Tense, Aspect and Mood in Mesqan
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Date
2012-09
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
This study takes Mesqan as its target language. The researcher has
taken over the task of describing the tense, aspect and mood system of
Mesqan verbs. Besides, the researcher seeks to achieve the following
specific objectives.
i. Describe the distinction between tense and aspect.
ii Identify the grammatical markers of tense, aspect and mood of the
language.
ii. Analyze whether Mesqan is primarily a tense or aspect language.
Mesqan verbs are primarily marked for aspect, i.e. they have distinct
grammatical base forms for the perfective and imperfective aspects. In
addition to this, subject agreement markers are distinct for the two
aspects. In this language tense is expressed by means of auxiliaries: past
by the auxiliary bannä and non-past by the auxiliary –u. besides, the
perfective and the imperfective verb forms may or may not appear with
visible tense markers. If there is no visible tense marker the perfective
form is associated with past reading and the imperfective with non –past
and/or habitual meanings. If there is visible tense marker, the
progressive reading is obtained by the combination of the imperfective
form of the verb and the non-past auxiliary –u; whereas the habitual
reading is obtained by the imperfective form of the verb and the past
auxiliary bannä.
Mesqan verbs are also marked for mood. There are distinct grammatical
base forms for the jussive/imperative mood. Besides, obligation and
ability are expressed by periphrastic constructions.
In addition, the perfective form can be combined with the converb marker
–m to denote a reading of present perfect and with the past auxiliary
bannä to denote a reading of past perfect.
With regard to the third objective, Mesqan is an aspect based language.
In this language tense is secondary and it is mostly based on
imperfective aspect.
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Keywords
Tense