29.2568, Diss: General Linguistics; Typology: Ghazazleh Vafaeian: ''Progressives in use and contact: A descriptive, areal and typological study with special focus on selected Iranian languages''

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LINGUIST List: Vol-29-2568. Mon Jun 18 2018. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 29.2568, Diss: General Linguistics; Typology: Ghazazleh Vafaeian: ''Progressives in use and contact: A descriptive, areal and typological study with special focus on selected Iranian languages''

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Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2018 11:22:57
From: Ghazazleh Vafaeian [v_ghazaleh at hotmail.com]
Subject: Progressives in use and contact: A descriptive, areal and typological study with special focus on selected Iranian languages

 
Institution: Department of Linguistics 
Program: Linguistics 
Dissertation Status: Completed 
Degree Date: 2018 

Author: Ghazazleh Vafaeian

Dissertation Title: Progressives in use and contact: A descriptive, areal and
typological study with special focus on selected Iranian
languages 

Dissertation URL:  http://www.diva-portal.org/smash/record.jsf?dswid=-1451&pid=diva2%3A1200741

Linguistic Field(s): General Linguistics
                     Typology


Dissertation Director(s):
Agnes Korn
Östen Dahl
Maria Koptjevskaja Tamm

Dissertation Abstract:

Progressives are grammatical patterns primarily used to refer to events that
are ongoing at a specific time. This thesis investigates uses of such patterns
in a number of languages as well as the interaction of a number of
progressives in contact. The dissertation includes a typological study of the
uses of 89 progressive patterns in two parallel corpora, an investigation of
the uses and origin of the Persian dāštan progressive and an areal linguistic
investigation of 50 Iranian varieties spoken around the Caspian Sea.

The dissertation presents features that increase the likelihood that a
progressive is used. Such features are 1) a focalized (punctual) reference
point, 2) the engagement or ‘busyness’ of the agentive subject on the event,
3) an emotive component and 4) the desire to turn the attention of the
addressee towards an ongoing event. The significance of these features is
expected to weaken as progressives grammaticalize.

There is a cross-linguistic tendency for progressives to occur more often with
present time reference than with past time reference. In some cases, they are
even restricted to the former. Among the varieties of the Iranian language
Taleshi, on the other hand, we find asymmetric temporal paradigms as a
consequence of former progressive patterns having expanded and lost their
progressive character in the present but not in the past.

The study also shows that progressives are used differently in the present and
the past: while events with present time reference often have the features
mentioned above in 1-4, events with past time reference are often, although
not exclusively, background contexts to other events pushing the narration
forward.

The thesis also discusses various peripheral uses of progressives, such as
uses in habitual and performative-like contexts, proximative, iterative and
futurate uses, uses with stative verbs and temporary and subjective uses. Some
of these tend to be found in patterns with higher frequencies and can be
regarded as expansions towards the imperfective. Other uses are linked to the
type of event to which the progressive applies: the proximative reading is
shown to arise with achievements and the iterative use with repeated punctual
events.  

The data from the varieties of the Iranian languages Mazandarani, Gilaki,
Taleshi and Tati, as well as from varieties under the influence of Persian,
suggests that the progressive in these varieties is highly borrowable. Among
the varieties discussed in Chapter 5, an areal cline is noted where
constructional schemas used for ongoing events shift towards the imperfective.
In the borrowing process, on occasion, a shift from progressive to proximative
is also noted. As expected, the data from Caspian varieties shows that there
are more progressive patterns than imperfective patterns.




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