query: aspect and/or tense in tagalog and other Philippine languages

[David Gil]

Dear all,

I would like to solicit your insights with regard to a rather specific 
question concerning the semantic description of verbal inflection in 
Tagalog and other Philippine languages. 

I am interested in whether paradigms such as, for example, the Tagalog 
actor-focus forms for 'run' /tumakbo/, /tumatakbo/, and /tatakbo/ are 
most appropriately described as involving a contrast in aspect (as is, I 
believe, most commonly assumed to be the case), or rather tense or even 
mood.  I would greatly appreciate (a) bibliographical references to 
works which explicitly discuss this issue, for Tagalog or other 
Philippine languages, and (b) any thoughts of your own on this issue.

Of course, it is possible that such paradigms reflect a combination of 
aspect and also tense or mood.  For example, the above Tagalog paradigm 
appears to result from the addition of one or both of two morphemes, 
initial CV- reduplication, sometimes said to mark the imperfective, plus 
the infix /-um-/, which, in addition to marking actor-focus, also 
expresses what could possibly be analyzed as non-future tense or realis 
mood. 

Looking forward to any comments and suggestions you might have on this 
issue.

Many thanks,

David

-- 
David Gil

Department of Linguistics
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
Deutscher Platz 6, D-04103 Leipzig, Germany

Telephone: 49-341-3550321 Fax: 49-341-3550119
Email: gil at eva.mpg.de
Webpage:  http://www.eva.mpg.de/~gil/


_______________________________________________
An-lang mailing list
An-lang at anu.edu.au
http://mailman.anu.edu.au/mailman/listinfo/an-lang