Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Moon-Ryul Jung" <moon AT saint.soongsil.ac.kr>]

On 05/31/99, ""Bryan Rocine" <brocine AT earthlink.net>" wrote:
> So we may view the X-yiqtol
> clause as a good partner for the weqatal clause in terms of
> "stativity."  The X-yiqtol clause, in its use of the 2nd
> position verb and the fientive yiqtol arrests the mainline
> of instructions to elaborate upon a particular procedure.
> 
> At the same time we can see the value of using the fientive
> yiqtol (albeit in a "stative" syntax) as a complement to the
> attributive weqatal.  We expect there to be some alternation
> between stativity and activity on the mainline and
> elaborative portions of a discourse.  Either the mainline
> will be active and the offline stative as in Historical
> Narrative or or the mainline will be stative and the offline
> will have an active element as we see in Instructional
> Discourse.  Review:
> 
> Historical Narrative:
> mainline: wayyiqtol ("verbal" syntax, fientive verb)
> off-the-line:  X-qatal ("stative" syntax, attributive verb)
> 
> Instructional Discourse:
> mainline: weqatal ("verbal" syntax, attributive verb)
> off-the-line: X-yiqtol ("stative" syntax, fientive verb)
>
 
It is reasonable for attributive verbs to describe off-line information.
Why is it then that fientive verbs are used to describe off-line 
inforamtion
In Instructional Discourse? What characteristics of instructional 
discourse
makes it happen?

Moon-Ryul Jung
Assistant Professor
Dept of Computer Science
Soongsil University, Seoul, Korea.