Ling 442

1
Lecture 15

• Ling 442

2
Exercises (part 1)

• Do the following examples receive continuous
  state interpretations?
• Gemma has been a juggler since she was five.
• Jones has been a bank clerk since I saw him last.

3
Exercises (part 2)

• In the sentence pairs below, one version is
  marked and awkward. Which one is awkward? How do
  you account for this?
• They have lived here since 1985, but not
  recently.
• Since 1985 they have lived here, but not
  recently.
• Donna has had a job at Romeros this year, but
  not recently.
• This year Donna has had a job at Romeros, but
  not recently.

4
Exercises (3)

• Tense logic analysis of past tense is to posit a
  past tense operator for past tense morpheme. E.g.
  The man left ? Pthe x man (x) leaves (x) or
  the x man (x) P leaves (x)
• Why is this analysis problematic for sentences
  like (1) and (2)?
• All fugitives are now in jail.
• Every member of our investment club will buy a
  house.

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Reichenbachs theory

• The simple past vs. the present perfect
• A comma (,) indicates simultaneity.
• Mary left. R, E ___ S
• Mary has left. E ___ R, S
• A major point The use of tense/aspect is
  sensitive to the salient time (Reference time)
  at a particular point in a discourse.

6
Simple Past vs. Past progressive

• Puzzle What is the difference between (1) and
  (2) (in truth conditions)?
• Mary smiled.
• Mary was smiling.
• You need a discourse context to explain the
  difference between them. (There are not
  appreciable truth conditional differences between
  them.)

7
Simple Past vs. Past progressive

• John opened his eyes. Mary smiled.
• John opened his eyes. Mary was smiling.
• The difference has to do with whether the second
  sentence moves the narrative time forward. An
  event sentence in the simple past tense moves the
  narrative time forward, whereas a past
  progressive sentence (or a state sentence in the
  simple past) does not (in most cases).

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Exceptions

• Jameson entered the room, shut the door
  carefully, and switched off the light. It was
  pitch dark around him, because the Venetian
  blinds were closed. (Hinrhces 1982)
• In a case like this, the sentence (It was pitch
  dark around him) is forced to receive an
  event-like (inchoative) interpretation.
• 2. John went over the day's perplexing events
  once more in his mind. Suddenly, he was fast
  asleep. (Dowty 1986)

9
Sequence of tenses

• English normally uses a past tense in a verb
  complement clause for a simultaneous reading
  when the matrix predicate is in the past tense.
  But Japanese does not follow this pattern.
• John found out that Mary was pregnant.
• John-wa
• John TOP
• Mary-ga ninsinsiteiru -to
  sit-ta.
• Mary NOM be-pregnant-PRES that learn-PAST

10
Be V-ing vs. te iru (Japanese)

• English achievements do occur in the progressive
  form, but the target state is located in the
  future.
• The tree is falling over. (The tree has not
  fallen over yet.)
• Japanaese progressive/resultant morpheme te
  iru indicates a resultant state when it is
  suffixed to an achievement-like predicate
• Ki -ga taore-te i -ru.
• tree-NOM fall -PROG(?)-PRES
• A tree is on the ground. (Presumably, it has
  fallen over.)

11
Cross-linguistic semantics

• Perhaps all languages share the same semantic
  base (an ontology) but syntactic/morphological
  differences produce different constructions/strate
  gies for conveying the same thought
• Or perhaps languages may differ with respect to
  the semantic base already. They may use different
  semantic entities for conceptualizing meanings.
• Whatever the case may be, UG is incomplete
  without a proper study of semantics (I think).