The Semantics of Not Until

• 발행기관: 한국영어학학회
• 저자명: Younghan Chung
• 간행물 정보: 『영어학연구』영어학연구 제16권 1호, 75~97쪽, 전체 23쪽
• 주제분류: 어문학 > 영어와문학
• 파일형태: PDF
• 발행일자: 2010.04.01

영문 초록

There has been a perennial debate over the English word until. In affirmative sentences, until has a durative sense and is compatible only with durative verbs and not with punctual verbs. However, in negative sentences, until usually collocates with punctual verbs and generates a sense of lateness and actualization. According to a unified account of until, until is a single lexical item, and negation is an aspectual operator that makes the meaning of a verb (even a punctual one) stative. However, an ambiguity account argues that English has two untils―the durative until and the punctual (negative polarity) until. The lexical composition approach claims that not...until is a stereotyped, idiomatic unit. This paper compares these three accounts of until and examines the semantic properties of not...until. Based on fresh evidence like crosslinguistic evidence and some common features of the punctual until and other negative polarity items (NPIs), this paper will prove that the durative until and the punctual until are two separate lexical items, and that the punctual until is an NPI.

목차

1. Introduction

2. Three Accounts of Not Until

3. The Semantic Features of Not Until

4. The Analysis of Punctual Until as an NPI

5. Conclusion

키워드

durative and punctual verbs a sense of lateness and actualization the durative until and the punctual until negative polarity items