The German Perfect: Its semantic composition and its interactions with temporal adverbials

279 Pages·2002·13.32 MB·English

by  Renate Musan (auth.)

THE GERMAN PERFECT
Studies in Linguistics and Philosophy
Volume 78
Managing Editors
GENNARO CHIERCHIA, University ofM ilan
PAULINE JACOBSON, Brown University
FRANCIS J. PELLETIER, University ofA lberta
Editorial Board
JOHAN VAN BENTHEM, University ofA msterdam
GREGORY N. CARLSON, University ofR ochester
DAVID DOWTY, Ohio State University, Columbus
GERALD GAZDAR, University ofS ussex, Brighton
IRENE HElM, M.l.T., Cambridge
EWAN KLEIN, University of Edinburgh
BILL LADUSAW, University of California at Santa Cruz
TERRENCE PARSONS, University of California, Irvine
The titles published in this series are listed at the end oft his volume.
THE GERMAN PERFECT
Its semantic composition and its interactions
with temporal adverbials
by
RENATE MUSAN
Humboldt-University, Berlin, Germany
SPRINGER SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, RY.
A C.I.P. Catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.
ISBN 978-1-4020-0822-1 ISBN 978-94-010-0552-4 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-94-010-0552-4
Printed on acid-free paper
AlI Rights Reserved
© 2002 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
Originally published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 2002
Softcover reprint ofthe hardcover lst edition 2002
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To Eva
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .......................................................................................... xi
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ................................................................................... 1
1. Outline .............................................................................................................. 1
2. Tense and aspect .............................................................................................. .3
3. Contexts and temporal specifications ............................................................... 9
4. The tenses in German ....................................................................................... 9
5. Temporal interpretation and individuals ......................................................... 13
6. A formal semantic implementation of tense and aspect... ............................... 14
6.1. Basic assumptions concerning temporal interpretation .......................... 14
6.2. Basic assumptions concerning the syntax-semantics interface ............... 18
6.3. Semantic composition ............................................................................. 18
7. Conclusion ...................................................................................................... 20
CHAPTER 2: THE SEMANTICS OF THE PRESENT PERFECT .................................. 21
1. Perfectly compositional? ................................................................................ 21
1.1. The problem ............................................................................................ 21
1.2. Some characteristics of the present perfect ............................................. 23
2. The morpho syntactic source of the anteriority component ............................. 26
3. The stativity of perfect constructions ............................................................. .32
3.1. Application of standard tests .................................................................. 32
3.2. TS-specification and TT- specification by positional adverbials and
the role of the present tense in present perfect constructions ....................... .35
3.3. The aspect in perfect clauses ................................................................. .3 8
3.4. Consequences for the theory of aspect ................................................... 38
4. Identifying the synchronic anteriority component:
an optimality approach to focus effects .............................................................. 39
5. Conclusion, formal semantic account, and refmements ................................. 53
5.1. Outline of the semantic composition of perfect constructions ................ 53
5.2. Formal semantic interpretation ............................................................... 58
5.3. Brief comparison to Reichenbach (1947) and Klein (1992a, 1992b,
1994) .............................................................................................................. 60
5.4. Conclusion .............................................................................................. 60
CHAPTER 3: THE MEANING EFFECTS OF THE PRESENT PERFECT ..................... 63
1. The problem .................................................................................................... 63
2. The effects of the present perfect .................................................................... 64
3. Previous accounts ........................................................................................... 67
4. How pragmatic principles operate on the semantics ....................................... 73
4.1. Situation times ofVP and post-state: informative contrasts ................... 74
4.2. Values of times ....................................................................................... 75
4.2.1. Direct time values ................................................................................ 75
4.2.2. Time values provided by noun phrases ............................................... 77
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4.2.3. A survey of the options for providing time values .............................. 81
4.3. The topical status oftimes ...................................................................... 84
4.4. The proportion of situation times and their restrictors ............................ 87
5. Why past tense and present perfect often can be substituted by
each other ............................................................................................................ 88
6. Completedness effects .................................................................................... 90
6.1. Momentary situations in the past ............................................................ 90
6.2. Completedness by implicature ................................................................ 91
6.3. Effects of the Principle of Informative Contrast (PIC) ........................... 92
6.4. Effects by anteriority focus ..................................................................... 93
7. Indefmiteness effects ...................................................................................... 94
8. Present relevance ............................................................................................ 95
8.1. Cause and result ...................................................................................... 95
8.2. Preferences for designated post-states .................................................... 97
8.3. The time just before the time of utterance .............................................. 98
9. Stage-Ievel-to-individual-Ievel switches: Mozart's lung disease .................... 98
10. Individual-Ievel-to-stage-level switches: temporary intelligence ............... 100
10.1. Switches with the past perfect ............................................................ 100
10.2. No switches with the present perfect .................................................. 103
11. English vs. German: Einstein and Princeton ............................................... 105
12. Conclusion .................................................................................................. 10 6
CHAPTER 4: TYPES OF TEMPORAL ADVERBIALS .............................................. 109
1. Introduction .................................................................................................. 10 9
2. Quantificational adverbials, position adverbials, and duration adverbials .... 109
3. Duration adverbials and situation types ........................................................ 111
4. Distinguishing position and duration adverbials ........................................... l12
5. The interpretation of nonquantificational temporal adverbials ..................... 115
CHAPTER 5: INTERACTIONS WITH TEMPORAL ADVERBIALS .......................... 117
1. Introduction .................................................................................................. 117
2. The formal integration of temporal adverbials in semantic
representations .................................................................................................. 118
3. Temporal adverbials on the tense level, aspect level, and participle leveL.118
3.1. Distinguishing tense level and aspect level .......................................... 118
3.2. Position adverbials on the tense level and on the aspect level in
simple tense clauses ..................................................................................... 120
3.3. Position adverbials on the tense level and on the aspect level in
perfect clauses .............................................................................................. 120
3.4. Position adverbials on the participle level ............................................ 121
3.5. Duration adverbials on the aspect level and on the participle level
in perfect clauses ......................................................................................... 122
3.6. Duration adverbials on the tense level in perfect clauses? ................... 122
3.7. Duration adverbials on the tense level in simple tense clauses ............. 123
3.8. Quantificational adverbials on the tense level, aspect level, and
participle level ............................................................................................. 123
3.9. Defmite and indefinite adverbs of quantification ................................. 124
3.10. Conclusion .......................................................................................... 124
4. Temporal adverbials as frame-setting modifiers ........................................... 125
5. Temporal adverbials as restrictors of nontemporal quantifiers ..................... 127
6. Temporal adverbials below the participle level ............................................ 127
TABLE OF CONTENTS IX
7. Temporal adverbials with quantificational and nonquantificational
components ....................................................................................................... 128
8. Iteration of adverbials on a single level ........................................................ 130
9. On universal perfect readings ....................................................................... 130
10. Remarks concerning negation ..................................................................... 131
11. Summary ..................................................................................................... 134
CHAPTER 6: THE CONTRIBUTION OF PARTICULAR ADVERBIALS ................... 137
1. Introduction .................................................................................................. 13 7
2. Seit-adverbials: 'up-to-TT' interpretations .................................................... 141
2.1. Introduction .......................................................................................... 141
2.2. Up-to-TT adverbials: dependence on the tense time and
specifications of the aspect time .................................................................. 143
2.3. What seit-position-adverbials can apply to ........................................... 146
2.4. Seit-position-adverbials and seit-duration-adverbials ........................... 148
2.5. On the edges of seit-intervals ............................................................... 152
2.6. The semantics of seit and some applications ........................................ 154
3. Extended now theories of perfect constructions: apparent evidence by
up-to-TT- adverbials and why it is misleading .................................................. 157
4. Existential and universal perfect readings .................................................... 161
5. Temporal bis-adverbials: 'TT-independent' interpretations .......................... 167
5.1. Introduction .......................................................................................... 167
5.2. What bis-adverbials can apply to .......................................................... 171
6. Temporal in-adverbials ................................................................................. 173
7. Adverbials ofthe type x-lang ....................................................................... 179
8. Conclusion .................................................................................................... 180
CHAPTER 7: TEMPORAL SUBORDINATE CLAUSES, CONJUNCTIONS,
AND MATRIX CLAUSES ........................................................................................ 183
1. Introduction .................................................................................................. 183
1.1. What the chapter is about ..................................................................... 183
l.2. More about temporal subordinate clauses ........................................... 188
2. 'Simultaneity' between main clause and subclause ....................................... 189
2.l. Ais (defmite, past-oriented 'when') and general characteristics ofthe
semantics of temporal subordinate clauses .................................................. 189
2.2. Wenn ('when') ....................................................................................... 204
2.3. Wahrend ('while') .................................................................................. 208
2.4. Differences between als, wenn and wahrend. ....................................... 212
3. Time parameters of the main clause before time parameters of the
subclause ........................................................................................................... 213
3.1. Bevor and ehe ('before') ........................................................................ 213
3.2. Bis ('until') ............................................................................................. 220
4. Time parameters of the main clause after time parameters ofthe
subclause ........................................................................................................... 224
4.1. Nachdem ('after') ................................................................................... 224
4.2. Seit(dem) ('since') .................................................................................. 231
5. Durational subclauses: solange ('as long as') ................................................ 236
6. Conclusion .................................................................................................... 239
CHAPTER 8: ON THE SYNTAX OF TEMPORAL ADVERBIALS ............................ 241
1. Introduction .................................................................................................. 241
2. The unmarked surface order of temporal adverbials ofa single level.. ........ 241
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3. Preposing of temporal adverbials in English ................................................ 243
4. 'Topicalization' of temporal adverbials in German ....................................... 245
5. Scrambling of temporal adverbials ............................................................... 248
6. Summary: base positions and surface positions of temporal adverbials ....... 250
CHAPTER 9: CONCLUSION ................................................................................... 253
REFERENCES ......................................................................................................... 259
INDEX .................................................................................................................... 267
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book is a revised version of my Habiiitationsschrift, which was accepted at the
Humboldt-Universitat zu Berlin in 2001. Some people read earlier versions of it
and gave me quite detailed comments: Wolfgang Klein, Manfred Kritka, Sebastian
Lobner, and Amim von Stechow. I want to thank them for constructive as well as
for critical comments, not to mention their patience and friendship. Many other
people commented on parts of the book or gave helpful advice: Rainer Bauerle,
Karin Donhauser and the students in our joint class on "Tempustheorien und die
Entwicklung des deutschen Tempussystems", Veronika Ehrich, Christine Erb,
Annette Fischer, Andreas Haida, Brigitte Handwerker, Claudia Maienbom, Chris
Pifi6n, Mats Rooth, Nicole Schumacher, Dieter Wunderlich, Ede Zimmermann, and
probably some people I forget to mention. Ewald Lang provided ideal working
conditions for my research. Gaby Reinsdorf made it possible for me to benefit from
these conditions. Paul Kilpatrick corrected my English. I thank them all.
The fundamental ideas of chapter 2 were presented at the conference "Interfaces
of grammar" in Tiibingen, September 30 - October 3, 1996. Earlier versions of it
appeared under the title "The core semantics of the present perfect" in ZAS
Arbeitspapiere Nr. 10, Berlin, 1998, and as "The present perfect in German: Outline
of its semantic composition" in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 19, 2001.
The ideas and observations outlined in chapter 3 go back to the paper "Die Lesarten
des Perfekts" Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik 29, 1999. The ideas and much of
the data of section 2 of chapter 6 are also presented in "Seit-adverbials and perfect
constructions," to appear in the volume Perfect Explorations, edited by Artemis
Alexiadou, Monika Rathert, and Amim von Stechow, Mouton de Gruyter, Berlin.
Section 3 of chapter 6 takes up the discussion of the paper "Narrowing down the
ExtendedNow," which is published in Audiatur Vox Sapientiae. A Festschrift for
Arnim von Stechow, edited by Caroline Fery and Wolfgang Stemefeld, Akademie
Verlag, Berlin, 2001.
Writing this book would have been possible without them, but they made up for
the trouble writing means in real life: I heartily thank Wolfgang and, most of all,
Eva.
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