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Article In: Languages in Contrast: Online-First Articles

Ongoingness in grammar

A contrastive analysis of the progressive in Mandarin and Swedish

ORCiD logo with link | Umeå Universitet, Sweden
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Abstract
To expand the scope of typological work on progressive aspect, this study compares the usage patterns of progressives in an understudied language pair (Mandarin and Swedish). Drawing on parallel data from a progressive questionnaire, the study identifies similar typological patterns of progressive aspect in the two languages: (i) progressive zai and some Swedish constructions originate from locative expressions, and (ii) durative zhe and the posture verb constructions in Swedish depict a durative and stable situation related to location and position. The study also considers semantic factors such as verb types and temporal information that favor the use of the progressive. A quantitative analysis shows that a predicate’s telicity is more relevant for Swedish progressive constructions with a low to medium degree of grammaticalization, compared to highly grammaticalized markers in Mandarin.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Background
    • 2.1Characterizing progressive aspect
    • 2.2Imperfective aspect in Mandarin
    • 2.3Progressive constructions in Swedish
  • 3.The progressive questionnaire
    • 3.1Respondents
    • 3.2PROGQ materials
    • 3.3Data coding
  • 4.Overall results
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Comparison of imperfective use in Mandarin and Swedish
      • 5.1.1Locative as a source for progressive
      • 5.1.2Durative in Mandarin and Swedish
    • 5.2Semantic compatibility with different situation types
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
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