Luận văn a contrastive analysis of tense aspect combinations in english and the vietnamese equivalents with possible applications to teaching and learning english

vil LIST OF FIGTRES AND TABLES Figure]: Diagrammatic representation af time as a time line Figure2: Diagranmatic representation of “Mrs Lan cooked” Figure 3: Diagrammatic representati

VLETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOL UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES

BÙI VĂN TỰ

A Contrastive Analysis of Tense-Aspect Combinations in English and the Vietnamese Equivalents (with Possible Applications to

Teaching and Learning English)

(Phân tích đối chiễu sự kết hyp Théi-Thé trong tiếng Ánh và Lương

đương trong tiếng Việt với ứng dung trong day va hoc tiéng Anh)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Lingui Code: 60.22.15

HANOT- 2009

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOT UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INFERNATIONAL STUDLES

FACULTY OF POST - GRADUATE STUDIES

BÙI VĂN TỰ

A Contrastive Analysis of Tense-Aspect Combinations in English

and the Vietnamese Equivalents (with Possible Applications to

Teaching and Learning English)

(Phân tích đối chiéu sự kết hợp Thời-Thể trong tiếng Anh và tương

dương trong tiếng Việt với ứng dụng trong dạy và học tiéng Anh)

MLA MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Linguistics

Code: 6.22.15

Supcrvisor: Nguyễn Hương Giang, M.A

TIANOI - 2009

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ¬ tees nee eee

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES,

PART 1: INTRODUCTION

Rationale

2 Llypotheses

Scope of the study

Significance of the study

Methods of the study

Design of the study

LLL Diagrammatic representation of properties of time

1.1.2 Deixis and Temporal Referenec

1.3.8 Past Perfect Progressive

14 Expressions to future time in English

Chapter 2: The Expressions of the Equivalents to Tense and Aspect in Vietnamese 2.1, Literature review of the equivalents to Tense-Aspect System in Vietnamese 2.1L Vietnamese- an isolating language

2.1.2 The cquivalents to tenses in Vietnamese

2.1.3 The equivalents to aspect in Vietnamese

2.1.4 The use of Lense - aspecl markers in Vietnaroese

2.2 Examples of English Tense-Aspect combinations to the Vietnamese equivalents

Chapter 3: An empirical study

3.4, Rescarch design and procedures

3.5 Results and discussion

vil

LIST OF FIGTRES AND TABLES

Figure]: Diagrammatic representation af time as a time line

Figure2: Diagranmatic representation of “Mrs Lan cooked”

Figure 3: Diagrammatic representation of a situation in the past which is referred to from the

speech-act tine Figure 4: Present tense

Figure 5: Past tense

Figure 6: Present simple

Figwe 7: Present progressive

Figure 8: Present perfect

Figure 9: Prasent perfect progressive

Figure 10: Past simple

Figure 11: Past progressive

Figure 12: Past perfect

Figwe 13: Past perfect progressive

Table 1: Percentages of subjects’ options for items 1, 4, 7 and 15

Table 2: Percentayes of subjects’ options for items 5 and 12

‘Table 3: Percentages of subjects’ aptions for items 6, 8, 10 11

Table 4: Percentages of subjects’ choices far items 2, 3,9 13 and 14.

PART 1: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the stuily

[inglish is the most popular language in the world In Vietnam, Unglish has been more and

more important since Vietnam beeame an official member of the World Trade

Organization That is why every Viemamese desires to master this language to

communicate with the rest of the world, which seems to be far ftom easy for all

Vietnamese learn a foreign language

af Engtisl

To communicate eftzctively in English, it involves many aspects in which grammar is one

of the basic and central points ‘This M.A thesis focuses on the acquisition of the English

Tonsc-Aspocl combinations by Vietmnase learners, with the primary aim to what extent it

is possible to achieve competence in the field of Tense and Aspect of Euglish and their combinations,

Pursuing this aim tho paper conooulrates on thre major aspects: firstly, a generat introduetion of time and a general outline of Tense and Aspect are presented; secondly, an overview of the English Tense-Aspect combinations is shown, which will be contrasted with the Vietnamese equivalents; thirdly, an empirical research of error analysis is conducted to find out how the Victnamesc high-school Icamers deal with the Tense and

Aspect system in English in general and the present progressive in particular

2, Hypotheses

In this thesis, two research hypotheses are formulated as followed

4 Tha English Tense-Aspect combinations, especially the present progressive may

not properly be acquired by the Viemamese high school learners of English

2 Interference of the first language ix significant in the foreign language

acquisition of ihe present progressive of English,

3 Scope of the study

Both a primary research and the secondary one are conducted to meet the target of the thesis In the primary rescarch, the author draws out a general outline of tense and aspect system in English and the Vietnamese equivalents Though there exist many opinions of linguists and granmmarians in terans of lense- aspecl systems in English, the author fatlows

the ones in which English has two tenses: present and past tenses Therefore, there is no future tense mentioned i Lhe sludy, bul a various expressions to future tin Shown

aust be considered in addition to the linguistic structure of the second language and how

highly complex productive and arbitrary As Corder (1973, p 102) suggests: "Consrastive

comparison of the mother tongue of the learner and the second language will offer an account of the differences between L1 and L2 or predict learning problems or learning

len”

Tn fact, English and Victmamese have their own siruelures Vichnmmese is Iypielly classified as an isolating language in which all the words are invariable and grammatical relationships are shown through the use of word order, English, on the other hand, is classified as partially synthetic and analytical Thus, learsing English is so lurd fr Vietnamese tearnars

Since Vietnamese learners, especially high school students at my school - Quynh Ci high school in Thaibinh province, are confusingly using English tense and aspect systems when they speak English in the class or making quite a lot of mistakes in the written tests It is

my hope that this thesis plays an important role in helping the Vietnamese high school

learners

syslomative this kind of linguistic resources, and acquire a good knowledge of

English and Vielmmese grammar, which can help Ihcin usc English mors correctly

5, Methodology of the study

‘The major method of this research is contrastive analysis ‘Ihe theoretical background for the study is the comprehension of language leaning as

cognitive process For this aim,

the English Tense-Aspect combinations and the Vietnamese equivalents are analyzed

contrastively so as to find ont the similarities and the differences in which transfer from the

first language knowledge may be used lo comprehend and produce linguistic struclures iit the forsign language acquisition process

To prove whether the hypotheses can be maintained or should be rejected, an empirical research study is carried out by assessing students’ written tests A deductive method is

used to find aut the sources of crrors which help teachers of English at high schools teach

English more eftzctively

* Why Contrastive Analysis (C.A)?

Linguists and language teachers arc aware of the importance of C.A O’grady ct al (1991,

p 72) says: “seeking to improve the second language teaching methodologies, early

researchers came fo believe that by comparing and contrasting the learner's native

language with the second language, new insights could he gained into the language learning provess.”’ James (1980, p 204) states that “C.A is a linguistic enterprise aimed at

producing inverted (ie contrastive) two valued typologies (a CA is always concerned

with a pair of languages) and founded on the assumption that languages can be compared"

We know that the real purpose of C.A of the two langnages is to find out the differences and the sitilarilics in phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics, The ensors and difficulties occurring in the language acquisition may be caused by the negative interference from the first language ‘Therefore, one way to help leamers overcome the

difficulties is Lo study the differences and the sirnilarities carefully

Ellis, Rod (1994, p 17-38) asserts the importance of C.A:

“ the essential source for errors is in the cortrastive analysis {C_A) assumed to be transfer front the mother tongue (MT) af the learner towards the target language

(ILj Thus, interference from L1 towards a second or foreign language was assumed to take place whenever the habits of the learner's MI differed fram those

of the TT.”

Clearly, the am of € A is lo predict learner difficulties and make the rescarch resulls

available for language teaching so as to affect study programs and learning outcomes positively Besides, C.A provides an important impetus to the genesis of other theories and

rescarch approaches in sccond language acquisition, such as crror analysis (E.A) In EA,

Jearner language is analyzed first and then attempts are made to find explanations for the

In shot, C.A is an effective method for language teachers We-the English teachars should pay attention to the points where there are structural differences between the languages, prodicting the difficultics the learners may face We also make the Icarners awars of the contrast so that they will understand the causes of the errors and avoid committing them

6 Design of the study

‘The thesis has three main parts as follows

‘The first part - Introduction composes of the rationale, the hypothesis, the scope, the significance, the methodology and the design of the study

The second pat Development includes three chapters Chapter 1 shows the theoretical background of English tense and aspect system in chapter 2, the author presents the

PART 2: DEVELOPMENT

Chapter 1; Theoretical background

LL Time in language

There are many time deliilions and il seerus Lo be difficull to find oul the best one “Time

is a coniponent of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations

of events and the intervals Letween then, and to quantify te motions af objecis.” (the fiee Ancyclopedia) or according to the West’s Ancyclopedia of Amenican law, “time is

referred as a non-spatial contimaun in which events occur in apparenily irreversible

succession from the past through the present to the future.” Even A Einstein had his own opinion about time when he supposed that “The only reason for time is that everything

does not happen at once”

In short, time is a crucial concept of humans, since everything we experience is in some way related to time, even though we often do not perceive time intentionally ‘he

is universal, wheroas the moans of expres ing time are

expression af time in language

language specific Therefore, the acquisition of a foreign language always involves the acquisition of different linguistic means to express time

1.1.4 Diagrammatic representation of properties of time

‘Time can diagrammatically be represented as a straight time line, on which events,

Represented in a diagrammatic manner, a lime line would look the following way

Figure}: Diagrammatic representation of time as a time line

The utterance “Mrs Lan cooked”, for example, is therefore to be placed left to the present

moment to which it priority happened.

——T—————————kxt

Figure2: Diagrammatic representation of “Mrs Lan cooked”

Besides, the diagrammuitic represoulation of tims as a tims line makes the infinily of past

A fourth property of time should

be mentioned here — density, as Bennet & Michael (1981, p 46) suppose that “tine is

and future time as well as the continuity of time visible

dense, .gtven any two moments of time, there exists another moments that lies between

then,”

Nevertheless, time is a purely mental concept of humans to make the environment

measurable Klein (1984, 82) says: “Time and space are the basic categories af our

experience and our cognition, and without them, no well-coordinated collective action,

hence no human society, would be possible.”

4.1.2 Deixis and Temporal Reference

A central concept in the expression of time is deixis It relates time, place and person

Teferen

of an ufierance ditcetly Lo the situation in which the ufferance is made

Consequently, the meaning of such references depends on the context Deictic information

of an utterance can be made lexically such as the personal and locational information in the sentimes “I met hint there” (A Thomson & A Marlinct, 1991, p 284), or it can be rade

grammatically as in the tense of the verb Therefore a more complex definition of deixis is provided by Jaszezolt (2002, p.115):

“Deixis is the phenomenon of encoding cantextual information hy means of lexical

lems or grammatical distinctions to provide this information only when paired with this context in other words, it means lexicalizing or grammaticalicing coniextual information, that is making it into obligatory grammatical or lexical

distinctions.”

Almost all linguists and prammarians declare that tenses are used to locate situations in

time, therefore, tonsas are deictic catageries thal occur in mos

onlorices

It is important at this point lo clarify that tense is not directly related 1a physical time,

rather it is a grammatical category that expresses temporal relations Hence, in the sentence

like “The sun rises in the east” (L.G Alexander, 1988, p.162), the finite verb does not cxptcss a temporal relationship between the tims of utterance and a certain point of time,

“rises” is therefore is not deictic, it 1s temporal, or “Ihe earth goes round the sun” (L.G Alexander, 1988, p.162) can be related to ftom any poinl of titns and would always be trus, such utterances are called etemal truths, an other example for this would be the statement such as “one and two makes three.” (L.G Alexander, 1988, p.162)

Three more concepts have 1o be introduced al this poinl, since they sland in dirzcl relation

to dei event Lime, reference time and speech act time, These concepts derive from Reichenbach’s seminal work on temporal logic and allow for a global description of Lnglish tenses Kirst, event time (IT): event time is the time at which an eventuality takes

place Second, reference time (RT}: reference lime al which a situation is evaluated, ic

assuming that there are difftrent levels of time, a past level on which a situation occured and a present level, two possibilities arise to evaluate the past situation, either an the past level itsclf, or on the present level, which is precisely the difference of the simple past and the present perfect of the English language And third, speecb-act time (ST): speech-act

time is the point of time at which a utterance is made KT and RY can refer to punctual

the ø &, howovor, the relation ship botwoon ET RT, and ST states thơ

meaning of the tenses

‘The example “iMrs Lan cooked” can diagrammatically be represented as follows:

—————l +t

Figure 3: Diagrammatic representation of a situation in the past which is

referred to from the speech-act time

Here, “Ars Lan cooked” is an eventuality that happened and was evaluated in the past and

expressions of time are non-obligatory ‘The grammatical expressions of time are tense and

aspect In this study, lense and aspect system ought to be the main concern

1.2.1 Tense in English

L211 Definitions of tense

A lol of Einguists and griarmnarians suppose thal lense is 2 grammatical catogory referring

to the location of a sifuation in time B.Commie (1985, p 36) defines tenses as

“granmaticalised expressions of time’ Mowever, there are languages that do not

grarmnalicalive tine as tenses, such as Victmamese or Chinese and these languages are called tenseless In English, tenses are grammaticalized and formed by morphological marking of the verb and are obligatory in use The morphological boundness and

obligatory usc differentiate grammaticalized expressions of time from — lexicalized

expressions, since they are optional in use and adverbials are formed syntactically Since tenses are obligatory in use, finite verb constructions almost always indicate time

syntache means such as separate words, to express the same grammatical relationship as

inflections” English future is formed periphrastically and has a modal character, it cannot

be considered as a proper tense In this thesis, it is important to have the objections against

an English falure tense in snind though English has many ways of refering lo pasl, present

and futwe time

1.2.1.2 Classifications of tense

4212.1 Present tense Vs Past tense

As already mentioned, tense is a deictic category, or as Comrie (1985, p 39) putts it “rense

relates the time of the situation referred to some other fone, usually to tie moment of

speaking,”, nevertheless, there are differences among tenses regarding their deictic center

In pasl lense BT is prior lo ST and in present lense RT and ST are not distinguishable, they form one single point on the time line Diagranoalically pasl, presont can be represented

the following way

EY, RI, ST

Figure 4; Present tense

—-—

Figure 5; Pust tense

These diagrams show explicilly that the deictic center in simple lenses is the present moment, to which every event is related to Examples to illustrate the simple tenses are

- Present simple tense: The exhibition opens on Januury 1” and closes on January

30"

- Past simple tense: / Anew it was dangerous to get there

(LG Alexander, 1988, p 168) The deictic conler in present tense needs some further remarks TL is very unfikoly thal ET,

RT and ST coincide, B.Comrie (1985) brought only one type of situation forward that matches this picture exactly, performative speech acts” Crystal (1992, p.176) defines perfornmlive speech acis as “actions that are orally performed in the mament of speaking” To execute this sort of speech act, performative verbs have to be used, such as apologize, promise, despise etc Lience the sentence “/ name this ship Titanic’ Crystal (1992, p.187) is a performative action when ullered, since Ihe momentary event of parting

the ship happens simultaneously to the utterance

1.2.2 Aspect — definitions and Classifications

4.2.2.1 Definitions

A further grammatical category expressing time in language is aspect Many formmlations can be found in the Bicralure describing the subject of aspect, cach cmmphasizing a differcsit detail Leech et al (1971, p 145) desoribe aspect as “the wap we view an action or state, in terms of the passing of time.” Quitk et al (1993, 105) propose the following definition:

“Aspect refers to a granmatical category which reflects the way in which the verb action

is regarded or experienced with respect to time.” B.Comrie (1976, p 88) classifies

“aspects as different ways of viewing the internal temporal constituency of a situation”

What these definilions hava in coromon is the subjsclive poinl of view thal is attributed to

the articulation of aspect, yet only one mentions that aspect is a grammaticalized form of

10

time reference and one refers to the internal temporal structure [t seems that aspect is a field of great discontinuity

The author of this thesis followed Comrie’s definition of aspect because it set aspect apart

from tense Tense, as mentioned earlier, is a deictic category, whereas aspect is not deictic Tlowever, both tense and aspect are concemed with lite The difference between the

temporal relations of ense and aspect is thal tense relates the refersnee time of a silualion

to the time of utterance, which is usually the deictic center, whereas aspect relates the time

of reference to the event time For that reason Comrie (1976, p 64) refers to tense as

“situation external time”, as iL relalcs cventuafitics to he present moment or anolher point

of reference, and to aspect as “situation internal time”, since it is concerned with the internal temporal constitusncy of eventualities, and not with its relation to a reference

L22.2.1 Perfective Aspect Vs Imperfective Aspect

Granuvatical aspect is usually expressed through morphological inffsction, The prototypical representation of grammatical aspect occurs in many languages, where verbs can take different forms according to the characteristics of the situations they refer to ‘The

traditional distinction made between perfective and imperfective aspeei “overtly and

morphologically marked.” (Binnick,1991, p 204) Besides, the perfective aspect ofa verb

is the marked, whereas verbs that are non-perfective are the unmarked member of the

opposition

Regarding the meaning of the iwe aspecis, according lo Comic (1985, p 192), “the perfective aspect takes a position outside of the situation from which the writer! speaker

retrospectively views an eventuality as an entity”: therefore no distinction is made into

possible phases of the eventuality Conversely, the imporfective aspect views cventualitics

11

from inside and is concemned with the internal temporal structure of the situation, since xt can both look backwards the start of the situation, and look forwards (o the end of the situation, and indeed is equally appropriate if the situation is one that Jasts through alll time, without any beginning and without end

Hence it can be said thal the imperfective aspecL focuses ory on a certain point of time inside a situation,nol considering the baginming or (he ond of a situalion, The lermporal relationships between ET and RT in the two aspects are distinct, the perfective aspect

locate: T within RT, while 'T and XY inthe imperfective aspect are overlapping

Comic (1985, p 194) points oul thal “the meaning of the perfective aspect does not

indicate that situations are not durative, but that it is just the effect of viewing a situation

rom the outside which makes a situation seem punctual” Furthermore, Commie states that

the outside vicwpoint denotes a “complete” situation, not a “completed” situation,

indicating a completed situation would put too much emphasis on the termination of the situation, but the completion ofa situation is only one possible meaning of situation

Contrasting the lack of relerenes to the internal temporal structure of a situation of the

perfective aspect, the imperfective aspect gives explicit reference toward the intemal temporal structuring of a situation However, the distinction of perfective and imperfective aspeel does nol affvel the compatibility of the wo, they may co-uccus within the sarne verb

phrase and not contradict each other In case of a co-occurrence the semantic features of

imperfective and perfective aspect supplement each other Linglish examples are the present perfeel progressive and the past perfeel progressive, since the progressive aspect contains an imperfective notion and the perfect aspect may include perfective notion, as in the following sentences:

- Presen perfect progressive: thas heen raining hard these days in the mountainous

12

L22.2.2 Progressive Aspect Vs Non-progressive Aspect

The English progressive, as i derived fiom a spatial location, which developed into

temporal location, expresses an activity in progress and duration of a situation, but it may

also convey other meaning than that Leech (1971, p 180) summarizes the meaning of the

progressive aspect as “heing used to indicate duration, limited duration, lack of certainty ahaut the completion of a situation and the enclosure of an event with a tamporal frame”,

additionally he denotes the use of’ the progressive aspect to refer to inexorable situations emphaaizing ths persistence of situations

Examples for the various uses are

- Duration They are demanding that richer countries cut back their carbon emissions

to compensate (Vietnam Business Forum, Vol 7, June 6-12, 2009)

This cxamplc also illustrates that the proccss which is going on is not considered to be

finished in the near future, rather temporal boundaries are left indistinct

- Limited duration: He are very sensible and talking about this as we should have done last year (Victnam Business Forum, Vol 7, June 6-12, 2009)

Here the current state of being sensible is emphasized, indicating that it is only temporary state and additionally contrasted with the characteristic manner of “no? being sensible in

1988, p.163) denotes a permanent state, and “J am fiving in Wimbledon” (LG Alexander,

1988, p 167) denotas a lornporary stale

An oflen quotzd example fo illustrate tha incornpletion thal occurs with the use of the progressive aspect, is the difference between the sentences “The man drowned” (Tom Hntchinson,1997, p 28) and “The man was drowning”, of which the former indicates that

“the man died”, which is not necessarily the case in the latter sentence, since it just implics

18

that the man was in the process of drowning at a certain point of time in the past, whereas this process could have been stopped al a laler point in (he pasl Another exaraple for the incompletion of a situation would be the discrimination of the following sentences: “F

read a book that evening” (Yom Hutchinson,1997, p 16) indicates a completion of the

process of my reading a book and thal T actually reached the end of the book, whereas “T was reading a hook that evening” (Tein Hutchinson,1997, p 32) doos nol indicate

completion

1.3 Tense-aspect combinatians in English

In English, tenses are grammaticalized and formed by morphological marking of the varb and are obligatory in use The English system of grammatical time references can be described in mathematical terms as an addition of tenss and aspeet Each grammatical fonn

of locating an eventuality in time consists of a tense and either none, one or two aspects

‘The table below shows us the overview of the tense-aspect combinations in Unelish

According to B Comrie (1976, p 165), the basic meaning of present simple is “the

location of a situation at the present time", henec ET, RT and ST arc located

simultanzously in time as the fingure below:

ET, RT, ST Figure 6: Present simple

‘The simple present has multiple uses According to Celce-Murcia (1999, p 166-234),

there are some basic uses as follows:

- Habitual actions in the present:

Le walks to school every day [14-234]

~_ General ti

s Irutlhs

14

Water freeses at cero degree centigrade [17,234]

- Txpresse future when scheduled events are involved, usnally witha future time adverbial:

have a meeting next Monday [3235]

- Present event or action (usually in demonstrations, procedures, etc.)

Now I add three eggs to the mixture [15; 166]

- Inthe subordinate clauses of time or condition when the main clause contain a firture-time verb:

After he finishes work, he'll do the arvandit [22; 171]

- Present speech acts where the action is accomplished in the speaking of it

Lvesign from the commission [19-234]

1.3.2, Present Progressive

‘The meaning of the present progressive is to express a situation in progress at the present moment, viewing the situation from a point of view inside the situation ‘I'his is the reason why Kirsten (1987, p 74) ealls the present progressive “an experiential form conwasting the factual form of the simple present” The present progressive can be represented in the

following way

— + }_} +1

Figure 7: Present progressive

As mentioned the progressive aspect can be used to express “‘durativity, limited durativity and incomplation of a situation, and it can pravide a frame for another situation.”

Celce-Murcia (1999, p 236-237) presents the basic uses of the present progressive suchas:

- Activities in progress:

Ta is working at the moment [8:236]

- Extended present (action will end and therefore lacks the permanence of the

simple present) Fam studying geology at the University of Colorado [ 11; 236}

~ A Lemporary silualion

Phillips is living with his aunt] 15,236]

- Expresses fisture whsn events are planned; usually with future-time adverbials

She is coming tomorrow [17;236]

1.3.3 Present Perfect

Combining present tense with perfect aspect results in a past situation which is being

related to the present moment as the reference point ‘(he relation [ < (II = ST) can also

be presonted ina diagram:

———————

Figure 8: Present perfect

Contrasting (he past simple, where RT = ET, the presen perfeel takes the prescal slate of atlhirs as starting point for a retrospective view ona past event The exact location of ET in

the past, however, is indefinite, if the position of #'f was definite the simple past would be required Avcording to E.G Alexander (1988, p 172-174), the prosenl porfeel is used in

such cases as:

- A situation that began at a prior point in time and continues into the present:

This has helped the competent and motivated Vietnamese resources acquire solid

skills and in-depth knowledge (Vietnam business forum, vol 7, 2009)

- An action occurring or not occurring at an unspecified prior time that has

current Televarice:

She has already seen that movie.[12, 172]

- A recently completed action (often with “#sf”)

Te has just finished his homework [23.172]

- An action that happened over a prior time period and that is completed at the moment of speaking:

The value of the Johnson's house has daubled in the lost four years.[26:173]

+ Wilh verbs in subordinate clauses of lime or condition:

She won’t be satisfied until she has finished another chapter.|5;274|

18

13.4, Present Perfect Progressive

The present perfect progressive overlaps with the present perfect in that it xefers to a situation in the past fiom the present moment, yet the present perfect progressive focuses

mainly on the situation being in progress in the past and does nat make any teference as lo

the result of the situation A diagrarnmalic

could hence look as the following:

—————————t

apresenlation of the present per feel progressive

Figure 9: Present perfect progressive

The present perfact progressive is, according to Comic (1985, p 159), usually uscd with

“activity verbs and can thus be viewed as the opposite of the resultative perfect” Nevertheless, the present perfect progressive can also be used with achievement and

accomplishment verbs if crmplusis is pul on the situation itself and nol on the ongoing process of the situation The use of the present perfect progressive is sometimes similar to the use of the present perfzct According to A ‘Thomson et al (1992, p 296-297)

- —A gilumtion that began in the past (recent or distant) and continues up to the

present and possibly into the future time:

J've been waiting for an hour and he still hasn't turned up.[2;296]

+ Anaclior in progress Ibul is nol completed

Thave been reading that book.|4;296|

- Anevaluative comment on something observed over a period of time in the past

prior to some other past even! or time:

You have been drinking again!{11;296]

- Astate that changes over time:

The suidents have been getting better and hetter [17,297]

13.5, Past simple

The basie taming of the past simple is [ho location of a situation prior to the moment of

speaking so as fa express past time reference Tis important that there is a termporal gap

between the moment in which the utterance is made and the past situation which is referred

to This is usually the reason to interpret situations, described in the past tense, as

completed and thus perfective.

1

SEP

Figure 10: Past sunple

According lo Kirsten (1987, p 210), Zhe past simple is oflen used in such silualions as narrations whers il is employed o describe subjective experiences and situations in a vivid way or for exanaple the setting of a situation Thus the simple past can in narratives be used

to convey background information for the actual events of a narration Kirsten (1987, p

212 Ypuls forward Ihe fallowing example: “when Peter walked with me, T asked him some questions ”

The simple past tense can also be used to refer to present situations, such as the utterance

of a present wish Here the simple past signals a distance between the requester and his

request, making the request more polite, since in this way it is easier for the person being asked a favor to deny if Or it can be used to express an unreal situation in the present, sich

as in the sontsnce “If I were rich, T would spend the vest of my life holidaying.” (Tom Hutchinson, 1997, p 29}

Celce-Murcia (1999, p 242-245) adds more uses of the past simple as the following:

- The event can be remote in tire The Brazilian team won the World cup in 1994

- A definite single completed event in the past’

J attended a meeting of that committee last week [-4;243]

- Habitual or repeated action or event in the past:

it snowed almost every weekend last winter [9,243]

- Amevent with duration thal applied in the pas! with the implication dat it

no longer applies in the present:

Professor Nelson taught at Yale far #0 years [15,245]

- With stales in the past

He appeared to be a creative genius }20;245]

18

to the fact that neither the beginning nor the end of the situation taken into contemplation,

il appears lo be alelic and incomplete A diagrarmalic representation could be like this

——_|_}—— }—> t

Figure 11: Past progressive Vollowing the views of L.G Alexander (1988, p 170-171), there are some basic rules of the past progressive as follows:

- An action in progress at a specific point of time in the past:

They were playing foathall at 3.00 p.m yesterday [20: 170]

- Past action simultancous with some other cvents that arc usually stated in the simple past:

Karen was washing her hair when the phone rang |22;170]

- Repetition or ilcration of some ongoing past action:

Jake was coughing all night long |2;171|

- Social distancing which comes from the past and the tentativeness of the

‘The past perfect has similarities with two other past time references, the present perfzct and

the simple past; it is similar to the present perfect in that is may provide a retrospective

view on a situation in {he pasl, the difference boiry thal ET is prior to RT, and il is similar

to the simple past in that there is a tormporal gap between RT and ST Because of this similarities, the past progressive may be substituted by the simple past if there is a temporal gap between ET and RT, the temporal gap is often described by temporal adverbs

He had left befare 1 could offer him a ride (Nguyén Van An, p 467)

After he had finished his dinner, he phoned me (Xiguyén Van An, p 467)

- The past perfect may also be used with the same Lemporal references like the present perfgct, when it provides a retrospective view on a past situation, such as “jusy, already, ever” and with prepositional phrases inelnding “iif, by, since, for” such as in the following example

Her husband had just finished the day's work at his butcher's shop and they were

settling down to supper (A Thomson & A Martinet, 1991, p 301)

- When the past perfect is uscd for cetrospection it may display causal relationships and

give explanations on the source (event time) of a past situation (reference time) in which case it might be possible that the causal situation might continue up to the moment of the

siluation at RT

- The past perfect can be used in indirect speech when it is applied to the backward information expressed in the simple past or the present perfect Such the sentence as

“Have you finished the letter? said Murry” can be interpreted as “Marry wanted to know

whether I had finished the leuer” (A Thomson & A Martinet, 1991, p 304)

- The past perfect may express the unreal past situations, where a hypothetical situation in the past is presented and a temporal reference is made prior to this situation

I wish I had not failed the driving license exam yesterday (Neuyén Vin An, p 469)

1.3.8, Past Perfect Progressive

The past perfect progressive expresses the same temporal reference as the past perfect, however, emphasis is put on the curative quality of EY When there is a temporal gap delween ET and RT, ET is implied lo be aletic, this feature is used to provide background

information on a situation narrated in present perfect

—————>—— t

Figuva 13: Past perfect progressive

Celee-Murcia (1999, p 120) shows the rules of the past perfect progressive as follows:

- An action or habit taking place over a period of time in the past prior to some

other past event or time: