Various interpretations of the Perfect forms.
The position of the perfect forms in the system of the English verb is a problem which has been treated in many different ways. Various views on the essence of the perfect forms in Modern English:
1)The category of perfect is a peculiar tense category, i. e. a category which should be classed in the same list as the categories "present" and "past". This view was held, for example, by O. Jespersen.
2)The category of perfect is a peculiar aspect category, i. e. one which should be given a place in the list comprising "common aspect" and "continuous aspect". This view was held by a number of scholars, including Prof. G. Vorontsova.2 Those who hold this view have expressed different opinions about the particular aspect constituting the essence of the perfect forms. It has been variously defined as "retrospective", "resultative", "successive", etc.
3)The category of perfect is neither one of tense, nor one of aspect but a specific category different from both. It should accordingly be designated by a special term and its relations to the categories of aspect and tense should be investigated. This view was expressed by Prof. A. Smirnitsky. He took the perfect to be a means of expressing the category of "time relation" (временная отнесенность).
The difference between the perfect and non-perfect forms of the verb, according to the tense interpretation of the perfect, consists in the fact that the perfect denotes a secondary temporal characteristic of the action - precedes some other action or situation in the present, past, or future. The idea of the perfect conveying a secondary time characteristic of the action is quite a sound one, because it shows that the perfect, in fact, coexists with the other, primary expression of time.
Laying emphasis on the temporal function of the perfect, the "tense view", though, fails to expose with the necessary distinctness its aspective function, by which the action is shown as successively or "transmissively" connected with a certain time limit. Besides, the purely oppositional nature of the form is not disclosed by this approach either, thus leaving the categorial status of the perfect undefined.
The second grammatical interpretation of the perfect was the "aspect view": according to this interpretation the perfect is approached as an aspective form of the verb. The aspect view is presented in the works of M. Deutschbein, E.A. Sonnenschein, A. S. West (Soviet linguist G. N. Vorontsova): masterly demonstrated the idea of the successive connection of two events expressed by the perfect, prominence given by the form to the transference or "transmission" of the accessories of a pre-situation to a post-situation. The great merit of G. N. Vorontsova's explanation of the aspective nature of the perfect lies in the fact that the resultative meaning ascribed by some scholars to the perfect as its determining grammatical function is understood in her conception within a more general destination of this form, namely as a particular manifestation of its transmissive functional semantics (some perfect forms express result, while the second presents a connection of a past event with a later one).
|
|
|
Though there are merits, there are also two serious drawbacks: 1) while emphasising the aspective side of the function of the perfect, it underestimates its temporal side, convincingly demonstrated by the tense view; 2) the described aspective interpretation of the perfect fails to strictly formulate its oppositional nature, the categorial status of the perfect being left undefined.
The third grammatical interpretation of the perfect was the "tense-aspect blend view": the perfect is recognised as a form of double temporal-aspective character, similar to the continuous. The tense-aspect interpretation of the perfect was developed in the works of I. P. Ivanova. According to I. P. Ivanova, the two verbal forms expressing temporal and aspective functions in a blend are contrasted against the indefinite form as their common counterpart of neutralised aspective properties. It demonstrates the actual double nature of the analysed verbal form, its inherent connection with both temporal and aspective spheres of verbal semantics. The tense-aspect view overcomes the one-sided approach to it peculiar both to the first and the second of the noted conceptions.
Disadvantage: loses sight of its categorial nature altogether, since it leaves undisclosed how the grammatical function of the perfect is effected in contrast with the continuous or indefinite, as well as how the "categorial blend" of the perfect-continuous is contrasted against its three counterparts, i.e. the perfect, the continuous, the indefinite.
|
|
|
As we see, the three described interpretations of the perfect, actually complementing one another, have given in combination a broad and profound picture of the semantical content of the perfect verbal forms, though all of them have failed to explicitly explain the grammatical category within the structure of which the perfect is enabled to fulfil its distinctive function.
The categorial individuality of the perfect was shown as a result of study conducted by the eminent Soviet linguist A. I. Smirnitsky. His conception, the fourth in our enumeration, may be called the "time correlation view", to use the explanatory name he gave to the identified category (вопрос 36).
Дата добавления: 2019-01-14; просмотров: 2095; Мы поможем в написании вашей работы! |
Мы поможем в написании ваших работ!