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Re: Aspect + Mood combinations

From:James W. <emindahken@...>
Date:Friday, July 28, 2006, 18:06
(Fixing the !*@$%&# codes in my original message)
On Fri, 28 Jul 2006 13:27:05 -0400, "Roger Mills" <rfmilly@...>
said:
> James W. wrote:
[snip]
> > Aspects: perfective, imperfective, inceptive > > Moods: imperative, dubitative, negative, optative, > > permissive, conditional > > > > Have I interpreted these correctly? And what would > > the ones with question marks mean, if anything? > > Are there any others that you can think of from > > any con- or natlang examples? > > I suppose each A+M is also subdivided by Tense??
Yes, there are future and non-future tenses.
> > > > combinations > > ASPECT MOOD ENGLISH equivalents > > (perf) + (imperat) [none?] > > What about: "Have your report finished by noon tomorrow" ?? Sort of a > Future > Perf. Imperative?? Or would it be Imperf., since the report is unfinished > at > the time of speaking?
I will definitely look into this possibility. Thanks!
> > (perf) + (dubit) doubted that > > (perf) + (neg) did not > > (perf) + (optat) wanted to ---- > > Where would "have (always) doubted that...", "have not.../do not..." et > al. > fit in? Generic statements?
Hmmm. More thought needed on my part, obviously. For "have (always) doubted that..." I would need some way to express habitual action. For "have not..." (you mean like "I have not taken the trash out yet"?), That will require some thought. I don't know how to do that with my current system.
> (snips) > > (incept) + (dubit) ?? > "beginning to doubt..., becoming uncertain that..., (it's) likely to... > "???
"Beginning to doubt..." This could work. I like it :)
> Never having studied a Slavic language, I'm a little bit uncertain just > how > perf/imperf. aspects work :-((((
Well, my knowledge of anything linguistic is quite uncertain :). My understanding is that perfective indicates a completed, single event. I had to review on sil.org what Imperfective means: "Imperfective aspect is an aspect that expresses an event or state, with respect to its internal structure, instead of expressing it as a simple whole." So I interpret that as meaning unspecified completion, focusing more on the process of the event itself. (Which is more or less what I thought.) Thanks, -------- James W.