Croft, nouns are used for categorizing and adjectives for modifying. Now, a given concept, say 'sick', is likely to be lexicalized as an adjective. As such, its function is to modify

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

J.5

3 5 8 Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

Acknowledgements Previous versions of this paper were presented in March I 990 at the annual meeting of the German Linguistic Society (DGfS) in Saarbriicken and at the Berkeley Linguistic Colloquium. I wish to thank Peter Pause, Frans Plank and Gotz Wienold for their comments on this paper in its various earlier states, and I am grateful to Bruce Mayo who checked the English text. CHRISTOPH SCHWARZE

Universitiit Konstanz Philosophische Fakultiit Fachgruppe Sprachwissenschafi Universitiitsstr. 1 o 7750 Konstanz Germany

NOTES I For a good characterization o f the tradi­

2.

tional theory and a summary of the main structuralist objections, see Lyons ( I 977: 42.3 ff.). I use the term 'word class' as a stylistic variant of'part of speech'. 'The thesis that will be maintained here is that the semantic, or ontological part ofthe traditional definitions of the parts-of­ speech define for each part-of-speech, not the whole class, but a distinguished sub­ class ofthe total class. Each such semantic­ ally defined subclass is focal within the larger class . . .' (Lyons I 977= 440).

4 I prefer to use the term 'types of concepts' rather than Lyons's term 'ontology'. I would like the terminology to hint at the fact that the system underlying the parts of speech is not the structure of the world in itself, but the result of human categori­ zation. And I am· not sure whether this conceptual system is as well organized as the ontology inherent to a formal lan­ guage. 'Du fait qu'un mot designant une qualite (c'est-a-dire un adjecti� peut fonctionner soit comme epithete, soit comme attribur (predicat), soit comme support autonome

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

the category expressed by the noun to which it is syntactically related. But the concept 'sick' may also be useful for categorizing. Therefore some languages, e.g. French or German, have untypical nouns which are derived from adjectives: un malade , ein Kranker 'a sick person'. But speech act categories probably do not explain all untypical associations of word class and concept type. Complementary explanations may be found on the level of the organization of discourse. There are certain nouns, such as fact, matter, event , person , object , place , which, in spite of being excellent means for categorization, are untypical nouns. Their raison d'etre seems to be that they appear in noun phrases which are used as anaphoric expressions. Other untypical nouns, such as departure , connection , result, sincerity, foolishness , seem to be needed in order to make it easier to treat events and properties as arguments of other predicates. They also are useful, on the level of control of the flow of information, for presenting events and properties as topics.

C. Schwarze 3 59 de determination (adjecrif anaphorique),

had formulated interesting reflections on

il ne s'ensuit pas que routes ces foncrions

this topic (Plank

syntaxiques soient au meme degre essen­

6

II

rielles ou caracterisriques de Ia partie du

lexikalische

discours en question . . . Autrement dit, le

unter die gleiche oder unter eine sehr ahnliche Bedeutungskategorie fallen, ist

Si le changement de Ia foncrion syn­

die gleichen oder ahnliche Verhaltensei­ genschaften als total verschiedene Eigens­

I2

chaften besitzen' (Plank '

. . •

I 984: 5 I6).

dazu pradesriniert . . . in referierenden

Ausdriicken verwendet zu werden, deren kommunikarive

foncrion syntaxique primaire celle qui

Situarionsbeteiligte als Thema von Pradi­

correspond a Ia forme-base, et foncrion

karionen zu idenrifizieren' (Plank

I 936: 42).

I3

Hauptfunkrion es ist,

5 1 7).

I 984:

'[Da] lndividuierung und eventuell Quan­ rifizierung . . . bei solchen Lexembedeu­

'. . . les mots possedent une foncrion syn­

tungen perzeptuell gut moglich und in

taxique primaire en vertu meme de leur

dieser Funkrion kommunikariv am ehe­

sens lexical . . .' (Kurylowicz

I 936: 43 );

sten norwendig [ist, gehort] die Ausdriick­

'. . . les foncrions syntaxiques primaires

barkeit von Numerus-Opposirionen . . . zu

decoulent des valeurs lexicales des parries

den bevorzugten grammarischen Verhal­

du discours . . .' (ibid.).

tenseigenschaften

'Tout comme Ia derivation syntaxique se

Klasse von Lexemen' (ibid.).

deroule a l'interieur d'une seule et meme valeur

lexicale

(par

exemple

I4

dieser

semanrischen

We would accordingly have to observe

adjecrif

terminological distinctions berween the

epithete-adjecrif anaphorique, Ia valeur

rwo levels: e.g. on the semantic rype level

lexicale restant Ia meme), tout ainsi Ia

there would be 'individuals' and 'pro­

derivation lexicale suppose que le mot­

perties', on the conceptual level there

base et le derive sont idenriques quant a leur

foncrion

(Kurylowicz

syntaxique

I 936: 45 ).

primaire'

I5

would be 'objects' and 'qualities', etc. A remark is necessary regarding the 'in­ region': the relation 'x in y' in itself is

One might doubt whether the direction

neuter with respect to the distinction

of derivation actually goes from 'event' to

berween external and internal region; c£

'physical object'. But it can easily be shown that this analysis is correct: all

there is an apple in the bowl vs. there are holes in the cheese. But the French prepositions

deverbal nouns formed with the suffix

for 'in' behave very much like the other

-age

prepositions, which all specify external

can denote an event, whereas not all

nouns of this rype can denote a physical object. Examples are

massage

regions. It 1s thus convenient, if not

'massage',

language 'swaying movement (of a vessel)', abattage 'felling (of trees)', rodage 'running

entirely justified, to include the in-region

I6

among the external regions. Lyons did not formulate a proper theory of prepositions. The above qualification is

in (a new car)'. In his book on morphology he remarks ·

meant to express a result of recent work

that the semantics of sufflxless derivation

on rhe lexicon of space; c£ Bierwisch

( I 988: 8 f£),

might be built upon a more elaborate semantic theory of the parts of speech, and he points out that already Hermann Paul

I7

Wunderlich

The status of a

&

Herweg

J.4). (droite, gauche) de

(forthcoming: section

X

as

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

(Ia foncrion lexicale restant Ia meme), est

pond a Ia forme derivee' (Kurylowicz

IO

die

es erstens vie! wahrscheinlicher, dal3 sic

syntaxique secondaire celle qui corres­

9

haben,

praricien s'en riendra a Ia notion de

entraine le changement forme! de A en B

8

Bedeutungen

Jonction syntaxique prima ire (et Jonctions syntaxiques secondaires) . . .' (Kurylowicz I 936: 42). taxique d'une forme (ou d'un mot) A

7

1 98 I : I I4).

'Wenn mehrere Lexeme einer Sprache

360 Concept Types and Parts of Speech: the Lexicon of Space in French

I9

20 2I

22

23

24 The system of region adjectives of modern French seems to be relatively recent. There is some evidence that the present system has replaced a system in which internal regions were specified by prepositions or adjectives of dimension. Compounds like avant-bras , 'fore-arm', arriere-train 'rear end', bas-ventre 'lower abdomen' represent this state of evolution; cf also the occur­ rence of haul 'high' and bas 'low' in geographical proper names such as les

Hautes-Pyrenees , Ia Basse-Bretagne . 25 Lyons ( I 989: I S7 f) emphasizes rhar, for a

26

27

28 29

universal theory of the grammatical expression ofontological srructure, phrasal distinctions (concerning constituents, like 'noun phrase') are more relevant than lexical distinctions (concerning lexical categories, like 'noun'). This ofcourse does not affect the analysis of parr of speech systems of particular languages like French, which have a clear formal distinc­ tion berween nouns and noun phrases. In Lyons's theory second-order entities are 'events, processes, stares-of-affairs, etc., which are located in time and which, in English, are said to occur or take place' (Lyons I 977: 443); third-order entities are 'such abstract entities as propositions, which are outside space and rime' (ibid.). There is no general noun for the rear region, because rhe words which one would expect here have undergone semantic change, due to euphemistic usage: le posterieur, le derriere both mean 'buttocks'. cote originally meant 'ribs', bord comes from a meaning which is still present, namely the board of a boat. Lyons reasonably postulates such a domain of arbirrariness: 'That ir is difficult to draw rhe line precisely berween what counts as a discrete physical object and what is nor is unimportant . . . Ir is the lexical and grammatical srructure of particular languages that draws the line for us in the unclear instances (e.g., with respect ro the ontological status of moun­ tains, rivers, etc.' (Lyons I 977: 442).

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

I8

prepositions is doubtful. x cannot be a personal pronoun: .a droite de moi is clearly agrammarical, whereas a cotede moi is fully grammatical. One has ro use rhe possessive pronoun instead: a ma droite. In this expression droite behaves like an ordinary noun. One might conclude from rhis rhar a {droite, gauche) de x are nor complex prepositions, but prepositional phrases which contain a modifier. In any event, ir is clear that a { droite,gauche) de X have gone less far in rhe process oflexicalizarion rhan rhe other complex expressions in the present list. The use of avec as a pronominal adverb, like in le camion est parti , et moi avec 'the truck starred off, and I with ir' is con­ demned by purists, but is fully gram­ matical in spoken French. This also holds for other words in rhe present table. The use of pour as a pronominal adverb is resrricred to the expression of an opinion, i.e. to contexts in which the incorporated zero pronoun refers to an absrract enriry such as a suggestion, or a plan. The exception is parcourir 'to move within an object, reaching most or all of irs parts'. Theoretically, region concepts can also be amalgamated with the concept of loca­ tion. But there are only very few and rather marginal verbs which show this conceptual structure in their basic mean­ ing; cf desJossesjouxtent Ia route 'there are ditches along the road', un rocher surplombe Ia route 'there is a rock hanging over the road'. Bur this small group of verbs is extended by secondary readings of verbs of motion; cf (8) and (9) above. The only exception is traverser which is derived from (a ) travers. longer and le long de both are derived from rhe adjective long . survoler is a compound; it is formed following a pattern which French has almost completely given up. This whole discussion confirms an old methodological experience: rests and descriptive criteria are certainly useful, but they cannot be used without inter­ pretacion.

C. Schwarze 361

RE FE RE N CE S Bierwisch, M. (1 988), 'On the grammar of local prepositions', in M. Bierwisch et a/. (eds), Syntax, Semantik und Lexikon (Studia Grammatica, 29 ), Akademie Verlag, Berlin,

I-65.

Cresswell, M. J. ( 1 97 3), Logics and Languages, Methuen & Co Ltd, London. Croft, W. (1 990), 'A conceptual framework for grammatical categories (or: A taxon­ omy of propositional acts)', Journal of

Societe Linxuistique de Paris , 37 (1 936), 7992. Lyons, ]. ( 1 966), 'Towards a "notional" theory of rhe "parts of speech" ',journal oJLinguis­ tics, :z, 209-3 S · Lyons,]. (1 977), Semantics, vol. II, Cambr.idge

University Press, Cambridge. Lyons,]. (1 989), 'Semantic ascent: a neglected aspect of syntactic typology', in D. Arnold et a/. (cds), Essays on Grammatical Theory and Universal Grammar, Clarendon Press, Oxford, pp. 1 s 3 -8·6. Plank, F. ( 1 98 1 ), Morphologische (Ir-)Regulari­

tiiten: Aspekte der

Wortstrukturtheorie ,

Gunter Narr Verlag, Tiibingen. Plank, F. (1 9H4), '24 grundsarzlichc Bcmcr­ kungcn zur Wortartcn-Fragc', Leuvense

Bijdragen , 73, 489-520.

Semantics from Different Points of View, Springer Verlag, Berlin, pp. 304-23. Schwarze, Ch. ( 1 985), ' Uscire e andare Juori: srrurrura sintartica e semantica lessicale', in Franchi de Bellis & L. M. Savoia (eds),

A

Sintassi e moifologia della lingua itaIiana d'uso: teorie ed applicazioni descrittive , Bulzoni, Roma, pp. 3 S 5-7 1 . Schwarze, Ch. ( 1 989), 'Polysemie als Pro­ zedur, am Beispiel von frz. a travers und chez ', in Ch. Habel et a/. (eds), Raumkon­ zepte in Verstehensprozessen: Interdiszipliniire Beitriige zu Sprache und Raum , Niemeyer, Tiibingen, pp. 3 1 0-38. Talmy, L. (1 985), 'Lexicalization patterns: semantic structure in lexical forms', in T. Shopen (ed.), Language Typology and Syn­ tactic Description , Vol. 3, Cambridge Uni­ versity Press, Cambridge, pp. 5 7-149. Wienold, G. & Ch. Schwarze ( 1 989), 'Lexical structure and the description of motion events in Japanese, Korean, Italian and French', Konstanz, 1 989 (- Universitar Konstanz, Department of Linguistics, Working Paper No. s). Wunderlich, D. & M. Herweg (forthcoming), 'Lokale und Diektionale', in A. von Stechow & D. Wunderlich (eds), Handbuclz Semantik, De Gruyter, Berlin.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Semantics, 7, 245-79.

Kurylowicz, J. (1 936), 'Derivation lexicale et derivation syntaxique: contribution a Ia theorie des parties du discours', Esquisses linguistiques, Wrodaw-Krak6w, 1 960, 41so; presented originally i n Bulletin de Ia

Schwarze, Ch. ( 1 979), 'Reparer-Reparieren : a contrastive study', in R. Bauerle eta/. (eds),

Journal ofSemantics 8: 363-402

© N.J.S. Foundation (1991)

A Critical Examination of Two Classical Approaches to Aspect M I C HAEL

HERWEG

University ofHamburg

Abstract

1

THE S C O P E O F T H I S P A P E R

Any formal semantic theory of temporal expressions needs a viable account of the fundamental aspectual distinction between perfective and imperfective sentences, which, as a semantic opposition, shows up in most if not all languages of the world.1 Perfective sentences express propositions about durative or non­ durative events: they say that in a given period of time, an event of a certain type occurs in its entirety. Imperfective sentences express propositions about states (in the global sense, including e.g. habitual states and states of iteration) or ongoing processes: they say that at a given time a state holds or a process is going on. This correspondence between the aspects and the sorts of situations described is widely accepted; therefore, I will do without further justification here.2 Moreover, since it was demonstrated by Galton (1 984) that, considering those properties relevant from the point of view of aspectual semantics, there is no need to distinguish between sentences about states and sentences about processes-the former being sentences about 'states of no change' and the latter being sentences about 'states of change'-we may use as alternatives the terms

event sentence and state sentence to refer to sentences ofthe two respective aspects. The reasons for demanding an account ofaspect within a theory of temporal

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

This paper discusses the merits and shortcomings of the two leading paradigms in the model­ theoretic account of the perfective and the imperfective aspect the proposition-based approach in the tradition of Tense Logic, and the eventuality-based approach in the tradition of Donald Davidson's semantics for event expressions. It is shown that neither approach may claim general validity for their respective format ofanalysis, as their theoretical means suit one particular aspect only: those · of the proposition-based approach are confined to the imperfective aspect, and those of the eventuality-based approach are confined to the perfective aspect. Contrary to what is suggested by their advocates, neither format of analysis can be generalized to account for the other aspect. Rather, it is imperative to have a theory which integrates the two complementary approaches to one unified account. The basic features of such an integrated theory are outlined in the final part of the paper.

364 Two Classical Approaches ro Aspect

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

expressions in general are manifold; let me here name but a few. In the first place, a number of temporal adverbials and conjunctions are restricted to argument expressions of one particular aspect; this must be reflected in their semantic representations. For example, time-span adverbials like in one month are restricted to event expressions, whereas durational adverbials like for one month combine with state expressions only (Peter wrote a book in one month vs. •Peter wrote a bookfor one month -Peter was writing a bookfor one month vs. • Peter was writing a book in one month ; see e.g. Dowty 1 979; see also below, section 2). In the second place, the temporal reference of the tenses may depend on the aspect of their argument expressions. Well-known examples are the various forms of non-actual interpretations of the present tense when it is applied to an event expression. Consider, e.g., the future time reference of the present tense in German (morgen kommt Peter nach Hamburg 'tomorrow come-PRES Peter to Hamburg')3 and the habitual interpretation of the present tense in English (Peter drives his car to work , c£ Peter is driving his car to work). Finally, event sentences and state sentences have different effects on the temporal sequencing of the situations reported in particular types of texts and discourse. Most notably, only event sentences bur not state sentences are prone to give rise to a progression of the internal time of a narration, to which the reported course of events is linked (see. e.g. Partee 1 984). In the following, I will touch upon the first of these special topics only, since the purpose of this paper is a more fundamental topic in the semantics of the aspects: the question of the proper account of events and states as the subject matters of perfective and imperfective sentences. To this end, I will examine the particular accounts of the aspectual distinction between event expressions and state expressions within two competing paradigms in the model-theoretic approach to the semantics of temporal expressions. The bulk of theories which dominate the research in temporal semantics may globally be divided into two groups: on the one hand those approaches which align their basic pattern of analysis with the im­ perfective constellation, and on the other hand those approaches which shape their account of the aspects according to the perfective constellation. Theories of the imperfective paradigm (e.g. Reichenbach 1 947; Bennett & Partee 1 972/ 1 978; Bauerle 1 979; Dowty 1 979, 1 982; Cresswell 1985; Nerbonne 1 98 5; Fabricius-Hausen 1 986; Hinrichs 1 987; Ballweg 1988) folio� the tradition of classical Tense Logic (see e.g. Prior 1 957, 1 967; Rescher & Urquhart 1 97 1 ). Their basic picture is that sentences express that a proposition is true or not at a given time, which in general is considered as a time interval. The proposi­ tion is intended to represent the event or state the sentence is about. The role of the tenses is to specify the temporal relation between a time of evaluation, e.g. the time of utterance, and a time at which the proposition is true-in short, a truth interval of the proposition. Event sentences and state sentences

M. Herweg 365

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

are distinguished by characteristic heredity features of the respective proposi­ tions with regard to their truth intervals: propositions about states possess the subinterval property, whereas propositions about events are subject to the anti-subinterval property. Theories of the perfective paradigm (e.g. Wunderlich 1970; Saurer i984; and all approaches within the framework of Discourse Representation Theory (DRT); see e.g. Kamp & Rohrer 1983; Partee 1984; Reyle 1987, Bauerle 1 988) follow the Davidsonian tradition of event-based semantics (Davidson 1 967, 1970). Their basic picture is that sentences express the occurrences of events in time-or rather, adopting the terminology suggested by Emmon Bach, the occurrences of eventualities in time (Bach 1 986), since not only events in the narrow sense but also quantities ('bits') of states and processes are to be covered. The role of tenses is to specify the relation between a time of evaluation and the time of the reported eventuality. The aspectual distinction between event expressions and state expressions is captured by a distinction among the referential properties of type-predicates about eventualities, namely the properties of heterogeneous reference (for event expressions) and homogene­ ous reference (for state expressions). I will label the two types of theories the proposition-based approach and the eventuality-based approach , respectively. Both approaches generalize their basic scheme of analysis, which is essentially directed toward one particular aspect, to the opposite aspect. I will argue that both types of theories can give adequate analyses of their target aspect only (c£ Lohner 1 988). Therefore, they cannot be regarded as theories of temporal expressions which may claim any general validity. Neither can the notion of an event (or eventuality, if you like) occurring in time explain the semantics of the imperfective aspect, nor can the notion of a proposition being true at a time account for the semantics of the perfective aspect. I will demonstrate in particular that neither theory alone has the theoretical means necessary to facilitate an adequate formal reconstruction of the different logical status of the subject matters of perfective and imperfective expressions, namely situations of the sorts 'event' and 'state', which reveals itself from the semantic properties of the two aspects. The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. In section 2, I will sketch the semantic properties of event sentences and state sentences relevant for the ensuing discussion. From these the logical features of events and states will be determined which will serve as criteria for the evaluation of the proposition­ based and the eventuality-based approach to the aspects in the following section. Section 3 forms the core part of the paper. Here, the merits and short­ comings of the respective treatments of aspect in the two classical approaches are discussed in some detail. The discussion will result in the demand for a the­ ory which integrates the two complementary approaches into one unified account, providing the theoretical tools necessary for the appropriate formal

366 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

treatment of both aspects. The most relevant characteristics of such a theory, which is set out in more detail in Herweg (1 990, 1 992), are briefly sketched in section 4·

2 T HE S E M A N T I C P R O PE R T I E S O F E VE N T SE N TE N C E S A N D S T ATE SE N T E N CE S

( I)

a.

b.

c. (2)

a.

b.

c. (3)

a.

b. c.

Peter ran two miles in ten minutes. *Peter ran two miles for ten minutes. Peter ran two miles three times. *Peter was running in the park in ten minutes. Peter was running in the park for ten minutes. *Peter was running in the park three times. *Peter stood on the lawn in ten minutes. Peter stood on the lawn for ten minutes. *Peter stood on the lawn three times.

Event sentences like Peter ran two miles are compatible with time-span adverbials like in ten minutes but not with durational adverbials like for ten minutes . Furthermore, they may be combined with count adverbials like three times (see ( I )). For state sentences, such as sentences reporting ongoing processes like Peter was running in thepark (see (2)) and states like Peterstood on the lawn (see (3) ), it is just the other way around: they combine with durational adverbials, but not-or at best marginally-with time-span adverbials, and they do not go together well with count adverbials.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

The most notable semantic properties o f event sentences and state sentences, which will serve as clues for determining the logical properties of their respective subject matters, i.e. events and states, can be ascertained by exploring the combinatorial potential of these expressions with regard to time-span adverbials, durational adverbials, and count adverbials. The results will give us the background against which the competing theories of the aspects will be evaluated in the following sections. Since there has been extensive discussion in the literature (see e.g. Vendler I967, Verkuyl I 972, Mourelatos I978, Dowty I 979, Krifka I 987 and many others), let me simply give an overview ofthe well­ established facts and my interpretation of these (for a more detailed discussion see Herweg 1 990, 1 991. As far as possible, my interpretation of the linguistic facts is stated in terms which do not already show a bias towards one of the competing theoretical accounts to be discussed in the ensuing sections. The following English sample sentences provide us with the necessary linguistic data:

M. Herweg 367

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

I will say more on the combination of state expressions with count adverbials below. A number of cases seem to argue at first sight against the position that state expressions do not combine felicitously with count adverbials; consider e.g. Yesterday, Peter was in the park three times . Furthermore, the combination of a state expression with a count adverbial (and time-span adverbials) is often not strictly excluded but rather merely acceptable to a limited extent. All these combinations will be shown to involve a non-compositional reinterpretation of the state expression to the effect that the expression does not characterize a state but rather quantities of that state, the number of which is specified by the count adverbial. This reinterpretation results in an expression which exhibits all the logical properties of an event expression. Therefore, quantities of a state must be seen as events, in fact as events which consist in chat the state holds for a while. The reinterpretation is induced by the context. It is in particular forced by the aspectual requirements of count adverbials, which can be directly traced back to the nature of counting (see below). So, what we are really going for are the semantic properties of expressions which have a state or event meaning in a given context. The commonly cited distinctive features of events and states are the features of telicity and non-telicity. Events possess an inherent goal or set terminal point (Krifka 1987). Only when this set terminal point is reached, can the event be said to have occurred. The feature of inherent telicity gives events a definite temporal bound, which allows them to be temporally located within a time span (see ( 1 a)). In contrast, states are inherently a relic. A state may be said to have held (or a process to have been going on) irrespectively of any constitutive terminal point having been reached. Ofcourse, most states actually end at some rime, but this end is not a constitutive part of the state, but merely an extrinsic property. This lack of inherent telicity disallows states to be assigned a definite temporal bound. Therefore, states cannot be located within a rime span (see (2a) ). Due to their relic character, each event can be assigned a definite time, its unique time of occurrence: no proper part of the overall rime occupied by an event is also a rime at which the event occurs (Vendler I ¢7). In contrast, the relation between states and the rimes at which they hold is indefinite: if a state holds over some period of rime it also holds at each part of this period. That a state holds is a continuous property of an uninterrupted stretch of time; this property holds for all parts of that period.4 We may sum up this feature by saying chat states are homogeneous with respect to the time at which they hold. In contrast, events may be said to be heterogeneous with respect to the time they occupy. The different modes in which states and events are related to their times show up in the interpretation of the tenses in state sentences and event sentences. Let me illustrate this with the example of the past tense.5

368

Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

(4.) a. The book was on the table. b. The book was on the table, where it still is now.

(s) a. Peter put the book on the table.

b. *Peter put the book on the table, where he is still putting it.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

In the case of states, only some indefinite time at which the state holds is located in the past, which leaves it open whether or not the state stiil holds at the time of utterance. (4b) shows that there are no semantic implications as to whether the state actually ceased to hold before the time of utterance or still continues to hold. Imagine (4a) as an answer to someone asking Where didyou last see the book? with the intention of finding out where the book is now. By answering (4a), the person asked makes a statement about a past time only. It is neither implied that the book is still on the table nor that it is not. Due to their indefinite relation to the times at which they hold, it is an essential characteristic of state expressions in the past tense that the actual duration of the state beyond the past time in question is simply left open. In contrast, since events, due to their definite relation to the time they occupy, possess a unique time of occurrence, the past tense locates the whole time occupied by an event in the past (see (sa) ). This is shown by (sb), which is unacceptable for semantic reasons. The proper treatment of the aspects within the setting of a semantic theory of temporal expressions must reflect this difference in the interpretation of the tenses in state sentences and event sentences. I will come back to this demand in the evaluation of the proposition-based and the eventuality-based approach to aspect. The distinction between two particular modes in which situations may be related to time explains the complementary distribution of state sentences and event sentences in the context of durational adverbials and time span adverbials. Durational adverbials like for ten minutes are expressions of duration measure­ ment: they specify a lower bound for the duration of a situation, i.e. they fix the minimum amount of the time the situation occupies. Durational adverbials are downward-entailing but not upward-entailing (c£ Krifka I 987): if someone was running in the park for ten minutes, he or she necessarily was also running in the park for nine, eight, . . . minutes; whether or not he or she has been running even for eleven, twelve, . . . minutes is left open by the duration specification. Due to this feature, durational adverbials are confined to situations which are homogeneous with respect to the times they occupy. The applicability of a durational adverbial requires that the time in question can be arbitrarily narrowed down to quantities each of which has the same property as the entire time, in fact the property that it is a time of the situation in question. Clearly, only states allow this kind of division of the time at which they hold. Since an event is heterogeneous with respect to the time it occupies, its unique time of occurrence cannot be divided into distinct quantities which also are times at

M. Herweg 369

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

which the event occurs. Of course, an event of Peter running two miles as a whole can take ten minutes of time. But this must be expressed by means of a time-span adverbial like in ten minutes , which specifies an upper bound for the time assigned to a situation. Time-span adverbials are upward-entailing but not downward-entailing: if someone ran a mile in ten minutes, he or she necessarily ran a mile in eleven, twelve, . . . minutes as well; the time-span specification does not however imply anything about whether or not the person managed to run a mile in an even shorter time. Due to this feature, time-span adverbials are confined to situations which are heterogeneous with respect to the time they occupy: there must be a unique time of the situation, i.e. a time which cannot be divided into proper sub-times which in turn are times of the situation in question. Only events show this definite relation to their times. Count adverbials put the same semantic restrictions onto their argument expressions as time-span adverbials. The combinatorial restrictions of count adverbials to event sentences can be shown to follow from the requirement of heterogeneity that count adverbials put on their argument expressions. Counting means to specifY the number of possible applications of a predicate to entities which satisfY that predicate.6 Thus, there are two shirts in the wardrobe means that the predicate 'shirt' can twice be applied to distinct entities in a limited area which is specified by the local adverbial. In order to make counting possible, the predicates must provide a criterion ofindividuation for the entities which satisfY the predicate, since individuality is a prerequisite for countability. Only predicates of a special class provide such a criterion, namely predicates which in the philosophical tradition have been called sortal predicates (e.g. Strawson 1 959) and which in the terms of modern formal semantics usually are called heterogeneous predicates (cf Krifka 1 987, 1 989 on 'quantized predicates'). As Frege ( 1 8 84: 66) put it, these predicates do not apply to any part of an entity in their extension, and they separate each entity they apply to from any other ' entity. Thus, these predicates individuate the entities in their extension. As a matter of fact, something is an individual only in virtue of being subject to a heterogeneous predication. From their countability we conclude that events are individuals from a logical point of view. The heterogeneous predicate which secures their logical status as countable individuals is provided by the event sentence itself Let us call the sentence minus its temporal specifications by means of tense and temporal adverbials a radical. I will indicate radicals by using bare forms of verbs without the inflectional component (e.g. Peter run- two miles , Peter be­ running in thepark, Peterstand- on the lawn ) We may then say that the radical of an event sentence-in short, the event radical -is a heterogeneous type-predicate about events, which means that it does not apply to any proper temporal part of the events in its extension. As such, it includes the criterion of individuation and counting for the events it applies to. Each type-predicate about events-in short,

370 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

each event-type predicate-carries its own criterion of individuation and counting. So, one and the same situation may be viewed as being composed of a different number of events, if it may be characterized by different event-type predicates which carry distinct criteria of individuation and counting. Take e.g. a situation in which a musician tunes his or her violin. This situation may be viewed either as one event of the type 'a musician tune- his/her violin' or as being composed of four events of the type 'a musician tune-a string of his/her violin'? As a state holds homogeneously over periods of time, it must be considered to have an indefinite number of proper parts which also are instances of that state. This property is clearly incompatible with counting, since one could not make sense of specifying a definite number of possible applications of a predicate to something which has an indefinite number of parts, each of which can be characterized by the same predicate. In contrast to heterogeneous event radicals we classify state radicals, i.e. radicals of state sentences, as homogeneous predicates , which means that they are closed with respect to the part-of relation defined on the entities in their extensions: if a homogeneous predicate applies to an entity, it applies to all of its parts as well. Due to being homogeneous predicates, state radicals do not involve any criteria of individuation. Therefore, a state radical cannot individuate the entities in its extension. So, states must not be considered as situational individuals from a logical point ofview; this implies that they cannot be counted. It is exactly this property of homogeneity of predicates about situations which durational adverbials require from their argument expressions (see above). So, the essential opposition of criteria! contexts by which the logical properties of states and events can be determined is the one between count adverbials and durational adverbials. Count adverbials are restricted to hetero­ geneous argument expressions; by contrast, durational adverbials demand homogeneous argument expressions. These aspectual requirements are based directly in the nature of counting and duration specification (i.e. duration measurements), respectively. Events are situations characterized by a hetero­ geneous predicate; as such, they are individuals, which means that they can be counted but cannot appear as arguments to lower-bound duration speci­ fications. States are situations characterized by a homogeneous predicate; as such, they must not be treated as individuals from a logical point of view. Therefore, states cannot be counted; they can however be specified with regard to their minimum duration. The distributional pattern of event expressions and state expressions in the context of time-span adverbials does not give us any substantial new evidence. Time-span adverbials demand situations which are assigned a definite time; a definite time can only be assigned to situational individuals, i.e. events.8 Although a state is not an individual from the start, it may be turned into an

M. Herweg 3 7 1

individual by providing it with an external criterion of individuation. We do so by splitting up the time at which a state homogeneously holds into continuous stretches of time at which the state holds just for a while. Thus, we single out a number of quantities of a state (Krifka 1 987). One way of quantizing a state is to explicitly assign a duration to the state (c£ the above exposition on duration specification). The resulting predicate is a heterogeneous one, as can be seen from the count construction (6), which presupposes that no proper temporal part ofPeter's running in the park for ten minutes is also Peter's running in the park for ten minutes. From this we conclude that quantities of a state are simational individuals, i.e. events. Another, implicit way of quantizing a state is achieved by taking the maximum period at which the state continuously holds. Let us call this period a phase of the state (cf Lohner 1 988). In German and English, this way of implicitly quantizing a state is totally conventionalized for copula construc­ tions like (7a) and (7b). In German, the perfect form of the auxiliary can freely be used as an alternative to the simple form of the auxiliary (see (7b) ); in English, the use of the perfect form is more constrained; it is e.g. excluded by particular temporal adverbials. (7) a. Im letzten Jahr war Peter dreimal in London. (in-the last year be-PAST Peter three-times in London) b. Peter was in London three times last year. c. Im letzten Jahr ist Peter dreimal in London gewesen. (in-the last year be-PRES Peter three-times in London be-PARTPERF) d. Peter has been to London three times in the past two weeks/*last year. The sentence radicals underlying the tensed sentences in (7) are predicates about occurrences of phases of the state in question. These radicals are heterogeneous predicates, i.e. event radicals. Otherwise, we could not make sense of the count construction since there would be no way to justify the claim that Peter was in London exactly three times within the last year and not indefinitely often, namely that indefinite number of times that is the number of parts the state possesses. So, the occurrence of a phase of a state is an event (cf Partee 1 984 on 'holistic states'). This concludes our survey of the feamres of event sentences and state sentences and the corresponding sorts of simations relevant for the following evaluation of the two predominant model-theoretic accounts of the aspects introduced at the outset. It has often been noted in the literamre (see Mourelatos 1 978; Bach 1 986; Krifka 1 987, 1 989, to name but a few) that the distinction between events and states and the corresponding predicates, i.e. event radicals and state radicals,

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

(6) Yesterday, Peter was running in the park for ten minutes three times.

372 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

parallels a distinction among concrete entities and their predicates, namely the distinction between objects and masses and the corresponding predicates, i.e. count nouns and mass nouns. Objects may be counted but not be arguments to downward-entailing measurement specifications. So we have two shirts but *two pounds ofshirt , since the noun shirt is a heterogeneous predicate. Because of this, a shirt is a countable individual. As such, it cannot be divided into equal units, each with a weight of one pound, which in turn are all shirts. By contrast, masses may be subject to measurement specifications but cannot be counted, which gives us two pounds ofcotton but *two cotton (s ). In the same way a state can be turned into an event by providing it with an external criterion of individuation which defines a quantity of the state, a mass can be turned into an object by means of quantizing it; consider pound ofcotton and bale ofcotton . These parallels have especially been exploited within the eventuality-based approach to aspect, which employs theoretical notions originally introduced in Link's model-theoretic semantics of count nouns and mass nouns (Link 1 98 3). In particular, the eventuality-based approach subscribes to a domain of quantification comprising events and quantities of states in very much the same way Link's theory makes use of a domain of objects (the denotations of count terms) and quantities of stuff (the denotations of mass terms). Thereby, the eventuality-based approach fits into a fairly recent development within the model-theoretic semantics of natural language. Instead of dwelling upon the long prevalent model structures known from classical intentional approaches to natural language semantics in the tradition of Max Cresswell (Cresswell 1973) and Richard Montague (Montague 1 974), which by and large get by with set-theoretic constructions out of standard objects, truth values, and possible worlds, the theorists participating in this current development employ domains of entities of a variety of sorts with a rich internal structure, including domains of non-standard individuals like quantities of masses, times, events, and quantities of states. By contrast, the theoretical tools used in the proposition­ based approach are much more conventional in that one exclusively relies on the traditional notion of a proposition, for which a semantics in the style of ordinary modal logics is given. So, instead of assuming a domain of quantifica­ tion for abstract entities like events and states, natural language talk about events and states and their location in time is reconstructed solely by the notion of the truth of propositions at times. I will now present and evaluate in some detail the treatments of the aspects proposed in those two leading theoretical paradigms within formal temporal semantics. As I indicated above (section 1 ), I will demonstrate that neither approach may claim general validity for their respective pattern of analysis. Rather, each of the two paradigms is essentially confined to one aspect and obtains inadequate results for the opposite aspect. The major difficulty for both is the formal reconstruction of the difference between events and states

M. Herweg 3 7 3

3 T W O C L A S S I C A L A P P R O A C H E S TO A S P E C T 3.1

The proposition-based approach

For quite some time, most if not all formal approaches to temporal semantics have subscribed to various conservative modifications of the inventory of classical Tense Logic (see e.g. Prior 1 957, 1 967; Rescher & Urquhart 1 97 1 ) in order formally to represent temporal expressions, and give a model-theoretic semantics to them which takes into account the aspectual distinctions discussed in section 2. These theories in the tradition ofTense Logic constitute what I call the proposition-based approach to temporal semantics. The modifications of the original system of Tense Logic are especially motivated by linguistic considerations. Since there has been extensive discussion in the literature (e.g. Bennett & Partee 1 9721 l 978; Dowry 1 979, 1 982; Galton 1 984), I am not going to bother with a comparison of the original system and its various successors. Instead, I will simply list the features of what appears to be the core version of a proposition-based approach to temporal semantics on which most theories working within that paradigm can currently agree. The basic idea of the proposition-based approach is the following: natural language sentences express that a proposition, which represents the event or state the sentence is about, is true or false at given times of evaluation. These times are formally intervals which represent extended periods of time. The times at which a proposition is true may be called its truth intervals. The tenses

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

regarding their logical status. The proposition-based approach will turn out to reconstruct successfully the logical properties of states as non-individuals. It fails, however, to treat events as individuals of their own, in particular as individuals logically independent from the times they occupy. By contrast, the eventuality-based approach gives a correct analysis of events. However, it cannot avoid treating states on a par with events, since it is irrevocably confined to quantities of states, which are individuals under a logical perspective. I will present the general characteristics of both accounts from a fairly global point of view. Specific proposals by individual representatives will be con­ sidered in detail only if they form substantial progress compared with the mainstream within their respective framework. I will pay special attention to the interplay between the proposed semantics of the tenses and the aspects. The reason for this is that in judging the two competing approaches, we will have to consider how they cope with the peculiarities of tensed state expressions and event expressions demonstrated above with the sample sentences (4) and (s). Especially in the eventuality-based approach, considerable effort has been made just to achieve the correct analyses of state sentences in the past tense (see below, section 3.2).

374 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

( I ) The book was on the table. (2) The tenseless proposition expressed by the sentence radical the book be- on the table is true at a time interval which is earlier than the time of utterance (and which is included in the time of reference). A very simple and elegant formal system along these lines is the one proposed by Hinrichs (I 987). In the following, I confine myself to presenting only those features of the system which are relevant for our purpose. In Hinrichs' system, tenseless and tensed propositions are evaluated with respect to a time of utterance t and a time of reference r. PAST is an operator on tenseless propositions p, representing the past tense. Besides locating the time of evalua­ tion t ' for the argument proposition p before the time of utterance t, this opera­ tor posits t ' within the time of reference r, which in general is contextually specified. Adverbials like yesterday , which serve to fix the time of reference, are also treated as propositional operators. YEST shifts the time of reference to the day before the time of utterance. The truth conditions are defined as follows; < is the relation of temporal precedence; <;;;; is the relation of inclusion between intervals of time. (3) a. [PAST p ]r,t b. [YEST p ]r,t

= I = I

iff [p].,t . = I for a time t ' such that t ' iff [p ] IDAY(t)-tl,t = I

>

t and t ' <;;;; r

In order to get an idea of how the system works, consider the truth conditions for the following sentence:

(4)

Yesterday, the book was on the table. b. [YEST PAST p]r,t = I iff[PAST p] IDAY(t)-ll,t = I iff = I for a time t' such that t ' < t and [ P] IDAY(t)-tl,t' t ' � [DAY(t) - I ] a.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

are treated as operators on tenseless propositions yielding tensed propositions. Using the notion of a sentence radical introduced in section 2, tenseless propositions may be seen as formal representatives of those sentence radicals. Semantically, the tense operators determine the time of evaluation for their argument proposition to be e.g. earlier (in the case of the past tense) or later (in the case of the future tense) than the time of evaluation for the tensed proposition as a whole. The time of evaluation for the tensed proposition is in general the time of utterance. In addition to being in a certain relation ro the time of utterance, the supposed truth interval of the embedded proposition is often constrained to be incl�ded in a time of reference in the style of Reichenbach (I 947), which is understood as a definite time the speaker has in mind when he or she locates a situation in time. So, the truth conditions for the past tense sentences in (I ) are given in a way which is informally sketched in (2):

M. Herweg 375

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

In order to see how the proposition-based approach copes with the differing logical status of events and states, let us take a closer look at what tenseless propositions, which we considered above as formal representatives of sentence radicals in general, represent in the special cases of event radicals and state radicals. In the case of an event radical, the corresponding tenseless proposition suggests itself to represent an event-type. Each time at which the proposition is true is an individual token of this event-type. In the case of a state radical, it is natural to assume that the proposition represents the state directly. Since states are not individuals, a type-token distinction would be meaningless. Each time at which the proposition is true is simply a time at which the state holds. This method of analysis amounts to treating states and event-types as properties of intervals of time. The aspectual distinction between state radicals and event radicals is captured by means of characteristic inheritance properties of the respective propositions with regard to their truth intervals, i.e. state propositions and event-type propositions differ in how the respective property of times is passed on from an interval to its subintervals. State propositions possess the subinterval property: if a state proposition p, is true for a time interval I, it is also true for all, possibly point-like, subintervals I ' of I. 9 In contrast, event-type propositions possess what may be called the anti-subinterval property : if an interval I is a truth interval of an event-type proposition p e• no proper subinterval I ' of I is also a truth interval ofp e· So, if the book was on the table is true for I, the proposition is true for all parts of I as well. If Peter put the book on the table is true at I, the proposition is true at no proper part of I. Clearly, the subinterval property expresses the fact that states are homogeneous with regard to the times at which they hold, whereas the anti-subinterval property is intended to express the fact that events are heterogeneous with regard to their times of occurrence. As a matter of fact, considering that the proposition-based analysis of state expressions and event expressions boils down to treating states and event-types as properties of times, the distinction between propositions showing the subinterval property and propositions showing the anti-subinterval property amounts exactly to the distinction between homogeneous and heterogeneous predicates among natural language sentence radicals introduced in section 2: a state proposition is a homogeneous predicate in that it is closed with respect to the part-of relation between the entities in its extension, whereas an event-type proposition is a heterogeneous predicate in that it does not apply to any proper parts of the entities in its extension. It is to be observed, however, that events do not appear as logically independent individuals in this anaysis. At best, the proposition-based approach has events as secondary individuals, i.e. as individuals which for their identity depend on other entities; in the case of events, these other entities are the respective times of occurrence. This is so because their heterogeneous type-predicates, which are supposed to provide

376

Two Classical Approaches

to

Aspect

( 5) a. b. (6) a. b.

The book was on the table. The book was on the table, where it still is now. Peter put the book on the table. *Peter put the book on the table, where he is still putting it.

Since state propositions are characterized by the subinterval property, the semantics of the past tense given in (3a) correctly predicts that in the case of states only some indefinite time at which the state holds is located in the past, leaving it open whether or not the state still holds at the time of utterance. This is exactly what is required for sentences like (5), as was demonstrated in section 2. In contrast, since event-type propositions are subject to the anti-subinterval condition, the past tense as defined in (3a) locates the whole time occupied by an event in the past. This again is correct for the sentences in (6). So, considering these truth conditions for past tense state sentences and event

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

the relevant criteria of identity, are predicates about their times of occurrence only. In a nutshell, this account of events comes down to having events as nothing but intervals of time with an event-type description applied to them. I will come back to this point, which I regard as the major weakness of the proposition-based account of the semantics of the perfective aspect, in due course. However, let us beforehand have a brief look at the treatment of time span adverbials like in two hours and durational adverbials like for two hours . Both are treated as operators on tenseless propositions. A time-span adverbial specifies the maximum length (here: two hours) of an interval at which its argument proposition is heterogeneously true. The heterogeneity (= anti-subinterval) condition secures that time-span adverbials accept event-type propositions as arguments only. A durational adverbial specifies the minimum length (here again: two hours) of an interval of which its argument proposition is homogeneously true. The homogeneity (= subinterval) condition secures that durational adverbials are semantically restricted to state propositions as arguments. The proposition which results from applying a durational adverbial to a state proposition has the anti-subinterval property, since its truth interval must have the length specified by the adverbial. Obviously, this condition cannot be fulfilled by any proper subinterval of that interval. This is intended to reflect the fact that the application of a durational adverbial to a state expression produces an event expression (see above, section 2). I will now proceed to the evaluation of the proposition-based approach as a general format for the analysis of the natural language aspects. As I announced in section 2, I will first examine how the proposition-based approach copes with the critical case of state sentences and event sentences in the past tense. Therefore, let us again consider the sample sentences (4) and (s ) of section 2, which are repeated here for convenience.

M. Hcrwcg 3 77

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

sentences only and refraining from other criteria for judging the appropriate­ ness of the suggested analysis of states and events for a moment, the proposition-based approach achieves appropriate results in both cases. And I indeed think that treating states as homogeneous properties of times is a convincing move in order to reflect that states are logically not individuals. In fact, I will pursue the same pattern of analysis below (see section 4). However, I have strong reservations against the proposition-based analysis of events and their types, i.e. against the 'treatment of sentences reporting the occurrences of events of a certain type by means of propositions true at intervals of time which have to be thought of as the times at which the events in question take place. First of all, the relation between an event-type proposition and its truth interval is unclear at least. Due to the anti-subinterval property, an interval does not become the truth interval for an event-type proposition until the event has come to an end (Cresswell I 978/8 s:45). This means that the truth interval of an event-type proposition can never be a time at which, and with respect to which, the corresponding present tense sentence might be truly uttered. One would always have to use a past tense sentence instead [cf Bauerle I 988]. Now consider performative statements like I declare the Olympic Games open . Performative statements provide one of the rare examples in which the time of the reported event coincides exactly with the time of utterance. In purely proposition-based terms, this means that the time of utterance is the truth interval of the corresponding tenseless event-type proposition. But then, for the reasons just given, but contrary to the facts, one should not be able to use the present tense to refer to the time of utterance. So, the proposition-based approach to event expressions obviously cannot account for the present tense in performative statements. In general, the occurrence of an event at a given time, say an event of Peter putting a book on a table, should not be identified with the holding of a (tcnscless) proposition Peter put- the book on the table at that time. As Galton (I 987b) indicated, the notion of the occurrence of an event could at best be reconstructed by a proposition stating that the event is in progress and will come to ari end, the latter clause making the telicity of the situation explicit. The event would then consist in this proposition's being true for a while. But this move cannot be a way out for a purely proposition-based approach, since a proposition stating that the event of Peter putting a book onto a table is in progress and will come to an end obviously possesses the subinterval property. Therefore, the proposition does not show the definite relation to time characteristic of events which secures their countability. It is not the holding of a progressive proposition asserting that a relic process is in progress which may be identified with an event but only the occurrence of a phase of the progressive state, but this again is an event, as was shown in section 2. I agree with Bauerle's ( I 988) assessment that within proposition-based

378 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

temporal semantics, two strikingly different phenomena have been mixed: on the one hand the existence of events as individuals with temporal properties, and on the other hand the notion of the truth of propositions about these events. The time of evaluation relevant for the truth of a proposition about the temporal location of an event is independent from the time occupied by the event. Thus, instead of pursuing the proposition-based account of event sentences, the following treatment appears to be much more adequate: event sentences like Peterput the book on the table simply state that within a past period of time there existed an event of Peter putting the book on the table. This is exactly what is proposed by eventuality-based approaches: rather chan reconstructing the notion of the occurrence of an event in time by the notion of a tenseless proposition being true at the event-time, events arc treated as abstract individuals which, inter alia , may be located in time. This Davidsonian line of analysis is supported by quite a number of further considerations, which are not confined to temporal semantics. Consider the counting of events, which in section 2 was shown to be an operation which gives us substantial insight into the nature of events as individuals, and quantification over events. Within purely proposition-based approaches, the counting of events can presumably be analysed via truth intervals of event-type propositions only: what is counted in sentences like Peterput the book on the table three times (last nig ht) are not events directly but times, i.e. truth intervals of the tenseless proposition Peter put- the book on the table . After all, according to the above reasoning these intervals are the individual tokens of the event-type represented by this proposition. The same applies to quantificational expres­ sions like whenever Peter put the book on the table, Mary went to the table to remove it again . This analysis runs into severe problems because the identity criteria of events and times are different: two distinct events may occur at the same time. This even holds for events of the same type: a person, say Mary, may break her left arm twice at exactly the same time, e.g. in an accident which caused Mary's arm to break in two different places. In such a situation, there is only one time at which the proposition Mary break- her arm is true but two distinct events of Mary breaking her arm. Thus, barring some rather sophisticated provisions (presumably in terms ofpossible worlds), the purely proposition-based account, counting the number of distinct times at which a certain proposition is true rather than counting the number of distinct events of a given type, would yield the wrong truth conditions for a sentence like Yesterday, Mary broke her left arm twice . These findings clearly support a theory which assumes that event-type predicates are directly applied to events which are individuals logically independent from the times they occupy. In general, linking event sentences to events in the universe of discourse yields a much more direct and uniform method to deal with all ways of referring to events than the methods suggested by propositional accounts. For

M. Herwcg 3 79

3 .2

The eventuality-based approach

In the last decade, the eventuality-based approach to tense and aspect has gained increasing popularity. For example, all accounts within the framework of DRT by and large follow this approach (cf. section I). The model-theoretic foundations of the eventuality-based approach were mainly established by Emmon Bach (Bach I986), who took up some of the basic ideas of Link's semantics for count nouns, mass nouns and plurals (Link I 98 3; c£ above, section 2) and transferred them to the analysis of event expressions and state expressions. The theory has been developed further in a number ofwritings; see especially Krifka ( I 987, I 989), Link ( I 987), Reyle (I 987) and Bauerle (I 988). The different variants of the eventuality-based approach converge in the assumption that the universe of discourse includes a domain of eventualities, comprising individuals of two subsorts, namely events and quantities of states.10 Each subsort is structured by its own part-relation. In addition, a special operation of summation is defined for both subsorts, which produces a complex eventuality out of two less complex eventualities. The complex eventuality is called the sum of its parts. As an example in the subdomain of events, take an event of building a house. Among its constituent events there are events like excavation, laying bricks, roofing and so on. These events are different parts of the event of building a house; this overall event is the sum of all its subevents. Although it is composed of a number of proper subevents, an event of building a house is atomic in the sense that none of its subevents is of the same type as the superevent (e.g. laying bricks is not a house-building). In the subdomain of quantities of states we have e.g. a two hour quantity of the

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

example, definite and indefinite event terms like the arrival and an arrival , which ought to be treated on a par with object tenns like the book and a book , i.e. as terms referring definitely or indefinitely to an entity in the universe of discourse, may directly be linked to the corresponding verbal and sentential expressions. This allows a straightforward treatment of coreferential event expressions of different linguistic categories as in Last night, Peter arrived in London two hours late. Nevertheless, his arrival made Mary happy. The first sentence states the occurrence of an event of Peter arriving in London, which is picked up by the definite NP his arrival in the second sentence. Therefore, both from the narrow perspective of temporal semantics and from the broader perspective of natural language semantics dealing with reference to events and quantification over events in general, it is advisable to follow the eventuality-based approach to event sentences. However, this approach achieves adequate results for event sentences only but, in contrast to what is suggested by its advocates, cannot be generalized to cover state sentences as well.

3 80 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

(I) Peter put the book on the table.

(2) There is an eventuality-in fact an event-of the type 'Peter put- the book on the table', which occurs at a time earlier than the time of utterance.

In order to yield a definite interpretation of tense, the position of the time of the eventuality may be further constrained by a time of reference in a way similar to the one pursued within the proposition-based approach (see above, section J.I). I will ignore this complication for the time being but will come back to it in due course. Let us beforehand have a look at a more simple formal treatment of sentences like (I) based on the notion of an eventuality. Let A v(E(v)) be an eventuality-type predicate; v is a variable ranging over eventualities. The past tense, on which we will again concentrate in our discussion, may then be treated as a functor A V3v( V(t�} l\ PAST(v) ) which maps an eventuality-type predicate A v(E( v)) onto a proposition 3v(E( v) 1\ PAST( v)) stating that there exists an eventuality v of type E, whose time precedes the time of utterance. V is a variable ranging over eventuality-type predicates. PAST is a temporal predicate about eventualities associated with the past tense. The interpretation ofPAST is given in (3). In (3), -r ( v) is the time of the eventuality v. We now get the following truth conditions for sentences in the past tense:

( 3 ) [3v(E(v) 1\ PAST(v))]r = I iff there exists an eventuality v of type E such that -r(v) < t

The aspectual distinction between event radicals and state radicals is captured by a division of eventuality-type predicates into heterogeneous and homo­ geneous predicates. Event radicals are heterogeneous predicates: no part of an

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

state that a particular man is in his living room. This quantity of a state has an indefinite number of quantities of the same state-the state chat the man is in his living room-as parts. The different parts of the overall state vary in their duration. Quantities of states are atomic in the same sense as events, since no part of a specific quantity of a state is also that specific quantity of the state (e.g. proper parts of two hours of being in the living room are not two hours ofbeing in the living room). As regards the semantics of temporal expressions, the basic idea of the eventuality-based approach is the following. Sentences report the occurrences of eventualities in time. Using again our notion of a sentence radical, we may say that the type of those eventualities is determined by the sentence radical, i.e. sentence radicals are type-predicates about eventualities. The role of the tenses is to specify a relation between the time of evaluation, e.g. the time of utterance, and the time at which the eventuality in question occurs. The truth conditions for the past tense sentence in ( I ) are informally given in (2):

M. Herweg 3 8 1

(4) a.. b. (s) a. b.

Peter put the book on the table. *Peter put the book on the table, where he is still putting it. The book was on the table. The book was on the table, where it still is now.

The tense predicate PAST defined in (3) is applied to individual eventualities. It was demonstrated in section 2 that treating a state as an individual means to treat it as an event. The eventuality-based approach, considering states exclusively as eventualities with the logical status of individuals, is confined to quantities of states. In Bach's ( I 986) theory, this is reflected by only having a domain of quantities of states, which is a subdomain of the domain of atomic eventualities, i.e. those eventualities which do not possess proper parts of the same type (see above). As was set out in section 2, quantities of states may either be defined by explicitly giving a duration of the state in question, which may yield a non-maximum quantity of the state, or by taking a phase of the state,

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

event o f type E is also a n event o f type E . I n contrast, state radicals are homogeneous predicates, which means that every part of a quantity of a state of type S is also a quantity, possibly of a different size, of a state of type S (this is the property of distributivity), and the sum of two quantities of a state of type S is again a quantity of a state of type S (this is the property of cumulativity). So, the properties of heterogeneity and homogeneity are expressed as closure condi­ tions for event-type predicates and state-type predicates with regard to the specific part-of relation defined directly on the situational individuals in their extensions, rather than by giving a purely temporal definition of these properties, as is done in the proposition-based approach. The aspectual restrictions of durational and time-span adverbials to state expressions and event expressions, respectively, can also be directly expressed by restrictions with respect to the sorts of situational arguments they accept. Durational adverbials specify the minimum length of the time of occurrence of a quantity of a state; time-span adverbials specify the maximum length of the time of occurrence of an event (see e.g. Reyle 1 987). Krifka ( 1987, 1 989) proposes an elaborate theory of the compositional constitution of aspect which correctly predicts that the application of a durational adverbial to a homo­ geneous predicate about eventualities yields a heterogeneous predicate (see above, section 2; c£ section 3.1). Evaluating the eventuality-based approach to tense and aspect in a way parallel to our evaluation of the proposition-based approach in section 3.1, we sec that the past tense as defined in (3), irrespectively of aspectual distinctions, locates the whole time assigned to an eventuality before the time of utterance. As was shown in section 2, this is correct in the case of events (sec (4); c£ section 2, (s), and section 3 . 1 (6)), but wrong for states (sec (s); c£ section 2, (4), and section 3 - 1 (s)):

382 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

(6) a. (past tense event sentences) 3 e(E(e) 1\ r < t 1\ r(e) � r) b. (past tense state sentences) 3s(S(s) 1\ r < t 1\ r � r (s)) From (6a), it follows that the rime of the event e as a whole precedes the time of utterance t, whereas (6b) only asserts that the time of the state s contains a past time r, without any further implications regarding the temporal relation between r (s) and t. We now seem to have what is required for both aspects. Or do we? In order to obtain an answer to this question, we must be aware that the proposed solution totally depends on the notion of a time of reference, which now has become an essential ingredient of the semantics of aspect. Since the proposed modification of the simple cvenruality-based approach mainly originates within DRT approaches to tense and aspect, let us first have a look at the notion of reference times put forward there. Srudies within the DRT framework direct their attention almost exclusively towards a special kind of texts, namely narrative texts like (7), in which the temporal sequence of the reported events is usually mirrored by the order in which the events are introduced in discourse.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

which, in the terminology of section 2, is a maximum period at which the state holds. In either case, the resulting evenruality-type predicate is a hetero­ geneously referring predicate, which provides a criterion of individuation and counting. The latter, implicit way of individuating states inevitably would have to be assumed in the evenruality-based account of the past tense in (sa), since no explicit criterion of individuation is given there. Thus, considering sentences (sb), the simple evenruality-based approach to tense which we assumed so far yields the wrong truth conditions for state sentences in the past tense. In order to remedy this, one might, as was done in the competing, proposition-based approach (see above, section 3.1), appeal to the notion of a time of reference as a second time of evaluation and revive Reichenbach's original idea that the tenses do not, as the truth conditions in (3) tell us, specify the relation between the time of utterance t and the time of the evenruality r ( v) but the relation between t and the rime of reference r. One might then try to caprure the aspecrual distinctions between perfective and imperfective expres­ sions by letting the two aspects determine the direction of the relation of inclusion between r ( v) and r: whereas the time of an event e is included in r [r(e) � r] , the time of a state s includes r [ r � r(s)]. This modification, which seems to be widely accepted within DRT and related theoretical frameworks (see e.g. Partee 1 984;· Hinrichs 1986; Reyle 1987), yields (6a) and (6b) as meaning representations for event sentences like (4a) and state sentences like (sa), respectively. In (6a), E is a heterogeneous event-type predicate; in (6b), S is a homogeneous state predicate.)

M. Herweg 3 8 3

(7) a. Peter entered the room (e 1 ), went to the lamp in the comer (e2) and turned on the light ( e3). b. The room was light now (s 1), but (still) awfully cold (s2), c. so he left the room again (e4).

The DRT notion of a time reference emerging from this is that of a sequence of rather short periods of time which are subject to the principles of dynamic interpretation listed above, each of which forming only a small part of the overall time the text deals with. No such notion of reference time can plausibly be assumed for a sentence like (9), which may quite intelligibly be uttered and

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

In order to account for the temporal relations between the events and states reported in (7), the following principles of temporal and aspectual interpre­ tation were proposed within DRT (see. e.g. Partee 1 984; Reyle 1 987): each sentence is interpreted with respect to the current time of reference, which may alter as the text proceeds. The interpretation starts with an initial time of reference r1, which in general is determined by the context in one way or another. With each event en, a new period of reference rn+t immediately following the time en is introduced [ r ( en) < rn+t l · The next sentence is then interpreted with respect to this new time of reference. Since event sentences and state sentences are distinguished as was indicated in (6), this means that, in the case of an event sentence, the next mentioned event en+t is temporally included in r n+t [ r ( en+t) � rn+t l • whereas in the case of a state sentence, r n+t is part of the time of the state [ rn+ t � r (s )) . Unlike events, states do not introduce a new time of reference. So, a sentence following a state sentence is interpreted with respect to the same time of reference as its immediate predecessor sentence. With these principles. of temporal and aspectual interpretation, we get the following interpretation for our small text (7): The times of the events e 1 , e2 and e3 reported in (7a) form a sequence -c ( e 1 ) < r ( e2) < r ( e 3) . Since states do not introduce a new time of reference, r4 is the current time of reference for both state sentences in (7b) and for the event sentence (7c). In (7b), both r (s 1 ) and r (s2) include r 4, which follows r ( e3) . This leaves the duration of the two states open: a state may overlap with the event mentioned last (at least) or it may set in after that event. In (7b), the former presumably holds for s2 and the latter for S p The actual interpretation is not fixed by the principles of semantic inter­ pretation but depends on extra-linguistic knowledge about the states in ques­ tion. Since (7c) is an event sentence, r4 includes r (e4). Thus, r (e4) follows r (e3) but is included both in r (s 1 ) and r (s2) . We now have the following, somewhat simplified (by not explicitly listing reference times) representation of the purely temporal information in (7):

384 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

understood in isolation, i.e. without having to link its temporal reference to a previously given time of the kind in question:

(9) Peter was in London yesterday (s 1 ). ( 1 0) He arrived at Victoria station (e1) at 10 o'clock in the morning. He went to his hotel Hrst (e 2 ), took a shower (e3) and put on a fresh shirt (e4). He then took the tube to Leicester Square (e 5) and had lunch at Pizzaland (e6) •

.

.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

(9) Peter was in London yesterday. If we want to adopt the concept of a time of reference in the semantics of tense and aspect at all (see my reservations below), the adverbial yesterday in sentence (9) should most naturally be taken to Hx that time for the state sentence Peter was in London . Recall that in the proposition-based approach, yesterday is treated as ftxing the time of reference r for the argument proposition of the operator YEST to be the day before t (see section 3.1, (3b) ). If we accept an analysis of yesterday as providing the time of reference within the eventuality-based approach as well, (6b) gives us the wrong truth conditions for (9) (cf Bauerle 1 988). According to (6b), the period r, which for the time being we assume to be specified by yesterday , is included in the period during which the state of Peter being in London holds. However, (9) does not imply anything about the duration of the state: Peter may have spent the whole day in London or just a few hours of that day, i.e. the relation between r(s) and r may not only be r � r (s) but, for example, r (s) � r as well. In so far as adverbials like yesterday are taken to provide the time of reference r, a proper treatment of state sentences must leave the direction of inclusion between r(s) and r open. The sentence (9) simply expresses that some past time at which the state of Peter being in London holds is part of the period to which yesterday refers. DRT accounts of tense and aspect pay attention only to the kind of texts exemplified by (7), thereby neglecting cases like (9). 1t is exactly this very limited notion of a time of reference which is essential for any approach trying to capture the aspectual distinction between state sentences and event sentences only by means of different relations of inclusion between the time of reference and the time of the eventuality. If the notion of a time of reference is taken in the broader sense, which appears to be convincing for sentences like (9), the representation (6b) runs into severe problems with temporal adverbials like yesterday in state sentences. Of course, a proponent of the distinction between (6a) and (6b) is still free to argue that letting adverbials like yesterday in (9) fix the time of reference for state sentences simply amounts to adhering to the wrong concept of a reference time. One might argue instead that yesterday only determines the possible range of appropriately small reference times which are subject to the principles of dynamic interpretation outlined above. To support this view, its proponent might appeal to texts like (10) as typical continuations to (9):

M. Herweg 3 8 5

( I I ) Last weekend, Boris Becker lost to Ivan Lendl at the Queens Club tournament. Mike Tyson knocked out Henry Hillman in the first round and Hale Irwin won the U.S. Open Golf Championships at Medinah. At the football world cup in Italy, Egypt reached a draw against Ireland and Belgium beat Uruguay 3 - 1 . Franz Beckenbauer was at the Castello di Castiglia, where he extensively exposed himself to the sun.

In ( I I ), there is no such thing as a progressing time of reference which is subject to the DRT principles of dynamic interpretation. Since a semantics for tense and aspect should not be confined to specific types of texts, we therefore must conclude that an explanation of the semantic features of state sentences and event sentences by means of distinguishing two directions of inclusion between the time of the eventuality in question and a time of reference is of no general theoretical validity for the semantics of aspect. At best, (6b) may claim to capture some characteristics of state sentences in a specific class of texts, namely narrative texts like (7). (6b) cannot give an adequate theoretical explanation for the semantic characteristics of state sentences in general. The basic component upon which the opposition between (6a) and (6b) is built, the concept of a time of reference, must not be accorded the status of an essential ingredient of the semantics of tense and aspect. Reference times and principles which determine

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

·

If one assumes an initial time of reference r 1 for the first sentence of(w), which (possibly improperly) includes the time of e 1 and in fact might be identified with the referent of the adverbial at 1 o o'clock in the morning, one would again obtain the right truth conditions for (9) simply by stipulating in accordance with (6b) that r1 be included in r (s 1). To get the correct truth conditions for (9) in general, one would have to postulate such an appropriately small time of reference r 1 even in cases where that sentence is uttered in isolation. However, this move appears highly artificial and comes close to a petitio principii solely in order to justify the notion of a time of reference as the basis for the proper treatment of state sentences. This move amounts to nothing but stipulating some time at which the state holds, and it is questionable whether such a time should be called a time of reference in the sense outlined above. The semantics of tense and aspect should rather be stated independently from the notion of a time of reference. After all, not every text contains a time of reference in the narrow sense of DRT and the like, which, as we saw, is essential to a treatment of state sentences and event sentences along the lines given by (6a) and (6b). Consider ( n ), where nothing can be said about the temporal order of the reported events. Here, the past tense simply locates the times in question, i.e. the definite times of the reported events and some indefinite time at which the reported state holds, in any order within a period before the time of utterance; this period is determined by the adverbial last weekend , which has the same role as yesterday in (9).

386 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

their properties in texts do not form a part of temporal semantics but rather of a pragmatic theory of the temporal interpretation of texts of a certain type. We now face the following situation: neither the simple version of an eventuality-based approach, which suggests the truth conditions in (3) for past-tense sentences, nor its more sophisticated but still conservative modi­ fication in the spirit of Reichenbach, which was put forward within the framework of DRT, can offer an apprpopriate treatment of the tenses in state sentences. Both must fail, since the arguments of tense predicates arc, irrespective of aspectual considerations, uniformly treated as individual eventualities, i.e. as events. The attempted repair of this fatal bias towards events fails since it is based on a rather limited notion of a time of reference, which goes together with some types of texts only and therefore does not belong to a general temporal semantics. A more radical modification of the traditional eventuality-based paradigm, designed especially in order to cope with the critical case of state sentences in the past tense, has recently been proposed by Bauerle (1 988). In this theory, an alternative explanation of the semantic role of the tenses is suggested which makes substantial usc of some additional structure imposed upon the domain of eventualities. Bauerle assumes a domain which besides eventualities contains their so called episodes , where the episodes e of an eventuality v are all parts of v which are of the same type as v. The requirement that £ and v share the same type implies that e.g. roofing a house, although being a part of building a house, is not an episode of that event. Because of its heterogeneity, which is due to the applicability of a heterogeneous type-predicate, an event e has exactly one episode ee; the event and its unique episode are in fact identical. In contrast, for a state individual s, since it is a homogeneous eventuality, Bauerle stipulates that it has indefinitely many different episodes e,; each part of s is an episode of s. Only one ofits episodes is supposed to be identical with the state individual s, namely its maximal episode £smax· Each episode t: , be it an episode of an event or of a state individual, has a point of culmination cul(t: ) In the case of an event episode Ee, cul(ee) is its constitutive, intrinsically determined end point. In the case of a state episode £,, cul(e,) is its extrinsically determined end point, i.e. that point of time at which the state simply ceases to hold. The major deviation of Bauerle's account of the semantic role of the tenses from the standard assumptions of eventuality-based approaches is the follow­ ing: tense predicates like PAST are not applied to an eventuality v directly but to one ofits episodes Ev- Semantically, the tense predicates specify the temporal relation between the point of culmination cul(ev) and the time of evaluation t . In the compositional semantics, the past tense is treated as a functor A. V3e3v(V(v) 1\ ep(e , v) 1\ PAST(e) ), i.e. as a functorwhich mapsan eventuality­ type predicate A. v(E(v)) onto a proposition 3e3v(E(v) 1\ ep(e , v) 1\ PAST(e) ),

M. Herweg 387

which states that there is an eventuality v oftype E andan episode e ofv [ep(e , v)] such that the point ofculmination ofe is in a past relation to t (accordingly for the other tenses). We so get the following truth conditions for sentences in the past tense: (12) [ 3e 3 v(E(v) 1\ ep(e , v) 1\ PAST(e) )]t - I iff there is an eventuality v of type E and an episode of e of v such that cul(e) < t. It may easily be verified that (12) indeed yields the correct truth conditions for the past tense event sentence ( I Ja) (- (4a) ) and state sentence ( I 3 b) (- (sa) ):

According to (12), the past tense event sentence ( r 3a) is true at t iff there is an event e of the type 'Peter put- the book on the table' and an episode e e of e which terminates before t. Since ee is identical to e, the time of e is as a whole located before t. This is exactly what is required for event sentences in the past tense. The past tense state sentence (1 3b) is true iff there is a state individual s of the type 'the book be on the table' and an episode e, of s which ceases to hold before t. Since e, need not be identical to s but may be just any part of s, s may end before t or continue to hold at t. Again, this is exactly what is required for state sentences in the past tense. At first sight, the proposed transition from eventualities to episodes as arguments of tense predicates appears to be a practicable move in order to make the eventuality-based approach suit to the critical semantic properties of state sentences. It can however be demonstrated that the basic assumption on which Bauerle's imaginative proposal rests, the alleged equality of type of a state individual and its parts, cannot be maintained. To see this, we must bear in mind that any situation (or eventuality, in Bach's · and Bauerle's terms) can only be viewed as an individual if there is a heterogeneous type-predicate which can be applied to the situation in question. Only predicates of this kind provide the necessary criteria of individuation and counting. In those cases which, according to Bauerle, necessitate the proposed transition from state individuals to their episodic parts, states are implicitly individuated by taking their phases, i.e. maximum quantities of the states in question. The corresponding type-predicates, which represent that type of event which consists in the occurrence of such a phase of the state, indeed refer heterogeneously. It is exactly this feature of the predicates which allows us to count the phases of a state as e.g. in (14): (14) a. Last year, Peter was in London three times. b. lm letzten Jahr war Peter dreimal in London.

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

(1 3) a. Peter put the book on the table. b. The book was on the table.

3 8 8 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Any proper parts of the three phases of the state of Peter being in London are of a different type than the phases of the state themselves. If we would reject this assumption, we could not explain why we are justified to claim that Peter was in London exactly three times and not more often, namely the number of times that is the number of parts the state possesses at all (cf. above, section 2). So singling out maximum quantities of states is an essential characteristic of the predicate used in (14) in the operation of counting. Such a predicate is of course heterogeneous. By claiming that a state individual s is supposed to have more than one episode, i.e. more than one part of the same type, Bauerle neglects the fact that the type-predicate, which is essential to viewing the state as an individual, must be a heterogeneous predicate. Bauerle overlooks the fact that only for the maximum episode of a state, the criterion of individuation and counting is the same as those for the state individual itsel£ To put it more generally: each way of quantizing a state, whether by means ofimplicitly taking a phase of the state or by means of explicitly defining some other quantity of the state, e.g. by assigning a duration to the state (Peter was in London for two days), leads to own criteria of individuation and counting which are different from those for any other part of the state individual whatever. Just like any other event, a state individual s which is a phase of the state in question has exactly one episode, namely its maximum episode fs max· Viewed as an individual, any other part of s belongs to a different type than s; this is exactly what makes quantities of states atomic eventualities in the model structures put forward by Bach (1986) and his followers. Therefore, these parts cannot be episodes of s according to Bauerle's definition. Bauerle's proposed solution to the problem of state sentences in the past tense thus loses its most important foundation. Note that the equality of type of an individual eventuality and its episodes is a necessary prerequisite for the truth conditions in ( I 2) to work at all. If one would give up the requirement for equality of type, ( 1 2) would yield the wrong truth conditions for past tense event sentences. To see this, consider again an event of building a house. An event e of this type consists of a number of subevents, each of a type different from that of e: excavation, laying bricks, roofing and so on (see above). If one would abandon the condition that the eventuality in question and its episode(s) share the same type, the past tense event sentence Peter built the house would be true according to (12) right after the first subevent of building the house has ended, say immediately after excavation work has been carried out. This clearly is not correct. The only way out I see for Bauerle is to assume that in sentences like (1 3b) and also (14), it is not the predicate expressed by the sentence radical directly which provides the criterion of individuation and counting for the state individual s, but another predicate not explicitly contained in the sentences

M. Herweg 3 89 themselves. Under this assumption, the predicate expressed by the sentence radical would be applied homogeneously to an individual which is singled out by a heterogeneous predicate which can be systematically obtained from the corresponding homogeneous predicate. The way to obtain the heterogeneous predicate is to transform its homogeneous counterpart into a type-predicate about maximum quantities of the state in question.11 This assumption would however be most problematic, because event radicals and state radicals were to be treated totally differently: in event radicals it is always the denoted event­ type predicate itself which determines the logical character of the event e, whereas in state radicals the logical character of the state individual

s would be due to an implicit event-type predicate which is merely associated in a

denotes. This move would be based on nothing but the wish to stick to the event-based view of states. It becomes obsolete as soon as states and events are strictly distinguished with regard to their logical status. The lesson to be learned from our examination of different variants of the eventuality-based approach to the semantics of the aspects is the following: to treat states basically on a par with events, i.e. as individuals from a logical point of view, leads to difficulties which can be overcome neither by utilizing external notions like that of a time of reference nor by appealing to an alleged internal structure ofindividuals. There appears to be no way to counterbalance the fatal consequences that an exclusive bias towards situational individuals produces. For a proper treatment of the imperfective aspect, which in particular is necessary in order to cope with the peculiarities of the tenses in state sentences, a categorial distinction between events, which are individual entities, and states, which are not individuals, is imperative. Of course, states (of certain kinds) can conceptually be associated with events. States can be transformed into situational individuals by means of quantizing, but they must not be treated as individuals from the start.

A

semantic theory of the aspects must

directly reflect this substantial difference between events and states.

3 ·3

Conclusion: in need ofan integrated approach

Our discussion of the two leading theoretical paradigms in temporal semantics, the proposition-based approach and the eventuality-based approach, has revealed that neither paradigm may claim general validity for their respective treatments of the aspects. The basic perspective of the proposition-based account was shown to be appropriate for state sentences but inappropriate for event sentences, as the notion of a proposition which is subject to the anti­ subinterval property does not adequately reconstruct the notion of events as logically independent individual entities which occur in time, and may be referred to, be counted and be quantified over. In contrast, the basic perspective

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

systematic way with the homogeneous predicate the state radical directly

390 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

of the eventuality-based approach was shown to be right for event sentences but cannot be extended to state sentences. The reason for this is that there appears to be no way to get around the unwanted consequences brought about by exclusively treating states as individuals. What we need is an account ofrhe semantics ofthe aspects which integrates the two complementary approaches into a unified approach. This integrated theory must draw upon the methods which each approach evolved for the semantic analysis ofits respective target aspect. That means that the analysis ofimperfecrive expression must by and large follow the line ofthe proposition-based approach to state sentences and represent the notion ofa state holding at a rime by means ofthe notion of a homogeneous proposition true at that rime. As we saw in section 3 . i , this ultimately amounts to treating states as homogeneous properties o frimes. By contrast, the analysis ofperfective expressions must follow the eventuality-based approach to event sentences in treating events as individual entities, i.e. as entities characterized by heterogeneous type-predicates, which occur in time but are nevertheless logically independent from their rimes ofoccurrence. In this theory, the semantic role ofthe tenses is to specify the temporal relation between a rime of evaluation, which in general is the rime of utterance, and either some indefinite rime at which the state in question holds or the definite rime ofoccurrence ofthe reported event. The essential features of an integrated approach along these lines will briefly be sketched in the following section. The basic idea of this approach is fairly close to that of Antony Galton's Logic of Aspect (Galton 1 984) and Logic of Occurrence (Galton 1 987a) in several points. Galton proposes a logic with two sorts of basic expressions: propositions and so-called event radicals. Proposi­ tions represent state expressions, and event radicals represent event expressions. Accordingly, there are two sorts of operators to cover the role of the tenses in state sentences and event sentences; on the one hand, the ordinary tense operators P and F in the style of Prior's Tense Logic, which are applied to a proposition p to yield the propositions Pp and Fp; on the other hand, two oper­ ators Perf and Pros, which are applied to an event radical E to yield the propositions PetjE and ProsE. Pp is intended to express that the state represented by p held in the past, and Fp means that this state will hold in the future. In contrast, PerjE means that an event of type E has occurred, and ProsE means that an event of type E will occur. A system of aspectual operators relates event expressions to state expressions (imperfective operators) and vice versa (perfective operators). In fact, Perf and Pros formally are not pure tense operators but rather imperfective aspectual operators, as both map event radicals onto propositions, PetjE being the state that consists of an event of type E having occurred, and ProsE being the state that consists of an event of type E going to occur. Another imperfective operator is the progressive operator Prog. ProgE means that an event of type E is in the process of occurring. Among the

M. Herweg 3 9 1

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

perfective operators there is a so-called 'pofective' operator Po. The function of Po is to quantize a state: the event radical Pop means that the state represented by p holds for a while. In Galton (1984), this system is purely axiomatic. Galton (1987a) gives the model-theoretic semantics for parts of his overall system only. In the model­ theoretic semantics, states, which are denoted by propositions, are treated as sets of points in time, i.e. as sets of those times at which the states in question hold. The semantics of the tense operators P and F is defined in the ordinary fashion known from Tense Logic. Events are treated as pairs < B, A > of sets of times. B is the set of times before the event; A is the set of times after the event. Event­ types E, which are denoted by event radicals, are sets of events. ProsE is true at a time t just in case t is a member of the set B of an event of type E. Accordingly, PetjE is true at a time t just in case t is a member of the set A of an event of type E. ProgE is true at t just in case t is a member of the intersection of the complement sets of A and B. It should be obvious from what has been said in the present chapter that, in principle, I subscribe to several ideas of Galton's approach. In the first place, we need a categorial distinction between two sorts of basic expressions in the formal meaning representation language in order to mirror the aspectual distinction between imperfective and perfective expressions in natural lan­ guage. In the second place, we need a system of operators which correspond to linguistic devices of aspectual transformation such as the Progressive. Formally, these operators relate expressions of the different sorts to each other. In the con­ ceptual system, which I consider to provide the structures with respect to which the formal semantic representations assigned to natural language expressions are interpreted,12 we need a theory of events and states which meets the requirements developed in the preceding sections. These include the need to distinguish events as individuals, which may be counted but not characterized with respect to their minimum duration, and which have a definite time of occurrence, from states, i.e. non-individuals, whose duration may be specified by durational adverbials but which cannot be counted and which hold homo­ geneously over periods of time. In addition, it is imperative to have a number of operators which allow us to relate events and states to each other in a variety of ways. The system which will be sketched in the following section draws on some of Galton's basic ideas but departs from his approach in several ways. One major difference concerns the conceptual theory of events. By identifYing events with pairs of sets of times, Galton confines himself to purely temporal criteria of identity for events. As I demonstrated in section 3 . 1 , this is inappropriate since several distinct events may occur at exactly the same time. Events must instead be considered as entities on their own which. among other things, have temporal properties. In addition, they have spatial properties, for example, and

392

Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

4 A S K E T C H O F A N I NTE G RATE D T H E O RY O F ASPECT, TENSE A N D TE M P O RAL ADVERBIALS The conceptual theory of states and events is based on two sorts of individuals: periods of time and events.13 Both domains of abstract individual entities, the domain T of periods of time and the domain E of events, are structured by a part-of relation. � is the part-of relation between periods of time, �:; is the part­ of-relation between events. Both relations are partial orders. A state is a homogeneous property of times, which is extensionally represented as a set of times, in fact the set of those times at which the state in question holds.14 The theory thereby reflects that states are not situational

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

are integrated into causally connected courses of events. The criterion of individuation and counting which an event-type predicate carries is defined on events directly, rather than on other entities like times which are merely associated with events. One motivation I see for Galton's decision to identify events with pairs of sets of times is that he intends to treat events basically as single changes of states; after all, states are represented by sets of times in Galton's theory. But this is again highly questionable in the face of event sentences like Yesterday, Peter said twice that . . . Events like someone saying something should not be treated as single changes of states, unless one wants to claim quite artificially that the state before the event consists of the event having not yet occurred and that the state after the event consists of the event having already occurred. Note that in Galton's system the propositions ProsE and PeifE denote exactly these kinds of states holding before and after an event. Further points of divergence are especially motivated by linguistic con­ siderations, which Galton, being mainly concerned with questions of logics, largely neglects. As an example, note that Galton's model-theoretic semantics of temporal and aspectual operators is based on the idea of sets of times unbounded in the direction of both the relative past and the relative future. This is clearly inadequate from a linguistic point of view. I argue elsewhere (Herweg 1990, 1992) that the notion of unbounded sets of times before or after an event plays no significant role in natural language semantics. Quite the contrary, the semantics of the tenses as well as the semantics of other temporal expressions such as temporal conjunctions should be spelled out in terms of sets of times that are potentially bounded. After all, the tenses are means of deictic reference, which means reference to a limited periodrof time determined by circumstances of the event of utterance (c£ below, section 4). And finally, the semantic role of the tenses in event sentences and state sentences should be covered by one unified semantic representation rather than being distributed to two classes of temporal operators.

M. Herweg 393

individuals and that the relation between a state and the times at which it holds is indefinite. In the formal representation language, which is a two-sorted predicate logic, states correspond to homogeneous state predicates S, which are predicates about times t. The homogeneity is secured by the following, somewhat simplified 1 5 axiom for state predicates: (Hom (S)) For all state predicates S: 'V t1 t2(S(t1 I\ t 2 � t1 - S(t 2))

(Het (E) ) For all event-type predicates E: --.3 e1e2(E(e 1 ) 1\ E(e 2) 1\ e 1 c e2) There is a total function T which maps events or periods onto periods. For a given event e, -r(e) is the unique time of occurrence of e, which is to be considered as the intersection of all periods within which e can be located. For times t, T simply is the identity map. T is defined as follows:

(D-r) -r: E u T � T, where -r(t) - t for all t E T In order to set up the interrelations between the domain of events and the domain of times, which is the domain in which states are anchored, the system comprises a set of operators which map state predicates onto event­ type predicates and vice versa. Let me here mention just two operators rele­ vant for our topic. In the first place, there is an operator PO-this designation alludes to Galton's perfective operator Po (see above, section 3-3)-which maps a state on to the type of events which consist of the occurrence of a phase of that state. According to section 2, a phase of a state is a maximum period at which the state holds. The predicate S-PHASE, which marks a period t as being a phase of the state A. t(S(t)), is defined as follows; the second conjunct simply guarantees that the definition of a phase is restricted to states. Note that S-PHASE, though being a predicate about times, is not a state predicate as it is not homogeneous.

(D S-PHASE) For all periods t: S-PHASE(t) - der S(t} 1\ Vt '(t ' � t - S (t )) 1\ V t *(t c t * - --.S(t *)) '

For a given state S, the set A. e(PO(S)(e) ) is the type of events which are occurrences of phases, i.e. maximum quantities, of that state. This event-type is called the pojective event-type .

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Events are individuals which belong to particular event-types and possess a definite time of occurrence. In the formal representation language, event-types correspond to heterogeneous predicates E about events e. Extensionally, event­ types are sets of events. The following axiom determines that event-type predicates are heterogeneous ( c is the proper part-of relation, i.e. the strict partial order corresponding to J;; ) :

394

Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

In the second place, there is an operator which maps an event-type onto the state that an event of the type in question is in the process of occurring. For a given event e, this state is the set of times which are temporally included in r (e), i.e. the set A t( t � r (e)). As this is the state which in languages like English is expressed by the progressive aspect, we define a corresponding relation PROG between events and periods of time as follows:

(D PROG) For all events e and periods of time t : PROG(e, t) -def t � r(e)

( I ) a. (event radical) Peter put- the book on the table A e (PETER-PUT-THE-BOOK-ON-THE-TABLE(e)) b. (state radical) the book be- on the table A t (THE-BOOK-BE-ON-THE-TABLE(t)) This analysis accords with the different roles sentences of the two fundamental aspects play in a text or discourse. Whereas perfective sentences report what happens within a given period of time, imperfective sentences describe the state of affairs which obtains more or less invariandy at the various times a text deals with. Often, these times are the rimes ofoccurrence of the events introduced in the preceding text or discourse. The following small text is a typical -example:

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

It may easily be verified that, for a given event e, the predicate A t(PROG( e, t)) is homogeneous. The state A t(PROG(e, t) ) is called the progressive state associated with the event e. In the semantic system, the relation PROG forms the core component of an operator which transforms event-type predicates into their corresponding progressive state predicates. This operator, which is defined in its full form in Herweg (1990, 199 1), semantically represents the progressive aspect. Further operators which establish a number of correspond­ ences between event-types and states are introduced there, too. I skip the details here. In the system of semantic representations, natural language sentence radicals as defined above, section 2, are considered as the carriers of the aspects.16 In the semantic representations assigned to expressions in the perfective and imper­ fective aspect, perfective expressions, i.e. event radicals, and imperfective expressions, i.e. state radicals, are treated as one-place predicates of different sorts. Event radicals are predicates about events, namely heterogeneous event­ type predicates of the form A e(E( e) ); state radicals are predicates about times, namely homogeneous state predicates of the form A t(S(t) ). So we get the following semantic representations for perfective and imperfective natural language sentence radicals:

M. Hcrweg 395

(2) Yesterday, Peter put a book on the table in Mary's study. The room was full of smoke.

(3) a. (time-span adverbial) in two days ), F), e(F(e) 1\ 2d :2 Qu (r(e) ) ) b. (durational adverbial) for two days A Tl e(PO(T)(e) 1\ Qu (r(e) ) :2 2d) With these representations of the adverbials, we get (s) as the semantic representations of the sentence radicals in (4) by way of functional application:

(4) a. b. (s) a. b.

Peter write- an article in two days Peter be- in London for two days l e(PETER-WRITE-AN-ARTICLE(e) 1\ 2d :2 Qu (r(e) )) l e(PO(PETER-BE-IN-LONDON)(e) 1\ Qu(r(e) ) :2 2d)

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

The adverbial yesterday fixes a period of time within which the event reported in the first sentence is temporally located. The state expressed in the second sentence is said to hold at (i.e. is predicated o� the time of this event. The sortal distinction among the semantic representations of natural language sentence radicals allows us to represent the characteristic aspectual requirements of durational adverbials and time-spa� adverbials by means of specific restrictions of functional expressions with regard to the sorts of radicals they accept as arguments. As was demonstrated in section 2, time-span adverbials combine with event radicals only, whereas durational adverbials require state radicals as arguments. In the semantic representations, this is reflected by distinguishing two sorts of variables for predicates: variables F, F ', F" ranging over event-type predicates, and variables T, T ', T " ranging over state predicates. Time-span adverbials say that the time of occurrence of an event does not exceed a certain amount. Durational adverbials specify the minimum amount of a phase of a state. Let Qu (for 'quantity') be a function which assigns periods of time their amount, e.g. a certain number of units of an appropriate kind, on which a partial order :2 is defined. Qu(t) :2 Qu(t ') means that the amount of t (improperly) includes the amount of t '. In the semantic representation of the time-span adverbial in two days and the durational adverbial for two days listed in (3), 2d is the amount specified by the adverbials, i.e. the amount of two days. By explicitly mentioning the pofective event-type predicate corresponding to the argument state predicate, the representation of durational adverbials correctly predicts that their application to a state radical yields an event radical (see above, section 2).

396 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

(6) a. (tense)

A.Ql:A. w(Ql:(w) 1\ TEMP(e*, r(w))) b. (temporal adverbial) A.Ql:A. w(Ql:(w) 1\ r(w) � tADv)

Besides specifying the temporal relation between the time of utterance r ( e *) and r ( w ), the tense relations PAST, PRES and FUT further constrain r ( w) to be included within a period which is determined by features of the event of utterance. This second component in the meanings of the tenses highlights

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

The tenses as well as temporal adverbials are functionally applied to sentence radicals of the two sorts to yield radicals of the same sort.17 So not only the application of a temporal adverbial to a sentence radical is formally treated as resulting in an expression which still is a sentence radical, but also the application of the tenses. I prefer this to an account which lets the tenses directly bind the individual variable of their argument radical by existentially quanti­ fying it, so that a finite sentence is irrevocably represented by an existential proposition. Here, the binding of the variables is rather regarded as a process which is carried out after the application of the tenses. This is advisable in order to account for different modes of binding besides existential quantification, e.g. anaphoric binding, i.e. binding by means of linking the variables to entities introduced in the preceding discourse. Semantically, the tenses express certain relations between the event of utterance and a time provided by their argument expression. In the case of an event expression, this time is the time of occurrence of the reported event. In the case of a state expression, the time is any time whatever out of the set of times which represents the state in question. This clearly gives us the correct truth condition for both past tense event sentences and past tense state sentences (see below, (8) ), which have proven extremely problematic especially for the eventuality-based approach, as was demonstrated above (section 3.2). Temporal adverbials like yesterday locate the time provided by their argument radical within the period they refer to (see below, ( 1 0) ). Since tense operators and operators representing temporal adverbials show no restrictions with respect to the sort of arguments they take, we use in their semantic representations predicate variables and individual variables which range over two sorts. QI: is a predicate variable for both event-type predicates and state predicates; w is an individual variable ranging over events and periods of time. Schematically, the semantic representations of tense operators and adverbial operators meet the scheme in (6). TEMP is one of the specific temporal relations PAST, PRES, and FUT associated with the past, present and future tense, respectively; tADV is the particular period of time the adverbial refers to; e* is the event of utterance.

M. Herweg 3 97

{D PAST) For any event e and time t: PAST(e, t) =def t < r(e) 1\ DIST(e, t ) The semantic representation of the past tense is now as follows:

(7) (past tense) A.lltA. w(Vl:(w) 1\ PAST(e*, r(w) )) The distality component in the relation PAST gives us the means formally to represent that the past tense in general does not refer to the entire time before the event of utterance but rather to a limited part thereof, which is determined deictically. This feature of the past tense is but one instance of an essential characteristic of temporal expressions in natural language which I brought up in section 3·3 against Galton's position, namely that the notion of an unbounded past as well as other notions of unbounded periods of time do not play a significant role in natural language. Rather, the semantics of temporal expressions in natural language must be based on the notion of potentially bounded periods of time. This holds not only for the tenses but also for other temporal expressions such as the perfect and the prospective aspect as well as a number of temporal and durational conjunctions (see Herweg 1990, 1992). In our account, the restriction of the period referred to by the past tense is achieved without utilizing the concept of a time of reference, which according to the discussion in section 3.2 rather belongs to the pragmatics of special types

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

their deictic character. Let me briefly illustrate the idea with the example of the past tense. The time to which the past tense refers is considered to be separated from the current time, i.e. the time of the utterance. By using the past tense, the speaker indicates that he or she considers the reported situations to be disconnected from the present situation. This often means that, from the point ofview of the speaker, there is no course of events which connects the past situation in question with the present. We represent this characteristic feature of the past tense by means of the relation of distality . In addition to locating r(w) before r(e*), the past tense constrains r(w) to be distal with respect to e*-formally: DIST(e*, r(w) ). Among other things, the distality of r(w) with respect to e* serves to explain the well-known characteristic of the past tense that it is the preferred tense in narrations in which the speaker describes a sequence of situations without any subjective involvement. Of course, due to being dependent on the event of utterance e*, the determination of the times distal to e* is subject to considerable contextual variation. The relation of distality is complemented by the relation of proximity, which appears e.g. in the meaning of the present tense and the perfect aspect (see Herweg 1990, 1992). The relation PAST, which appears in the semantic representation assigned to the past tense, is defined as follows:

398 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

(8) a. The book was on the table. b. Peter put the book on the table. The semantic representations of the sentences in (8), which we get by functionally applying the past tense operator (7) to the sentence radicals in ( r ), are listed in (9):18

(9) a. A t(THE-BOOK-BE-ON-THE-TABLE(t) 1\ PAST(et) ) b. A e(PETER-PUT-THE-BOOK-ON-THE-TABLE(e) 1\ PAST(e*, r(e)) ) These are indeed the representations we demanded. I n (9a), only some indefinite rime at which the state holds is located in the past; in (9b), the entire rime of occurrence of the event is located in the past. Let us finally have a look at the interplay between the tenses and temporal adverbials. In our discussion of the eventuality-based approach in section 3.2, sentence (r r a) ( (9), section 3.2) turned out to be critical for those theories which attempt to obtain the correct truth conditions for past tense state sentences by forcing the time of reference to be included in the time of the maximum quantity of the state in question. ( I o) shows the semantic representa­ tion of the adverbial yesterday according to the general scheme (6b). Here, O (e*) - I is the period of the day before the event of utterance. ( 1 I b) is the semantic representation of ( I I a) obtained by functionally applying the past tense operator (8) and the adverbial operator ( r o) to the state radical Peter be- in London . -

( 1 o) yesterday it �it w(� (w) 1\ r( w) � o(e*) -

(I 1)

r

)

Peter was in London yesterday. b. A t(PETER-BE-IN-LONDON(t) 1\ t � o (e*) -

a.

I

1\ PAST(e*, t) )

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

of texts and therefore should be left out of a semantic theory of temporal expressions. Most important, the theoretical tools used here, in particular the relations of proximity and distality, have a far wider domain of application than the concept of a time of reference. They appear in the semantic representations of a wide variety of temporal expressions which demand the restriction of periods of time before or after an event; see the examples listed above. In none of these cases can the restriction ofperiods reasonably be achieved by means of a time of reference. Let us now have a look at how the proposed system formally copes with the critical cases of event sentences and state sentences in the past tense. To this end, let us consider again the sample sentences which we used in the evaluation of our competing accounts of the aspects.

M. Herweg 3 99

(I I b) does not imply anything about the actual duration of the state that Peter is in London: he may have spent the whole of yesterday or just part of it m London. This again is the correct result. Acknowledgements For helpful discussions and comments on an earlier version of this paper I wish to thank Carola Eschenbach, Claudia Maienborn and Heidi Sinn. Thanks also to Geoff Simmons for correcting my English.

N O TES I

2

4

6 7 8

See Comrie (1976) and Dahl (198s) for cross-linguistic studies of aspectual phe­ nomena. For a more detailed argumentation see Herweg (1990, 1991). See also e.g. Galton (1 984) and Lohner (1989). 'PRES' indicates that the original verb appears in the present tense form. Below, I will in addition use 'PAST' and 'PART­ PERF' to indicate the past tense and perfect participle forms of verbs. This position is quite controversial for processes; see, e.g. Galton (1984) and Dowry (1986). In Herweg (1990, 1991), I defend this position for all rypes of imperfective sentences. It can easily be verified that what holds for the past tense directly carries over to the fu rure tense. This view has been put forward by S. LOhner on a number of occasions. Think of a musician tuning each string separately, e.g. by using one of those modem electrical tuning appliances. There is further evidence for the distinc­ tion berween events and states regarding their logical status, most notably the behaviour of event sentences and state

sentences with respect to negation. See Herweg (1 990, 199 1 ) on this matter. 9 Qualifications of the subinterval properry which were suggested for the special case of propositions representing process sentences, e.g. the exclusion of point-like intervals (Dowry 1979) or the permission ofgaps within the overall truth interval o fa process proposition (Allen 1984), are of no relevance for the fol lowing argument. See Herweg ( 199 1 ) for a discussion. 10 Most authors, so e.g. Bach (1986), do not consider quantities ofstates in general but confine themselves to quantities ('bits') of processes. However, this does not affect the argument which I will give below. Bauerle (1988) explicitly considers quan­ tities of states in the broad sense. See below for a detailed examination of Bauerle's approach. I I c£ my event-rype predicate PO(S) obtained from a state predicate S in this way; see below, section 4· 12 See Bierwisch & Lang (1989) for the details of a semantic theory according to which the semantic interpretation of an expression involves the mapping of its abstract semantic representation, which is

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

MICHAEL HERWEG Universitat Hamburg FB Informatik, AB Wissens- und Sprachverarbeitung Bodenstedtstr. 1 6 D-zooo Hamburg 5 0 Germany

400 Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

determined by the rules of the grammar

LOhner's

of the language in question, onto a

states (and events, for that matter) intro­

conceptual

duced in Lohner

representation,

which

is

determined by the principles of the conceptual system; cf. Herweg ( I 990,

)

rwo-dimensional

( 1 989). ( 1992) on that point.

theory

of

See Herweg

I s The axiom of homogeneity is simplified in that we confine ourselves here to the

I 992 . I 3 Some of the basic ideas of this theory

property of distributivity and neglect the

grew out of a year ofjoint research with

property of cumulativity; see Herweg ( 1 99 I ) for the complete version of the

Sebastian LOhner; cf. the system ITAL {Integrated Tense and Aspect Logic) in Lohner

( I 98 8);

see also Herweg

( I 98 7).

The theory outlined in this section is set out in more detail elsewhere. Herweg

constitution of the aspects of sentence radicals determined by the semantic properties of their constituent expres­

expressions and event expressions and the

sions. See e.g. Krifka ( I 987, I 989) on this

various means of transformations in both directions, and presents a formal con­

1 7 In addition to the two sorts of one-place

matter.

ceptual theory of times, states and events

predicates,

which accords with the findings in the

expressions, namely two-place relations

foregoing paragraphs. In Herweg ( 1 992), the theory is applied to the semantics of

German

subordinating temporal and

durational conjunctions. Herweg

( I 990)

presents the approach to temporal and aspectual semantics in its entirety; the

focus is on the semantic analyses of the system of German temporal expressions. 1 4 I wish to point out that this treatment of

states is simplified in that it is confined to

a second

logical type of

between events and times, is introduced in Herweg ( 1 990) in order to represent sentence radicals in the perfect aspect (in

Peter have- opened the door is an example). As the tenses and

short, perfect radicals;

temporal adverbials may freely be applied to sentence radicals of all three kinds, the introduction of a second logical rype necessitates more complicated formal means in order to reflect the fact that

those aspects relevant in order to meet the

these functor expressions are unrestricted

demands of temporal semantics. In order

with regard to the sort and type of

to deal with non-temporal matters like the localization of states in space and other things, one needs a more sophisti­ cated account of states; I favour an account

r�ughly along the lines of

arguments they accept. I 8 The choice of the sorted variables

in

(9)

instead of

w,

t and e

which originally

appears in the past tense operator (7), is

triggered by the sorts of their predicates.

R E F E RE N CE S Allen, James F.

( I 984),

'Towards a general

Bauerle, Rainer

Artificial Intel­

riisentationen ,

theory of action and time',

ligence, 23:

1 2 3-54.

(I986), 'The algebra of events', Linguistics and Philosophy, 9: s- r6. Bauerle, Rainer ( I 979). Temporale Deixis, temporale Frage, Tiibingen, Narr. Bach, Emmon

( 1988), Ereignisse und Rep­ LILOG-Report

43,

IBM

Deutschland GMbH, Stuttgart, and Uni­ vetsitat Tiibingen.

( r 988), Die Semantik der deutschen Tempusformen: Eine indirekte Ana­ lyse im Rahmen einer temporal erweiterten

Ballweg, Joachim

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

{ I 99 I ) develops a semantic theory of state

homogeneiry axiom for state predicates. 1 6 I do not consider the compositional

M. Herweg 401

•

·

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Aussagenlogik, Schwarm (Sprache der of discourse: semantics or pragmatics?', Gegenwart 70), Diisseldor£ Linguistics and Philosophy, 9: 3 7-
402

Two Classical Approaches to Aspect

Meaning, Use, and Interpretation ofLanguage,

de Gruyter, Berlin, pp. 25o-69. Krifka, Manfred ( 1 987), 'Nominal reference and temporal constitution: towards a semantics of quantity', in ]. Groenendijk, M. Stokhof & F. Veltman (eds), Proceedings

of the Sixth Amsterdam Colloquium , I 3-16

April 1987, ITLI, University of Amster­ dam, pp. I S 3-7J. Krifka, Manfred (1 989), Nominalreferenz und

Zeitkonstitution: Zur Semantik von Massen­ termen, Pluraltermen und Aspektklassen , Fink,

Mourelatos, Alexander P. D. (I 978), 'Events, processes, and states', Linguistics and Philo­

sophy , 2: 4 1 5-34.

Nerbonne, John A. ( I 985), German Temporal

Semantics: Three-dimensional Tense Logic and a GPSG Fragment, Garland, New York. Partee, Barbara (1984), 'Nominal and tem­ poral anaphora', Linguistics and Philosophy , '· 243-86. Prior, Arthur N. ( I 957), Time and Modality,

Downloaded from jos.oxfordjournals.org by guest on January 1, 2011

Oxford University Press, Oxford. Prior, Arthur N. ( 1 967), Past, Present and Munich. Future, Clarendon Press, Oxford. Link, Godehard (I98 3), 'The logical analysis Reichenbach, Hans { I947). Elements of Sym­ ofplurals and mass terms: a lattice-theoret­ bolic Logic , The Free Press (reprint I 966), ical approach', in R Bauerle et a/. (eds), New York. Meaning, Use, and Interpretation ofLanguage, Rescher, Nicholas & Alasdair Urquhart de Gruyter, Berlin, pp. 302-23. {I97 I ), Temporal Logic, Springer, Vienna. Link, Godehard ( 1 987), 'Algebraic semantics Reyle, Uwe (I 987), Zeit und Aspekt bei der of event structures', in ]. Groenendijk, M. Verarbeitung natiirlicher Sprachen , doctoral Stokhof & F. Veltman (eds), Proceedings of thesis, Institut fiir Linguistik!Romanistik, the Sixth Amsterdam Colloquium , I 3-I 6 Universitat Stilttgart, also published as April I987, ITLI, University of Amster­ LILOG-Report 9, IBM Deutschl;and dam, pp. 243-62. GmbH, Stuttgart, and Universitat Stutt­ LOhner, Sebastian ( I 988), 'Ansatze zu einer gart. integralen semanrischen Theorie von Saurer, Werner ( I 984), A Formal Semantics of Tempus, Aspekt und Aktionsarten' in V. Tense, Aspect and Aktionsarten , Indiana Ehrich & H. Vater (eds), Temporalsemantik: University Linguistics Club, Blooming­ Beitriige zur Linguistik der Zeitreferenz, ton, Indiana. Niemeyer, Tiibingen, pp. I 63-9 1 . Strawson, Peter F. {I959). Individuals, LOhner, Sebastian ( I 989), 'German schon-erst­ Methuen, London. noch : an integrated analysis', Linguistics and Vendler, Zeno ( 1 967), Linguistics in Philosophy, Philosophy , 1 2: I 67-2 I 2. Cornell University Press, Ithaca. Montague, Richard { I974). Formal Philosophy: Verkuyl, Henk]. ( I 972), On the Compositional Selected Papers of Richard Montague, ed. Nature ofthe Aspects , Reidel, Dordrecht. R H. Thomason, Yale University Press, Wunderlich, Dieter ( 1 970), Tempus und Zeit­ New Haven. referenz im Deutschen , Hueber, Munich.