LINGUIST List 17.1568
Mon May 22 2006
Diss: Syntax: MacDonald: 'The Syntax of Inner Aspect'
Editor for this issue: Meredith Valant
<meredithlinguistlist.org>
Directory
1. Jonathan
MacDonald,
The Syntax of Inner Aspect
Message 1: The Syntax of Inner Aspect
Date: 22-May-2006
From: Jonathan MacDonald <macdonald.jongmail.com>
Subject: The Syntax of Inner Aspect
Institution: Stony Brook
Program: Linguistics
Dissertation Status: Completed
Degree Date: 2006
Author: Jonathan E MacDonald
Dissertation Title: The Syntax of Inner Aspect
Dissertation URL: http://www.linguistics.stonybrook.edu/pub/dissertations.html
Linguistic Field(s):
Syntax
Subject Language(s): English (eng)
Finnish (fin)
Russian (rus)
Dissertation Director:
John F. Bailyn
Daniel L. Finer
Richard K. Larson
William McClure
Dissertation Abstract:
The main goal of this dissertation is to explore and provide an account ofthe syntactic nature of inner aspect. I conclude that the syntactic natureof inner aspect consists primarily of a space within the verb phrase withinwhich elements must be located in order to contribute to the aspectualinterpretation of the predicate; this is the domain of aspectualinterpretation. Technically the domain of aspectual interpretation isminimally defined as an aspectual projection (AspP)between vP and VP (seealso Travis 1991). When a certain property of an NP Agrees with Asp, thedomain is extended to everything dominated by AspP; this is the syntacticinstantiation of an object-to-event mapping (cf. Krifka 1989, Verkuyl1972). The result of the presence of this domain is that elements aboveAspP (e.g. CAUSE introducing external arguments (Hay, Kennedy & Levin1999), external arguments themselves (Tenny 1987), and locative PPs) cannotcontribute to the aspectual interpretation of the predicate (cf. Thompson2006).
I also provide a syntactic typology of aspectual predicate types. Thisconsists of the minimal syntactic machinery necessary to account for anarray of properties systematically associated with statives, activities,accomplishments, and achievements. Relevant to the determination of thistypology are AspP, as well as syntactically and semantically activeproperties of predicates (event features). The presence or absence of AspPand event features in conjunction with the syntactic relation between theevent features themselves derive the typology.
Furthermore, I claim that a locus of parametric variation in inner aspectis the AspP projection itself. I argue that English is representative oflanguages that possess AspP and Russian is representative of languages thatlack AspP. This claim is motivated by the systematically distinct aspectualdistributions and interpretations of mass nouns and bare plurals.
Finally, a natural consequence of this proposal is that case and aspect areindependent syntactic relations. I conclude that aspect is a relationbetween an NP and Asp and assume that accusative case is a relation betweena DP and v (Chomsky 2001). I discuss this consequence for Finnish, oftenput forth as a language that exemplifies a direct relation between case andaspect.
|