Sequence of Events and its Influence on Verbal Aspect Usage in Slovene

Abstract

The sequence of events forces actions into restricting each other (the borders of the closed interval limiting the duration of an action are represented by the preceding and following action: (d n – 1[dn]dn + 1)), which leads to a holistic, panoramic view of them, expressed by PF. The share of PF taking at least three places in the sequence of actions is high enough (low 70% in the present-state corpora material and low 60% in the corpora material from the 16th to the beginning of the 20th century), reaching even higher when taking at least two places beside IPF (85% and 77%, respectively). The prevalence of PF is thus undisputed, while IPF denoting duration occurs mainly in the last action in a sequence, taking place in the half-open interval.

Such state in the Slovene language from the 16th century onwards agrees well with the findings of some foreign researchers: although in the sequence of events in Slovene PF prevails, the use of IPF is not out of the question (Dickey 2000: 203 , 210, Petrukhina 2019: 42–43).

The sequence of events appears mainly in the narrative of the past – in the past tense and as a historical present. Particularly in the present, the repetition, habituality of the action is also common, quite often in the form of instructions and recipes.