Transcript How to account for aspectual derivation in Russian

“How to account for
aspectual derivation in
Russian”
Laura A. Janda
UNC-Chapel Hill
[email protected],
www.unc.edu/~lajanda
In a nutshell…
• Q: So, how DO we account for aspectual
derivation in Russian?
• A: Look at the verbs of motion!
– Verbs of motion are prototypical for the
Russian aspectual system
– Understanding of events is metaphorically
motivated by verbs of motion
Laura A. Janda
SLS 2006
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Overview:
• Metaphors based on properties of motion are
crucial to understanding Russian aspectual
derivation.
• These metaphors motivate the derivation of four
different types of perfective verbs.
• There is a single implicational hierarchy that
predicts all and only the aspectual clusters that
exist in Russian.
– This result is based on an empirical study of a
multiply stratified sample of 283 verb clusters
(including over 2000 verbs).
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The two metaphors:
• Travel vs. Motion, metaphorically
interpreted as Completability vs. NonCompletability
• Granular vs. Fluid, metaphorically
interpreted as Singularizable vs. NonSingularizable
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Why are motion verbs so central?
• A prototypical event, like ‘write a
dissertation’, has a beginning, a middle
(where progress is made), and an end. We
understand events and timelines as travel
(through time) toward a goal (destination):
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Travel vs. Motion
One can travel to a destination
– or –
One can move without a destination
This distinction is grammaticalized in Russian
motion verbs: идтиi ‘walk (somewhere)’ vs.
ходитьi ‘walk (around, back and forth)’
This can be likened to the Completability of an
action
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Completability:
Писатель пишетi книгу.
‘The writer is writing a
book.’
Профессор работаетi в
университете.
‘The professor is
working at the
university.’
For Non-Motion verbs, Completability is a
scale involving various kinds of construal.
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Completability:
• Many verbs are Ambiguous:
– Completable
• Писатель пишетi книгу ‘A writer is writing a book’
– Non-Completable
• Писатель пишетi книги ‘A writer writes books’
• Some verbs are Non-Completable: стонатьi ‘moan’
– But some can be Completable if specialized
• работатьi ‘work’ > переработатьp ‘revise’
• Few verbs are unambiguously Completable:
• крепнутьi > окрепнутьp ‘get stronger’
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Completability for Motion Verbs:
• Motion verbs are NEVER Ambiguous
• Non-Determined Motion verbs are
Non-Completable: ходитьi ‘walk, go’
• Determined Motion verbs are
Completable: идтиi > пойтиp ‘walk,
go’
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What Completability means for aspectual
derivation:
• Only verbs that can be construed as Completable have
Natural Perfectives
– писатьi ‘write’ > написатьp ‘write’, крепнутьi ‘get stronger’ >
окрепнутьp ‘get stronger’
• Only verbs that can be construed as Non-Completable
have Complex Act Perfectives
– писатьi ‘write’> пописатьp ‘write a while’, стонатьi ‘moan’>
постонатьp ‘moan a while’, работатьi ‘work’> поработатьp ‘work
a while’
• Verbs that can be Completable if specialized have
Specialized Perfectives
– писатьi ‘write’> переписатьp ‘rewrite’, работатьi ‘work’ >
переработатьp ‘revise’
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SLS 2006
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What Completability means for aspectual
derivation:
• Only verbs that can be construed as Completable have
Natural Perfectives
– писатьi ‘write’ > написатьp ‘write’, крепнутьi ‘get stronger’ >
окрепнутьp ‘get stronger’, идтиi > пойтиp ‘walk, go’
• Only verbs that can be construed as Non-Completable
have Complex Act Perfectives
– писатьi ‘write’> пописатьp ‘write a while’, стонатьi ‘moan’>
постонатьp ‘moan a while’, работатьi ‘work’> поработатьp ‘work
a while’, ходитьi ‘walk, go’> походитьp ‘walk, go a while’
• Verbs that can be Completable if specialized have
Specialized Perfectives
– писатьi ‘write’> переписатьp ‘rewrite’, работатьi ‘work’ >
переработатьp ‘revise’, идтиi ‘walk, go’> перейтиp ‘walk across’
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Granularity
• A Non-determined Motion verb (ходитьi ‘walk,
go’) can represent different kinds of motion:
– Fluid-like, non-directed
– Granular and repeated
сходитьp ‘make one round trip’
This can be likened to Singularizability
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Singularizability:
Мальчик дулi на
одуванчик.
‘The boy was blowing on the
dandelion.’
Профессор работалi в
университете.
‘The professor was working
at the university.’
Мальчик дунулp на
одуванчик.
‘The boy blew once on the
dandelion.’
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What Singularizability means for
aspectual derivation:
• Only verbs that can be construed as NonCompletable and have a Complex Act can also
have a Single Act Perfective:
• щипатьi ‘pinch/pluck’ + пощипатьp ‘pinch/pluck a
while’ > щипнутьp ‘pinch/pluck once’
• дутьi ‘blow’ + подутьp ‘blow a while’ > дунутьp
‘blow once’
• скрипетьi ‘squeak’ + поскрипетьp ‘squeak a while’
> скрипнутьp ‘squeak once’
• работатьi ‘work’ + поработатьp ‘work a while’ >
*работнутьp ‘work once’ [NB: Some are formed
ad-hoc]
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Summary thus far:
• Two metaphors distinguish four different
types of Perfectives:
– Natural Perfectives
• писатьi ‘write’ > написатьp ‘write’
– Specialized Perfectives
• работатьi ‘work’ > переработатьp ‘revise’
– Complex Act Perfectives
• стонатьi ‘moan’ > постонатьp ‘moan a while’
– Single Act Perfectives
• дутьi ‘blow’ > дунутьp ‘blow once’
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Adding in Motion verbs:
• Two metaphors distinguish four different
types of Perfectives:
– Natural Perfectives
• идтиi > пойтиp ‘walk, go’
– Specialized Perfectives
• идтиi ‘walk, go’> перейтиp ‘walk across’
– Complex Act Perfectives
• ходитьi ‘walk, go’> походитьp ‘walk, go a while’
– Single Act Perfectives
• сходитьp ‘make one round trip’
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Definition:
• An aspectual cluster is a group of verbs
joined via transitive relationships on the
basis of aspectual derivational morphology
– All verbs in a cluster are aspectually related to
a single lexical item
• In addition to Imperfective Activity verbs,
an aspectual cluster can include all four
types of Perfective verbs:
– Natural Perfective, Specialized Perfective,
Complex Act, Single Act
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Distribution of the four types of
Perfectives:
• Natural Perfective:
– написатьp ‘write’, связатьp ‘tie’, о(б)щипатьp ‘pinch/pluck’,
окрепнутьp ‘get stronger’
• Specialized Perfective:
– переписатьp ‘rewrite’, развязатьp ‘untie’, переработатьp
‘revise’, вдутьp ‘blow in’, выщипатьp ‘pluck out’
• Complex Act:
– пописатьp ‘write a while’, поработатьp ‘work a while’, подутьp
‘blow a while’, пощипатьp ‘pinch/pluck a while’, поскрипетьp
‘squeak a while’
• Single Act:
– дунутьp ‘blow once’, щипнутьp ‘pinch/pluck once’, скрипнутьp
‘squeak once’
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Distribution of the four types of
Perfectives:
• Natural Perfective:
– написатьp ‘write’, связатьp ‘tie’, о(б)щипатьp ‘pinch/pluck’,
окрепнутьp ‘get stronger’
• Specialized Perfective:
– переписатьp ‘rewrite’, развязатьp ‘untie’, переработатьp
‘revise’, вдутьp ‘blow in’, выщипатьp ‘pluck out’
• Complex Act:
– пописатьp ‘write a while’, поработатьp ‘work a while’, подутьp
‘blow a while’, пощипатьp ‘pinch/pluck a while’, поскрипетьp
‘squeak a while’
• Single Act:
– дунутьp ‘blow once’, щипнутьp ‘pinch/pluck once’, скрипнутьp
‘squeak once’
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Cluster components:
• Five items (Imperfective Activity + four
types of Perfectives) can compose 31
different combinations, but only 12 cluster
types are attested
• The metaphors motivate an Implicational
Hierarchy that constrains the structure of
aspectual clusters
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The Implicational Hierarchy:
Activity
щипатьi ‘pinch/pluck’
> (Natural/Specialized Perfective)
о(б)щипатьp ‘pinch/pluck’/выщипатьp ‘pluck out’
> Complex Act
пощипатьp ‘pinch/pluck a while’
> Single Act
щипнутьp ‘pinch/pluck once’
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SLS 2006
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The Implicational Hierarchy
Illustrated with a Motion verb:
Activity
идтиi ‘walk, go’/ходитьi ‘walk, go’
> (Natural/Specialized Perfective)
пойтиp ‘walk, go’/перейтиp ‘walk across’
> Complex Act
походитьp ‘walk a while’
> Single Act
сходитьp ‘make one round trip’
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Extant verb clusters
•
•
•
•
Activity
Activity + Natural Perfective
Activity + Specialized Perfective
Activity + Natural Perfective + Specialized
Perfective
To any of the above one can add either:
…+ Complex Act
…+ Complex Act + Single Act
Total: 12 extant cluster types
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What the hierarchy excludes:
• 18 unattested cluster types
• 1 cluster type that is rare, but known to
exist:
– Natural Perfective (perfectiva tantum)
• рухнутьp ‘collapse’, уцелетьp ‘survive’
• morphologically complex, probably remnants of
clusters that were historically larger
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Distribution of extant cluster types:
• Three cluster types account for over half the verbs in the
lexicon
– Activity+Natural+Specialized+Complex Act
• Like писатьi ‘write’
– Activity+Natural+Specialized
• Like вязатьi ‘tie’
– Activity+Specialized+Complex Act
• Like работатьi ‘work’
• Five cluster types follow, each representing less than
10% of verbs
• Remaining cluster types are rare (2% or less)
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Comparison with “pair” model:
• Activity + Natural Perfective type accounts for
only 6.4%, and is a semantically unusual group
(can be continued after result is achieved):
– Иван окреп. Потом он еще больше окреп.
‘Ivan got stronger. Then he got even stronger.’
– Иван написал книгу. *Потом он еще больше
написал книгу.
‘Ivan wrote a book. *Then he wrote the book even more.’
• Most attested cluster structures have 3-5
components
• The three most common cluster structures have
3 or 4 components
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Conclusions:
• The cluster model gives a richer, more
accurate account of aspectual
relationships than the “pair” model.
• Cluster structures are highly constrained
and transparently motivated.
• In the cluster model, the Motion verbs are
prototypical, not exceptional.
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SLS 2006
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Relevant works (all available at
www.unc.edu/~lajanda):
“Aspectual clusters of Russian verbs”, forthcoming in Studies in
Language, 68pp.
“Totally normal chaos: The aspectual behavior of Russian motion
verbs”, to appear in a festschrift for Michael S. Flier (Harvard
Ukrainian Studies 2006), 9pp.
“What makes Russian Bi-aspectual verbs Special”, to appear in:
Dagmar Divjak and Agata Kochańska, eds. Slavic Contributions to
Cognitive Linguistics. Cognitive Linguistics Research. Berlin/New
York: Mouton de Gruyter. 20pp.
“A Metaphor for Aspect in Slavic”, Henrik Birnbaum in Memoriam
(=International Journal of Slavic Linguistics and Poetics, vol. 4445, 2002-03; released 2006), 249-60.
“A metaphor in search of a source domain: the categories of Slavic
aspect”, Cognitive Linguistics, vol. 15, no. 4, 2004, 471-527.
“A user-friendly conceptualization of Aspect”, Slavic and East European
Journal, vol. 47, no. 2, 2003, pp. 251-281.
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SLS 2006
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