Instructor: Ryan Bochnak (ryan.bochnak@gmail.com)
This course explores the semantics of tense and temporal reference, broadly construed, from both formal and typological perspectives. We examine how tense morphemes are interpreted across a range of constructions and languages. After building a basic framework to capture salient features of temporal reference in English, we turn to languages that make more temporal distinctions than English, so-called “graded tense” languages. We then explore languages that have been described as “tenseless.” Two major themes weave a common thread throughout the course: (a) the division of labour between the conventional meanings of morphemes and contextual factors in determining temporal reference; (b) the utility of cross-linguistic categories such as “tense” in the face of wide-ranging morphological and semantic variation.
Note: This course will assume some familiarity with an LF-based formal semantic framework. However, all the important analytical concepts and tools will be introduced in class.
Preliminary programme:
- Temporal interpretation: preliminaries
- Developing a framework; quantificational and pronominal approaches
- Graded tense languages
- Tenseless languages
- Optional tense languages
Suggested preliminary readings:
Comrie, Bernard. 1985. Tense. New York: Cambridge University Press.
von Fintel, Kai & Irene Heim. 2011. Intensional semantics. Ms. MIT
Tonhauser, Judith. 2015. Cross-linguistic temporal reference. Annual Review of Linguistics, 1, 129–154. doi:10.1146/annurev-linguist-030514-124923