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Lecture 15

Lecture 15. Ling 442. 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. Exercises (part 2).

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Lecture 15

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  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 Romero’s this year, but not recently. • This year Donna has had a job at Romero’s, 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 P[[thex: 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.

  5. Reichenbach’s 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).

  8. 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/strategies 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).

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