Papers by Veran Stanojevic
Aktuelna pitanja sintakse rečenice srpskoga jezika, 2024
ON THE MEANING OF VERB TENSES IN COMPLEX SENTENCES
The relation of the process to the evaluat... more ON THE MEANING OF VERB TENSES IN COMPLEX SENTENCES
The relation of the process to the evaluation time - the speech time or another moment - and thus, the characterization of verb tenses as being used as indicative (deictic) or relative, cannot be explained by chronological relations between processes in complex sentences. Chronological relations are compatible, ceteris paribus, with both types of uses (indicative/deictic and relative) of verb forms. We show that, based on syntactic configuration (at the level of Logical Form), relevant interpretations of verb tenses can be compositionally derived in both extensional and intensional contexts. We compare the predictions of the system adopted in this work with those of Belic’s classical theory of ‘indicative-relative’.
Српски језик, књижевност, уметност, Зборник радова са XVIII међународног научног скупа одржаног на Филолошко-уметничком факултету у Крагујевцу (27–28. X 2023). Књига 1, Српски језик између стандарда, супстандарда и дијалекта. Ур. Милош Ковачевић и Јелена Петковић. Крагујевац: Филолошко-уметнички ..., 2024
ОN THE (NON-)SEQUENCE OF TENSES
In this paper, we start from the fact that natural languages v... more ОN THE (NON-)SEQUENCE OF TENSES
In this paper, we start from the fact that natural languages vary, among other things, in the ability to use the past tense in the embedded indicative complement clause to express simultaneity with the higher past tense in the matrix clause. Thus, languages can be divided into two groups: SOT (Sequence of Tense) languages and non-SOT languages. Serbian, which is a non-SOT language, uses the present tense in the complement to express simultaneity with a matrix past tense. In this paper, we examine cases in which Serbian apparently behaves like an SOT language, given that with certain matrix verbs, the past tense can be used to express the simultaneity of two past actions. A corpus study allowed us to identify several types of these verbs, such as perception verbs, factive verbs, and certain modal verbs. Most of them have not been studied in the linguistic research on Serbian concerning the expression of temporal relations between the action of the matrix clause and that of the complement clause.
Научни састанак слависта у Вукове дане, Vol. 53/1, 2024
SHOULD WE ABANDON BELIĆ’S THEORY OF ’INDICATIVE-RELATIVE’?
We criticize Belić’s theory of ’indic... more SHOULD WE ABANDON BELIĆ’S THEORY OF ’INDICATIVE-RELATIVE’?
We criticize Belić’s theory of ’indicative-relative’, as well as the efforts made by his successors to improve it, highlighting specific issues in the analysis of verb tenses. We note that the concepts of indicative and relative should not be tied to specific uses but rather to what we, following von Stechow,
refer to as ’semantic tenses’. These establish a relationship between the reference time and the evaluation time. We argue, on one hand, that temporal meaning can be treated, depending on the context, as
indicative or relative, and on the other hand, that verbal forms can be evaluated based on the definiteness or indefiniteness of the reference time.
Научни састанак слависта у Вукове дане, Vol. 51/1, 2022
Having examined the necessary conditions of the meaning of “early and unexpected action” in Serbi... more Having examined the necessary conditions of the meaning of “early and unexpected action” in Serbian, we found that it is the result of the relation between the time of the event introduced by the predicate of the temporal kad (when)-clause and the time in which the process of the main clause was preparing to take place. We question the relevance of the notion of “premature completion” of the action denoted by the predicate of the main clause in the explanation of the meaning of “early and unexpected action” in some temporal kad-clauses in Serbian.
Naučni sastanak slavista u Vukove dane, 2023
ON THE EFFECT OF PERFECTIVITY OF THE IMPERFECTIVE ASPECT
This paper explores the conditions und... more ON THE EFFECT OF PERFECTIVITY OF THE IMPERFECTIVE ASPECT
This paper explores the conditions under which Serbian imperfective verbs can be used to express not only unbounded but also bounded eventualities – i.e. what we, inspired by W. Klein, call ’semantic perfectivity’. W. Klein defines aspect as a relation between the so-called ’time of the situation’
and ’topic time’. It appears that Serbian imperfective verbs don’t always express the inclusion of the topic time in the time of the situation: the inverse relationship is also possible, creating the effect of aspectual boundedness, i.e. perfectivity. We also analyse the factors which, at least in Serbian, challenge the predictions of W. Klein concerning the interpretation of the imperfective aspect.
Aktuelna pitanja morfosintakse srpskoga jezika, 2023
In this paper we argue that the opposition between the so-called ‘indicative’ (or ‘deictic’) and ... more In this paper we argue that the opposition between the so-called ‘indicative’ (or ‘deictic’) and ‘relative’ uses of tenses, based on Aleksandar Belic’s theory, is inadequate both empirically and conceptually: empirically, because there are temporal uses that are neither indicative nor relative, and conceptually, because this opposition is not necessary to account for the temporal interpretation of the relevant uses of finite verb forms in Serbian. In the framework of formal approaches to semantics of verb tenses, we assume that finite verb forms represent a morphosyntactic reflex of the so-called semantic tenses, namely semantic present, past and future. The key concepts of this type of approaches are the so-called local evaluation time, on the one hand, and its relation to the interval (the so-called reference time) introduced by the tense morpheme to which an appropriate semantic tense has been assigned, on the other. The temporal location of the local evaluation time depends on the syntactic configuration in which the tense form occurs, so that all the effects pertaining to the opposition ‘indicative/relative ’ and much more could be derived from the identification of the local evaluation time throughout the compositional interpretation of sentences.
travail se propose de montrer qu'en dépit des défauts bien connus de l'approche reichenbachienne ... more travail se propose de montrer qu'en dépit des défauts bien connus de l'approche reichenbachienne des temps verbaux, certaines des idées de Reichenbach se sont avérées essentielles non seulement dans les recherches néoreichenbachiennes portant sur l'expression du temps et de l'aspect en langue naturelle, mais aussi dans les travaux plus ou moins récents relevant de la sémantique formelle. En dépit du fait que des chercheurs d'orientation néoreichenbachienne ont contribué à dépasser des limites de l'approche classique, leur démarche n'est pas suffisamment explicite pour rendre compte de manière compositionnelle de la contribution sémantique des formes verbales fléchies. Nous essaierons de montrer que, grâce à des outils de la sémantique formelle, il est possible non seulement de dériver les conditions de vérité correctes de la phrase, mais aussi d'expliciter le rôle sémantique des temps verbaux. Nous ferons la distinction entre les temps morphosyntaxiques et les temps sémantiques, pour introduire ensuite des opérateurs sémantiques rendant compte de l'aspect grammatical et des lectures résultatives des temps composés du français. Mots-clés : Reichenbach, sémantique formelle, le temps et l'aspect, les temps verbaux, le français. 1 Il y a, bien entendu, des langues qui, comme le chinois, n'ont pas de temps verbaux, mais qui ne sont pas pour autant dépourvues de moyens pour situer des événements dans le temps, c'est-à-dire par rapport au moment de l'énonciation (v. Klein 2009 : 6). Comme nous nous focaliserons sur le français dans ce travail, nous étudierons la contribution sémantique des temps verbaux de cette langue à la signification de la phrase.
Primenjena lingvistika, 2016
Travaux De Linguistique, 2016
Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour De Boeck Supérieur. Distribution électronique Cairn.inf... more Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour De Boeck Supérieur. Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour De Boeck Supérieur. La reproduction ou représentation de cet article, notamment par photocopie, n'est autorisée que dans les limites des conditions générales d'utilisation du site ou, le cas échéant, des conditions générales de la licence souscrite par votre établissement. Toute autre reproduction ou représentation, en tout ou partie, sous quelque forme et de quelque manière que ce soit, est interdite sauf accord préalable et écrit de l'éditeur, en dehors des cas prévus par la législation en vigueur en France. Il est précisé que son stockage dans une base de données est également interdit. Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse https://www.cairn.info/revue-travaux-de-linguistique-2016-1-page-121.htm Découvrir le sommaire de ce numéro, suivre la revue par email, s'abonner... Flashez ce QR Code pour accéder à la page de ce numéro sur Cairn.info.
Nasleđe, 2021
Based on certain principles of the processing of temporal information in the framework of dynamic... more Based on certain principles of the processing of temporal information in the framework of dynamic semantics such as Discourse Representation Theory (Kamp, Reyle 1993), in this paper, we examine the semantic role of the conjunction kad(a) (when) which introduces tem- poral clauses in Serbian. Starting from the supposed function of the temporal clause at the discourse level, we claim that the role of the conjunction kad(a) reflects its discourse function in which, together with the predicate of the subordinate clause, it contributes to updating the current reference point. Although this discourse function in dynamic semantic frameworks only characterizes events, we argue that, under certain conditions, it can also be attributed to the conjunction kad(a) when it occurs with atelic predicates in the subordinate clause. The temporal relations between the actions of the main and those of the subordinate clause essen- tially depend on the type of the main predicate. Only event predicates can update the current reference point, which produces the effect of temporal succession between the predicates in the sentence. On the other hand, with atelic predicates one expressеs simultaneity, with the possible exception of immediate posteriority, which could be explained away by pragmatic factors. After all, by definition, all this kind of predicate can do is encompass the current ref- erence point without updating it. Finally, although the use of the pluperfect in the main clause imposes the anteriority of the action it denotes, we argue that the pluperfect focuses on the resulting state which includes the reference point and produces the effect of simultaneity.
This contribution consists of a short presentation of the way in which several university level g... more This contribution consists of a short presentation of the way in which several university level grammars embed macrosyntactic and discourse aspects in their descriptions of the grammatical facts. The present paper looks at Italian, Spanish, Romanian, European Portuguese and Serbian, and outlines to what extent the books selected for this purpose introduce pragmatic and textual examples – from written and oral corpora – to support their explanations. The main hypothesis put forward here is that the inclusion of the grammar-discourse interface modifies to some degree the descriptive categories commonly used in such works.
Ce dossier thematique reunit une selection d'articles tous issus de communications presentees... more Ce dossier thematique reunit une selection d'articles tous issus de communications presentees lors du colloque international " L'expression de l'espace et du temps en francais : quelles formes pour quels sens ? ", qui a eu lieu a la Faculte de Philologie de Belgrade du 23 au 26 mars 2011. Les six contributions portent des regards croises sur la problematique de l'expression de l'espace et du temps en francais a plusieurs egards. Tout d'abord, elle est abordee sous differents angles theoriques et methodologiques. Ensuite, dans deux articles, l'expression de l'espace et du temps en francais est etudiee dans une perspective contrastive. Enfin, certaines etudes s'interessent a l'expression de notions non spatiales a l'aide d'elements et/ou structures a l'origine spatiaux. A la diversite d'approches s'ajoute celle des marqueurs spatiaux et temporels etudies, en francais mais aussi dans d'autres langues comparees : verbes locatifs, noms, adverbes, prepositions, syntagmes prepositionnels, subordonnees relatives, temps verbaux.
Langue française, 2013
Dans ce travail, nous analysons et comparons les parametres necessaires pour decrire la semantiqu... more Dans ce travail, nous analysons et comparons les parametres necessaires pour decrire la semantique des prepositions temporelles et ceux qui sont a la base de la semantique des temps verbaux en francais. Nous montrons qu’il est possible de decrire les instructions des prepositions temporelles par le recours a des predicats spatiaux, ce qui est en accord avec l’hypothese du localisme linguistique. En revanche, les temps verbaux ne peuvent pas etre reduits aux notions et aux predicats qui servent a definir les prepositions temporelles, meme s’ils sont semantiquement moins complexes que ces dernieres. C’est parce que le moment de la parole, notion centrale pour la description des temps verbaux, n’est derivable d’aucun predicat spatial et, en plus, ne joue aucun role dans la semantique des prepositions temporelles primaires (pendant, avant, apres). Le dernier argument pour l’impossibilite de reduire la semantique les temps verbaux a la semantique des prepositions temporelles git dans le fait que le recours au traitement pragmatique est obligatoire uniquement dans l’interpretation des premiers.
ROMANSKI BALKAN
... est tres vite apprise. 23 La phrase correcte serait: Il m'a dit de signer le contrat pou... more ... est tres vite apprise. 23 La phrase correcte serait: Il m'a dit de signer le contrat pour six mois. 24 Nous renvoyons ici a l'ontologie de Vendler (1957). 25 Rappelons que pour MP le/lo signifie je. Page 351. Tous cela montre que ...
Годишњак Филозофског факултета у Новом Саду
En nous servant d’outils de la sémantique formelle, nous examinons des interactions entre l’aspec... more En nous servant d’outils de la sémantique formelle, nous examinons des interactions entre l’aspect grammatical et le mode d’action dans le processus de la construction du sens aspectuel de la phrase en français. Si la notion de temps topical de Klein sert de lien entre l’information temporelle et l’information aspectuelle véhiculées par des morphèmes temporels, elle nous permet également de comprendre pourquoi on doit postuler, dans certains cas, la transformation aspectuelle du procès.
ParCoLab is a 12-million-word parallel corpus containing original and translated texts in three E... more ParCoLab is a 12-million-word parallel corpus containing original and translated texts in three European languages: Serbian, French, and English. Each of the languages functions both as a source and as a target language. The texts included in the corpus, which are mainly literary, are paragraph- and sentence-aligned. The alignments have been manually validated, which guarantees their quality. ParCoLab is also distinguished by the fact that it follows the current standards of corpus creation and distribution (it is stored in a TEI-compliant XML format). The ParCoLab parallel corpus can be queried online for free. A search engine allows users to formulate queries and extract sentences containing the target expression, as well as the corresponding sentences in one or both other languages. As a work in progress, the corpus is in continuous qualitative, quantitative, and technical development.
Les études françaises aujourd’hui, 2019
Nous nous intéressons dans ce travail 12 au rôle de la position de la perspective temporelle dans... more Nous nous intéressons dans ce travail 12 au rôle de la position de la perspective temporelle dans l'interprétation des temps verbaux du serbe par comparaison au français. En nous appuyant sur l'approche de Co Vet selon laquelle, en français, la perspective temporelle, située soit au moment de la parole soit à un moment du passé, ne change pas de position dans différents emplois temporels des formes verbales fléchies, nous constatons qu'en serbe, par contre, pour rendre compte de différents emplois des temps verbaux, il est nécessaire de postuler la flexibilité de la perspective temporelle. Ceci explique non seulement certains emplois dits relatifs des temps verbaux en serbe, mais en plus donne des prédictions quant au choix des équivalents français des formes verbales constituant le premier sous-système temporel en serbe.
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Papers by Veran Stanojevic
The relation of the process to the evaluation time - the speech time or another moment - and thus, the characterization of verb tenses as being used as indicative (deictic) or relative, cannot be explained by chronological relations between processes in complex sentences. Chronological relations are compatible, ceteris paribus, with both types of uses (indicative/deictic and relative) of verb forms. We show that, based on syntactic configuration (at the level of Logical Form), relevant interpretations of verb tenses can be compositionally derived in both extensional and intensional contexts. We compare the predictions of the system adopted in this work with those of Belic’s classical theory of ‘indicative-relative’.
In this paper, we start from the fact that natural languages vary, among other things, in the ability to use the past tense in the embedded indicative complement clause to express simultaneity with the higher past tense in the matrix clause. Thus, languages can be divided into two groups: SOT (Sequence of Tense) languages and non-SOT languages. Serbian, which is a non-SOT language, uses the present tense in the complement to express simultaneity with a matrix past tense. In this paper, we examine cases in which Serbian apparently behaves like an SOT language, given that with certain matrix verbs, the past tense can be used to express the simultaneity of two past actions. A corpus study allowed us to identify several types of these verbs, such as perception verbs, factive verbs, and certain modal verbs. Most of them have not been studied in the linguistic research on Serbian concerning the expression of temporal relations between the action of the matrix clause and that of the complement clause.
We criticize Belić’s theory of ’indicative-relative’, as well as the efforts made by his successors to improve it, highlighting specific issues in the analysis of verb tenses. We note that the concepts of indicative and relative should not be tied to specific uses but rather to what we, following von Stechow,
refer to as ’semantic tenses’. These establish a relationship between the reference time and the evaluation time. We argue, on one hand, that temporal meaning can be treated, depending on the context, as
indicative or relative, and on the other hand, that verbal forms can be evaluated based on the definiteness or indefiniteness of the reference time.
This paper explores the conditions under which Serbian imperfective verbs can be used to express not only unbounded but also bounded eventualities – i.e. what we, inspired by W. Klein, call ’semantic perfectivity’. W. Klein defines aspect as a relation between the so-called ’time of the situation’
and ’topic time’. It appears that Serbian imperfective verbs don’t always express the inclusion of the topic time in the time of the situation: the inverse relationship is also possible, creating the effect of aspectual boundedness, i.e. perfectivity. We also analyse the factors which, at least in Serbian, challenge the predictions of W. Klein concerning the interpretation of the imperfective aspect.
The relation of the process to the evaluation time - the speech time or another moment - and thus, the characterization of verb tenses as being used as indicative (deictic) or relative, cannot be explained by chronological relations between processes in complex sentences. Chronological relations are compatible, ceteris paribus, with both types of uses (indicative/deictic and relative) of verb forms. We show that, based on syntactic configuration (at the level of Logical Form), relevant interpretations of verb tenses can be compositionally derived in both extensional and intensional contexts. We compare the predictions of the system adopted in this work with those of Belic’s classical theory of ‘indicative-relative’.
In this paper, we start from the fact that natural languages vary, among other things, in the ability to use the past tense in the embedded indicative complement clause to express simultaneity with the higher past tense in the matrix clause. Thus, languages can be divided into two groups: SOT (Sequence of Tense) languages and non-SOT languages. Serbian, which is a non-SOT language, uses the present tense in the complement to express simultaneity with a matrix past tense. In this paper, we examine cases in which Serbian apparently behaves like an SOT language, given that with certain matrix verbs, the past tense can be used to express the simultaneity of two past actions. A corpus study allowed us to identify several types of these verbs, such as perception verbs, factive verbs, and certain modal verbs. Most of them have not been studied in the linguistic research on Serbian concerning the expression of temporal relations between the action of the matrix clause and that of the complement clause.
We criticize Belić’s theory of ’indicative-relative’, as well as the efforts made by his successors to improve it, highlighting specific issues in the analysis of verb tenses. We note that the concepts of indicative and relative should not be tied to specific uses but rather to what we, following von Stechow,
refer to as ’semantic tenses’. These establish a relationship between the reference time and the evaluation time. We argue, on one hand, that temporal meaning can be treated, depending on the context, as
indicative or relative, and on the other hand, that verbal forms can be evaluated based on the definiteness or indefiniteness of the reference time.
This paper explores the conditions under which Serbian imperfective verbs can be used to express not only unbounded but also bounded eventualities – i.e. what we, inspired by W. Klein, call ’semantic perfectivity’. W. Klein defines aspect as a relation between the so-called ’time of the situation’
and ’topic time’. It appears that Serbian imperfective verbs don’t always express the inclusion of the topic time in the time of the situation: the inverse relationship is also possible, creating the effect of aspectual boundedness, i.e. perfectivity. We also analyse the factors which, at least in Serbian, challenge the predictions of W. Klein concerning the interpretation of the imperfective aspect.