On the aspectuality of the Individual-Level / Stage-Level dichotomy

Abstract

<p><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Cambria';">This paper addresses how the contrast known as Individual-­‐Level/Stage-­‐Level (IL/SL) is implemented in the grammar. More specifically, the paper is a critical assessment of the view that the IL/SL distinction is an aspectual distinction. The empirical data I will be using to probe into the IL/SL dichotomy is the contrast between the copular verbs in Spanish </span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Cambria'; font-style: italic;">ser/estar. </span><span style="font-size: 12.000000pt; font-family: 'Cambria';">I will argue that the Spanish copular contrast reflexes the IL/SL dichotomy and that this dichotomy cannot be reduced to an aspectual difference in the ways it has been proposed in previous literature. Concurring with other authors I will argue that IL/SL-­‐ness ensues from a different syntactic composition, very likely from different heads of prepositional nature, which can be argued to carry aspectual value. Crucially, however, this aspectual heads do not seem to translate into differences at the level of viewpoint or situation aspect in any relevant sense, as has been proposed in the literature. </span></p>

Encoding States Is Not Enough: The Case of Spanish Deadjectival Nominalizations1

“…My analysis, according to which the individual‐level/stage‐level distinction is irrelevant when accounting for the temporal and aspectual properties of mass deadjectival nominalizations, is consistent with Arche's (2006, 2012) analysis of Spanish copulative sentences, in which the individual‐level/stage‐level distinction is not grounded on temporal or aspectual considerations.…”

“…However, in assuming, on the one hand, that mass deadjectival nominalizations derived from individual‐level predicates express atemporal properties, these analyses mistakenly predict that they cannot combine with temporal modifiers (for the individual‐level/stage‐level distinction, see Milsark 1974; Carlson 1977; Kratzer 1995; Chierchia 1995; Fernández‐Leborans 1999; Arche 2006, 2012; Husband 2010; Sassoon & Toledo 2011; Fábregas 2012; Silvagni 2017; a.o). For example, nominalizations like validez ‘validity’ and popularidad ‘popularity’ are derived from the individual‐level predicates válido ‘valid’ and popular ‘popular’, respectively, and nothing prevents them from co‐occurring with temporal modifiers:…”

“…Inspired by Levinson (1978Levinson ( , 1980, there are other authors who also make use of qualities (Villalba 2009 However, in assuming, on the one hand, that mass deadjectival nominalizations derived from individual-level predicates express atemporal properties, these analyses mistakenly predict that they cannot combine with temporal modifiers (for the individual-level/stage-level distinction, see Milsark 1974;Carlson 1977;Kratzer 1995;Chierchia 1995;Fern andez-Leborans 1999;Arche 2006Arche , 2012Husband 2010;Sassoon & Toledo 2011;F abregas 2012;Silvagni 2017;a.o). For example, nominalizations like validez 'validity' and popularidad 'popularity' are derived from the individual-level predicates v alido 'valid' and popular 'popular', respectively, and nothing prevents them from cooccurring with temporal modifiers: (35) a. la validez de este argumento durante el Renacimiento the validity of this argument during the Renaissance b. la popularidad de esta canci on en 1990 the popularity of this song in 1990…”

Ser and estar

“…The idea is that the distinction between the copulas reflects the classical imperfective/perfective contrast, with estar as the perfective, aspectually marked member of the pair. A second way of relying on aspectual notions, mainly inspired by Carlson (1977) and subsequent work, is to understand aspect in the sense of Aktionsart or lexical aspect, and more precisely by resorting to the IL/SL distinction, as already mentioned (Leonetti, 1994;Lema, 1996;Escandell-Vidal & Leonetti, 2002;Marín, 2004Marín, , 2010Arche, 2006Arche, , 2012 stages, on the other hand, has received special attention in the last four decades (see, among others, Crespo, 1946;Bolinger, 1947;Roldán, 1974;Falk, 1979;Franco & Steinmetz, 1983, 1986Porroche, 1990;Gumiel-Molina, Moreno-Quibén & Pérez-Jiménez 2015, this volume). When the focus is on the discourse dependence of estar (as in Clements, 1988;Maienborn, 2003Maienborn, , 2005Schmitt, 2005;Schmitt & Miller, 2007, and others; see also Leonetti, this volume, and Romeu, this volume), the perspective is compatible with both criteria: if the predication is linked to a specific situation, then it is naturally inferred that it holds with respect to a stage of an individual, and that the state is probably episodic.…”

Copular clauses in Dene languages: Argument structure and interpretation

“… 13 The SER-ESTAR distinction between the copulas of Spanish (along with Portuguese, and to some extent Catalan and Italian) has a vast literature that we cannot do justice to in this article (but see Carlson 1977; Luján 1981; Schmitt 1992; Escandell-Vital and Leondetti 2002; Maienborn 2005; Arche 2006, 2012; Gallego and Uriagereka 2009; Camacho 2012; Fábregas 2012; Zagona 2012). The Irish (and Scottish Gaelic) copula distinction is less discussed, but still well documented (Carnie, 1995, Doherty 1996, Adger and Ramchand 2003).…”