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Title:
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A Semantic Framework for Analyzing Tense, Aspect and Mood: An Application to the Ranges of Polysemy of -Xr, -DIr, -Iyor and -Ø in Turkish
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Author:
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Ceyhan Temurcu
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Email:
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click here to access email
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Homepage:
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http://www.ii.metu.edu.tr/~temurcu/
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Degree Awarded:
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Universiteit Antwerpen
, Department of Linguistics
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Degree Date:
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2007
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Linguistic Subfield(s):
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Linguistic Theories
Pragmatics
Semantics
Cognitive Science
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Director(s):
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Johan van der Auwera
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Abstract:
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This dissertation develops a semantic framework for analyzing tense, aspect
and mood (TAM) markers on the basis of a language-independent semantic
space and applies this framework to the ranges of polysemy associated with
-Xr, DIr, Iyor and zero-marking (Ø) in Turkish.
The semantic framework introduces anchoring relations as semantic building
blocks of TAM reference, which serve to ‘anchor’ (or situate) an abstract
predicational content in the temporal, the epistemic, and the volitional
frames defined in the immediate discursive context. It formulates anchoring
relations in terms of higher-order entities (temporal locations, thoughts,
and projections) qualified relative to cognitive states that serve as
reference points in the three domains. It defines basic anchoring
categories in each of the three domains of anchoring and illustrates them
with grammatical strategies across languages. It then develops a
quasi-formal metalanguage which enables one to decompose the
convention-bound meaning of an utterance into a volitional category, an
epistemic category, a temporal category and an abstract predicational
content (SoA), taking scope over each other in this respective order.
Although the framework is primarily about sentence meaning, it centrally
deals with phenomena traditionally relegated to pragmatics, including
deixis, anaphoric reference and conventional implication. It also accounts
for how the speaker’s linguistic intentions relate to the illocutionary act
she performs.
The analytic part of the dissertation identifies the main conventional uses
of the Turkish TAM markers -Xr, -DIr, -Iyor and -Ø in finite sentences,
using a ‘family resemblance’ approach to polysemy. It analyzes each of the
identified uses into their semantic building blocks and renders them into
the metalanguage of anchoring categories. It seeks the motivations for the
present-day ranges of polysemy of these markers in the diachronic stages of
their semantic evolution.
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