Re: Inchoactive in Jpn? (was: "Anticipatory" Tense)

At 4:32 am -0800 5/3/02, M.E.S. wrote:
>--- Raymond Brown <ray.brown@...> replied:
>
>< It was my understanding that "inchoative" was
>"becoming", and that's how I've been using it in my
>language. >
>
>> This is correct - the inchoative aspect (also called
>> by some 'inceptive' or 'ingessive') notes "becoming"
>
>> or "starting", e.g. Japanese: hanasu "to talk" -
>> hanashidasu "to start to talk" furu "rain" -
>> furidasu "to start to rain"
>
>Really!?  I never knew that this phenomenon of
>Japanese verbs would be considered a tense!
Not a tense - an aspect.

How far it is developed as a fully-fledged aspect in Japanese, I know not.
It may be, like the Latin -sc-, a remnant of an earlier system which some
verbs have retained, or it may be more productive in Japanese.  No doubt
some on this list will tell us.

[snip]
>
>Are you sure about the above as being classified a
>verb tense?
I am very, very sure about its NOT being classified as a tense.

Maybe the subject heading of the original mail - Anticipatory tense - was
misleading.  There is no (and cannot be any) 'anticipatory _tense_' in any
language, any more than there can be an 'inchoative tense'.  These concepts
are _aspects_ which can, and often do, have fully fledged tense systems of
their own.

>Also, doesn't _hanashidasu_ really refer
>to something more like _to speak up (suddenly)_,
>whereas _hanashihajimeru_ would be better suited to
>_to start to speak_ ??
Don't know.  I was relying on Trask for the Japanese examples.  I think was
identifying -idasu as an inchoative suffix.

Ray.

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A mind which thinks at its own expense
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