@article {9432, title = {From Aktionsart to aspect:\ grammaticalization and subjectifica\­tion in Greek}, journal = {Acta Linguistica Hafniensia}, volume = {46}, year = {2014}, pages = {955-965}, abstract = {

This article proposes an analysis of the historical changes in the aspectual system of Greek as a process of grammaticalization and subjectification, thus challenging the traditional view of Greek verbal aspect as a stable and in fact extremely conservative category, possibly very close to that of Proto-Indo- European. Specifically, the claim put forward here is that the original tripartite morphological opposition (Aorist {\textendash} Present {\textendash} Perfect stems) expressed Aktionsart, i.e. lexical aspect, distinctions (punctuality/telicity{\textendash} durativity/atelicity{\textendash}state, respectively) while the modern binary morpho- logical opposition (Aorist{\textendash}Present stems) expresses the purely aspectual perfective{\textendash}imperfective opposition. Since Aktionsart is based on inherent features of the action/state denoted by the verb while aspect expresses the speaker{\textquoteright}s point of view, this constitutes a shift from objectivity to subjectivity as well as a somewhat atypical grammaticalization process.

Keywords: gradient; perfective; progressive; habitual; perfect\ 

}, url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03740463.2014.955965}, author = {Amalia Moser} }