Aspekt und Generizität: Über die Rolle des (im)perfektiven Aspekts in generischen Aussagen

Elena Gorishneva

The present paper deals with encoding of genericity in two Slavic languages, Russian and Bulgarian. The focus is on the distribution of the (im)perfective aspect in different types of generalizations. It has been shown that the use of the imperfective aspect is felicitous in descriptive generics which are inferred in a inductive way. In contrast, the perfective does not signal inductiveness but triggers a dispositional reading. Thus, perfective forms are preferrably used in definitional generics. Another interpretation of the perfective aspect has been attested in generic sequences, that is, habitual expressions with an introductive imperfective sentence followed by the sequence of events in which the perfective aspect displays its visual-exemplary function. Futher, some assumptions wrt. semantics and pragmatics of the aspect have been discussed in order to account for different semantic and distributional properties of the (im)perfective aspect in generic statements.

Linguistische Beiträge zur Slavistik: XIX. JungslavistInnen-Treffen in Berlin, 16.–18. Dezember 2010. Hg. Luka Szucsich, Natalia Gagarina, Elena Gorishneva und Joanna Leszkowicz. München, Berlin, Washington: Sagner 2012 (Specimina Philologiae Slavicae, 171). 91–108.