Preverbs in Russian: situation or viewpoint aspect?

Abstract

The present paper has two goals: to present the complex data of verbal prefixation of Russian, and to assess the validity of the Situation Aspect-Viewpoint Aspect (Smith 1991) distinction for preverbs, in particular the thesis that all preverbs are telicity-markers (Borer 2005). First, arguments are introduced to show that all prefixed verbs are automatically perfective (pf), all are subject to lexical restrictions. A preliminary conclusion is that all preverbs are telicity markers, contra Filip (2005, 2008) for whom the preverb is pre-functional (lexical). This raises the question of the exact nature of telicity. In the literature (Dowty 1979, Krifka 1998), telicity is tested by means of in x time frame adverbials. A more relaxed version of telicity is proposed, following Borer (2005) & Lakorczyk (2010): it suffices for an event to be either non divisive or non homogeneous to be telic. The concept is akin to Paducheva & Pentus’ (2008) terminativity: the function of the preverb is to seal off the event. This accounts for the behavior of po-delimitative verbs. The data show that some assumptions are not correct: po-delim verbs are currently extending their functional scope in Russian and often act as pf partners to impf verbs, they do not necessarily indicate short duration, and are subject to lexical restrictions (Dickey 2006). Finally, the role of the preverb with respect to viewpoint aspect is assessed. The conclusion is that it is Situation Aspect that is grammaticized in Russian by means of the preverbs, and not viewpoint aspect, which is derived by means of correlations.