Punctual Verbs Research Articles

Spatial prepositions for original (and richer) meanings: the case of Spanish

Spatio-temporal prepositions like hasta ‘until’ find crucially distinct uses across Spanish varieties. In many cases, uses disallowed in more restrictive variants alternate nontrivially with canonical P distribution, raising pressing questions on spatiotemporal prepositions, lexicalized denotational properties, and their potential exploitation in complex semantic representations. In Central American varieties in particular, Ps like hasta ‘up to’ show puzzling behavior in two instances: (i) with spatial situation verbs and copulas, in nondynamic, nondurative predications locating an object relative to a perspectival landmark; (ii) with punctual verbs, situating the V-described happening relative to a distal (temporal) vantage point. Both cases are unexpected for general crosslanguage principles touching on aspectual requirements imposed by projective or directional Ps and the specific nature of the verbs combined. Here, we draw on a general crosslanguage condition for otherwise unpredicted uses of directional spatial Ps building on perspectival location and extend the analysis to accommodate progressive uses in the locative/temporal domain accordingly. We follow the premise that directional/projective prepositions express directions on an interval, and that such directions can be defined either by inherent ground properties or by the relative position of an observer. In noncanonical uses, we contend, the object is situated relative to a landmark serving as origo of the relevant conceptual space. Polar coordinates in the analysis guarantee proper inclusion of all points in the perspectival path, accommodating negation effects accordingly.

The Japanese Compound Verb ~ kakeru (~ かける): It's Meaning and Formation

This study examines "~kakeru (～かける) Compound Verbs in Japanese Sentences." This study describes the structure and meaning of the compound verb kakeru in Japanese sentences. The data used by the researcher come from diverse sources, including books, dictionaries, and sentences written by the researchers themselves. It utilizes library resources to collect the necessary data. Then, the form and meaning of the compound verb kakeru are determined using the distributional method and the basic direct element technique. Based on the data analysis, it can be concluded that the meaning describes the activity's initiation and its state. In addition to being attached to activity verbs and punctual verbs, the form of the compound verb kakeru can also be attached to stative verbs. In sentences containing the compound verb kakeru, that state just before an activity begins and activities that have been ongoing for some time.

The Contrastive Analysis of Inchoative Aspect of Japanese and Indonesian Language

Compound verb –dasu in Japanese language, adverb mulai (start), and adverb baru (just) in Indonesian language are marks of inchoative aspect. This research aims to describe the difference and similarity of those three marks of inchoative aspect. The method applied in this research is intralingual padan method. As the result of the research, it is proven that compound verb –dasu and adverb baru are focusing on the beginning of an activity or alteration, meanwhile adverb mulai (start) is a sign of the beginning of an event with an exact finished oriented. Compound verb –dasu, adverb mulai (start), and adverb baru can be constructed as activity verb and punctual verb, both volitional and non volitional with animate and inanimate as the subject. Then, the differences are compound verb –dasu shows the beginning of an event that happens suddenly, meanwhile the adverb mulai (start) and baru (just) do not; beside, the adverb mulai (start) can be modified as stative verb, adjective and noun, meanwhile compund verb –dasu can not.

PROYECCIÓN SUBJETIVA DE TRAYECTOS TEMPORALES Y ESPACIALES CON ‘HASTA’

Las preposiciones en español han sido tema de discusión de numerosos investigadores (Trujillo, 1971; Fernández, 1991; Galán Rodríguez, 1992; Jolly, 1993; Bosque, 1996; Horno Chéliz, 2002; Cuadros, 2005; Rodrígues, 2009). Este trabajo se centra en la preposición direccional hasta que se asocia con la función de trayectoria (Jackendoff, 1983; Zwarts, 2005; Demonte, 2011) por ello, está íntimamente relacionada con el espacio. Suele tener como primer significado el de meta espacial, además del significado de meta temporal. (Caravedo, 2011; Gutiérrez Ordoñez, 1997; Lope Blanch, 2008; Moliner, 1998; RAE, 2001; Seco, 1998). En ambos casos, hasta marca el límite de una trayectoria ya sea en el tiempo o en el espacio. Sin embargo, existen casos en los que se puede obtener otro significado. Por un lado, el llamado uso anómalo (Lope Blanch, 2008) de algunos dialectos como el mexicano, en el que hasta aparece con un verbo puntual en oración afirmativa y un complemento temporal (‘llegó hasta las 11’). O los ejemplos en los que aparece con un verbo de estado con complementos espaciales (‘vivo hasta el sexto piso’). Con datos extraídos de un corpus de habla oral en México, se llevó a cabo el análisis en el que se propone una explicación para ambos fenómenos en términos de subjetividad.

Adjective distribution in Modern Mongolian

This paper discusses adjective distribution in Mongolian based upon the mereological framework: scale structure. It investigates how adjectival complements are sensitive to the scalar structure of adjectival predicates (APs) in resultative constructions as well as direct perception expressions. The findings reveal that Mongolian only tolerates inherent resultatives; derived resultatives are ruled out. The acceptability of adjectival complements in inherent resultatives runs from 'Totally open-scale/Totally closed-scale' down to 'Lower closed/Upper closed-scale'. On the other hand, adjectival complements in direct perception expressions are of no diverse acceptability, i.e. all layers of APs are licensed. Furthermore, durative verbs are likely to yield open-scale APs whilst punctual verbs seem to favour closed-scale APs.

MAKNA VERBA MAJEMUK ~KIRU DALAM BAHASA JEPANG Kajian Struktur dan Semantis

Abstract The purpose of this paper is to know the structure of compound verb (V + V) in Japanese. The structure is a forming of zenkoudoushi (first verb) and koukoudoushi (second verb). The second verb is kiru. And the first verbs are joutai doushi (statis) keizoukudoushi (contuinity), shunkandoushi (fungtual), and daiyoushudoushi (the four verb). This classification from the Kindaichi’s classification. As a single verb kiru means to cut, to slice, to decide, and to turn off. When it combined with other verbs, the verb kiru will form a compound verb which has several meanings. Commonly, compound verb kiru has two meanings, namely in terms of lexical meaning and syntactical meaning. Lexically, compound verb kiru means setsudan ‘cutting’ and shuketsu ‘ends/over’, while syntactically this verb means kyokudo ‘extraordinary/ infinite’ and kansui ‘perfective’. The compound verb ~kiru which attached to continuity (keizokudoushi) has meaning as setsudan ‘cutting’, shuketsu ‘ends/over’, and kansui ‘perfective’, while when it is attached to the punctual verb (shuunkandoushi) means kyokudo ‘extraordinary/ infinite’. Keyword : zenkoudoushi, koukoudoushi, compound verb, ~kiru

Aspectual Constraints on the (Anti)Causative Alternation in Old Italian

AbstractThis paper discusses the strategies used for the anticausative alternation and the constraints on their distribution in two early Italian vernaculars, Old Florentine and Old Neapolitan, focusing on the emergence of aspectual notions such as telicity in determining variability in the occurrence of the reflexive morpheme si/se, the main/only strategy for anticausatives with some inherently telic and punctual verbs, depending on the vernacular. It is also shown that in the early varieties the reflexive in the anticausative alternation mainly signals the suppression of the Actor, only gradually coming to mark the presence of a terminal point in the meaning of the verb/predicate.

Processing events: Behavioral and neuromagnetic correlates of Aspectual Coercion

Much recent psycho- and neuro-linguistic work has aimed to elucidate the mechanisms by which sentence meanings are composed by investigating the processing of semantic mismatch. One controversial case for theories of semantic composition is expressions such as the clown jumped for ten minutes, in which the aspectual properties of a punctual verb clash with those of a durative modifier. Such sentences have been proposed to involve a coercion operation which shifts the punctual meaning of the verb to an iterative one. However, processing studies addressing this hypothesis have yielded mixed results. In this study, we tested four hypotheses of how aspectual mismatch is resolved with self-paced reading and magnetoencephalography. Using a set of verbs normed for punctuality, we identified an immediate behavioral cost of mismatch. The neural correlates of this processing were found to match effects in midline prefrontal regions previously implicated in the resolution of complement coercion. We also identified earlier effects in right-lateral frontal and temporal sites. We suggest that of the representational hypotheses currently in the literature, these data are most consistent with an account where aspectual mismatch initially involves the composition of an anomalous meaning that is later repaired via coercion.

The acquisition of tense—aspect in child second language English

The aim of this article is two-fold: to test the Aspect Hypothesis, according to which the early use of tense—aspect morphology patterns by semantic/aspectual features of verbs, and Tense is initially defective (e.g. Antinucci and Miller, 1976; Bloom et al., 1980; Andersen and Shirai, 1994; 1996; Robison, 1995; Shirai and Andersen, 1995; Bardovi-Harlig, 1998; Shirai, 1998); and to test Gavruseva's aspectual features account, according to which inherent aspectual properties of the verbs such as telicity and punctuality determine which verbs will be non-finite and which verbs will not (Gavruseva, 2002; 2003; 2004) in child L2 acquisition. Based on longitudinal data from a Turkish child second language (L2) learner of English, we present counter evidence for both hypotheses. First, it is shown that despite the fact that the early production of past tense morphology occurs exclusively with punctual predicates, data from copula be, auxiliary do and pronominal subjects do not show any evidence for defective tense. Second, contrary to what is predicted in Gavruseva's hypothesis, the rate of uninflected punctual verbs is much higher than that of uninflected non-punctual verbs in the child L2 grammar.

The magic of the moment: what it means to be a punctual verb

n/a

Mood as verbal definiteness in a tenseless language

This article argues that the mood morphemes found on punctual verbs in Mohawk are to be analyzed semantically as markers of verbal definiteness/specificity. In particular, the so-called future marker is an indefinite morpheme, indicating that the event argument of the verb undergoes Heim's (1982) rule of Quantifier Indexing. In contrast, the seeming past marker is a marker of definiteness/specificity, indicating that the event argument is immune to Quantifier Indexing. This explains many apparent peculiarities of the Mohawk verbal system, including: the use of "future" as a past habitual form, the use of mood prefixes in conditionals, free relatives, and complement clauses, and the incompatibility of "past" with negation. The relationship between indefinite mood and future events, where it exists, is explicated in terms of the branching theory of time proposed by Dowty (1979) and Kamp and Reyle (1993), which is grounded in a fundamental asymmetry in how humans conceive of the future versus the past.

The development of past marking in a bilingual child and the punctual-nonpunctual distinction

This study examined a child's simultaneous acquisition of pastmarking in English and Spanish, and looked for evidence supporting Bickerton's punctual-nonpunctual hypothesis. It was found that punctual verbs were those that first exhibited past forms. However, early verbs were usually invariant in both form and function. The child was not marking a punctual-nonpunctual distinction in Spanish as he did not control corresponding past and nonpast forms. Although the English data in isolation would point to the child's marking a punctual-nonpunctual distinction, the same explanation is proposed for both languages: the past forms that emerged first were those most frequent in the input. The categories of punctual vs. nonpunctual were relevant insofar as the great majority of past events first commented on were punctual/resultative events.

A Japanese child's use of stative and punctual verbs.

ABSTRACTThis study investigated the use of stative, process, punctual, and non-punctual verbs by a child acquiring Japanese as a first language between the ages of 1;0 and 4;11 in an attempt to find evidence for two of Bickerton's (1981) proposed language acquisition universals, which form part of the language bioprogram hypothesis of language acquisition. As predicted by Bickerton's state-process hypothesis, it was found that all sampled present progressive verb forms occurred with process verbs while these forms were never used with stative verbs. Also, with only one exception, all omissions of present progressive forms occurred with the early use of ‘mixed’ verbs, i.e. verbs which behave syntactically as process verbs in Japanese but are nonetheless semantically stative. However, contrasting with Bickerton's hypothesis that children initially use the past tense to mark punctuality, no relationship between past tense use and punctuality was found.

PUNCTUAL VERSUS DURATIVE AS COVERT CATEGORIES1

The inherent meaning of punctualness or durativeness found in many English verbs, can best be studied in the framework of Whorf's theory of Grammatical Categories. When co‐occurrence restrictions attributable to other features such as activity or nonactivity are set aside, it is clear that we must posit at least these two aspectual features, punctual and durative, to account for the way verbs and longer verbal expressions are used with time adverbs such as “already” and with the tense signs and auxiliaries. For example, punctual verbs in the present tense form express a future meaning after “hope” as in “I hope he says something”, whereas durative verbs refer to present time, as in “I hope he knows”. Comparable reactances are found after “wish”, “like”, and “would like”. Whether semantic or syntatic, these restrictions can be described in terms of either lexical features or covert categories, but not in a mathematically rigorous way.