> ***
>
> It is not "ongoing", that is progressive.
>
> Imperfective and perfective have to do with the the
> goal of the action which > cann occur in any time.
>
> "I am eating up the cake." is perfective and
> progressive.
PR
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The present tense with be ing + is progressive
the perfective meaning is here conveyed by
the lexical item "to eat *up*.
"I'm eating the cake." is progressive.
To eat is neutral
to eat up is lexically perfective :
roughly "to eat until it's finished".
Can you distinguish lexical and grammatical features ?
Arnaud
==========================
> I do not subscribe to "coloring" laryngeals. I
> believe their major
> discernible effect was to lengthen vowels before
> disappearing; and perhaps,
> they occasionally aspirated consonants with which
> they came into immediate
> contact..
>
> Patrick
===========
Have you read "Le mémoire" de Saussure ?
As emphasized by MEillet for example,
the odd thing about *a is that it's rare,
and the only place where it's less rare,
is the initial position where it never alternates
with e.
This suggests that *a and *e are basically allophones.
a is just h2e or e is just H1a
e and a are not contrastive.
Which leads to H1 and H2
The same reasoning applies to o
which never alternates with either a or e
hence H3.
It's simple, linear and unescapable.
It can't be refuted.
ARnaud
=========