Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>]

Dear David,

I see no reason to go into the details of this post. I will just 
remind you that M. Broman Olsen got her Ph.D in linguistics with the 
"plod"-example as her basis for uncancellable meaning. As long as you 
have not shown that the dynamicity and durativity of verbs like 
"sing" and "run" can be cancelled, you have failed to prove tha 
uncancellable meaning does not exist.

Best regards,

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo


> Hi Rolf,
>
> It seems to me that you are operating with a syllogism that might be
> appropriate from your science background, but one that is not
> necessarily appropriate for language.
>
> With "plod" here's how your syllogism seems to be working:
>
> "plod" means "slow" because this meaning cannot be cancelled > because
> this meaning cannot be cancelled, there is an "uncancellable meaning" to
> "plod" > since I have demonstrated that "plod" has an "uncancellable
> meaning", I have therefore demonstrated that "uncancellable meaning"
> exists and is appropriate elsewhere in language such as in verbal systems.
>
> This is wrong -- all you have demonstrated is that English "plod" has a
> tight semantic field, not that "uncancellable meaning" is appropriate
> wholesale across language. This type of thing has already been raised
> with you by Stoney Brewer on this list. Besides, your claim that "plod"
> must always have the meaning "slow" may not be true, as "plod" can not
> just trigger a concept of speed, but also the movement performed. The
> so-called uncancellable meaning of "plod" can in some contexts be
> cancelled, as in the this sentence which is acceptable in my English
> dialect:
>
> (1) I plodded quickly through the mud to the garage.
>
> So if the so-called "uncancellable meaning" of "plod" is not "slow",
> evidenced by the fact that "plod" can co-occur with "quickly" as in (1),
> then what is it?
>
> I note that you have did not interact with the number of pages I
> presented in my review where the evidence of "uncancellable meaning" is
> entirely lacking, eg demonstrative and anaphoric multifunctionality,
> conjunctions, modal multifunctionality, person, number and gender
> multifunctionality, etc., etc. All of this evidence establishes the fact
> that "uncancellable meaning" is not a linguistic category which is
> appropriate wholesale across language. This means that "uncancellable
> meaning" might exist in a verbal system, or it might not, since
> "uncancellable meaning" is not intrinsic to language. In my review, I
> even presented references where it has been shown that even your
> so-called "uncancellable" procedural traits have been shown to be
> cancellable!
>
> All this means that a linguistic work cannot assume that "uncancellable
> meaning" exists in language, and must exist in a verbal system, as yours
> has done.
>
> Regards,
> David Kummerow.
>
>
> >  Subject:
> >  [b-hebrew] b-hebrew Uncancellable meaning and Hebrew verbs
> >  From:
> >  Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>
> >  Date:
> >  Tue, 23 Jun 2009 15:55:13 +0200
> >  To:
> >  b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
> >
> >  To:
> >  b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
> >
> >
> >  Dear list-members,
> >
> >  David Kummerow brought up the question about "uncancellable meaning" and
> >  indicated his strong feeling against the claim that such meaning exists.
> >  So I think it is fine to say something about it. The approach I have
> >  used in my study of Hebrew verbs is diametrically opposed to the
> >  discourse approach of Niccacci and others. Discourse analysis describes
> >  functions and patterns, but I have been looking for the *meaning* of
> >  each verb form. My question has been whether it is possible to speak of
>  > meaning, and if so, whether it is possible to describe this meaning.
> >  Therefore I have been looking for characteristics of verbs that remain
> >  the same regardless of the outward circumstances. I understand David to
> >  mean that such an approach is not possible, because meaning that always
> >  is the same and can never be cancelled does not exist. This is the
> >  issue, and I will now demonstrate that David is wrong.
>  >
> >  Mari Broman Olsen wrote the dissertation "A Semantic and Pragmatic Model
> >  of lexical and Grammatical Aspect," and it was published in 1997.  She
> >  discussed the English and New Testament Greek verbal systems, and her
> >  basic approach was to distinguish between "concersational pragmatic
> >  implicature" (meaning that is derived from the context and may change
> >  (be cancellable) and "semantic meaning" (meaning that always will be the
> >  same and never can be cancelled). She got her Ph.D in linguistics, and
> >  she would not have achieved that if "uncancellable meaning" is not a
> >  viable linguistic concept. I got my Ph.D with a similar approach to
> >  Hebrew verbs.
> >
> >  Broman Olsen gives the following example to illustrate the existence of
> >  uncancellable meaning:
> >
> >  This principle Broman Olsen takes from the linguist H. P. Grice, and it
> >  is that "semantic meanings may not be cancelled without contradiction or
> >  reinforced without redundancy".
> >
> >  We can ask: Are the concepts "tired" and "slow" a part of the semantic
> >  meaning of "plod"? Example 1) is contradictory, 2) is redundant, but 3)
> >  and 4) are normal. This means that "slow" is a part of the semantic
> >  meaning of "plod" (there are no situations when "slow" can be cancelled
> >  or separated from "plod". But "tired" is not a part of the semantic
> >  meaning; people who are plodding along may or may not be tired.
> >
> >  1) Elsie plodded along, #but not slowly.
> >
> >  2) Elsie plodded along, #slowly.
> >
> >  3) Margaret plodded along, although she was not tired.
> >
> >  4) Margaret plodded along; she was very tired.
> >
> >  These examples show clearly that "semantic meaning" do exist!  In
> >  connection with verbs, we may also distinguish between semantic meaning
> >  and conversational pragmatic implicature. A verb who is viewed as
> >  stative, may also be fientive ("The ship floats," versus "The ship was
> >  afloat."). So stativity cannot be classified as semantic meaning. The
> >  same is true with verbs that are viewed as punctiliar (some say,
> >  punctual); such verbs may have a durative interpretation in some
> >  situations. But in three groups of verbs we can speak of semantic meaning.
> >
> >  When a verb is marked for telicity, this property is uncancellable. I
> >  use the expression "marked for," because verbs, and phrases, and clauses
> >  can be made telic by addition of particular words. Thus, 4) is
> >  non-telic, and 5) is telic because of the adverbial. So telicity per se
> >  does not represent semantic meaning. But some verbs "are born" telic, so
> >  to speak, and they can never loose their telicity. Because of this we
> >  can say that they are marked for telicity (the end is conceptually a
> >  part of the Aktionsart of the verb).
> >
> >  4) Peter walked on the street.
> >
> >  5) Peter walked to his office.
> >
> >  In English, pharasal verbs are often marked for telicity, such as "break
> >  through; pass away; fall apart" etc. They can never loos thir telicity.
> >
> >  Other properties of verbs apart from telicity that are uncancellable are
> >  dynamicity (=change) and durativity (an action or state continues for
> >  some time).  To apply this to 2 Samuel 12:3, the verbs $TH and )KL are
> >  both marked for dynamicity (the actions of eating and drinking change
> >  through time) and for  durativity (the actions go on for a time).
> >  Regardless of whether these verbs are expressed as YIQTOLs, WAYYIQTOLs,
> >  QATALs, infinitives or participles, they will always remain durative and
> >  dynamic.
> >
> >  Those who deny the existence of "semantic meaning," must demonstrate
> >  that verbs that are marked for durativity, dynamicity, or telicity can
> >  loose these properties.
> >
> >  On the basis of the fact that semantic meaning do exist, in the work
>  > with the Hebrew verbal system, I systematically distinguished between
> >  pragmatics and semantics. And this has never systematically been done in
> >  in studies in BH or the other ancient Semitic language. This means
> >  particularly that I distinguish between temporal reference and tempus,
> >  which is an elementary linguistic distinction. So why no one has done
> >  this in Semitic studies is strange.
> >
> >  In practical application, this distinction between pragmatics and
>  > semantics means that when I analyze 93.1% of the WAYYIQTOLs as having
> >  past reference, I am not prepared to say that this means that they
> >  represent past tense. Neither would I say that this shows that they
> >  represent the perfective aspect, because this aspect normally is used
> >  with past reference in aspectual language. I did not exclude these
> >  possibilities when I started my study, but I took different steps to try
> >  to illuminate the situation.
> >
> >  First, I asked if we see a grammaticalization process that is almost
> >  completed. Grammaticalization means that a verb form with several uses
> >  or functions, gradually over time looses one function after the other,
> >  until it eventually has only one function. Such a process would be
> >  discernible in the books of the Tanakh; we would expect to see more
> >  different uses of WAYYIQTOL in the older books compared with the younger
> >  ones. But that is not the case, so I exclude any grammaticalization
> >  process.
> >
> >  Second, I asked whether past reference of so many WAYYIQTOLs was
> >  pragmatic rather than semantic, and after an analysis of thousands of
> >  examples, I concluded that this was the case.
> >
> >  The points above may illustrate the issue, and I stop with this. But the
> >  point is that uncancellable semantic meaning do exist, and because of
> >  this, it is profitable to study dead languages with this in mind.
> >
> >
> >
> >  Best regards,
> >
> >  Rolf Furuli
> >  University of Oslo
>
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