Universals and Cross-Linguistic Variations in the Semantic Structure of Predicates

Research field grammar
Keywords transitivity, voice, tense, aspect, modality

Project leader

Prashant PARDESHI (Professor, Department of Crosslinguistic Studies, NINJAL)

Summary

The goal of this project is to unravel the universals and cross-linguistic variations in the semantic structure of predicates through detailed cross-linguistic comparisons. In linguistic study, various semantic notions have been proposed to describe the semantic type of predicates such as transitivity, do-type/become-type description, affectivity, stage-level/individual-level description, perfective/durative/perfect, evidentiality, etc. In fact, these notions are not sufficient to describe the meanings of predicates in individual languages, and the interpretation of these notions varies from one language to another. Furthermore, the psychological reality of some of these notions has not been verified. In this project, the validity of these notions will be reexamined through detailed cross-linguistic comparisons.