Search results for "lexical aspect"
showing 6 items of 6 documents
On deictic motion verbs in Homeric Greek
2017
This paper investigates the basic motion verbs ‘go’ and ‘come’ in Homeric Greek. In particular, it aims to examinewhether the deictic component,which is usually ascribed to the inherent semantic meaning of these verbs cross–linguistically, has to be considered as a prototypical semantic property of εἶμι ‘go’ and βαίνω ‘step; go; come’. These latter can indeed take a deictic interpretation at a pragmatic, syntactic or discourse level, but I will show how the deictic component is not inherently associated with their lexical semantics. Data from the contexts of use of these verbs, in both narrative discourse and direct speech, strongly suggest that the original semantic opposition between ‘go’…
Root lexical features and inflectional marking of tense in Proto-Indo-European
2009
This paper examines early inflectional morphology related to the tense-aspect system of Proto-Indo-European. It will be argued that historical linguistics can shed light on the long-standing debate over the emergence of tense-aspect morphology in language acquisition. The dispute over this issue is well-known; it has been pursued mostly by scholars following various general linguistic approaches, from typology to acquisition, but also by historical linguists and Indo-Europeanists, who have long debated about the precedence of aspect or tense from both a synchronic and a diachronic perspective. However, so far Indo-Europeanists have rarely confronted their results in a successful way with re…
Lexical Aspect and Motion Event Encoding in Homeric Greek: A Case Study - poster
2017
Lexical Aspect and Motion Event Encoding in Homeric Greek: A Case Study This paper aims to investigate the role that lexical aspect (Aktionsart) plays in motion event encoding in Homeric Greek. In particular, the role of telicity as an inherent semantic property of the verb has been recently re-evaluated within the verbal system of early Indo-European languages (Bartolotta 2016). On the basis of textual analysis of the Iliad and the Odyssey, I will argue how Homeric Greek motion verbs appear to be compatible with the entailment of the arrival of the Figure to the Ground according to their inherent telicity (see Bartolotta forthcoming). Specifically, I will focus on the Homeric verbs for ̔ru…
Lexical aspect and motion event encoding in homeric greek: a case study
2017
This paper aims to investigate the role that lexical aspect (Aktionsart) plays in motion event encoding in Homeric Greek. In particular, the role of telicity as an inherent semantic property of the verb has been recently re-evaluated within the verbal system of early Indo-European languages (Bartolotta 2016). According to Talmy (1985; 2000), a translational motion event consists of an object (Figure) that moves (Motion) through a path (Path) with respect to another reference object (Ground).On the basis of textual analysis of the Iliad and the Odyssey, I will argue how Homeric Greek motion verbs turn out to be compatible with the entailment of the arrival of the Figure to the Ground accordi…
Sul suppletivismo verbale in Omero: l’apporto della prospettiva tipologica talmiana
2020
This paper aims at investigating the partially uncertain relationship on which the suppletion of the Homeric verbal forms within the paradigm for ‘go’ is based. For this purpose, the Homeric distribution of some motion verbs for ‘go’, as well as their contexts of use, are taken into account. In the light of Talmy’s theoretical framework of the lexicalization patterns, the analysis focuses on the motion events expressed by ἔρχομαι and ἦλϑον (fut. ἐλεύσομαι, pf. εἰλήλουϑα) and their cooccurring spatial elements, i.e. particles, adverbs, nominal case markers, which encode the path followed by the moving object. Building on telicity as a verb-inherent actional feature (i.e. Lexical Aspect), and…
Sulle origini della ‘telicità’: κίνησις ed ἐνέργεια in Aristotele
2014
Nell’ambito della classificazione aspettuale dei verbi un ruolo particolare riveste la distinzione del tratto telico-atelico, alla base della tradizionale suddivisione tra le classi vendleriane rispettivamente di accomplishment e achievement da una parte e states e activities dall’altra. Nonostante la rilevanza di tale tratto nella riflessione linguistica contemporanea, a tutt’oggi gli studiosi non condividono una definizione univoca della telicità, soprattutto perché dietro ad ogni definizione si nasconde una diversa prospettiva teorica. Scopo del presente lavoro è un’analisi dell’origine del termine nella teoria linguistica, che è solita ricondurre la distinzione del tratto telico-atelico…