telicity marking in Siouan and Caddoan

[Bryan James Gordon]

Speaking for Siouan in general (if I may be permitted), the most common
aspect distinction in the family is between continuative and an unmarked
non-continuative. I am not familiar with the reasons we call it
"continuative" as opposed to "imperfective", but I recall being relatively
convinced by whatever argument I heard in the past. I do know that the
unmarked is used for statives. Other marked aspects are common, too: I think
most Siouan languages also have some sort of iterative or habitual, and it
is common for lexical verbs to mark aspectual and aktionsart information
like "suddenly", "repeatedly", "abruptly". Positional verbs often mark
information like stativity, perfect aspect, inferred or derived states,
immediacy, continuativity, etc.

As for Omaha and Ponca in particular, generally the atelic "for" temporal
phrases you refer to are unmarked:
Míⁿdoⁿbe-wiⁿ-égoⁿ oⁿgthíⁿi.
hour-one-about we.sat
"We sat for about an hour."
Wáthiⁿ-athái-égoⁿ míⁿdoⁿbe ánaxti-égoⁿ ahíi-tʰe
them.have-they.go-as hour what.number.AUG-about they.arrived-C
"After they chased them for a good number of hours"

I am not familiar with any telic "in"-type temporal phrases.

-- 
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Bryan James Gordon, MA
Joint PhD Program in Linguistics and Anthropology
University of Arizona
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