Variation in tense and aspect, and the temporal interpretation of complement clauses
- In this paper, we investigate the temporal interpretation of propositional attitude complement clauses in four typologically unrelated languages: Washo (language isolate), Medumba (Niger-Congo), Hausa (Afro-Asiatic), and Samoan (Austronesian). Of these languages, Washo and Medumba are optional-tense languages, while Hausa and Samoan are tenseless. Just like in obligatory-tense languages, we observe variation among these languages when it comes to the availability of so-called simultaneous and backward-shifted readings of complement clauses. For our optional-tense languages, we argue that a Sequence of Tense parameter is active in these languages, just as in obligatory-tense languages. However, for completely tenseless clauses, we need something more. We argue that there is variation in the degree to which languages make recourse to res-movement, or a similar mechanism that manipulates LF structures to derive backward-shifted readings in tenseless complement clauses. We additionally appeal to cross-linguistic variation in the lexical semantics of perfective aspect to derive or block certain readings. The result is that the typological classification of a language as tensed, optionally tensed, or tenseless, does not alone determine the temporal interpretation possibilities for complement clauses. Rather, structural parameters of variation cross-cut these broad classes of languages to deliver the observed cross-linguistic picture.
Author: | M. Ryan Bochnak, Vera Hohaus, Anne Mucha |
---|---|
URN: | urn:nbn:de:bsz:mh39-93034 |
URL: | https://academic.oup.com/jos/article/36/3/407/5532629?searchresult=1 |
DOI: | https://doi.org/10.1093/jos/ffz008 |
ISSN: | 0167-5133 |
Parent Title (English): | Journal of Semantics |
Publisher: | Oxford University Press |
Place of publication: | Oxford |
Document Type: | Article |
Language: | English |
Year of first Publication: | 2019 |
Date of Publication (online): | 2019/10/08 |
Publicationstate: | Zweitveröffentlichung |
Reviewstate: | Peer-Review |
GND Keyword: | Aspekt <Linguistik>; Attributsatz; Kontrastive Linguistik; Tempus |
Volume: | 36 |
Issue: | 3 |
First Page: | 407 |
Last Page: | 452 |
DDC classes: | 400 Sprache / 400 Sprache, Linguistik |
Open Access?: | ja |
Leibniz-Classification: | Sprache, Linguistik |
Linguistics-Classification: | Grammatikforschung |
Program areas: | Grammatik |
Licence (English): | Creative Commons - Attribution 4.0 International |