[B-Greek] Undefined Aspect
waldo slusher
waldoslusher at yahoo.com
Tue Feb 10 12:31:51 EST 2004
Mitch:
I would consider the statement by Mounce to be in
error. The "present tense" itself does NOT indicate
undefined action.
The use of "continuous" strikes me as another misnomer
when referring to the present tense. I say that with
reservation because TO ME the idea behind "continuous"
implies an action that keeps on going, whereas the
present tense only indicates that the action is
"currently in progress" in relation to the deictic
center. How long it "continues" is not inherent in the
present tense.
Returning to my first remark, an action very well may
be portrayed as "simple occurrence" (undefined?) with
a present tense verb, but at its deep structure it
would be understood to be "in progress" in relation to
the deictic center. If that aspect is not being
emphasized, then so be it, but contextual factors are
always intruding on tense.
Waldo
--- Mitch Larramore <mitchlarramore at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Under the heading of Aspect, Mounce says...
>
> "The present tense indicates either a continuous or
> undefined action."
>
> I thought the present tense was part of the
> Imperfective Aspect, which does not indicate
> undefined
> action (that would be the Perfective Aspect).
>
> What does he mean?
>
> =====
> Mitch Larramore
> Spring Branch, Texas
> Student/Memorial High School
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! Finance: Get your refund fast by filing
> online.
> http://taxes.yahoo.com/filing.html
> ---
> B-Greek home page: http://metalab.unc.edu/bgreek
> B-Greek mailing list
> B-Greek at lists.ibiblio.org
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-greek
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Finance: Get your refund fast by filing online.
http://taxes.yahoo.com/filing.html
More information about the B-Greek
mailing list