Non-Culminating Accomplishments, a typological and theoretical study.

非终极成就，一项类型学和理论研究。

• 批准号: 2882064
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Edinburgh
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2023 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2882064
• 关键词: Non; Culminating; Accomplishments; typological; theoretical

So-called "accomplishment predicates" (henceforth, accomplishments) typically describe events in which a verb's object changes, such as "mow the lawn" or "solve a Rubik's Cube". While past-tense accomplishments have traditionally been analysed as entailing the event's completion (Parsons, 1990), it is documented that such an entailment is not always present cross-linguistically. Accomplishments that have this property are called non-culminating accomplishments (NCAs). NCAs are not a novel problem. However, their cross-linguistic properties remain unexplored within the field.There are two contemporary analyses of the semantics of NCAs. Modal views claim they are a product of language-specific 'modal' mechanisms (Beavers & Lee, 2020 - Korean; Nadathur & Filip, 2022 - Hindi) that offset the culminating moment of an event into a set of 'possible worlds'. If the completion is true in a possible world, it is deniable in the actual world. Scalar views (Koenig & Chief, 2008; Martin et al., 2021) claim that accomplishments denote scales comprising gradable properties (e.g., how burned the book is) along which the object (book) shifts over the course of the (burning) event. Scalar views broadly suggest that NCA languages possess a particular requirement that only a partial amount of change is necessary for an accomplishment to be interpreted as complete, instead of a full change in a non-NCA language.However, if the above views were crosslinguistically consistent, we would expect all accomplishment predicates in NCA-capable languages to allow for an NCA variant. However, sentences like "John solved the Rubik's Cube" cannot be an NCA in Mandarin, contrasting to (1). This raises the crucial problem for both views, that there is no principled explanation for empirical counterexamples. Furthermore, if we consider mechanisms to be consistent across languages, we should see cross-linguistically stable patterns in the type of predicate that allow for an NCA interpretation. However, this question of cross-linguistic variation is unexplored.I suggest a hypothesis that unifies modal and scalar approaches. It also begins synthesising the cross-linguistic data. Hypothesis: NCAs are a product of a cross-linguistically consistent modal mechanism that acts on a specific subset of verbs denoting scalar change. For some accomplishment predicates, a full change-of-state is only required in a "possible world". This hypothesis captures the intuition that specific types of accomplishment are more likely to receive an NCA construal across languages, resolving the problems of current views. It also provides the scaffolding for a cross-linguistically uniform modal analysis to start uncovering the root of NCAs. Thus, my research questions are:- To what extent can we find consistent patterns in non-culminating accomplishment (NCA) phenomena across languages?- How can we account for consistencies/differences within a unified theoretical and cross-linguistic model?To evaluate the validity of the hypothesis, we require empirical modelling through fine-grained cross-linguistic data that tracks (in)consistencies between NCA expressions between languages. I will use a fieldwork methodological format (Matthewson, 2004) through data elicitation from seven languages, with around two speakers each (Nauze, 2008). The first year consists of the literature review, data elicitation, and database compilation. The database will be a .CSV format, with language family information coded alongside the semantic variables and native-speaker acceptability judgement scores. This provides the correct qualitative data required to address the question of cross-linguistic (in)consistency. The second year involves further hypothesis testing required for research question two, such as: "does the amount of change consistently affect the level of acceptability for an NCA across languages?". I will write up the thesis in the final year.

所谓的“成就谓词”(以下简称“成就”)通常描述动词的宾语发生变化的事件，如“修剪草坪”或“解魔方”。虽然过去式的成就传统上被分析为事件的完成(Parsons，1990)，但有文献表明，这种蕴涵并不总是跨语言存在的。具有这种属性的成就被称为非终极成就(NCA)。NCAS并不是一个新问题。然而，它们的跨语言特性在该领域仍未得到探索。目前有两种关于NCAs语义的分析。情态观点声称它们是特定于语言的“情态”机制的产物(Beivers&Lee，2020-朝鲜语；Nadathur&Filip，2022-印地语)，这些机制将一个事件的高潮时刻抵消为一系列的“可能世界”。如果完成性在可能的世界中是真的，那么在现实世界中它是不可否认的。标量观点(Koenig&General，2008；Martin等人，2021)声称，成就是指由可分级属性(例如，书被烧毁的程度)组成的标度，对象(书)在(燃烧)事件的过程中沿着这些属性移动。标量观点广泛地表明，NCA语言有一个特殊的要求，即只需要部分变化就能将一项成就解释为完整的，而不是非NCA语言的全部变化。然而，如果上述观点在跨语言方面是一致的，我们预计NCA语言中的所有成就谓词都会允许NCA变体。然而，像“约翰解决了魔方”这样的句子不能成为普通话中的NCA，而不是(1)。这为这两种观点提出了一个关键问题，即对经验反例没有原则性的解释。此外，如果我们认为机制在不同语言之间是一致的，我们应该在允许NCA解释的谓词类型中看到跨语言稳定的模式。然而，这个跨语言变异的问题还没有被探讨，我建议一个统一了情态和标量方法的假设。它还开始合成跨语言的数据。假设：NCAS是跨语言一致的情态机制的产物，该机制作用于表示标量变化的特定动词子集。对于某些成就谓词，只有在“可能的世界”中才需要完全改变状态。这一假设抓住了这样一种直觉，即特定类型的成就更有可能接受跨语言的NCA识解，从而解决了现有观点的问题。它还为跨语言统一的情态分析提供了脚手架，从而开始揭示NCA的根源。因此，我的研究问题是：-在多大程度上我们可以在语言之间找到一致的模式？-我们如何在统一的理论和跨语言模型中解释一致性/差异性？为了评估假设的有效性，我们需要通过跟踪语言之间NCA表达一致性的细粒度跨语言数据进行经验建模。我将使用实地工作方法格式(Matthewson，2004)，通过从七种语言收集数据，每种语言大约有两名发言者(Nauze，2008)。第一年包括文献综述、数据收集和数据库编辑。该数据库将是.CSV格式，语系信息与语义变量和母语人士的可接受性判断分数一起编码。这提供了解决跨语言(不)一致性问题所需的正确定性数据。第二年涉及研究第二个问题所需的进一步假设检验，例如：变化的程度是否一致地影响不同语言对NCA的接受程度？我将在最后一年写完这篇论文。