[Lingtyp] Motion verbs and actionality classes

[Stefan Savić]

Hello,

In isiXhosa there are quite a few verbs for which the (recent) past marker refers to the moment of speech (sometimes referred to as 'inchoative' verbs in three literature), albeit I don't remember motion verbs per se. These include:

- ukubamba 'catch'
- ukuphatha 'hold, carry'
- lala 'sleep'
- hlala 'sit'
- ukulamba 'get hungry'
- ukulahleka 'get lost'
- ukufaneleka 'be suitable'
- ukulunga 'be good'
- phila 'be well/fine'
- ukuqina 'become firm/hard'
- ukubukela 'watch'
- ukumamela 'listen'

The list of such verbs is, of course, much longer. Uku- is the infinitive augment + prefix.

In the present tense these verbs often refer to the onset of the activity/position, e.g. in present habituals. Some of these verbs can also be used as non-inchoative verbs, e.g. ukuhlala with the present tense means to 'reside, live', whereas ukuphila with the same tense means 'to live, be alive'.
As a non-inchoative verb, ukuhamba normally means 'walk, travel', but it can also denote the act of leaving ("onset" of walking, travelling) but unlike the inchoative verbs from the list above the activity of walking/travelling is not restricted to the present tense when used with the recent past (it can also refer to an event of walking/travelling entirely located in the past).

Best,
Stefan





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________________________________
From: Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> on behalf of Mark Donohue via Lingtyp <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
Sent: Tuesday, September 3, 2024 2:50:34 AM
To: Sergey Loesov <sergeloesov at gmail.com>
Cc: LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
Subject: Re: [Lingtyp] Motion verbs and actionality classes

Hi,

Back in 1973 Andy Pawley noted the odd behaviour of directed motion verbs in Oceanic, observing that they can simultaneously be viewed as agentive (the moving person initiates the action) and patientive (the moving person undergoes a change of location). For this reason, they can be interpreted differently by different languages, including their behaviour with respect to aspectual classes, or what have you.

-Mark

On Tue, 3 Sept 2024 at 06:13, Sergey Loesov via Lingtyp <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org<mailto:lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>> wrote:

Dear colleagues,

In Modern Western Aramaic, an endangered language spoken in Syrian Qalamoun mountains, verbs of telic intransitive motion (those for ‘enter’, ‘go out of/leave’, ‘go up/ascend’, ‘go down/descend’, ‘go past’ [German ‘vorbeigehen]’) use their denominal Resultative/Perfective form to encode the respective events in progress at the reference time, quite like static verbs of perception (‘see’, ‘hear’) or body posture (‘lie’, ‘stand’, ‘sit’). Various other dynamic intransitives (e.g., the verbs for ‘fall’ or ‘pounce’, and also ‘die’) use, quite expectedly, the denominal Imperfective for progressive situations at the reference time, while their Perfective encodes Resultative, Perfect, (past time) Evidential, etc.


I observe a similar picture in Levantine Arabic dialects, in particular the Damascene. I wonder what is so special about basic verbs of intransitive telic motion that they behave like statives?  Have you ever seen something similar?

Thank you very much,

Sergey

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