Pluractionality vs. discontinuity

Abstract

Verbal plurality that includes meanings such as iteration and frequency is commonly thought of as the pluralization of the event argument of a verb. This paper aims at identifying another source of iterativity whereby a sentence refers to a single but temporally discontinuous event. In Chuvash (Altaic, Turkic), this is what happens when the morpheme -kala- attaches to VP. I analyze this morpheme as a degree modifier on event predicates indicating that the degree to which a certain event type is realized with respect to a contextually determined gradable property falls below the standard of comparison. If continuity is fixed as a relevant property, the discontinuous interpretation results.