Coding of contexts with experiential semantics in the iron Ossetic translation of the New Testament (in comparison with Slavic languages)

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Abstract

Experiential semantics indicates that a given situation occurred at least once and its participant, or the subject of experience, has acquired certain qualities due to participating in it. This meaning figured prominently in studies on Slavic languages due to the peculiar use of imperfective forms in experiential contexts exhibited by East Slavic and Bulgarian. However, the marking of such contexts in Ossetic, which is described as a language with Slavic-style aspect, has not been discussed yet. In this paper, I analyze the usage of perfective and imperfective verb forms in 59 contexts with experiential semantics in the 2004 Iron Ossetic translation of the New Testament. They were extracted based on their coding in eight languages as a part of the project devoted to creating a database of typologically relevant grammatical contexts: they are expected to feature the means of experiential marking, if a language has one. The Ossetic translation turned out to use perfective verbs in 38 cases and imperfective verbs in 20 clauses (one context is changed). This can be compared to 50 uses of imperfective verbs in Russian Synodal Translation. I show that the choice of aspectual forms in Ossetic depends on the actional class of the verb: achievement verbs are perfective, activities and states are expressed by imperfective forms, and accomplishments combine withboth types. Such distribution is close to that described for West Slavic and some South Slavic languages, in which the choice of aspect in such “peripheral” aspectual contexts as experiential ones is determined by the actional characteristics of the verb rather than contextual semantics, as, for example, in Russian.

About the authors

Anastasia D. Podgornaia

Lomonosov Moscow State University

Author for correspondence.
Email: podganastas@gmail.com

Education Specialist at the Department of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, Philological Faculty

Russian Federation, 1 Leninskie Gory, Moscow, 119991

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