THE LEXICO-GRAMMATICAL CATEGORY OF THE VERB ASPECT

Abstract

The paper provides an in-depth analysis of the theories of aspect and outlines the new tendencies in the research of aspectuality in the Slavic languages. It also shows a good number of their flaws concerning methodology. The author develops her own theory of aspectuality, which supports the idea of three verbal aspects, not just two, as they are traditionally described. They correspond to the simple imperfective aspect (primary) being unmarked; the perfective, and the iterative aspect. Morphological and word-formation arguments in favour of such an interpretation exist in all modern Slavic languages.