Aspectual-Actional Functions of Spatially-Orientational Meanings of Preverbs in the Ossetian Language (in Comparison with the Russian Language)

Abstract

The content of this article continues the topic of aspectual inconsistency, namely, the lack of an imperfective aspect pair in a large group of Ossetian verbs. Two previous articles in thе Bulletin of the NOSU are devoted to this topic [20, pp. 169-181; 21, pр.95-108]. The material presented in the publication indicates that the reasons for the aspectual inconsistency of Ossetian verbs (perfectiva tantum) can be not only aspectual-actional meanings, meanings of certain Aktionsarts, but also the spatial-orientational semantics of certain prefixes, which, when combined with verbs expressing local manifestation actions, allow or do not allow to indicate the perceptual nature of the action (its perception, observability of its development in the middle of the flow, between the beginning and the end). Accordingly, that part of prefixed verbs, the spatial-orientational semantics of which does not allow the designation of perceptuality, does not have an imperfective pair. Meanwhile, it is the semantics of perceptuality that is the core of the specific process meaning of the imperfective verbs in the Ossetian language, as well as in the Russian language. From the point of view of typological similarities and differences, the linguistic facts analyzed in the article are interesting for general and comparative aspectology also because it is in the circle of Ossetian prefixed (limiting) verbs with the semantics of the local manifestation of the action that the formation of the specific process meaning of the imperfective verbs begins similarly to the processes of the emergence of the grammatical category of the form and in modern Russian at the junction of the categories of limiting and a certain direction of action in the group of verbs of movement-displacement. The development of the aspect category in the modern Ossetian language due to the action of such factors as the limit denoted by prefixed verbs, the possibility of expressing the perceptual action in verbs with the semantics of the local manifestation of the action, as well as the implementation of the patterns of typological development proves that the grammatical category of aspect is the property of not only Slavic languages, that in one form or another aspectual semantics is expressed in different languages of the world. Establishing the boundaries of the sphere of Ossetian verbs of only the perfect form in comparison with the Russian language with a detailed description of the reasons for their aspectual inconsistency, of course, can be used as a demanded educational material when studying the topic “Verb aspect as a grammatical category” in educational institutions of all levels, both in the North, and in South Ossetia.