Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-s22k5 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-13T08:24:39.775Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

‘Already’ and ‘yet’: a suppletive set of aspect-markers?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Elizabeth Closs Traugott  and
John Waterhouse
Elizabeth Closs Traugott
Affiliation:
Department of English, University of California, Berkeley, 94720
John Waterhouse
Affiliation:
English for Foreign Students, University of California, Berkeley, 94720
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The present study arose out of an investigation of whether already and yet as in He has left already, *He has left yet, IHe hasn't left already, He hasn't left yet formed a suppletion set that matches some →any, sometimes → ever, etc. as in They want some love, *They want any love, ?They don't want some love, They don't want any love (for discussion of some, sometimes, too, etc. cf. Klima, 1964; Fillmore, 1967; UCLA, 1967: Negation). Various observations about the restriction of already and yet to certain tenses and aspects, and about their failure to match with many adverbs of time, led to an investigation of whether already and yet were really adverbs of time, as is usually assumed. The conclusions we reached are that already and yet indeed form a suppletion set (with certain limitations not shared by other suppletives), but that they cannot usefully be treated as time adverbs. Rather, they seem to have close connexions with perfect aspect. The arguments presented here in support of this hypothesis are by no means exhaustive but will hopefully provide a suggestive contribution toward the study of both adverbs and aspects.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Linguistics , Volume 5 , Issue 2 , September 1969 , pp. 287 - 304
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1969

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Allen, R. L. (1966). The Verb System of Present-Day American English. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Bach, E. (1967). Have and be in English syntax. Lg 43. 462–485.Google Scholar
Bierwisch, M. (1967). Some semantic universals of German adjectivals. FL 3. 1–36.Google Scholar
Boyd, J. C. & Thorne, J. P. (1969). The semantics of modal verbs. JL 5. 57–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chomsky, N. (1965). Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Crystal, D. (1966). Specification and English tenses. JL 2. 1–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Diver, W. (1963). The chronological system of the English verb. Word 19. 141–181.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Diver, W. (1964). The modal system of the English verb. Word 20. 322–352.Google Scholar
Fillmore, C. J. (1966). Deictic categories in the semantics of ‘come’. FL 2. 219–227.Google Scholar
Fillmore, C. J. (1967). On the syntax of preverbs. Glossa 1. 91–125.Google Scholar
Greenberg, J. (1966). Language universals. In Sebeok, T., ed. Current Trends in Linguistics 3; Theoretical Foundations. 61–112. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Hofmann, T. R. (1966). Past tense replacement and the modal system. Mathematical Linguistics and Automatic Translation, Report No. NSF-17, Section VII. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Computation Laboratory.Google Scholar
Jespersen, O. (1911–1949). A Modern English Grammar on Historical Principles. 7 vols. London: Allen & Unwin.Google Scholar
Joos, M. (1964). The English Verb: Form and Meanings. Madison, Wisc.: University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
Kate, J. J., & Postal, P. M. (1964). An Integrated Theory of Linguistic Descriptions. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Klima, E. S. (1964). Negation in English. In Fodor, J. J. & Katz, J. J., eds. The Structure of Language: Readings in the Philosophy of Language. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G. (1965). On the nature of syntactic irregularity. Mathematical Linguistics and Automatic Translation, Report No. NSF-16. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Computation Laboratory.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G. (1966 a). Stative adjectives and verbs in English. Mathematical Linguistics and Automatic Translation, Report No. NSF-17, Section I. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Computation Laboratory.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G. (1966 b). A note on negation. Mathematical Linguistics and Automatic Translation, Report No. NSF-17, Section III. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Computation Laboratory.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G. (1968). Instrumental adverbs and the concept of deep structure. FL 4. 4–29.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G. & Ross, J. R. (1966). Criterion for verb phrase constituency. Mathematical Linguistics and Automatic Translation, Report No. NSF-I7, Section II. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Computation Laboratory.Google Scholar
Langendoen, D. T. (1966). The syntax of the English expletive ‘It’. MSLL 19. 207–216.Google Scholar
McCawley, J. D. (1967). Why auxiliaries are verbs. Unpublished paper.Google Scholar
Palmer, F. R. (1965). A Linguistic Study of the English Verb. London: Longmans.Google Scholar
Rosenbaum, P. S. & Lochak, Dorita. (1966). The IBM CORE grammar of English. In D. Lieberman, Specification and Utilization of a Transformational Grammar, Scientific Report I. Yorktown Heights, N.Y.: IBM Corporation, Thomas J. Watson Research Center.Google Scholar
Ross, J. R. (1967). Auxiliaries as main verbs. Unpublished paper.Google Scholar
Svartvik, J. (1966). On Voice in the English Verb. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Twadell, W. F. (1960). The English Verb Auxiliaries. Providence: Brown University Press.Google Scholar
UCLA. (1967). University of California Air Force English Syntax Conference (Sept. 1967), Working Papers.Google Scholar