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Article: Aristotle's kinesis/energeia-test and the semantics of the Greek perfect (1).
- Article from:
- Linguistics: an interdisciplinary journal of the language sciences
- Article date:
- March 1, 2004
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2004 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Abstract
The purpose of this article is twofold. First, I aim to arrive at a better understanding of Aristotle's distinction between kineseis and energeiai in the Metaphysics 1048b. I argue that in order to understand Aristotle's test, we must understand the workings of the Greek perfect better. The main part of the article is then concerned with the semantics of the Greek perfect from Homer to classical times, discussing Gero and von Stechow's recent contribution (2002). Finally, an interpretation of Aristotle's test in the light of this discussion is proposed.
1. Introduction
Linguists presenting the modern taxonomy of aktionsarten (2) often ...