Marking aspect along a scale: The semantics of -te iku and -te kuru in Japanese
Yusuke Kubota
University of Tokyo, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science
[email protected]
Introduction
Iku means ’go’ and kuru means ’come’ when used as main verbs.
As aspectual markers, they typically have continuative meanings.
(1) a. Gakusei-no namae-o hitori-zutu yon-de it-ta.
student-GEN name-ACC one-each call-TE IKU-PAST
‘I went on callling the names of the students one by one.’
b. Naganen daigaku-de osie-te ki-ta.
long
university-at teach-TE KURU-PAST
‘I have been teaching at a university for a long time.’
This paper focuses on the uses of these verbs as aspectual markers
when they occur with degree achievements.
-Te iku and -te kuru with degree
achievements
(7)
katamui-te i-nai.
slanted
be-NEG
‘The tower came to be slanted, but it isn’t slanted yet.’
Ana-ga
husagat-te it-ta/ki-ta-ga
mada
hole-NOM close-TE IKU-PAST/KURU-PAST-but yet
husagat-te i-nai.
closed
be-NEG
‘The hole came to be closed, but it isn’t closed yet.’
Some subtle meaning differences between -te iku and -te kuru:
Open-scale: (5) with -te kuru (but not with -te iku) is infelicitous for
a slight change of degree (e.g. from 80 C to 75 C).
Min closed: (6) with -te kuru (but not with -te iku) is felicitous only
when the object in question has no degree of bend initially (‘initial
zero degree requirement’).
Max closed: (7) with -te kuru (but not with -te iku) entails that the
degree in question ends up coming close to the maximum endpoint
(but not reaching it).
Entailment patterns
Telicity
Japanese degree achievements entail the positive form in the result
state.
(2) *Oyu-ga
same-ta-ga, mada same-te i-nai.
hot.water-NOM cool-PAST-but yet cool
be-NEG
intended: ‘The hot water cooled, but it isn’t cool yet.’
(open-scale)
(3) *Too-ga
katamui-ta-ga, mada katamui-te i-nai.
tower-NOM lean-PAST-but yet slanted
be-NEG.
intended: ‘The tower got slanted, but it isn’t slanted yet.’
(min closed)
(4) *Ana-ga
husagat-ta-ga, mada husagat-te i-nai.
Hole-NOM close-PAST-but yet closed
be-NEG
intended: ‘The hole got closed, but it isn’t closed yet.’
(max closed)
The entailment patterns change with the addition of the aspectual
markers -te iku and -te kuru:
(5) Oyu-ga
same-te it-ta/ki-ta-ga
mada
hot.water-NOM cool-TE IKU-PAST/KURU-PAST-but yet
same-te i-nai.
cool
be-NEG
‘The (hot) water came to be cooler, but it isn’t cool yet.’
(6) *Too-ga
katamui-te it-ta/ki-ta-ga
mada
Tower-NOM lean-TE IKU-PAST/KURU-PAST-but yet
In Japanese (unlike in English), degree achievements are uniformly
telic (regardless of the scale structure of the corresponding adjective)
(Sugioka 2009):
(8) Sanzyup-pun??(-de) oyu-ga
same-ta.
30min(-in)
hot.water-NOM cool-PAST
‘The hot water became cool in/??for 30 min.’
(9) Sanzyuu-nen??(-de) too-ga
katamui-ta.
30years(-in)
tower-NOM lean-PAST
‘The tower became slanted in/??for 30 years.’
(10) Mik-ka-kan??(-de) ana-ga
husagat-ta.
3days(-in)
hole-NOM close-PAST
‘The hole closed in/??for 30 days.’
-Te kuru and -te iku affect the telicity of the predicates they attach to.
General pattern (with some apparent exceptions):
-Te kuru-marked predicates are telic.
-Te iku-marked predicates are atelic.
In/for adverbials
-Te iku:
(11) Sanzyup-pun(*-de) oyu-ga
same-te it-ta.
30min(-in)
hot.water-NOM cool-TE IKU-PAST
‘The water got cooler for 30 min.’
Degree achievements in Japanese
Accounting for entailment and telicity
Kennedy & Levin’s (2008) analysis of English degree achievements as
derived minimally closed-scale
predicates:
(23)
cool = cool cool (24)
pos = stnd (25)
(26)
(27)
= cool "# w stnd cool (28)
Sanzyuu-nen(*-de) too-ga
katamui-te it-ta.
30years(-in)
tower-NOM lean-TE IKU-PAST
‘The tower kept leaning for 30 years’
(13) Mik-ka-kan?(?-de) ana-ga
husagat-te it-ta.
3days(-in)
hole-NOM close-TE IKU-PAST
‘The hole closed for/in 3 days.’
-Te kuru:
(14) Sanzyup-pun*(-de) oyu-ga
same-te ki-ta.
30min(-in)
hot.water-NOM cool-TE KURU-PAST
‘The water became cool in 30 min.’
(15) Sanzyuu-nen*(-de) too-ga
katamui-te ki-ta.
30years(-in)
tower-NOM lean-TE KURU-PAST
‘The tower became slanted in 30 years.’
(16) Mik-ka-kan*(-de) ana-ga
husagat-te ki-ta.
3days(-in)
hole-NOM close-TE KURU-PAST
‘The hole got closed in 3 days.’
Daitai/zutto
-Te iku:
(17) Oyu-ga
*daitai/zutto same-te it-ta.
hot.water-NOM daitai/zutto cool-TE IKU-PAST
‘The water got cooler for the most part/kept getting cooler all
along.’
(18) Too-ga
*daitai/zutto katamui-te it-ta.
tower-NOM daitai/zutto lean-TE IKU-PAST
‘The tower kept leaning for the most part/kept leaning all along.’
(19) Ana-ga
?daitai/?zutto husagat-te it-ta.
hole-NOM daitai/zutto
close-TE IKU-PAST
‘The hole kept getting closed for the most part/kept getting
closed all along.’
-Te kuru:
(20) Oyu-ga
?daitai/*zutto same-te ki-ta.
hot.water-NOM daitai/zutto
cool-TE KURU-PAST
‘The water became cool for the most part/kept becoming cooler.’
(21) Too-ga
*daitai/*zutto katamui-te ki-ta.
tower-NOM daitai/zutto lean-TE KURU-PAST
‘The tower became slanted for the most part/kept becoming
slanted.’
(22) Ana-ga
daitai/*zutto husagat-te ki-ta.
Hole-NOM daitai/zutto close-TE KURU-PAST
‘The hole became closed/kept becoming closed.’
= RedPrec cool "# w stnd RedPrec cool By making the scale coarser-grained, the object in question can
count as reaching the standard with a lower degree than otherwise.
-Te iku
Relative and minimally closed-scale predicates
(31)
oyu-ga same-te iku = cool %"# stnd cool%
Minimally closed-scale predicates
too-ga katamui-te ki-ta
(35)
Japanese:
same = cool pos ! stnd stnd = oyu-ga same-ru
stnd cool = cool w !
stnd cool cool w (12)
= RedPrec slanted "# t stnd RedPrec slanted (32)
too-ga katamui-te iku = slanted % "# stnd slanted%
By making the scale coarser-grained, the object in question has to
have a larger degree than otherwise to count as exceeding the standard (= minimum endpoint).
(abbrev.)
too-ga katamuk-u = slanted "# t stnd slanted Maximally closed-scale predicates
(33)
ana-ga husagat-te iku = closed %"# stnd closed%
The meanings of -te iku and -te kuru
-Te iku and -te kuru are operators that modify the scales associated
with the predicates that they take as arguments:
$
(29)
-te iku = (30)
-te kuru = RedPrec Remaining issues
Two possible standards: minimum endpoint and maximum endpoint
-Te kuru
Relative predicates
(34)
oyu-ga same-te kuru
intended: ‘The water got cooler instantly.’
If interpretable at all, (38) with -te iku has only the irrelevant inchoative
reading.
The complexity of scales
Telicity and change of state
In addition to changing the scale structure, -te iku and -te kuru seem
to require the relevant scales to be complex (cf. Beavers (2010) for the
notion of scale complexity).
(37) Oyu-ga
issyun-de same-ta.
hot.water-NOM instantly cool-PAST
‘The hot water cooled instantly.’
(38) #Oyu-ga
issyun-de same-te it-ta/ki-ta.
hot.water-NOM instantly cool-TE IKU-PAST/KURU-PAST
Both the unmarked form and the -te iku form of minimally closedscale predicates have minimally (but not maximally) closed scales.
Why, then, is the former telic but the latter atelic?
Intuitively, the difference between the two is whether a change of state
is involved:
(3) entails a change of state from ‘the tower is not slanted’ to ‘the
tower is slanted’.
(6) (with -te iku) doesn’t entail any such change.
Maximally closed-scale predicates
(36)
ana-ga husagat-te ki-ta =
RedPrec closed "# the-hole stnd RedPrec closed -Te kuru-marked predicates are still telic.
Reason:
RedPrec doesn’t change the type of scale involved (open,
min/max/fully-closed).
(Unmarked) degree achievements in Japanese have fully closed
scales.
Thus, by attaching -te kuru, the whole predicate still has a fully
closed scale.
Conclusion
I have proposed an analysis of two aspectual markers -te iku and
-te kuru in Japanese that crucially makes use of the notion of scale
structure, building on the scale-based analysis of degree achievements in English by Kennedy & Levin (2008).
The proposed analysis captures the meanings and distributional
properties of these aspectual markers adequately, in particular:
– the ‘initial zero point requirement’ of the unmarked form of minimally closed-scale predicates
– the emergence of variable telicity in the -te iku forms of maximally
closed scale predicates