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<Paper uid="W01-1308">
  <Title>Unifying TENSE, ASPECT and MODALITY across languages</Title>
  <Section position="4" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
2 Formalization and translation
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> We will compute the semantic representation of while as the pragmatically most relevant one which speakers select from a variety of grammatical constructions in which while may occur in contemporary English. The different uses of while form a cline from relatively free to bound meaning. The meanings of this cline are represented by a componential analysis, which provides the condition for translating while into the adequate German equivalent. We analyse the use of while in terms of several grammatical and semantic components:  1. grammatical categories 2. grammatical domains 3. image schemata which represent domains  metonymically and which are transferred across domains metaphorically The semantic representations of while are implemented in a unification-based formalism as introduced by Martin Kay (1985) and may thus be used in a machine translation system. According to Langacker (1991, 532) the categorization of an expression's meaning occurs by its integration into the contextually related schemata. In this unification an expression's meaning is constrained by the schemata of other functions. The composition of a composite structure may thus be represented by a unification-based model par excellence (Zelinsky-Wibbelt, 2000). In terms of this formalism composition occurs through the unification of attribute-value structures. At each level these structures consist of an attribute on the left-hand side and a value on the right-hand side:</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> In this schematic attribute-value matrix the lexical unit LU is the only variable specified by a simplex value V. The attribute LU is conjoined by the attribute N, N being paired with the complex value consisting of the attribute-value pair T A. Integers represent the inheritance from free to bound categories.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="3"> In accordance with Gutt (1991, 189), we claim that translators produce an equivalent target language text by following the principle of relevance. As communication in general translation involves the comparison of interpretations as a universal disposition of human reasoning (Sperber and Wilson, 1995, 46ff.). In order to agree in their interpretations, speakers negotiate their mental representations by recognizing the relevant information with minimal cognitive cost and maximal cognitive benefit.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="5" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
3 Clines between grammatical
categories
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> On account of its intension while is part of a cline of the grammatical categories from more lexical to more grammatical meaning in the following order: null N a6 V a6 ADJ a6 ADV a6 PREP / CONJ Clearly nouns are lexically richer in meaning than verbs, that is the intension of nouns is lexically more autonomous, as verbs are contextually dependent on the semantic values of the arguments which they lexically expect or contextually require (Langacker, 1987; Gentner, 1981). This means that the senses of verbs are less constrained by their own attributes. Instead their attributes function as variables which unify with the values of the arguments which provide the gammatical context.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> Psycholinguistics accounts for this intensional difference between nouns and verbs by the natural partitions hypothesis about the speakers' spatial conceptualization. Nouns correspond to relatively stable concepts and verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions and conjunctions correspond to more variable concepts. The stability of nominal concepts results from object permanence. The notion of object permanence has been introduced by Piaget (1972) as the child's ability to represent an object permanently, independently of its physical existence. Object permanence as a condition for conceptual stability implies the persistence of the object's attributes which are internally cohesive, that is densely interrelated. Furthermore, the stability of nominal concepts results from external boundedness. All of these properties adhere less to the concepts of verbs on account of their contextual variability (Imai and Gentner, 1997, 193). Verbal and prepositional concepts have less internal relations between attributes than nominal concepts. Instead verbs, prepositions and conjunctions have external relations to the parts of speech they interrelate (Zelinsky-Wibbelt, 1990).</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> The extensional variations of verbal concepts explain that they are harder to learn, to remember, to produce and to comprehend.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="3"> The context-dependent concepts of verbs, adjectives, prepositions, and conjunctions are also less similar across languages than the more autonomous concepts of nouns (Zelinsky-Wibbelt,</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="6" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
DIRECTION MANNER
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> (Talmy, 1978) Whereas in English the MOTION verb float expresses MANNER and the preposition into DI-RECTION, this is reversed in Spanish, where the verb entrar expresses DIRECTION while the the adverbial phrase flotando expresses MANNER.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> On account of their extensional consistency translators also take nouns to contribute more to their interpretation of a text than other grammatical categories (K&amp;quot;onigs, 1993, 233f.).</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> In comparison to verbs adjectives are semantically even more dependent on the nouns which they modify and from which they inherit their specific value. In (6) the lexically vague meaning of the adjective high is contextually graded on a scale by the specific size which is a component of the lexical concepts of heel and tower: (6) high heel, high tower To summarize: the contextual and cross-linguistic semantic variability increases from nouns to verbs over adjectives to prepositions and conjunctions (Gentner, 1981, 176).</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="3"> With the senses of while it is most evident that they are related in a grammaticalization cline in the above pathway with the noun at the lexical pole and the conjunction at the grammatical pole.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="7" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
4 Clines between grammatical domains
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> Each grammatical category is organized in a cline of grammatical domains. Thus the cline of while may be represented in a semantically more finegrained way with the comparison of the different grammatical domains of MODALITY, TENSE and ASPECT. Bybee (1994, 22ff., 300ff.) claims this order of domains to be universally valid by drawing on extensive cross-language statistical analyses . She also correlates this cline of grammatical domains with the order in which the morphemes expressing the domains of MODALITY, TENSE and ASPECT are arranged around the verb stem: the proximity of these morphemes to the verb correlates with the degree to which they influence the meaning of the verb, for which Bybee introduces the term &amp;quot;semantic relevance&amp;quot;. Semantic relevance is also signalled by the degree of morphologization:</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> (7) She might be telling the truth.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="8" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
TENSE ASPECT
MODALITY
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> The domain of ASPECT most directly influences the verb meaning by representing the internal constituency of the situation in relation to the speech time (Hopper and Traugott, 1993, 142ff.); (Comrie, 1976) and by the morphological fusion manifested by the -ing inflection of the verb in (7). The domain of TENSE is less relevant to the verb as it expresses how the EVENT TIME is related to another TIME, either to SPEECH or REFERENCE TIME. MODALITY is even less relevant to the verb, and thus least grammatical in our comparison, as is evident from the word order in (7) in which the MODAL form of might is most distant from the verb stem. EPISTEMIC MODALITY represents the speakers' evaluation of the truth of the proposition. DEONTIC MODALITY represents the VOLITION which speakers impose on the situation expressed by the proposition. null</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="9" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
5 Clines through metonymy and
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> metaphor Each grammatical domain is organized through metonymy and metaphor. Both semantic extensions are two complementary stages of the same problem-solving activity (Heine et al., 1991, 49); (Croft, 1993). Metonymy is a semantic extension within the same domain of discourse: (8) We had a glass or two.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> In (8) the noun phrase a glass represents an elliptical construction of e.g. a glass of wine. In the discourse domain of DRINKING the two contingent objects glass and wine embody the imageschema of CONTAINER and CONTENT (Lakoff, 1987, 272f.). (8) exemplifies a metonymic extension, where the CONTAINER represents the CON-TENT. Each metonymy embodies at least two parts of a schema, such as CONTAINER and CONTENT. null</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="10" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
6 Grammaticalization paths of while
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> A grammaticalization cline initially proceeds metonymically by semantic reduction within the same domain. In this way the TEMPORAL meaning of the noun while has become reduced to the grammatical meaning of a conjunction within the same domain. Prerequisite of this metonymic bleaching is the previous semantic reduction of the lexical meaning, which is the case with the noun while. Intensionally the noun while is related to the vague concept of a CONTAINER in the domain of TIME. With this lexically vague concept while is very untypical of the grammatical category of nouns as content bearers within our cline of grammatical categories. Yet, grammatically the noun while has the autonomous qualities of nouns (Zelinsky-Wibbelt, 1988; Zelinsky-Wibbelt, 1992). It constrains the relational meanings of verbs, it can be determined and modified, and it can have co-referential functions, as it has in (9) (Hopper and Traugott, 1993, 104): (9) We waited for three hours, all the while hoping that someone would come and fetch us.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> (Hornby and Crowther, 1995, OALD) In example (9) the quantifying and identifying NP all the while refers anaphorically to the NP three hours, which specifies the reference time (REF TIME) from which the NP the while inherits the exact measure of its boundary. By inheriting this boundary, the while functions as the CONTAINER (CONTAIN) of the CONTENT which is expressed by the verb phrase hoping that .... The PROGRESSIVE ASPECT (PROGRESS) of the form hoping is thereby bounded to what fits into the CON-TAINER. This attribute-value representation is a condition for the corresponding German equiva-</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="3"> By its lexically vague and reduced meaning the noun while is metonymically related to the conjunction while within the same domain and context of discourse. Formally this is illustrated by deleting the referential functions of the determiner and the quantifier whereby the noun while turns into a conjunction.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="4"> (10) We waited for three hours, while a17 we werea18 hoping that someone would come and fetch us.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="5"> By this formal reduction while has lost all referential functions, it cannot be determined and quantified (Hopper and Traugott, 1993, 104), nor can it be modified or have co-referential functions. The anaphoric reference relation of the NP the while to the NP three hours has changed to the grammatical relation of SIMULTANEITY (SIMULTAN) between two situations in TIME as expressed by the conjunction while. Semantically, while has lost the iconic function of a CONTAINER. Instead the conjunction while indexically interrelates other expressions in the context which provide the functions of CONTAINER and CONTENT. In (10) the conjunction while relates the nucleus as the CONTAINER to the adverbial clause as the CONTENT (Langacker, 1991, 424ff.). The TEMPORAL situation expressed in the adverbial clause is within the scope of the situation expressed in the nucleus by the predication of the ACCOMPLISHMENT (AC-COMPL) verb wait and the NP three hours specifying the reference time. Thereby the reference time defines the length of the SIMULTANEITY. In these relations the SIMULTANEITY sense of while is computed from two conditions: firstly, both clauses need to express the same TENSE value.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="6"> Secondly there has to be partial or complete TEMPORAL overlap between the two situations.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="7"> Cognitively, the metonymic reduction to the grammatical meaning increases the schematic semantic structure of while and improves the recognition of the relevant information in the discourse domain of TIME. This configuration of the TEMPORAL meaning of the conjunction while provides a condition for the German equivalent</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="9"> If we compare (9) to (10), we can now locate while at the two opposite poles of the cline between grammatical categories: the noun while as a content word is lexically most autonomous in its meaning and thus is ordered at the leftmost end of the cline, whereas the conjunction while is intensionally most reduced and extensionally most dependent on the content words it interrelates and thus is ordered at the rightmost end of the cline.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="10"> By this metonymic representation the TEMPORAL domain is organized in terms of image schemata in a way which is cognitively relevant enough for the metaphorical transfer of these image schemata into a different target domain. The TEMPORAL sense of the conjuntion while is semantically related to two metaphorical extensions in the domain of MODALITY (MODAL). The SIMULTANEITY between two situations is related to the ADVERSATIVE CONCESSIVE (ADVERS CON-CESS) sense relating two antonymous situations.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="11"> In (11) while expresses the ADVERSATIVE relation, in that the adverbial clause asserts the opposite of the nucleus (Heine, 1997, 116f.); (Bybee et al., 1994, 225). The ADVERSATIVE sense of WHILE is a lexicalization from the speakers' conversational implicature of an ANTONYMY (Grice, 1975). The SIMULTANEITY between two different situations supports this implicature if it is communicatively relevant (Traugott and K&amp;quot;onig, 1991, 201), thereby again strengthening the informativity and the relevance of the conjunction while. In this metaphorical transfer the abstract structure of the image schema has been preserved.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="12"> SIMULTANEITY is the result of comparing two situations in the domain of TIME. The ADVERSATIVE relation results from contrasting two situations in the domain of MODALITY: (11) While this is an attractive theory there is little or no contemporary evidence ... to support it (ICE-GB:W1A-001 # 29:1) In (11) the conjunction while juxtaposes EPISTEMIC CERTAINTY (CERTAIN) expressed by the positive mood in the adverbial clause with EPISTEMIC UNCERTAINTY (UNCERTAIN) expressed by the negative mood in the nucleus. From this contrast the ADVERSATIVE CONCESSIVE sense of while is computed which translates into the German equivalent obwohl:</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="14"> While the TEMPORAL SIMULTANEITY sense of the conjunction while may be computed from the morphological functions of the verbs expressing the PROGRESSIVE ASPECT and the PAST TENSE which while relates in (10), the ADVERSATIVE sense of the conjunction while in (11) has to be inferred from the discourse coherence relations between several semantic values imposing constraints on each other: the lexical units theory and evidence intensionally embody CERTAINTY of knowledge. This lexical value of theory is emphasized by the adjectival modifier attractive in the adverbial clause, while the lexical value of evidence in the nucleus is negated and downtoned by the modifying adjective little.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="15"> The other metaphorical sense of while which proceeds from the TEMPORAL domain draws on the scope which the predication of the nucleus clause has on the situation expressed in the adverbial clause in (10). This is the metaphorical concept of a CONCESSIVE relation presupposing a condition.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="16"> (12) In a few weeks the Fourteenth Household Division will be moving from Horse Guards here to a temporary home at Chelsea Barracks while Horse Guard's building is completely refurbished (ICE-GB:S2A-011 # 101:1:A) In (12) the COMPLETIVE ASPECT expressed in the adverbial clause provides a boundary condition for the continuously extending OBLIGATION expressed in the nucleus and thereby induces the CONDITIONAL CONCESSIVE sense on while, which is translated into German solange bis. This computation needs even more compositional work to be done. The REFERENCE TIME expressed by the PP in a few weeks and the morphological function of will locate the situation in the FUTURE. The discourse coherence relation which the verbs refurbish and move adopt in the respective discourse domain induce the DEONTIC OBLIGATION (OBLIG) sense on will and the CONDITIONAL mood on the adverbial clause. This is consonant with Bybee's claim that the FUTURE is less a TEMPORAL than a MODAL category with important temporal implications (Bybee et al., 1994, 280).</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="17">  In (12) the general image schema is preserved by the conjunction while in the domain of MODALITY in two respects: firstly, the CONDITIONAL CONCESSIVE sense presupposes partial or complete TEMPORAL overlap between the situations expressed in both clauses. Secondly, the boundary condition of the COMPLETIVE ASPECT is schematically isomorphous with the scope of predication, which the ACCOMPLISHMENT verb of the nucleus has on the TEMPORAL meaning of the adverbial clause in (10).</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="18"> The schema of the CONDITIONAL CONCES-SION sense of while in the domain of MODALITY is metonymically closely related to the CAUSAL sense. In the following example the CAUSAL sense of while may be computed from relating the CONDITION (CONDIT) expressed in the adverbial clause to the CONSEQUENCE (CONSEQU) expressed by the indirect IMPERATIVE speech act of the nucleus: (13) While you're in the kitchen, bring me another drink. (Quirk et al., 1985, 15.46)  The transfer in the domain of MODALITY has preserved the basic structure of the image schema. The DEONTIC OBLIGATION uttered with respect to the FUTURE in the nucleus in (12) corresponds to the DEONTIC OBLIGATION uttered in the indirect IMPERATIVE speech act of the nucleus in (13). Moreover the CAUSAL sense of while presupposes TEMPORAL overlap between the CONDITION and the CONSEQUENCE. This is to say, that the CAUSAL sense is intended as a conversational implicature in (12).</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="19"> This sense of while is not lexicalized. We did not find it in our corpus, nor in any monolingual dictionary. Yet, it is used in contemporary English and may be hypothesized to be indicative of the ongoing dynamics of English typically promoted at the colloquial level of speech. In (13) the informal style becomes evident from the contradiction involved in the SIMULTANEITY between the addressee's SPATIAL presence and absence.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="20"> This non-monotonic reasoning is less typical of the written medium.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
  <Section position="11" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="metho">
    <SectionTitle>
7 Summary
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> As we have seen the TEMPORAL meaning of while is presupposed in all grammaticalizations, except in the ADVERSATIVE CONCESSIVE sense.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> Therefore it represents the prototypical core meaning from which all other senses derive. The initial grammaticalization from the noun to the conjunction is a typical case of bleaching, i.e.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> reduction of semantic components whereby the semiotic function of while changes from an icon to an index. Yet, the emptying of meaning occurs in the same domain. Once the minor grammatical category is derived, the grammaticalization cline continues metaphorically by a shift from reference to the text world to reference to the internal cognitive situation of the speakers, i.e.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="3"> from objective to subjective reasoning, from the speakers' measurement of TEMPORAL periods to their measurement of EVALUATIVE and ATTITU-DINAL values (Zelinsky-Wibbelt, 2001). Thus our grammaticalization cline of while starts from the speakers' reference to the relatively stable nature of their external environment by lexical concepts. The cline initially increases the textual relevance and then continues to increase the relevance which the text has for the speakers, as represented in figure 1.</Paragraph>
  </Section>
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