Tense-Aspect Systems (Feature 49)

From Apics

Feature Annotation

Languages may have different kinds of tense-aspect systems. Note that we restrict aspect to the imperfective-perfective opposition (see APiCS Glossary, aspect).
A purely aspectual system (value 1) only has a perfective aspect marker (possibly realized as a zero morpheme) that normally refers to perfective past situations, and an imperfective marker, which can be used both in present and past situations (ongoing process, current state or habitual situation). An example is Papia Kristang, where imperfective ta occurs with dynamic verbs which refer to present and past progressive situations (while perfective dja occurs with dynamic verbs which refer to a past perfective situation):

Eli ta sintí bos keré ngganá ku eli.
3sg prog feel 2sg want trick obj 3sg
‘She is thinking you wanted to trick her.’ ~ ‘She was thinking you wanted to trick her.’ (ongoing events past and present, imperfective)

Note that in Papia Kristang future situations are marked by logo and states are zero-marked, but states and future time reference are left aside here.
A purely temporal system (value 2) only marks past, present and future situations, regardless of aspect, as in Afrikaans:

Ons Ø leer elke dag meer. Sy het Afrikaans gepraat.
we pres learn every day more she aux Afrikaans part.speak
‘We learn more every day.’ ‘She spoke/has spoken Afrikaans.’

Ek sal môre Afrikaans praat.
I aux tomorrow Afrikaans speak
‘I shall speak Afrikaans tomorrow.’

A mixed tense-aspect system (value 3) possesses both tense and aspect markers, as happens in most Romance languages (cf. French passé composé/passé simple vs. imparfait). For this value, it is not important whether tense marking is obligatory, optional or bound to certain contexts. For example in Papiamentu, ta refers to present situations and tabata to past imperfective situations, but in clearly past narratives it is ta and not tabata which is used to refer to past imperfective situations.
The difference between a purely aspect system and a mixed tense-aspect system lies above all in the domain of the imperfective. This can be illustrated by the difference between the marker ta in Papia Kristang and the marker ta in Papiamentu. In Papiamentu, one can use ta for present (imperfective) situations and tabata for past imperfective situations, but in Papia Kristang, one cannot mark this difference, since one can only use ta for both present and past imperfective situations.

Additional remarks

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Values

Value		Value Annotation
1	Purely aspectual	Papia Kristang
2	Purely temporal	Afrikaans
3	Mixed aspectual-temporal	Papiamentu, French
4	Other	(Please give details in the “General comments” field.)

WALS No.

(None)