UNIWERSYTET IM. ADAMA MICKIEWICZA W POZNANIU WYDZIAŁ NEOFILOLOGII THE NOTION OF COMPLETION IN MODERN GREEK: AN ANALYSIS OF ASPECTIVELY ADVERSATIVE SENTENCES KAMIL TRĄBA Rozprawa doktorska napisana pod kierunkiem: Prof. UAM dr hab. Karoliny Gortych-Michalak Poznań 2019 While numerous words of a language reflect a fragment of its world, the grammatical structure of this language affords an insight into the structure of the thought […] […] translations, if they concern grammatical forms, are almost always incorrect and determine completely different grammatical relations than the ones the speaker had in mind. To learn a foreign language should therefore be to acquire a new standpoint in the world-view hitherto possessed […]. But because we always carry over, more or less, our own world-view, and even our own language-view, this outcome is not purely and completely experienced. Wilhelm von Humboldt Acknowledgements Now, when I look back, I realise that the present work would have not acquired its final form without the help of many people. In the first place, I would like to express my sincerest gratitude to my supervisor, prof. Karolina Gortych-Michalak, who introduced me to the world of Modern Greek linguistics (firstly during my master’s, and then my doctoral studies). She was always patient, understanding, open for discussion, and creatively critical. Her comments, observations, and advice were, are, and always will be invaluable. I would also like to thank prof. Jerzy Bańczerowski for inspiration. I would have never reached this point without his vision of language and linguistics, his comments, openness, and willingness for discussion that I could draw heavily on in my research. It is also his vision of the Institute of Linguistics that made me the linguist I am now. Moreover, my thanks go to Kyriakos Papoulidis, Nikos Giallelis, and Paschalis Efthimiou, who were always willing to help me in my search for completion in Modern Greek. They bravely endured an (almost) endless series of questions regarding the Modern Greek language. Thankfully, they used to turn a blind eye to all my ‘weird’ questions like, How can this particular idea be expressed in Modern Greek? or Let us imagine that this sentence is correct. What would it mean? – questions that afforded me a new insight into Greeks’ aspectual view of the world. I would also like to thank a number of native speakers of Modern Greek whom I come across over the last few years and who (often being unaware of this fact) became my sounding board. This dissertation would have never been finalised without them. Finally, I want to thank my colleagues, friends, and family for all their support. They were always there for me when needed and believed in me, even if I did not. 2 CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .......................................................................................................... 2 ABBREVIATIONS .................................................................................................................... 7 LIST OF FIGURES .................................................................................................................... 8 LIST OF TABLES ...................................................................................................................... 9 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................... 10 THE RESEARCH OBJECTIVES AND MOTIVATION...................................................................................... 10 METHODOLOGY ............................................................................................................................. 11 THE STRUCTURE OF THE RESEARCH .................................................................................................... 12 CHAPTER 1 ASPECT: SETTING THE SCENE .............................................................................. 14 1.1 FROM ANTIQUITY TO MODERN ERA .............................................................................................. 15 1.1.1 Antiquity ....................................................................................................................... 15 1.1.2 Middle Ages .................................................................................................................. 19 1.1.3 Modern era ................................................................................................................... 20 1.2 TIME AND TENSE ....................................................................................................................... 23 1.3 ASPECT ................................................................................................................................... 28 1.4 GRAMMATICAL ASPECT, TELICITY, AND LEXICAL ASPECT ................................................................... 34 1.4.1 Grammatical aspect ..................................................................................................... 35 1.4.2 Telicity ........................................................................................................................... 39 1.4.3 Lexical aspect ................................................................................................................ 43 CHAPTER 2 APPROACHES TOWARDS ASPECT IN MODERN GREEK .......................................... 49 2.1 A REMARK ON TERMINOLOGY ..................................................................................................... 49 2.2 TENSES IN MODERN GREEK ........................................................................................................ 51 2.3 ASPECT ................................................................................................................................... 57 2.4 GRAMMATICAL ASPECT, TELICITY, AND LEXICAL ASPECT ................................................................... 58 2.4.1 Grammatical aspect ..................................................................................................... 59 2.4.2 Telicity ........................................................................................................................... 60 2.4.3 Lexical aspect ................................................................................................................ 64 2.4.4 Interaction between grammatical and lexical aspect .................................................. 67 2.5 ASPECTUAL MEANINGS SIGNIFIED BY IMPERFECTIVE AND PERFECTIVE LINGUAL UNITS ........................... 69 3 Contents 2.5.1 ‘Scenario’ approach ...................................................................................................... 70 2.5.2 E-R-S approach.............................................................................................................. 71 2.5.3 Parametric approach .................................................................................................... 72 2.5.4 Other uses of imperfective and perfective aspect ........................................................ 74 2.6 AKTIONSART AND ASPECTUAL-SENSITIVE ADVERBS.......................................................................... 76 CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGICAL CLARIFICATIONS .................................................................. 80 3.1 EVENTS, MEANINGS AND RELATIONS ............................................................................................ 80 3.2 WORD FORMS, PHRASES, CLAUSES, SYNTAGMATA, AND SENTENCES .................................................. 84 3.3 DIMENSIONS, CATEGORIES AND SYSTEMS ...................................................................................... 86 3.4 DELIMITATIVITY AND TOTIVITY..................................................................................................... 87 3.4.1 The system of delimitativity.......................................................................................... 87 3.4.2 The system of totivity ................................................................................................... 88 3.5 ASPECT ................................................................................................................................... 90 3.5.1 The dimension of aspect ............................................................................................... 90 3.5.2 The category of aspect ................................................................................................. 93 3.5.3 The completed event .................................................................................................... 94 3.5.4 Aspect, aspectuality, and aspectology ......................................................................... 95 3.6 IMPERFECT, AORIST AND PERFECT ................................................................................................ 96 3.7 SENTENCES .............................................................................................................................. 97 3.7.1 Negative and negated sentences and clauses .............................................................. 97 3.7.2 Adversative sentences .................................................................................................. 99 3.7.3 Aspectively adversative sentences.............................................................................. 101 3.8 GRAMMATICALITY, SENSICALITY AND CORRECTNESS ...................................................................... 104 3.8.1 Grammaticality, sensicality and correctness of adversative