Progressive forms and meanings: the curious case of Capeverdean

Abstract

The progressive may be described as a periphrastic construction (auxiliary + non-finite verb; for instance, in English: be + V-ing) which denotes an ongoing situation at a given time, be it an instant or an interval. This general picture, however, has faced two descriptive challenges: (i) those same forms may also appear associated with other temporal readings; (ii) the progressive meaning may also be obtained through other grammatical forms. The current paper approaches these apparent mismatches from the perspective of two varieties of Capeverdean, whose arrangements between forms and meanings of the progressive may provide a crucial insight to this cross-linguistic puzzle. The description and discussion of novel data support the two steps in a brand-new proposal for this Portuguese-based Creole: (a) the superficially different morphemes that mark the progressive have a unique diachronic path, involving the preverbal marker ta and a complete progressive cycle; (b) if we frame the temporal meaning of the progressive somewhat differently, considering the existence, under specific pragmatic conditions, of a precursory stage, at least one of the mentioned mismatches will be resolved. An additional contribution of the current discussion concerns the expression of time reference in natural language, namely that past, present or future meanings do not necessarily depend on dedicated tense morphemes.