Towards a typology of aspect in Sinitic languages

Abstract

This paper sets out to analyse the grammatical category of verbal aspect in representative dialects of three dialect groups within Sinitic, Mandarin, Yue-Guangzhou and Min-Xiamen, in order to investigate what the general grammatical features of aspect in Sinitic are as opposed to the specific and unique features of aspect in each dialect. The syntactic strategies used to encode aspect in Yue and Min are discussed as well as their function and morphological form, contrasting them with the aspect system of Mandarin Chinese in order to set up a typology of Sinitic aspect systems. Diachronic relationships are also considered. Hence, the aim of this study is to unify the two views regarding Chinese grammar by evaluating the categories of aspect in terms of contemporary cross-linguistic and typological studies of aspect, tense and modality such as Bybee 1985; Bybee & Dahl 1989, Bybee, Pagliuca & Perkins (1994), Comrie 1976, 1985 and Dahl 1985.
Secondly, this paper suggests that the feature of preverbal aspectual marking in Min-Xiamen may prove to be historically significant in terms of the general development of Sinitic aspect systems. An outline of the possible diachronic development of aspect markers in these two dialect groups will be presented and the speculated path of development will be contrasted with that attested for standard Chinese (Mandarin or putonghua). The diachronic outline as well as the synchronic descriptions are based on the following three premises proposed by Bybee (1985):

1) diachronic change proceeds from non-bound lexical morphemes to bound grammatical morphemes
2) similar paths of development of lexical meaning into grammatical meaning can be identified in different languages
3) grammaticized meaning is determined by the original lexical source.

Full text

TOWARDS A TYPOLOGY OF ASPECT IN SINITIC LANGUAGES
Hilary Chappell
Pre-publication version of :
Towards a typology of aspect in Sinitic languages. Zhongguo Jingnei Yuyan ji Yuyanxue: Hanyu Fangyan
[Chinese Languages and Linguistics: Chinese dialects] 1.1: 67–106, 1992. (Academia Sinica, Taipei).
1. Introduction: The study of dialect grammar
Kratochvil (1968:15-16) and DeFrancis (1984:54-56) have made useful comparisons of
the Sinitic languages (or Chinese dialects) with the Romance languages of Europe as
being on the same level of linguistic classification as a language family. Bloomfield
(1933:44) also regarded Chinese as being composed of a group of mutually unintelligible
languages, though ultimately related by means of a common proto-language. Chinese
popular and linguistic tradition has on the other hand, perhaps with equal justification,
viewed Sinitic languages as ‘dialects (fāngyán)’ resulting from the unique sociolinguistic
situation in China with a long unbroken history in the use of a common written language
that has served to unify the different linguistic areas.
1
The question of ‘dialect’ versus ‘language’ has however led to negative consequences for
the study of Chinese dialect grammar: While the study of dialect phonology and tone
systems is well-advanced for Sinitic languages, the grammar of Chinese dialects other
than Mandarin is relatively underresearched. There appear to be two opposing views with
regard to grammar: One view stresses the commonalities in grammar; the other, more
recently advocated viewpoint stresses the divergences.
Chao Yuen-ren, as a proponent of the first view, claimed (1968:13) that ‘in matters of
Chinese grammar ... the greatest degree of uniformity is found among all the dialects of
the Chinese language’ to the extent that ‘there is practically one universal Chinese
grammar’. Hashimoto (1974:80) in her study of Cantonese phonology while pointing out
that ‘the systematic study of grammar began late in the Chinese field’, attributes the
relatively recent appearance of studies on Cantonese grammar as also being ‘partly due to
the fact, that, in its main features, the grammatical system of Cantonese (as well as of
other Chinese dialects) agrees with that of Mandarin or the national language (1974:76)’.
1
This paper is based on research commenced at the University of Hong Kong during a field trip in
June and July, 1989 on a grant from the Australian Research Council (ARC) provided for an ongoing
project on the study of aspect systems in Sinitic languages and uses materials and data collected in both
Hong Kong and from a second ARC-funded research trip to Canberra in December 1989 to use the East
Asian collections at the Australian National University and the National Library of Australia. I would like
to thank the following language consultants for their assistance in recording or eliciting data: Angela Lai-
wah Wong; Anna Fung Shuk-han and Ada Chung Sau-lin from Hong Kong for Cantonese; Xu Ante from
Xiamen University; Fujian for Amoy Hokkien and Xu Yuzeng from Beijing Yuyan Xueyuan for Mandarin.

Aspect in Sinitic
2
2
It cannot be denied that the Sinitic dialect groups share many common features: They
could all be described as analytic tonal languages using means other than inflectional
morphology to signal grammatical relations. All display complex systems of aspect and
modality yet do not mark tense on the verb. In fact, absence of the category of tense is a
general feature of Sino-Tibetan. The noun phrase may not be marked by case yet is
typically built up into a complex with the semantically-based system of noun classifiers
and relative clauses preceding the head noun. The verb phrase may also be complex in
terms of elaborate postverbal modification, including resultative constructions and
sentence-final rhetorical particles, reduplication and verbal measure words
As proponents of the second view, Zhu Dexi & Lu Jianming (1987:45) claim that one of
the priority areas in Chinese Linguistics which needs to be opened up and investigated is
research on dialect grammar (fāngyán yufă diàochá yánjiū). The situation is similarly
assessed in Wu (1958:84-85) who states that the neglect of research into dialect grammar
is a serious shortcoming and that the current trend in emphasising phonetics continues to
hinder the full expansion of dialect research. Y.C. Li (1986:393-395) also takes issue
with the view that Chinese dialects have a homogenous grammar, urging recognition of
the view of Sinitic as being comprised of languages with both diverse phonological and
grammatical systems.
This paper sets out to analyse the grammatical category of verbal aspect in representative
dialects of three dialect groups within Sinitic, Mandarin, Yue-Guangzhou and Min-
Xiamen, in order to investigate what the general grammatical features of aspect in Sinitic
are as opposed to the specific and unique features of aspect in each dialect. The syntactic
strategies used to encode aspect in Yue and Min are discussed as well as their function
and morphological form, contrasting them with the aspect system of Mandarin Chinese in
order to set up a typology of Sinitic aspect systems. Diachronic relationships are also
considered. Hence, the aim of this study is to unify the two views regarding Chinese
grammar by evaluating the categories of aspect in terms of contemporary cross-linguistic
and typological studies of aspect, tense and modality such as Bybee (1985); Bybee &
Dahl (1989), Bybee, Pagliuca & Perkins (1994), Comrie (1976), (1985) and Dahl (1985).
Secondly, this paper suggests that the feature of preverbal aspectual marking in Min-
Xiamen may prove to be historically significant in terms of the general development of
Sinitic aspect systems. An outline of the possible diachronic development of aspect
markers in these two dialect groups will be presented and the speculated path of
development will be contrasted with that attested for standard Chinese (Mandarin or
pŭtōnghuà). The diachronic outline as well as the synchronic descriptions are based on
the following three premises proposed by Bybee (1985):
1) diachronic change proceeds from non-bound lexical morphemes to bound grammatical
morphemes
2) similar paths of development of lexical meaning into grammatical meaning can be
identified in different languages
3) grammaticized meaning is determined by the original lexical source.
Analysis of data for Min-Xiamen, Yue-Guangzhou and Mandarin is carried out in terms
of two main categories of aspect - bounded and unbounded. ‘Bounded’ aspect refers to

Hilary Chappell
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3
predicates aspectually modified to code events which have or contain a well-defined limit
- either a specific beginning or endpoint, such as resultatives, perfectives, inchoatives and
perfects of anteriority . In contrast to this, ‘unbounded’ aspect refers to those markers
which code the limitless or ongoing nature of an event such as progressive, continuous
and habitual aspects.
2. Northern Chinese - Mandarin
The Mandarin group or Northern Chinese bĕifānghuà is the largest dialect group of
Sinitic both in terms of number of speakers and geographical dispersion. About 72% of
PR China’s population speak a dialect of Mandarin as their first language, that is, close to
700 million (Ramsey 1987), while in Taiwan where Mandarin is also the official
language, 15% of the population use it as their first language, combined with the fact that
the majority of the population is bilingual (Kubler 1982:156-7).
Mandarin has the following verbal aspect system:
2
BOUNDED UNBOUNDED
 le Perfective zai+ V Progressive
 guo Experiential -zhe Continuous
 qilai Inchoative
In standard Chinese, the preferential strategy for marking aspect is by means of suffixes
to the main verb. The set of aspect markers does not however form a clear-cut paradigm,
as we find a preverbal marker zài encoding the progressive aspect.
Examples of each of these aspect markers are next presented without comment as
discussion will be carried out in comparative terms in the following section.
3
1. Tā zhāi -le sān lŏu guŏzi.
3sg pick PFV three basket fruit
‘He picked three baskets of fruit.’ (Chinese Pear Stories 1.4:4)
2. Wŏ mèimei qù -guo Aòmén
1sg sister go EXP Macau
‘My sister’s been to Macau (before).’
3. Tiānqì jiàn-jiàn rè-qilai.
weather gradual hot-INC
‘The weather’s getting hotter.’
2
The transcription system used for Mandarin is pīnyīn, as is commonly accepted practice in
conjunction with the following diacritics for tone: Tone
(1): High level 55 ā; Tone (2): High rising 35 á;
Tone
(3): Falling- rising 214 ă; Tone (4): High falling 51 à cf. Chao 1968:26.
3
Abbreviations used in the interlinear glossing are: PFV = perfective; PERF = perfect/anterior; EXP =
experiential; INC = inchoative; PROG = progressive; CONT = continuous; HAB = habitual; Q = question
particle; RP = rhetorical particle, SUB = subordinating particle; BA = marker of the disposal construction.

Aspect in Sinitic
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4
4. Tā zhèng zài xiūxi.
3sg just PROG rest
‘S/he’s having a rest right now.’
5. Tā xiào -zhe shuō.
3sg smile-CONT speak
‘Smiling s/he spoke.’
In terms of both diachronic evolution of aspect markers and grammatical studies of
aspect, Mandarin has been most thoroughly researched of the three dialect groups in this
study, not surprising given its sociolinguistic status. A brief outline of the aspect systems
in Yue and Minnan follows, dialect groups both located in southeastern China, where the
Sinitic languages are immigrant languages (Li 1988:32).
3. Yue-Guangzhou
The Yue group of dialects are spoken in the provinces of Guangdong and Guangxi in
southeastern part of the People’s Republic of China (PRC).
The prestige dialect and regional standard of the Yue group centres on the capital city of
Guangzhou but extends to the surrounding Pearl River delta and the British crown colony
of Hong Kong. There are roughly 50m speakers of Yue dialects in China, which
constitutes approximately 5% of the present population (Ramsey 1987:98; Norman
1988:214). In addition to this, large numbers of Yue speakers are found in both
continental and insular Southeast Asia, N. America and Australia, the result of large scale
migrations in the last few centuries (Hashimoto 1974:12 and Wurm & Hattori 1981).
4
The Yue dialects are of great significance in the reconstruction of Middle Chinese, due to
the fact that they preserve the sound system - particularly the finals or rhymes - and tonal
categories of the literary standard of the Tang dynasty better than any other dialect group
in the Sinitic family (see Norman 1988; Ramsey 1987).
Furthermore, if we compare the lexicon and morphology (grammatical particles) of the
Yue dialect spoken in Guangzhou and Hong Kong (Yue-Guangzhou) with standard
Chinese in terms of basic vocabulary, it is often hard to find direct correspondences in
standard Chinese. It is not merely a question of the well-known differences in register in
colloquial lexical items such as nouns and verbs denoting daily activities (e.g. YG sik
6
,
M
chī ‘eat’; YG jam
2
M hē ‘drink’) but much more thorough-going in that many
grammatical function morphemes are non-cognate (see Hashimoto 1972 for a detailed
description).
Similarly to Mandarin, aspect marking in Yue-Guangzhou, makes use of the strategy of
suffixing aspect markers to the main verb, however, in a consistent manner as opposed to
Mandarin, since Cantonese strictly adheres to the principle of suffixing.
4
Most of the population in Hong Kong are immigrants from the Pearl River delta area (Li Xinkui 1988:29).
For this reason, I follow the common practice in treating the forms of Yue spoken in Hong Kong and
Guangzhou as belonging to the same dialect area, as do Chao (1947); Kwok (1971), Cheung (1972),
Hashimoto (1974:70) and Bauer (1984).

Hilary Chappell
5
5
Yue-Guangzhou has six main fully grammaticized aspect markers acting as suffixes on
the main verb.
5
BOUNDED UNBOUNDED
 tso
2
Perfective -kan
2
Progressive
 kwo
3
Experiential -tsy
6
Continuous
 hei
2
(s
ø
ng
5
)lai
4
Inchoative -hoi
1
Habitual
Examples of each aspect marker are presented below and discussion given in section 5.
6. ngo
5
tsau
6
hai
6
Kwong
2
tsau
1
tsut
1
sai
3
ke
3
1sg then at Guangzhou be:born SUB
m
5
lok
6
nin
4
ne
4
tsau
6
lai
4
tso
2
H
ø
ng
1
Kong
2
five six year RP then come PFV Hong Kong
‘I was born in Guangzhou, and at five or six years of age, I came to Hong Kong.’
(Narrative II:1-2)
7. Ngo
5
h
ø
i
3
-kwo
3
O
3
tsau
1
1sg go EXP Australia
‘I’ve been to Australia.’
8. K’
ø
i
5
tei
1
ts’au:
2
hei
2
ka
3
lai
4
3pl quarrel INC INC
‘They began quarrelling.’
9. Nei
5
jiu
3
mat
1
je
5
ja
1?
2sg want what thing Q
‘What do you want?’
K’
ø
i
5
sik
6
-kan
2
ko
2
ti
1
la
1
3sg eat PROG that some RP
‘The stuff he’s eating.’
10. t’a:i
3
-tsy
6
nga:n
5
keng
3
wear CONT glasses
‘wearing glasses (at reference time)’
5
The transcription system used for Yue-Guangzhou is the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). The
tone numbers follow Lau (1977, 1978): Tone
(1): High level/falling 55, 53; Tone (2): High rising 35; Tone
(3) Mid level 33; Tone
(4) Mid falling 21; Tone (5): Low rising 23; Tone (6): Low level 22. The three
entering tones (rusheng) for syllables ending in -p, -t and -k are subsumed under the high level, mid level
and low level categories q.v. Chao 1947:24.

Aspect in Sinitic
6
6
11. ta:i
3
-hoi
1
nga:n
5
keng
3
wear HAB glasses
‘wearing glasses (always has to)’
’
It needs to be pointed out that Yue-Guangzhou possesses a far richer inventory of aspect
markers than the scope of this study allows us to discuss. Lexical aspect markers such as
y:n
4
‘ terminative’, sa:i
3
‘completive (of all objects)’, ma:i
4
‘completive (of remaining
objects)’, fa:n
2
’ resumptive’ and ts’an
1
‘resultative with undesirable effects’ are
discussed in Kwok (1971).
4. Min-Xiamen
The Min dialect group is one of the smallest in the Sinitic family with only 4.1% of
speakers of the Chinese languages (Ramsey 1987:87). According to Wurm et al. (1988:
Map B-12), there are 52.5 million speakers of Min dialects in China and Taiwan. In
Taiwan, 71% of the population speak a variety of Southern Min that is very close to Min-
Xiamen (or Amoy) as their first language (Kubler 1982). Overseas, large concentrations
of Min speakers are also to be found, for example, in Singapore where 53% of the
population speak a Min dialect as their first language (Kuo 1980).
The heartland of Min dialects is concentrated largely in the modern day province of
Fujian in mainland China. This area was one of the last to be colonized and settled by the
Han people. It is also one of the most geographically inaccessible areas of China with
high mountain ranges and few major rivers (Norman 1988:228). This may partially
account for the heterogeneous nature of the Min dialect group. It is reputed to be the most
highly divergent group within Sinitic from the point of view of phonology. Norman
(1970, 1973, 1988) classifies the Min dialects into eastern and western groups with finer
subdivisions within these, according to phonological and morphological features, a
classification which supersedes Yuan’s earlier one into northern and southern groups
(1960). It is also pointed out by Norman (1988:228), amongst others, that Min appears to
have been isolated from mainstream Sinitic at a very early stage, preserving, as a result,
many archaisms.
The late Ming dynasty (1368-1644 AD) witnessed several waves of migration of Min
Chinese who crossed the Formosa Stait to settle on the island of Taiwan. They also
moved southwards along the coast of Guangdong province where large groups of Min
speakers are to be found in northeastern Guangdong. Similarly, migration by seafaring
Min Chinese to Hainan island off the southeast coast of China, has resulted in a
population of 4.4 million Min speakers today, found concentrated in the eastern and
southern coastal areas of this island (Ramsey 1987:107). Sociolinguistically, Min-
Xiamen acts as a regional standard in southern Fujian and is used in this section as the
representative dialect for Minnan.
In general, Southern Min uses the strategy of preverbal adverbs and auxiliary verbs to
encode aspect rather than the use of suffixes or particles following the verb. Preverbal
marking of aspect can be considered a special characteristic of the Min group,
particularly the Xiamen dialect (see also Brosnahan 1972:52). Hence, from a diachronic

Hilary Chappell
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point of view, the analysis of the Xiamen dialect of Southern Min - known as both Amoy
Hokkien and Taiwanese in English - may provide an indication of the form of aspectual
constructions at an earlier stage. We will return to this point later in a brief overview of
diachronic developments in section 6.
The main verbal aspect markers of Min-Xiamen are given in the table below:
6
BOUNDED UNBOUNDED
wu
2
Perfect (ti
2
)-te?
5
Progressive
bat
1
Experiential V-.te? Continuous
V-k’i
3
.lai Inchoative
Loans from Mandarin:
 ke
4
Experiential
 liao
3
Perfective
The five main markers of aspect in Min Xiamen are exemplified here, then described in
the following section.
12. Gua
3
wu
2
sia
3
p’ue
1
ho
2
yi
1
1sg PERF write letter to 3sg
‘I have written a letter to him/her.’
13. Yin
1
bat
1
k’i
3
Pak
1
kiã
1
.
3pl EXP go Beijing
‘They’ve been to Beijing.’
14. Yin
1
ts’a
3
-k’i
3
.lai.
3pl quarrel INC
‘They began quarrelling.’
15. Tsa?
5
lit
5
gua
3
te
/
5
kun
4
si
5
yesterday 1sg PROG sleep time
‘Yesterday while I was sleeping...’
16. Li
3
tse
2
te
/
5
t’iã
1
yim
1
gak
7
2sg sit CONT listen music
‘You’re sitting down listening to music.’
6
The transcription system used for Min-Xiamen is the IPA. The tone values, indicated by raised
numbers, are as follows: Tone
(1): High level Tone (2): Low level 22; Tone (3): High falling 53; Tone (4):
Low falling; Tone
(6): Yinru 32; Tone (7): Yangru 4. See Xiamen dictionary (1982) and Brosnahan (1973).

Aspect in Sinitic
8
8
5 General definitions of aspect markers
The category of verbal aspect typically expresses the completion or non-completion of
events, actions or states of affairs. Perfectives, perfects and anteriors, completives and
resultatives belong to the first type of aspect, expressing completion whereas
imperfectives, progressives and habituals belong to the second type expressing the
ongoing nature of the event. - Unlike tense, the category of aspect is not deictic: It does
not encode the time at which an event took place with respect to the moment of speech
which enables aspect markers, in general, to freely occur in most temporal contexts.
By verbal aspect, grammatical markers belonging to a closed class with fixed position
with respect to the verb are intended. Sentence-final particles that also express aspect in
conjunction with modality and lexical aspect coded in the form of verbs that inherently
express or imply aspectual meanings fall outside the scope of this study. It will be seen
from the following discussion that tense, aspect and modality are meanings which are not,
however, easily disentangled from one another.
7
5.1 Perfectives
Perfectives code that an event has ended or is finished, without necessarily implying that
it is complete (cf. Comrie 1976:18-20). The semantic definition is not surprising, given
that it has been observed cross-linguistically that perfectives typically develop out of
verbs meaning ‘finish’, ‘conclude’ and ‘complete’; also ‘throw away’, ‘go’ and ‘lose’ (cf.
Bybee et al, 1994 : ch.3:8). In Mandarin, it is claimed that the perfective marker -le
evolved from the verb liăo 了 ‘finish’, according to Wang Li (1957), Cheung (1974) and
Mei (1978) inter alia. Even in earlier periods of Chinese such as during the Nanbeichao
and the Tang dynasties, the markers indicating perfectivity were all related to verbs
meaning ‘finish, complete’ such as bì, jìng, qì and yĭ (Mei 1981b).
Yue has tso
2
as its perfective suffix. The origins of tso
2
are not attested, although Mei
(1978) suggests zháo ~ zhuó 着< ‘to place’, ‘to stick’ as a source, which has developed
into the continuous marker in Mandarin. Min-Xiamen appears not to have a perfective
aspect in the form of a grammaticized marker of verbal aspect, but traditionally uses the
strategy of resultative complement verbs (RC) to code perfectivity such as tsia
/
5
-pa
3
‘eat-replete, to eat one’s fill’.
8
In contrast to Min-Xiamen, other dialects of Minnan such
7
The argumentation and examples for the following section are in the main to be found in Chappell
1989a and Chappell 1989b. Due to restrictions on space, most of these cannot be reproduced here.
Abbreviations used for language names are the following: M = Mandarin; YG = Yue-Guangzhou; MX=
Min-Xiamen; Fr = French; Ger = German and Eng = English.
8
Note that, in this case, as a marker of lexical aspect, liăo 了 may be used as a resultative complement
meaning ‘finish’, equivalent to Mandarin wán cf. Wu Zhongping 1958:88. The Xiamen consultant I
worked with, similarly, did not use liăo in his dialect in the same functions as Mandarin le but only as a
resultative complement to a main verb. For example, in past contexts with a referential postverbal object
where le is obligatory in Mandarin, the consultant used an unmarked verb form
.

Hilary Chappell
9
9
as Hainanese and Chaozhou (Teochiu) have borrowed Mandarin liăo 了 into their aspect
systems as the perfective (cf. Yuan 1960:276, see also Nakajimi 1977, 1979). Note that
sentence-finally, all three dialects use modal particles to express inception of a new state
of affairs (M.: le, Y. la
1
, MX: le /la).which is semantically closer to the category of
perfect (see below).
5.1.2 Specific characteristics of Sinitic perfectives
First, it should be noted that although aspect is typically not required grammatically,
perfectives in some of the Sinitic languages are used obligatorily in past contexts in the
presence of quantified or definite postverbal nouns. In this function, they express
completion of a specific individuated event. This holds true for both Mandarin (Chappell
1988. 1989a) and Yue (Cheung 1972:145-6). This correlates with the fact that in
languages that possess both tense and aspect, perfectives may be confined to past time
reference (see Dahl 1985).
Mandarin:
17. Tā zhāi -le sān lŏu guŏzi.
3sg pick PFV three basket fruit
‘He picked three baskets of fruit.’ (Chinese Pear Stories 1.4:4)
Second, Sinitic perfectives may also be used in irrealis contexts in the first clause of an if
conditional construction to denote, for example, the condition which must be fulfilled to
enable another action or event to take place.
Yue:
18. P’ei
3
ju
4
ts
ø
ng
1
lai
4
a
1
pi
1
tsai
2
peng
6
-tso
2
if future RP baby sick PFV
‘If baby becomes ill in the future...’ (Kwok 1971)
Thirdly, they can be used in imperatives to stress the urgency or necessity of a certain
action being carried out and thus brought to completion. These three uses of the
perfective markers are all semantically related by the feature of the completion of an
event, whether projected or real.
Mandarin:
19. Ni ba yifu xi-hao le!
2sg BA clothes wash-proper PFV
‘Wash the clothes!’
Since perfective aspect markers encode the positive realization of an event, it is not
surprising that they do not co-occur with negative markers in negated statements. This
applies equally to both Mandarin le and Yue tso
2
. The semantically-based nature of

Aspect in Sinitic
1
1
0
0
aspect contrasts with the more grammaticized nature of tense which marks verbs in both
affirmative and negative clauses.
Bybee et al (1994: ch.3) note that if perfectives are restricted to modifying certain verb
classes, it will typically only be dynamic verbs. This is true in Mandarin and in Yue
where the perfective markers cannot modify semantically stative yet syntactically
transitive verbs such as rènshi ‘know, be acquainted’ or xĭhuan ‘like’ in Mandarin and
hai
6
‘be’ in Yue (Cheung 1972:156). Light (1986:418) points out that verbs meaning
‘know’, ‘recognise’ and ‘know how to’ in Cantonese, as opposed to Toishan Yue, can,
however, take tso
2.
which means it is less subject to semantic restrictions on verb type
than is Mandarin -le. Other stative intransitive verbs such as M pàng and YG fei
4
‘be
fat’ do on the other hand permit an inchoative reading upon modification by the
perfective of ‘to become/get fat’. Again, this feature is found in a large number of
unrelated languages in Bybee et al’s survey, including Engenni (Kwa, Niger-Congo);
Island Carib and Slave (Athapaskan). Comrie (1976:20) notes that ‘there is some
functional value in utilising the perfective forms of stative verbs to denote entry into the
appropriate state, since otherwise there would be little use for the perfective forms of
these verbs..’.
5.2 Perfect/Anterior
Minnan stands out in contrast to both Mandarin and Yue in possessing a verbal
construction to express the perfect by means of the verb wu
2
‘have, exist’ which is
cognate to Mandarin yŏu .The perfect or anterior
9
implies a currently relevant state as a
result of a prior event. Wu
2
is a preverbal auxiliary which retains its full tonal value. The
aspectual construction it forms is remarkably similar to perfect constructions in Indo-
European languages. For example, French, German and English all use the verb ‘to have’
to form the perfect; Fr: je l’ai vu, Ger: ich habe sie /ihn gesehen, Eng: I’ve seen her/him,
MX: gua
3
wu
2
k’uã
4
ki
4.
yi
1
.
Cheng (1978) describes its use as a modal marker of emphatic assertion, translating it by
English ‘did’. In Bybee et al’s survey (1994: 3:12), perfect constructions are typically
formed by means of stative auxiliary verbs such as ‘be’, ‘have’ and ‘remain’ in
conjunction with the main verb.
Note that the distinction between the Mandarin anterior and the Mandarin perfective, that
is, between sentence-final le and verb suffix le, is often neutralized, particularly in verb-
final constructions. Cross-linguistically viewed, this does not constitute a problem in
analysis, since there are many attested cases of perfective aspects developing out of
perfects or anteriors, for example, French and German among other languages. In
Mandarin, the two functions of le, have not yet become completely separate, as the
following example shows where the perfect function of le can only be contextually and
not structurally determined (for details, see Chappell 1988).
9
Bybee (1985) uses the term ‘anterior’ in preference to ‘perfect’ to avoid confusion with the separate
category of perfective.

Hilary Chappell
1
1
1
1
20. Mandarin:
Tāmen jiù kàndao tā diē-dao le, bă tā fúqilai.
3sg then see 3sg fall:over LE BA 3sg help:up
‘They saw that he had fallen over, so helped him up.’ (Chinese Pear Stories II.5:51-52)
It has been argued that perfective le diachronically developed from a construction with
the form VERB-OBJECT-LIAO common in the Bianwen texts of 8
th
to 10
th
centuries
(Cheung 1977, Mei 1978, 1981b). The particle liăo was subsequently preposed to a
position after the main verb (common in some 10
th
-12
th
century vernacular texts) under
structural pressure of resultative and potential complements. Phonetic reduction of liăo
resulted in the eventual form le of modern spoken Mandarin. If we regard the two le’s of
modern Mandarin as ultimately having the same lexical source, the neutralisation and
overlapping of function is not difficult to explain. (Contra Wang 1957, Mei 1981a who
claim for Mandarin and Ningbo that sentence-final le and its Ningbo counterpart have
their source in the verb lái ‘come’. Note also, in favour of this view, that verbs meaning
‘to come’ are also cross-linguistically plausible sources of inchoatives and perfects.).
5.3 Experiential perfect
The experiential perfect codes that an event has taken place at some point in the past,
indicating in addition to this, that the subject gains experience or knowledge of the
situation as a result. Experiential perfects such as M -guo ( YG kwo
3
and MX bat
1
are
however rare in the languages of the world. In Bybee et al’s sample of 75 languages, only
Cantonese (the representative for Sinitic languages) is indicated as possessing this kind
of aspect marker.
Dahl (1985:139-144) also found only eight occurrences of the experiential perfect in his
sample of 64 languages from groups of different language families
10
. He observes that it
is a relatively uncommon category with languages possessing it concentrated in the two
areas of Asia and East Africa. Mandarin Chinese proved to have the highest frequency of
this aspect marker in terms of the questionnaire administered to all language consultants.
The lexical source for M and YG is transparent in that a fully lexical verb M guò,Y kwo
3
is found in use side-by-side with the aspect marker in each language. This verb means ‘to
pass/cross through space (or time)’. It is also used as a directional complement in both
languages which modifies motion verbs with the meaning of ‘over, across’. It is easy to
conceive of a semantic extension and generalisation taking place from movement through
space to the more abstract movement through time, then to the experiencing of an event.
The latter can, itself, be likened to ‘going through an event’.
The Yue experiential perfect is not identical in its range of functions to its counterpart in
Mandarin. Yue kwo
3
may also be used in future contexts and in the imperative to code
10
The languages were Japanese, Thai, Javanese, Indonesian, Sundanese, Isekiri (Kwa, Niger-Congo)
and Sotho (Bantu, Niger-Congo), apart from Mandarin. Comrie (1976:59) also notes that Kpelle (Niger-
Congo) has an experiential perfect.

Aspect in Sinitic
1
1
2
2
intention to repeat an action (Cheung 1972:148). Note however that Kwok (1971:95;
108-109;112) treats this function of kwo
3
as a different albeit homophonous aspect
marker which she labels the ‘repetitive aspect’.
Yue
21. Ma:i
5
m
4
ma:i
5
kwo
3
ko
3
po
1
buy NEG buy EXP CL ball
‘Are you buying another ball?’
Min-Xiamen traditionally uses the preverbal aspect adverbial bat
1
which means ‘to have
experienced something once in the past’ and is equivalent to literary céng 曾 q.v. Wu
1958:89; Yuan 1960:377. In addition to bat
1
, many dialects of Minnan have borrowed
Mandarin guò, in the case of Xiamen, as ke
4
(Brosnahan 1973:54). The suffix ke
4
can be
used with or without preverbal bat
1
(see Bodman 1955:369; Brosnahan 1973:54).
11
In contrast to markers of the perfect (anterior) which imply a currently relevant result
state, the experiential perfects in Yue, Minnan and Mandarin share the semantic feature
of coding that the situation no longer holds.
Consequently, the examples of the experiential perfect given in the introductory sections
on each dialect all code that the subject is no longer in the given place or country: For
example, MX:Yin
1
bat
1
k’i
3
Pak
1
kiã
1
. ‘They’ve been to Beijing’ can only be stated if
the subject is not in Beijing at the time of speech (see also Cheung 1972:148 for this
feature of kwo
3
in Yue).
5.4 Inchoatives
Separate from perfects and anteriors coding an inchoative meaning with stative verbs (e.g.
M hóng -le ‘to get red’; Y fei
4
-tso
2
‘to get fat’), all three dialects use a disyllabic or
polysyllabic suffix based on a directional complement to code the inchoative aspect
meaning ‘begin to do something’: M -qilai; .YG hei
2
(s
ø
ng
5
)lai
4
, MX k’ilai. As an
independent verb, these all mean ‘arise, get up’, while as a directional complement, they
denote a direction upwards in combination with a motion verb. The extension of use to a
marker of inchoative aspect conforms to cross-linguistic findings, in that inchoatives
typically derive from verbs with the meaning ‘to come’ (cf. English inchoative verb
become).
2.5 Progressives
11
The language consultant from Xiamen noted that, for him, ke
4
was more formal than bat
1
,
which tallies well with the fact that it is a borrowing from Mandarin, the sociolinguistically more
prestigious language.

Hilary Chappell
1
1
3
3
The progressive aspect is defined narrowly in this paper to denote markers which modify
only agentive verbs to code an ongoing event or action, following Bybee (1985). Bybee
et al (1994: 5:12) define the progressive as containing the following elements of meaning:
‘an agent who is located spatially in the midst of an activity at the reference time’.
Cross-linguistically, lexical sources of progressives are found in three main types of
stative verbs: be + locative marker + Verb, verbs meaning ‘be at’ and postural verbs (sit,
stand) (Comrie 1976, Foley & Van Valin 1984, Bybee 1985, Dahl 1985). Mandarin
conforms to this generalisation in its use of zài preverbally to code the progressive, since
the independent verb, zài, means ‘be at’. As a coverb or preposition preceding noun
phrases, it similarly means ‘at’. This is reminiscent of the English construction with the
present participle: be on /a VERB-ing as an earlier stage of the progressive, for example,
he is on hunting./ he is a coming home.
The progressive marker in Yue-Guangzhou is the suffix kan
2
whose written form is
almost identical to the verb kan
2
‘be tight, firm’.
12
Although orthographic evidence is
particularly unreliable when it comes to written forms of the dialects, the semantic link
between a resultative complement verb of enduring state meaning ‘be firm, tight’ and the
progressive is a plausible one.
In Min-Xiamen, the progressive is coded by te
/
in preverbal position, for which at
present there is no clear indication of lexical source. Progressives in all three dialects
seem to share a special semantic feature which Bybee et al note for Spanish (1994: ch
5:12) implying that ‘the subject is involved in an activity and cannot or should not be
disturbed’. This appears to be true for Sinitic, at least, for certain kinds of speech acts.
22. Spanish:
No puede venir al telefono, se está bañando.
‘He can’t come to the telephone, he’s having a bath.’
23. Taiwanese Min:
Ts’iã
3
tan
3
tsit
5
si
5
gua
3
te
/
5
ts’ing
2
sã
1
la
please wait a:bit 1sg PROG wear clothes RP
‘Please wait a bit, I’m just putting on my clothes.’ (Zhang 1983:135)
Comrie points out (1976:34-40) that many English stative verbs such as know, for
example, do not normally take the progressive aspect: ?I am knowing Susie well. He also
considers such restrictions on the progressive in other languages. Dahl (1985:91)
similarly found that specific markers of the progressive in many languages could not
combine with stative verbs. He tested the verb know with the result that it was unable to
take the progressive for any of the languages in the sample possessing this aspect
category (1985:93). This includes Mandarin, since zài cannot co-occur with zhīdao
‘know’. Cheung (1972:156) notes that kan
2
is not compatible with hai
6
‘be’ and
permissible with some auxiliary verbs. In general, this aspect marker is able to combine
with action, quality and status verbs of both transitive and intransitive types, which
12
The resultative complement has an additional radical on the left-hand side - the mouth radical.
Cheung (1972:149) points out in a footnote that this is merely to distinguish the two grammatical functions.

Aspect in Sinitic
1
1
4
4
means that Yue-Guangzhou is again less subject to semantic restrictions on co-
occurrence with verb type.
In Dahl’s sample, 85% of the languages with a progressive marker used periphrastic
means which corresponds to the situation in Sinitic for Min-Xiamen and Mandarin with
preverbal markers. Bybee et al (1994: ch.5:17-30) also observed that progressive was the
marked member of the set in opposition, for example, to zero-marked present tenses with
habitual or generic meanings. Diachronically, older progressives develop into habituals
and general imperfectives (Dahl 1985:93; Bybee et al, 1994 : ch.5:3) which leads into the
final discussion of continuous and habituals.
5.6 Continuous
This kind of aspect marker is found in Mandarin, Min-Xiamen and Yue. It stativizes
action verbs to denote ongoing situations that often form the background in clause
combining. Consequently, continuous markers are usually able to combine with a larger
range of verbs than the progressive, that is, with stative verbs as well as with dynamic
ones.
In Mandarin, the continuous marker is zhe which is claimed to be the grammaticized
form of a stative verb zhuó 着
‘adhere, be attached to, be in contact with’ that has
undergone phonetic reduction (Wang Li 1957). In Yue, the continuous is the suffix tsy
6
which is used side-by-side with its homophonous independent verb tsy
6
住
‘live, stay’
and resultative complement verb meaning ‘be tight, firm’. The lexical sources of these
two markers are thus compatible with the meaning of a continuing state of affairs
coded.
13
Although atypical for Min-Xiamen, there is a postverbal means of expressing the
continuous which appears to be homophonous to the preverbal progressive marker: te
/
/te. Zhang (1983:126) treats both preverbal and postverbal te
/
5
as belonging to the same
category of aspect. The Dictionary of Putonghua and Min Dialect (1982:484) treats both
markers under the same entry.
According to Bodman (195:325), the variety of Amoy Hokkien spoken in Malaysia also
allows postposing of the progressive marker te
/
to act as a verbal suffix to code the
continuous. Bodman states explicitly that te
/
loses its tonal value in this function, while
the complex of Verb + te
/
usually acts a ‘modifier’ preceding another verb. Hence, in all
three dialects, the continuous can be used to modify the first verb in a V
1
-CONT V
2
series with a backgrounding function, typically to indicate the manner in which the action
denoted by V
2
is carried out (see examples in sections 2, 3 and 4 above).
13
Note however, that Mei (1981b) proposes that tsy
6
,
identically to tso
2
, may have evolved from zhuo.

Hilary Chappell
1
1
5
5
24. Mandarin
Haizimen zuo-zhe ting yinyue
children sit-CONT listen music
‘The children are sitting down listening to music.
Note that neither Bybee et al (1994) nor Comrie (1976) give examples of these from
other languages. Bybee et al explain (ch.5:15) that no ‘clear category of ‘continuous’
emerges’. Dahl question-marks M zhe (1985:180) as a kind of progressive. Nor did his
survey apparently turn up any examples of this category. Hence, detailed descriptions of
these markers in Sinitic may provide important criteria for discerning continuous aspects
in other languages.
5.7 Habitual
Yue-Guangzhou, as opposed to both Mandarin and Minnan, possesses a grammaticized
marker of the habitual in the form of the suffix hoi
1
, according to Cheung (1972) which
is semantically related to the independent verb hoi
1 開
‘open, be opened’. Such a lexical
source for an imperfective is not unexpected, given its stative nature. However, according
to Bybee et al’s cross-linguistic survey, habituals typically evolve out of verbs with
meanings such as ‘sit’, ‘know’, ‘see’ or ‘live’ which, on the contrary, is the source for the
continuous in Cantonese.
Nonetheless, special markers for the habitual are not common in either of the surveys by
Dahl (1985) and Bybee et al (1994). Dahl (1985:96) found that only 4 languages met the
requirements for the habitual marker as a major TAM [tense, aspect, mood] category.
The source of habituals was less easy to ascertain than for progressives and was often not
given in the reference grammars consulted by Bybee et al (6 sources for 20 attested cases
of habituals for the category of ‘habituals without tense restrictions’, see ch.5:30).
Habitual is used to code usual situations pertaining to personal habits and customs, as
opposed to generic sentences that express the ‘lawlike’ character of a situation, for
example, typical properties of an object (cf. Dahl 1985:96-102). Cheung (1972:150)
explains that sik
6
-hoi
1
faan
6
[eat-HAB rice] can be used in the appropriate context to
mean ‘to usually or always eat rice’ as opposed to other kinds of staple foods.
5.8 Verb reduplication
The process of verb reduplication to encode aspect represents a widespread phenomenon
in Sinitic languages. Two related aspectual meanings are expressed: these are the
delimitative - ‘to do something for a little while’ and the tentative - ‘to try something out’.
Both meanings can be regarded as belonging to the unbounded or imperfective class of
aspect. This syntactic strategy is found, for example, in at least Northern Chinese, the
Yue dialect group and in Minnan. Furthermore, in all three dialect groups it expresses the
identical ideas of either short duration or tentative nature of the action, depending on the
verb class.

Aspect in Sinitic
1
1
6
6
25. Mandarin
Ràng wŏ xiăng-xiăng
let 1sg think-think
‘Just let me have a think about it.’
26. Yue-Guangzhou
Nei
5
si
3
.si
3
gin
6
saam
1
,
t’ai
2
t’ai
2
2sg try-try CLF clothes see-see
ngaam
1
-m
4
-ngaam
1
ts
ø
k
3
fit- not-fit wear
‘You just try these clothes on and have a look if they fit.’
27. Min-Xiamen
Gua
3
. sue.
3
-sue
3
k’uã
4
1sg wash-wash see
‘I’ll just wash it and see.’
The examples of verb reduplication for the three dialects, given above, show that the idea
of tentative action may be considered to be unbounded aspectually. Neither a definite
beginning point nor a definite endpoint is placed into focus by such an interpretation of
the internal temporal framework of an event.
This appears to be a possibly unique typological feature of Sinitic, as in Bybee et al’s
survey of 75 languages, reduplication was consistently used to express the different
meaning of action carried out over an extended period of time. There were three main
meanings identified for reduplication, all iconic to the form (1994 : ch.5:42-50): iterative
(doing an action over and over again); frequentative (often repeated action) and
continuative (to keep on doing something). Dineen (1989) in an examination of
reduplication in 41 Australian languages, both Pama-Nyungan and non-Pama-Nyungan,
found a majority used reduplication to express the iconic meanings. Notably, three
languages used reduplication to express attenuation. For example, Ngiyambaa: yuw-
yuwa-y-ga:-dha [lie-lie-CONJ-a:bit:IMP] ‘Have a nice little lie in!’ (Donaldson 1980).
From this we can conclude that Sinitic is not alone in pairing such a meaning with verbal
reduplication, but does stand out in making this its main function.
6. Conclusion
A comparative study of aspect has been made for the three Sinitic languages, Mandarin,
Yue-Guangzhou and Min-Xiamen. Within the two broad categories of bounded and
unbounded aspect, the experiential perfect, the inchoative, the progressive and the
continuous aspects were found to be present in the three systems. In addition to this,

Hilary Chappell
1
1
7
7
verbal reduplication was shown to be used by all three languages to encode the tentative
and delimitative aspects.
For the perfective, Mandarin and Yue both have specific markers which are non-cognate,
whereas Min-Xiamen uses the strategy of lexical aspect to encode perfectivity by means
of resultative complement verbs. In addition to this, some dialects of Minnan have
borrowed Mandarin liăo into their aspect systems. Minnan also uses a preverbal auxiliary
wu
2
to express the perfect or anterior which is coded by the use of sentence-final
particles in Mandarin and Yue (-le and la
1
respectively). Yue was shown to have a finely
nuanced system of aspectual contrasts, particularly in the unbounded or imperfective
class, where in addition to a progressive and continuous marker, we find a marker of the
habitual -hoi
1
.
Hence, in addition to the major categories of aspect found to recurr in cross-linguistic
studies such as Bybee et al (1994), Comrie (1976) and Dahl (1985), the three Sinitic
languages discussed in this paper are also typologically significant in that they make use
of an experiential perfect aspect marker, to date, instantiated only for a handful of other
languages of the world. The category of continuous aspect was also shown to be a
common feature of the three languages, clearly possessing a backgrounding function as
one of its main uses. These findings similarly contrast with those for recent cross-
linguistic studies of aspect where the continuous proved not to be a clear-cut category,
with the consequence that it is neither well-exemplified nor adequately discussed. It was
also shown that Sinitic possesses a language-specific meaning for the syntactic strategy
of verbal reduplication which is infrequently attested in other language families. This is
the non-iconic meaning of tentativeness or short duration of an event. The study of
Sinitic languages may therefore in future supply more adequate and precise criteria to fill
such gaps in cross-linguistic studies.
With respect to diachronic paths of development, the verbal origins of most of these
aspect markers are transparent. - In Mandarin and Yue, the process of grammaticization
has moved from the status of verb to verb complement of direction or result to aspectual
suffix. Many of the aspect markers in these two dialects are in fact still being used side-
by-side with either or both the related homophonous independent verb and resultative
complement verb, which enables easy identification of lexical sources. Mandarin also
displays one preverbal marker of aspect for the progressive.
This relates the discussion back to Min-Xiamen where the preferential strategy for
aspectual modification is to use preverbal auxiliary verbs or adverbs in periphrastic
constructions. Only continuous and inchoative aspects were marked postverbally. The
lexical sources for the progressive and continuous in Minnan (te
/
5
and te respectively)
are not attested, although possibly they have evolved from a verb meaning ‘to adhere’.
Similarly, in Yue, the sources for progressive -kan
2
and perfective -tso
2
still await
resolution.
A second subsidiary aim of this paper is to suggest the possibility that in grammar, as in
phonology, Minnan may show evidence of an earlier stage of Sinitic in general: one
where aspect was indicated by the use of preverbal adverbs, which is attested for written
records from the period of Middle Chinese (see Norman 198:123; Cheung 1977, Mei
1981b). In Mandarin and Yue, these aspectual constructions were replaced by other

Aspect in Sinitic
1
1
8
8
strategies for encoding aspect, such as postverbal complements: This was possible with
the rise of resultative compound verbs from serial verb constructions which exerted
pressure on the grammatical system (see Li & Thompson 1974, Mei 1978). Particularly,
complements of direction and result extended in use to performing aspectual functions as
well. The second stage of evolutionary development for these compound verbs was for
the postverbal complement, to lose its tonality (in some dialect groups, for example,
Mandarin, but not in Yue) become further desemanticised and grammaticalised into
exclusive use as an aspect suffix. The desemanticisation did not, however, lead to
complete semantic bleaching but rather to generalisation and abstraction of meaning
which shaped the eventual synchronic function of each aspect marker. This can be
observed in the semantic constraints and co-occurrence restrictions of contemporary use
in Yue and Mandarin. This hypothesis regarding the status of Minnan is further supported
by the fact that its aspect system is less grammaticized, shown by the use of periphrasis
as the favoured strategy as opposed to bound suffixes.
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