Frustratives as aspect: A view from Chorote (Mataguayan) and Mẽbengokre (Jê)

Abstract

The grammatical category of frustrative, present in various languages from South America and other parts of the world, indicates that some result or consequence of the event expressed in a proposition hasn’t obtained. In a strict definition (Overall 2017), it shows that the event culminated but without the expected effect; however, it can also indicate that the event was not completed or initiated. The analysis of data from various languages shows that there is a systematic alternation between these two (groups of) meanings when frustrative interacts with aspect. Thus, for instance, in some languages the frustrative morpheme carries by default the meaning of completion without the expected effects, and acquires the value of not culminated or not initiated eventuality when it co-occurs with imperfective morphology. In other languages, the inverse occurs: the default value of frustratives is the latter, while the former is obtained when frustrative co-occurs with perfective morphology. In the present article we propose a formal analysis of frustrative as aspect using the notion of inertia (Dowty 1979), examining primarily data from two South American languages: Chorote (Mataguayan, Argentina and Paraguay) and Mẽbengokre (Jê, Brazil).