The ambiguity of the English present perfect  

Oleh:

Michaelis, Laura A.

Jenis: Article from Journal - ilmiah internasional
Dalam koleksi: Journal of Linguistics (Full Text & ada di PROQUEST & JSTOR) vol. 30 no. 1 (Mar. 1994), page 111 - 158.
Fulltext: 111-157.pdf (6.1MB)

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Perpustakaan PKBB Nomor Panggil: 405/JOL/30 Non-tandon: 1 (dapat dipinjam: 0) Tandon: tidak ada

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Isi artikel

This study examines grammatical and discourse-pragmatic reflexes of the existential and resultative readings of the English present perfect. I present both negative and positive arguments in favor of the claim that the present perfect is ambiguous (rather than vague) with respect to these readings. In particular, I argue that the resultative present-perfect represents a formal idiom: a morphosyntactic form characterized by idiosyncratic constraints upon grammar, meaning and use. Certain constraints upon the resultative present-perfect, in particular that which prevents it from denoting a pragmatically presupposed event proposition, can be MOTIVATED with respect to a discourse-pragmatic opposition involving the preterite. However, such constraints cannot be PREDICTED from functional oppositions or any general semantic principles. Finally, I suggest that mastery of aspectual grammar crucially entails knowledge of such idiomatic form-meaning pairings.

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