Aspectuality in Bantu: on the limits of Vendler's categories

Persohn, Bastian

doi:10.1349/ps1.1537-0852.a.479

Cited by 4 publications

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“…We highlight this subclass because of its importance for Bantu and the relative paucity of attention paid to it in typological literature (see Polančec forthc.). The facts described in this section add to the cross-linguistic evidence for the salience of this class in many Bantu languages; see, for example, Kershner (2002) on Sukwa (M301, ndh); Botne (2008) on Ndali (M301, ndh); Seidel (2008) on Yeyi (R41, yey); Crane (2011) on Totela (K41, ttl); Gunnink (2018) on Fwe (K402, fwe); Persohn (2017Persohn ( , 2018 on Nyakyusa (M31, nyy); Kanijo 2019 on Nyamwezi (F22, num); and Crane & Persohn (2019b) on Bantu in general.…”

Section: Evidence For Two-phase Verbs In Southernmentioning

confidence: 90%

Notes on actionality in two Nguni languages of South Africa

Crane¹,

Persohn

2021

sal

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This paper presents some key findings of studies of actionality and the verbal grammar–lexicon interface in two Nguni Bantu languages of South Africa, Xhosa and Southern Ndebele. We describe interactions between grammatical tense marking (and other sentential bounding elements) and lexical verb types, arguing for the salience of inchoative verbs, which lexically encode a resultant state, and, in particular, a sub-class of inchoative verbs, biphasal verbs, which encode both a resultant state and the “coming-to-be” phase leading up to that state. We further discuss other important features of actional classes in Xhosa and Southern Ndebele, including topics such as the role of participant structure and the relative importance of cross-linguistically prominent distinctions such as that between Vendlerian activities and accomplishments. Although differences between Xhosa and Southern Ndebele are evident both in the behaviour of individual tense-aspect forms and in the interpretive possibilities of specific verbs, the general patterns are quite similar. This similarity suggests that the patterns are likely to extend to other Nguni languages, as well, and that cross-linguistic comparison of particular lexical items across these languages are both feasible and likely to bear fruit.

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Section: Evidence For Two-phase Verbs In Southernmentioning

confidence: 90%

Notes on actionality in two Nguni languages of South Africa

Crane¹,

Persohn

2021

sal

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The phasal polarity marker -(a)kona in Manda and its history

Bernander¹

2021

The Expression of Phasal Polarity in African Languages

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Two-phase verbs: a crosslinguistic look at an actional class

Polančec

2021

STUF - Language Typology and Universals

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This paper documents the properties and realizations of the actional (aspectual, Aktionsart) class of two-phase verbs, with a particular focus on languages with inflectional (obligatory) grammatical aspect. The paper adopts a descriptive (non-formal) and typological perspective. Two-phase verbs are defined, for the purposes of the paper, as verbs whose inflectional (obligatory) aspect grams (e.g., imperfective, progressive, etc.) can express both the durative phase of the situation leading up to the culmination, as well as the durative phase resulting from that culmination. The realizations of the class in perfective-imperfective languages are compared to realizations in two languages with idiosyncratic aspect systems, Belhare and Nyakyusa.

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Aspectuality in Bantu: on the limits of Vendler's categories

Cited by 4 publications

References 0 publications

Notes on actionality in two Nguni languages of South Africa

Notes on actionality in two Nguni languages of South Africa

The phasal polarity marker -(a)kona in Manda and its history

Two-phase verbs: a crosslinguistic look at an actional class

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