Contradictory (forward) lifetime effects and the non-future tense in Mandarin Chinese

Chen, Sherry Yong; Husband, E. Matthew

doi:10.3765/plsa.v3i1.4296

Cited by 6 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 21 publications

(28 reference statements)

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“…We show that Mandarin is only superficially tenseless (as also argued by Sybesma 2007;Tsai 2008;Lin 2015). That is, Mandarin has a silent Non-Future tense restricting the reference time of bare sentences to non-future times, as first proposed in Sun (2014) for independent clauses (see also Huang 2015;Chen and Husband 2018). We extend Sun's hypothesis to embedded clauses which thus by hypothesis contain a null Non-Future tense selecting for times that precede or overlap the local evaluation time.…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 70%

“…Since neither Mòyán's smoking ((37)) nor Lùlu's being nervous during the exam (( 40)) can readily be construed as planned eventualities, simultaneous past and futurate readings are unavailable in (37) and ( 40), even when the future time adverb míngtiān 'tomorrow' is present. We close this section by pointing out that the Non-Future tense hypothesis has also been defended for Mandarin by Huang (2015), who argues for a syntactic Non-Future tense on the basis of the distribution of the morpheme jiāng, a future 'tense' morpheme according to Huang, as well as by Chen and Husband (2018), who provide experimental evidence for a Non-Future tense in Mandarin.…”

Section: Non-future Tense In Mandarinmentioning

confidence: 69%

“…The paradigms in (34) and (37) in the text are adapted from St'át'imcets (Matthewson 2006) to Mandarin. The reader is also referred to Chen and Husband (2018), who provide interesting experimental evidence for the contrasts illustrated in (37). 17…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Time Reference in Mandarin Relative Clauses

Sun

Demirdache

2022

Languages

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In this paper, we investigate constraints on the time reference of embedded clauses in Mandarin. We show that while English past-tensed embedded clauses disallow later-than-matrix readings in intensional contexts on a de dicto construal, Mandarin relative clauses with bare predicates yield temporally free readings across the board. We argue that the contrast between the temporal interpretations of bare embedded clauses in Mandarin vs. past-tensed embedded clauses in English is not due to a putative contrast between ‘tenseless’ languages (as Mandarin is traditionally assumed to be) and ‘tensed’ languages such as English. Mandarin is indeed not tenseless, but rather has a covert Non-Future tense, restricting the reference time of bare sentences to non-future times. Moreover, Mandarin superficially tenseless embedded clauses with overt—be it perfect, perfective, durative/progressive—aspectual marking do not allow later-than-matrix readings on a de dicto construal, just like tensed embedded clauses in English. We conclude that the freedom of interpretation of bare embedded clauses in Mandarin cannot be imputed to null semantically underspecified tense, but rather to null semantically underspecified aspect. Our analysis provides, to our knowledge, the first arguments for Non-Future tense in embedded contexts.

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Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 70%

Section: Non-future Tense In Mandarinmentioning

confidence: 69%

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Time Reference in Mandarin Relative Clauses

Sun

Demirdache

2022

Languages

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“…The same group of participants participated in, and was similarly described in, Werkmann Horvat, Bolognesi, & Kohl (2021)). The number of participants was determined based on the number of the experimental stimuli lists and on previous studies where two groups of participants are compared (Chen & Husband, 2018), but also on the feasibility of recruiting participants with the desired language history.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Comprehension of different types of novel metaphors in monolinguals and multilinguals

et al. 2022

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It has been suggested that multilingualism can lead to increased cognitive flexibility and creativity. No studies to date, however, have investigated whether this advantage leads to a greater propensity to find meaning in different kinds of novel metaphors. This article reports a self-paced reading study that focuses on whether such an increased propensity is displayed by multilingual English speakers, as opposed to monolingual English speakers. The article explores the difference between two broad types of novelty in metaphorical expressions, which are distinguished by how readily they conform to existing metaphorical schemata. The results indicate that both monolinguals and multilinguals find novel metaphors that conform readily to an existing schema easier to comprehend those that do not. They also take longer to seek meaning in metaphors that conform readily to an existing schema. Multilinguals are more likely than monolinguals to find meaning in both types of novel metaphor. The theoretical distinction drawn between metaphors that conform readily to an existing schema and those that do not highlights the variability of meaning in novel metaphors. It also focuses attention on the different extents to which hearers seek rich meanings as opposed to less rich but more easily derived ones.

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“…Many analyses of so-called tenselessness are hotly debated (see e.g. (Alotaibi 2020) for arguments against tenseless approaches to some varieties of Arabic, and (Chen & Husband 2018) for Chinese).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Aspectuo-Temporal Underspecification in Anindilyakwa: Descriptive, Theoretical, Typological and Quantitative Issues

Caudal¹,

Bednall²

2022

Preprint

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So-called ‘zero’ or ‘null’ tenses have often been characterized as functionally deficient forms, deprived of any inherent content. In this paper, we will focus on the semantics of a morpho-phonologically null inflectional verbal paradigm in Anindilyakwa (Groote Eylandt, N.T., Australia, which is both temporally and aspectually underspecified. Through a quantitative corpus study conducted in the paper, we establish that ‘zero inflection’ in this language, contra prior works on such tenses in general (e.g. Bybee 1990) and in Anindilyakwa in particular (Bednall 2019), presents various degrees of sensitivity to traditional Vendlerian aspectual parameters. We show that while telicity is not a significant predictor for the temporal interpretation of zero-inflected Anindilyakwa verbs, and dynamicity is a good but not very good predictor, only a very broad opposition between change-of-state (including qua boundedness) and non-change-of-state, or perfective/imperfective, gives very significant biases towards past vs. present anchoring. We also show that atomic telicity is the only categorical Aktionsart predictor for temporal anchoring in this context correctly predict the temporal anchoring of such verbs, and stativity is not biased towards present interpretations, thereby questioning currently received typological theories of the semantics of so-called ‘zero-tenses’ / aspectuo-temporally underspecified tenses.

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Contradictory (forward) lifetime effects and the non-future tense in Mandarin Chinese

Cited by 6 publications

References 21 publications

Time Reference in Mandarin Relative Clauses

Time Reference in Mandarin Relative Clauses

Comprehension of different types of novel metaphors in monolinguals and multilinguals

Aspectuo-Temporal Underspecification in Anindilyakwa: Descriptive, Theoretical, Typological and Quantitative Issues

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