IULC Publications

Stativity and the Progressive

By Salikoko Mufwene

In this paper the affinity between lexical stativity and the progressive is investigated and demonstrated to be supported by a number of grammatically significant characteristics in English and other languages. Dr. Mufwene proposes operational definitions of stativity as 'potential for permanence' and of the progressive as 'grammatical stativity' (though of 'transient duration'), but rejects the traditional dichotomic and rigid stative / non-stative distinction as useless for English. Instead, he proposes a Scale of Stativity, which applies to the whole of the verbal vocabulary, ranging from the most highly marked for duration (e.g., concern), through neutral verbs (e.g., enjoy), to least marked verbs hit). This model presents the aspectual temporal inflection of verbs as resulting from combined considerations of the lexical position of a verb on the proposed scale and of the speaker's subjective view of and attitude toward what he describes.

51 pages
$1.50

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