A comparative study of the syntax of aspectual auxiliary verbs

2021 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 19K00601
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Review Section: Basic Section 02060:Linguistics-related
• Research Institution: Mie University (2020-2021); University of Yamanashi (2019)
• Principal Investigator: Matsuoka Mikinari 三重大学, 人文学部, 教授 (80345701)
• Project Period (FY): 2019-04-01 – 2022-03-31
• Keywords: 進行相 / 完了相 / 助動詞 / 存在動詞 / 所有動詞 / 統語構造 / 日本語

Outline of Final Research Achievements

It is observed across languages that auxiliaries involved in perfective or progressive aspects have the same morphological forms as verbs of possession or existence, for example, 'have' and 'be' in English and 'iru' and 'aru' in Japanese. This project has aimed at providing a grammatical account of this fact. It has been argued that two kinds of 'iru' are involved in progressives in Japanese; one is a verb of existence, whereas the other is an auxiliary derived from the verb.

Free Research Field

言語学　統語論

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

歴史的にも地理的にも異なる世界各地の言語の完了相や進行相の文に、所有や存在を表す動詞が助動詞として現れるという事実は、人間言語一般の性質を反映したものだと考えられる。よって、その要因を明らかにすることは、人間の言語の文法や意味解釈の仕組みを知ることにつながる。延いてはそれは人間の思考の仕組みを解明することにつながると考えられる。