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Aspect and Tense in Russian. American Association Oe DOCUMENT RESUME ED 036 209 FL 001 394 AUTHOR TEFRAS, V. TITLE ASPECT AND TENSE IN RUSSIAN. INSTITUTION AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OE TEACHERS Oi SLAVICAND EAST EUROPEAN LANGUAGES. PUB DATE 60 NOTE 14P. JOURNAL CIT SLAVIC AND EAST EUROPEAN JOURNAL; NEW SERIES V4(18) P331-344 1S60 EDRS PRICE EDRS PRICE MF-$0.25 hC NOT AVAILABLE FROM EDRS. DESCRIPTORS DIACHRCNIC LINGUISTICS, *FORM CLASSES (LANGUAGES) , GRAMMAR, LINGUISTIC PATTERNS, LINGUISTICS, *MORPHOLCGY (LANGUAGES), *RUSSIAN, SLAVIC LANGUAGES, *STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS, SYNCHRONIC LINGUISTICS, *VERBS ABSTRACT ACCEPTING THE PERFECTIVE ASPECT AS THE "MARKED" CORRELATIVE OF A TRUE MORPHOLOGICAL CORRELATION IN THEOPPOSITION CF PERFECTIVE:IMPERFECTIVE IN RUSSIAN VERB STUDY, THE AUTHOR DISREGARDS NON-SYSTEMIC FACTS IN ORDER TO CONCENTRATE ON THE ASPECTRELATIONS AS ThEY APPEAR IN "LINEAR PAIRS". ThE AUTHORPROCEEDS TO DESCRIBE THE FUNLTIGNS OF THE ASPECT CATEGORY AS THEY APPEAR IN THEDIFFERENT FORMS OF THE FINITE AND INFINITE VERBS. FORMS WHICHDO NOT ALLOW FOR POSSIELE CONFUSION IN ASPECT AND TENSE DISCRIMINATION LEADTHE WRITER TC FIRST EXAMINE THE INFINITIVE AND THE IMPERATIVE.THE PRESENT-FUTURE, PRETERITE, AND PARTICIPLE AND GERUNDS ARE THEN EXAMINED WITH EXAMPLES CF GRAMMATICAL APPLICATION. (RL) U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH, EDUCATION 8 WELFARE OFFICE OF EDUCATION CT THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN REPRODUCED EXACTLY AS RECEIVEDFROM THE iCD PERSON OR ORGANIZATION ORIGINATING IT,POINTS OF VIEW OR OPINIONS C\I STATED DO NOT NECESSARILY REPRESENT OFFICIAL OFFICE OFEDUCATION ! POSITION OR POLICY. i CD 1 14( 1 IC) ASPECT AND TENSE IN RUSSIAN CI LLJ By V. Terras University of Illinois There have been many attempts to define the Russian ver- bal aspects, or at least to describe them in a way that would be both concise and complete.1Although the realization of the inherent asymmetry of this morphological correlation2 has made.this task somewhat easier, the picture is still far from clear.Recently the trend has been toward acceptance of the perfective aspect as the "marked" correlative of a true morphological correlation.3In the past, numerous efforts have been made to subdivide each aspect, especially the perfective, into subcategories, so that the correlation perfective : imperfective would appear to be a logical ab- straction more than an expression of grammatical fact.In the following, it will be taken for granted that the aspect is a general category of the Russian verb, i. e.,every verbal form in a live context is, at least in principle, eitherper- fective or imperfective. The majority of all Russian verbs are members of a "linear pair," i. e. a pair of verbs which differ in their aspect only, and which, in effect, are considered to be one verb by many grammarians. Given such a pair, the perfective, as a rule, can be distinguished from the imperfective verb T-.y formal criteria.The morphological details are, however, quite complicated.Thus, a verbal prefix perfectivates an imperfective verb, but not the indeterminate forms of "double imperfectives." According to Regnell.4 and other authors, these verbs have to be understood as "second imperfectives" of the respective perfective forms, i. e.,there is a correla- tion prinesu : prinogu, but none of the type nogu :2rino:.4u. Or, the suffix -nu / -ne is, in modern Russian as well as in the past, a genuine perfective suffix, but a number of impe.r- fective verbs also have it.These verbs are apparently back formations from prefixed forms, e.g.,gasnut' from pagasnut'.3 SEEJ, New Series IV (XVIII) (1960) 331 332 The Slavic and East European Journal Modern Russian has only one productive imperfective suffix,-yva (-iva).The older suffixes -va, -ja, and -a . are unproductive. As a result, many derived imperfectives are not immediately recognizable as such, e.g. ,uznavat', uverjat', pokupat' can be classed as imperfectives only if we know their perfective equivalents. In some cases the aspect correlation is expressed by lexical means, e. g. ,lovit': pojmat'. A number of verbs are used as both perfectives and imperfectives, a fact speaking in favor of the conception according to which the perfective and imperfective forms of a linear pair are really one verb. The productive group of verbs in -ovat' belongs here.However, there seems to be a tendency to perfectivate these verbs by means of a ",preverbe vide, " e. g.,organizovat' : sorganizovat'. A considerable number of verbs are perfectiva and iriperfectiva tantum, e.g. ,oCnut'sja, oCutit'sja, rexnut'sja appear as perfdcti.ves only, preobladat', bezdejstvovat', opasat'sja have imperfective forms only. In modern literary Russian, the iterative verbs have been, aside of a few non-systemic exceptions, integrated into the dual aspect system.6 Old Russian texts as well as modern Russian dialects show authentic iterative forms derived from perfective, and from imperfective verbs. Clearly, such verbs as pivat', bivat', pekat' do not fit into what we understand to, be the Russian aspect system, but represent a special grammatical subcategory. In the following we shall disregard the above-mentioned and other facts which can be considered non-systemic, and concentrate on the aspect relations as they appear in linear pairs. We shall now describe the functions of the aspect category as they appear in the different formsof the finite and infinite verb.Meillet7 pointed out that the forms in which no con- fusion of the tense and aspect categories was possible should serve as theprincipal testing ground for inquiries into the nature of the verbal aspects.Such forms are the infinitive, the imperative, and the supine, the last being no longer present in Russian. We shall begin our description with these forms. Terras: Aspect and Tense inRussian 333 The Infinitive. If we compa.re the perfective andimperfective forms of different pairs of verbs, we see that thefunctional distinc- tion is not the same in every case, butthat, on the other' hand, there is always some distinction betweenthem: In modern Russian, no perfective verb can beconnected with the verbs naCat', stat', prodoliat',konCit', bro3W and other verbs which semantically implyduration7Tt is interesting to note that Vaillant9 considers thissyntactical trait to be the most reliable criterionof the imperfective, as against the perfective aspect,in Old Church Slavic.Thus, all perfective infinitives form a set, asagainst all imper- fective infinitives.In this respect, the varioussubdivisions of the perfective aspect function alike:the semelfactive stuknut', the determinative posidet', andthe inceptive zakriCat' all have the common property ofabsolute incom- patibility with a verb implying duration. On the other hand, the differentsubdivisions of the perfective aspect are quite real.In each of them, the indeterminate action suggested by thelexical meaning of the imperfective verb is determined in aspecific fashion.In fact, the terms determinate and indeterminatefit the true nature of the aspect categoryasit appears here, that is, in the infinitivemuch better than the termsperfective and imperfective.° One may speakof the following types of correlation: (1) The distinction between theperfective and the imper- fective form is largely lexical, i. e. ,it does not follow a common functional pattern, e. g. ,ljubit' : poljubit' (the meaning "to grow fond of" is not the one wemight expect). (2) The distinction is lexico-grammatical,i.e. , where- as the lexical meaning of the twoverbs is different, such distinction follows a set pattern, e. g. ,govorit' : zagovorit' (inceptive); kugat' : pokugat' (determinative); vzdyxat' : vzdoxnut' ( semelfactive). (3) The distinction is strictlygrammatical, i. e. ,it amounts to the difference in aspect.This is the case in what we call "linear pairs, " e. g.naCat' : naCinat' ; doigrat' : doigryvat', etc. As to the linear pairs, thequestion must be raised whether the relation of perfective toimperfective infinitive is always the same, quite regardlessof whether the correla- tion belongs to the types primaryimperfective : prefixed 334 The Slavic and EastEuropean Journal perfective, primary perfective: 2nd imperfective with unproductive suffix,or prefixed perfective : 2nd imperfective with productive (or unproductive)suffix.I think that the pairs primary imperfective: perfective "au preverbe vide"" should not be consideredon a par with the pairs perfective : 2nd imperfective,as is done by many authors. The fact is that, in a majority of allcases, the "preverbe vide" has a trace of lexical meaning left.Vaillant's statement, "... et' it subsiste toujours le sentimentconfus que le preverbe veut dire quelque chose, Mamequand on ne peut preciser quoi, "12 is true of modern Russianjust as muchas of OCS.It must be also noted that, whereasa variety of prefixes have func- tioned, or still functionas "preverbes vides" in OCS, OR, and modern Russian,none of them has ever gained anything close to a monopoly of thatfieldwhich could have been expected if thesewere truly grammatical morphemes, with- out a trace of lexical meaning.There is a trend in modern Russian, particularly evidentin loanwords and neologisms, to use the prefixes po-,za-, o-, s-, and some others, OWED as a strictly grammatical mark ofthe perfective aspect.But I think that such procedure isnot as generally validas that by which an imperfectivecan be formed from a given per- fective, e.g., zatormaMvat'from zatormozit'.Also, whereas we havea variety of prefixes acting as "prgverbe vide," modern Russian has onlyone productive suffix of imperfectivation. The above implies that, whereas perfectivationby means
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