[Lingtyp] lexical aspect / actionality / Aktionsart in verb serialization / verb compounds / lexical affixes etc.

[Randy J. LaPolla]

Hi Adam,
Modern Mandarin Chinese does not have causative accomplishment and causative achievement verbs, and so to express the sense of such verbs, e.g. I broke a cup, one uses a serial verb construction where the first verb expresses the causal action and the second verb expresses the resulting accomplishment or achievement, e.g. [I hit-broke a cup]. This has been recognised for some 40+ years, so is discussed in any grammar of Chinese since then. This sort of thing is also found in some other Sino-Tibetan languages. See Matisoff 1969 (attached) or his 1973 Grammar of Lahu (U of California Press) for discussion of Lahu examples.

Randy



> On 22 May 2024, at 5:29 PM, Adam James Ross Tallman via Lingtyp <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org> wrote:
> 
> 
> Hello all,
> 
> I'm interested in combinations of lexical elements (serial verb constructions or verb compound constructions or whatever) and whether there is anything specific work which has described, classified or theorized about these in terms of lexical aspect. I guess the question is:
> 
> When V1 combines with V2, what happens to the actionality class of the combination? Is one just subordinated to the other or is there some way in which the aspects of each are coerced?
> 
> I've seen a lot of discussions about how pieces of such constructions might evolve into grammatical aspect markers (e.g. "finish" gradually becomes a completive marker), but I wonder why there appear to be few descriptions of the actionality classes of lexical combinations?
> 
> 
> best,
> 
> Adam
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Adam J.R. Tallman
> Post-doctoral Researcher
> Friedrich Schiller Universität
> Department of English Studies
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