Setence Semantics 1:

Situation
Materi 5
 Introduction of Members

Audy Fitriyah Isna Awalia M. Jerrih Siti Trisna Hadi

Febrina Latifatusadiah Saputra
Pulungan
Table of contents
A C
Background Discussion

B D
QnA Time Conclusion
 Background
Languages allow speakers to construct different views of
situations by using semantic distinctions of situation type,
tense, and aspect. Then, system of mood allows speakers to
adopt differing attitudes toward the factuality of their
sentences and evidentiality systems allow them to identify the
source of their belief. These are sentence-level semantic
systems which enable speakers to organize descriptions of
situations.
 Discussion
1). Introduction
2). Classifying Situations
3). Verb and Situation Types
4). A System of Situation Types
5). Tense
6). Aspect
7). Comparing Language across Aspect
8). Evidentiality, Modality, and Mood
 01
Introduction
One aspect is the marking of time, known as tense. How this is marked varies from language to
language: it might be marked on a verb in languages like English or by special time words as in
Chinese:
a. Ta xiànzài you kè
He now have classes
‘He now has classes.’

b. Ta zuótian you kè
He yesterday have classes
‘He had classes yesterday.’

c. Ta míngtian you kè he
Tomorrow have classes
‘He will have classes tomorrow.’

Here the verb you ‘has/have’ does not change form: the time reference is given by the time words,
xiànzài ‘now’, zuótian ‘yesterday’ and míngtian ‘tomorrow’. We can compare this with the English
translations where the verb have changes for tense to give the forms, have, had and will have.
However it is marked, the location in time identified by tense belongs not a single word but to the
whole sentence.
 Classifying
Situations
02
1). Static Situations
a. No information is given about the internal
structure of the state
b. Such situations do not involve changing
in state
c. They hold for a certain time
- Robert loves pizza
2). Dynamic Situations
• Dynamic situations involve changing in the state.
• Dynamic situations are usually portrayed by dynamic
verbs.

- I study English Language.

- Robert grew very quickly
 Types of Dynamic Situations
Dynamic situations can be classified into two types :
1. Events : where the speaker views the situation as a
whole.
-The mine blew up.

2. Processes : where the speaker views the internal

structure of the dynamic situation.
- He walked to the shop.
 Types of Processes
Processes can be divided into two types as well :
1. Inchoatives : where our attention is directed to the
beginning of a new state or to a change of state as in :
- The ice melted.
- My hair turned grey.

2. Resultatives : where our attention is directed to the end

of the process as when we say:
- Ardal baked a cake.
- Joan built a yacht.
 03
Verb and
Situation Types
Stative Verb
Stative verbs are verbs that express feelings, situations,
circumstances or conditions. Another word for the verb's
mention of this situation is an abstract verb. This verb is
not used to express an action, but for conditions that don't
change.

- Mary loved to drive sport cars.

 Types of Stative Verbs
Needs and
Possession Measurements
Preferences
need, want, preference, possess, own, have, and weight, cost, and owe.
desire, and wish. belong.

Emotions Mental States Sense of

Appearance
like, love, dislike, hate think, understand, know, hear, see, smell, seem,
and appreciate. remember and agree. taste, appear and sound.
Dynamic Verb
Dynamic verbs are also known as action verbs, which in
simple terms can be said to be verbs that express the
action of the subject of a sentence. Dynamic verbs can
also be classified into different types based on semantic
distinctions underlies the different dynamic situations.

- Mary learned to drive sports cars.

 Types of Dynamic Verbs
Durative Verbs Punctual Verbs
Durative is used for verbs which Is used for verbs which describe the event
describe a process which lasts for a that seems so instantaneous. That is to say,
period of time as in: it involves no time.

- I studied for the exam. - John coughed.

- The baby slept.
 Types of Dynamic Verbs
Telic Verbs Atelic Verbs
Is the property of a verb or verb phrase that Atelic verb is simply the inverse (an action
presents an action or event as having a or event that is incomplete). if the situation
specific endpoint. a telic aspect indicates it describes is not heading for any particular
that an action or event is complete in endpoint. Here are sentences with atelic
some sense verbs.
- She built a house. - I breathe.
- He drank a cup of coffee. - The man exists.
- Harry was singing a song. - He feels funny."
The Diffenrences Between Stative and Dynamic Verb
Stative Verb (Non Dynamic Verb
Action Verb) (Action Verb)

The use of Stative and Dynamic

Stative verbs are English verbs
Verbs is of course different.
that show a state, not an action.
Dynamic verbs or also often
This verb is used to express
referred to as action verbs are
conditions that do not change
verbs that are used to state that
or tend not to change. Stative
the subject is carrying out an
verbs generally do not have a
action or to state that something
continuous or progressive form
is happening. Action verbs have
(-ing form).
progressive/continuous forms or
have -ing forms.
 A system of
situation types
04
Below are the four kinds of situations he identified, together
with some English verbs and verb phrases exemplifying each
type:
A). States
desire, want, love, hate, know, believe.
B). Activities (unbounded processes)
run, walk, swim, push a cart, drive a car.
C). Accomplishments (bounded processes)
run a mile, draw a circle, walk to school, paint a picture, grow up,
deliver a sermon, recover from illness.
D). Achievements (point events)
recognize, find, stop, start, reach the top, win the race, spot someone.
We can provide examples of each
situation type, as follows:
● She hated ice cream. (State)
● Your cat watched those birds. (Activity)
● Her boss learned Japanese. (Accomplishment)
● The gate banged. (Semelfactive)
● The cease-fire began at noon yesterday. (Achievement)
05
Tense
Tense allows a speaker to locate situation relative to some reference point in time, most
likely the time of speaking. Tense is said to be a deictic system. Deictic systems are the
ways in which a speaker relates references to space and time to the ‘here and now’ of the
utterance.

Most grammatical tense systems allow the speaker to describe situations as prior to,
concurrent with or following the act of speaking. So in English we have the three tenses:
past, future and present

- She spoke to me. (past)

- She will speak to me (future)
- She speaks to me. (present)
These are basic tenses and we could use a diagram
06
Aspect
 Aspect systems allow speakers to relate situations and time, but instead
of fixing situations in time relative to the act of speaking, like tense
does, aspect allows speakers to view an event in various ways: as
complete or incomplete, as so short as to involve almost no time, as
something stretched over a perceptible period, or as something
repeated over a period.

There are four aspects in English:

1). Simple aspect
2). Progressive aspect
3). Perfect aspect
4). Perfect progessive aspect
Tense/Aspect Chart
The differences beteween
tense and aspect
 07
Comparing aspect
across languages
Many languages, most famously Slavic languages, have inflectional affixes
that give aspectual information, e.g:

Russian:
- On gital pis’mo. (imperfective)
‘He was reading a letter.’

- On progital pis’mo. (perfective)

‘He read a letter.

This perfective/imperfective distinction of aspect is very widespread among the

languages of the world: Dahl (1985) and Bybee (1985) identify it as the most
commonly found and in many senses the most basic distinction.
 Perfective/Imperfective
The greatest distinction is made between the perfective aspect, which focuses on actions and
events as whole elements, and the imperfective aspect, which deconstructs how an event is
structured and located in time.
08
Evidentiality,
Modality, and Mood
 Evidentiality
There is a further semantic category evidentiality which allows a speaker to
communicate her/his attitude to the source of her/his information. This is possible in
English of course by the use of a separate clause or by parenthetic adverbials.

For Example : I saw that she was rich.

These qualifications allow the speaker to say whether the statement relies on personal
first-hand knowledge, or was acquired from another source; and if the latter, perhaps
to say something of the source.
 Modality
Modality is a cover term for devices that allow speakers to express
varying degrees of commitment to, or belief in, a proposition.

Modal Verbs :Will, Would, Can, Could, May, Might, Shall, Should.

There are 2 types of modality

a). Epistemic Modality
b). Deontic Modality
Epistemic Modality

Modals of Possibility: Modals of Deduction: Modals of Expectation:

can, could, may, might could, may, must shall, should (rarely),
will,

She may be in her office. He must be around here because She should be on her way to
(It is possible that she is in his car is parked there work now. She is never late.
her office.) (We use must when we feel sure (You know that she is never
that something is true because late. You also know that it is
there’s very strong evidence.) almost time for work, so you
expect her to be in her car
driving.
Deontic Modality

Modals of Permission: Modals of Obligation:

can, could, may must, shall, should, will
(imperative)

You may go at 4 o’clock. (b) All programs should take place on

(The speaker has the authority or desire to allow schedule.
the addressee to go at 4 o’clock.) (The speaker shows his attitude that it
is necessary that all programs take
place on schedule
 Mood
Mood is a syntactic concept, referring to the
way in which Verb express the attitude of
the Adresser towards the factual content of
what is being communicated. Whether it is
being asserted, questioned, demanded, etc
 Types Of Mood
traditionally seen as the form
is described as the form of a of a verb that it used to speak
is used in sentence or clauses verb that is normally used in about hypothetical, desirable,
-> make factual statement directing or commanding or necessary situations.
Example : The sun rises at people to do something. Example : It's important that
6:00 a.m tomorrow morning. Example : Leave your coat in she be informed of the
the hallway, please. changes.

Indicative Imperative Subjunctive

QnA Time
 Conclusion
In this chapter we looked at aspects of sentence meaning which allow the speaker
to classify situations. The category of situation type, for example, incorporating
semantic distinctions like static/dynamic, durative/punctual and telic/atelic,
allows a basic classification of situations into states, activities, accomplishments,
etc. The categories of tense and aspect interact with situation type to allow a
speaker to relate a situation to time in two ways: to locate it relative to the act of
speaking, and to portray its internal temporal shape. We saw something of how
these choices are reflected in grammar. We also saw that the distinctions available
to speakers may be very subtle and language specific. We also looked at the
semantic categories of modality and evidentiality, which allow the speaker to
assume various attitudes towards a proposition.
Thank you