Xavier Frías Conde (UNED) Verbal Aspect: A Cross-Linguistic Study © Xavier Frías Conde, 2013 Área de Galego-Português. Faculdade de Filologia. UNED (Spain) All rights reserved worldwide Aspect in the Romance Languages Introduction This study mainly refers to Romance languages, though comparisons with other linguistic families are included later on. Romance languages do not show a homogeneous behaviour concerning aspect, since there are languages containing a large diversity of aspectual forms, while others have not developed so many. Spanish is probably the language whose aspectual diversity is larger, while French possess fewer aspectual forms. Aspect is interesting in itself, though it is often mistaken with tense. 4 Binary Tenses Tense and Aspect are clearly related, but they are not the same phenomenon. Basically, tense can be divided into – [+ past] – [ past] If tense is deemed to be binary, future can be also considered as something parallel to “present” In order to understand what future is, it is necessary to analyse it under the prism of mood – Real (related to indicative) • Past • Present – Unreal (related to indicative) • Conditional • Future – Hypothetic (related to subjunctive) • Past • Present 5 About Future and Conditional The autonomy of future and conditional clearly expressed in most languages is – DE: • Ich werde sprechen  werde [past] • Ich würde sprechen  wurde [+past] – FR: • Je parlerai (< PARABOLARE HABEO)  HABEO [past] • Je parlerais (< PARABOLARE HABEBAM)  HABEBAM [+past] But it does not exist in all languages – Arabic has no conditional tense – Czech forms conditional and future tenses in different ways: • Budu mluvit (=I will speak)  mluvit is infinitive • Mluvil(a) bych (=I would speak)  mluvil(a) is past participle – However, Polish may follow the same pattern as German or French • Będę mówić or more commonly Będę mówił(a) • Mówił(a)bym 6 About Future and Conditional Therefore the study of verbs require a threefold approach: Tense Mood Aspect The following pages will be devoted to aspect as one of the three items that make up verbs. Agreement and diathesis have been left aside. 7 Aspect in Traditional Handbooks Traditional Spanish and Portuguese handbooks refer to the so-called accidents of verbs, which are common to all Romance languages: – Time – Agreement – Aspect – Mood – Diathesis or Voice However the real essence of aspect is often neglected, it is generally mistaken with time itself. Canonical Spanish handbooks usually refer to an only type of aspect – Perfective: cantaba (= I sang, I used to sing, I was singing), expressing something not completed. – Imperfective: canté (= I sang), expressing something completed. Logically this aspect is just to be found in the past. 8 Perfective & Imperfective and (In)transitivity Traditional handbooks keep ignoring that the difference between perfectness and imperfectness not only refers to aspect itself, but often also to transitivity and intransitivity. Therefore imperfectness can be related to the lack of object: – ES: • De joven cantaba / *canté • Hace unos años traducía /*traduje / traduje este libro • Antes leía / *leí / leí un libro – CZ: • Když jsem byl mladý, zpíval jsem / *zazpíval jsem • Před nějakými lety jsem překládal /* jsem přeložil / jsem přeložil knihu • Dřív jsem četl / *jsem přečetl / jsem přečetl knihu 9 Aspect and Periphrases The other field where traditional handbooks usually make some references are verbal periphrases. Aspectual periphrases in handbooks are bestowed a secondary role in Romance languages if compared with English, i.e., they are not included within the usual tables of conjugation. Aspectual periphrases are vaguely defined as made up by a modal plus a gerund. We are referring to: – ES: estoy cantando – PT: estou a cantar – IT: sto cantando – SR: so cantende French does not have such an aspect as mandatory, though it may form it by means of être en train de – FR: je suis en train de chanter or just je chante 10 Aspect in Canonical Grammars Canonical Grammars recognise just one kind of aspect and occasionally two. – Perfective and imperfective just in the past – A vaguely defined aspectual information about durativeness provided by means of the so-called aspectual verbal periphrases. If compared with canonical English grammars, it is possible to distinguish three types of aspectual tenses: – Simple tenses: I sang – Continuous tenses: I was singing – Perfect tenses: I had sung 11 Some Theories about Aspect (1) Aspect refers to the internal temporal constituency of an event, or the manner in which a verb’s action is distributed through the time-space continuum. Tense, on the other hand, points out the location of an event in the continuum of events. Be advised that many of the verb forms which are traditionally called “tenses” in grammar books and foreign language text-books are actually aspects; the traditional terminology is misleading. The distinctions between she read that book, she used to read such books, and she was reading that book when I entered the room are aspectual distinctions rather than differences of tense. Harrison, Rick. Verbal Aspect. (2006) http://www.rickharrison.com/language/aspect.html 12 Some Theories about Aspect (2) Garey B. Howard. (1957): “Verbal Aspect in French”. In Language. Vol. 33, No. 2 (Apr. - Jun., 1957), pp. 91-110 13 How many kinds of aspect are there in Romance? We will accept that the difference set for English is applicable. Our starting point is that there are three main types of verbal aspect. It is important to state that these are the three main types, but not the only ones. A first approach valid for Spanish would be: • Concerning the conclusion – [+ perf.] hablé [- perf.] hablaba • Concerning the duration – [+ dur.] hablé [-dur.] estuve hablando • Concerning the perspective* – [+persp.] hablé [-persp.] he hablado * Also known as perfect ~ imperfect 14 (Im)perfective in Romance Perfective aspect is, as said previously, incomplete, since it just has different forms in the past tense. As a synthetic bunch of tenses it is a direct heritage from Latin [-perfv] [+perfv] PT cantava cantei ES cantaba canté CT cantava canté / vaig cantar IT cantavo cantai* SR cantaia cantei* FR je chantais je chantai* RO cântam cântai * In all these languages, the simple forms are merely literary, they have been substituted by the compound forms: IT: ho cantato, SR: apo cantadu, FR: j’ai chanté. 15 (Non-)durative in Romance Durative aspect includes all tenses, not only past tenses. It does not exist in all Romance languages [-dur] [+dur] PT canto estou a cantar ES canto estoy cantando CT canto estic cantant IT canto sto cantando SR canto so cantende FR RO je suis en train de chanter je chante cânt 16 (Im-)perfect in Romance Perfect aspect includes all tenses, as well. It does not exist in all Romance languages, either* [-perf] [+perf] PT canto --** ES canto he cantado CT canto he cantat IT canto ho cantato SR canto apo cantadu FR je chante j’ai chanté RO cânt am cântat * Certain verbs require essere-derived as an auxiliary: FR, IT, SR • FR: je suis venu • SR: so bènnidu • IT: sono venuto * PT does not use a present-like form, but a past-like form: tinha cantado. GL still uses an etymological synthetic form in this case: cantara. 17 Cross-Romance differences as for tenseaspect matters Given that aspect adds precise information to the mere idea of tense, there are circumstances in which it is necessary to refer to tense-aspect as an amalgam. Anyway a quick cross-Romance analysis shows the lack of items for all gaps [-perf] PT cantei ES canté [+perf] he cantado j’ai chanté FR 18 Tagging The previous analysis allows us to settle a tagging system referred to the three main types of aspect. Let’s take Spanish, which is probably the Romance language having the richest aspectual paradigm. [±perfv] [±perf] Cantaba  [±dur] Canté +   He cantado + Había cantado      + + Estaba cantando  + Estuve cantando + +  + + + + Había estado cantando He estado cantando  + 19  Aspect in Germanic Languages English possesses two types of aspects: - Duration - Perspective Actually it is the only Germanic language that has developed an aspect related to duration, since it doesn’t exist in other sister languages. EN DE DK ich arbeite jeg arbejdede ich habe gearbeitet jeg har arbejdet I work [±dur] I am working [±perf] I have worked 20 Aspect in Slavonic Languages: Past Aspect plays a crucial role in Slavonic languages, but it is restricted to perfectiveness. All Slavonic languages show a similar schedule. Their paradigms are bound to the difference between perfective and imperfective forms. 21 Aspect in Slavonic Languages: Future Another very interesting aspect regarding aspect in Slavonic languages is that there are two kinds of “presents” Present of perfective expresses an uncompleted action or process, actually a future:  CS: Zítra udělám úkoly.  IT: Faccio i compiti domani.  DE: Ich mache meine Hausaufgabe morgen. It is even possible to translate it as a present tense in the rest of the languages. Only the imperfect aspect possess an analytic future:  CS: Příští rok budu dělat kurz v Polsku.  IT: L’anno prossimo farò un corso in Polonia.  DE: Am nächsten Jahr werde ich einen Kurs in Polen geben. 22 Aspect in Arabic Egyptian Arabic makes just an aspectual difference: [±dur]. The marked aspect is formed by means of the present participle (as in English). Given the lack of copulative verb, it is often built up with the subject pronoun and the present participle. EN AR ‫أن بكت‬ I write [ana] baktob [present] I am writing ‫أن ك ت‬ ‫أن ك تب‬ ana kátib(a) [past] I was writing ‫كن ك ت‬ ‫كن ك تب‬ [ana] kunt kátib/katba 23 Something about the iterative aspect Apart from the aforementioned aspects, it is also possible to find a secondary aspect referred to actions and processes taken as a habit, known as iterative. Imperfective aspect may also refer to a habit (=iterative action/process), which is relatively common in Romance:  ES: Jugaba al fútbol en un equipo de mi barrio  PT: Jogava futebol numa equipa do meu bairro English uses its modal used to for the same purpose:  EN: I used to play football in a team of my neighbourhood Spanish and Portuguese may also use a modal verb for the same purpose (mainly to avoid ambiguity):  Solía jugar al fútbol en un equipo de mi barrio  Costumava jogar futebol numa equipa do meu bairro 24 Something else about the iterative aspect Czech possess its own formula to express iterativeness, but just in the past. For that purpose, it adds the ending –vat, to the imperfective root • říkat > říkávat, • hrát > hrávat, • dělat > dělávat, • chodit > chodívat, etc.  Jako kluk jsem hrával fotbal 25 A comparison of aspectual forms between Spanish and other languages Cross-linguistic: ES ~ FR Literary French ES FR canté [je chantai] estuve cantando cantaba je chantais estaba cantando he cantado j’ai chanté he estado cantando había cantado j’avais chanté había estado cantando [j’eus chanté] hube cantado 27 Cross-linguistic: ES ~ FR Literary French ES FR canté [je chantai] estuve cantando cantaba je chantais estaba cantando he cantado j’ai chanté he estado cantando había cantado j’avais chanté había estado cantando [j’eus chanté] hube cantado 28 Cross-linguistic: ES ~ EN ES EN canté I sang cantaba he cantado I have sung había cantado I had sung hube cantado estaba cantando I was singing estuve cantando he estado cantando I have been singing había estado cantando I had been singing 29 Cross-linguistic: ES ~ DE ES DE canté cantaba Ich sang estaba cantando estuve cantando he cantado I habe gesungen he estado cantando había cantado hube cantado Ich hatte gesungen había estado cantando 30 Cross-linguistic: ES ~ CZ ES CZ cantaba estaba cantando estuve cantando zpíval jsem había cantado había estado cantando he estado cantando canté he cantado zazpíval jsem hube cantado 31 Cross-linguistic: ES ~ AR ES AR cantaba estaba cantando canté ‫غني‬ estuve cantando he cantado he estado cantando había cantado ‫كن غني‬ había estado cantando hube cantado 32