Selected Papers from the Fourteenth International ... - STIBA Malang

44 Svenja Kranich
feature of the majority of the situations expressed by predicates containing the
progressive in OE (cf. Nickel 966: 238–259). One may opt for an intermediate
position and consider the progressive to have a ‘double core meaning’ (i.e., aspectual
and attitudinal meaning), as Rydén ( 997) does. 4
The combination of the progressive with always-type adverbials (henceforth
ALWAYS) 5 occurs frequently, both in subjective and objective meanings. In regard
to the former meaning, ALWAYS refers to a time-span perceived to be of remarkable
or even excessive length by the speaker; in regard to the latter, the adverb
refers to a situation that objectively holds at all times.
In Middle English (ME), apart from a drop in frequency, the progressive is
used more or less as in OE: it often refers to imperfective events and is commonly
used “to describe in a vivid and emphatic way” (Mustanoja 960: 594). It also still
regularly co-occurs with ALWAYS (cf. Scheffer 975 2 8–220 for evidence of this
and other similarities between the use of the progressive in OE and ME). In EModE
the progressive continues to be available for both aspectual and attitudinal functions,
but a change becomes noticeable in regard to its aspectual use: while in OE
and ME the progressive is used for imperfective situations in general, in EModE
the trend becomes clear that it is more and more restricted to progressive situations,
i.e., situations which are both imperfective and dynamic and hence most
often of limited duration (since dynamic events require an input of energy, which
is normally not endlessly supplied). This has the consequence that now ALWAYS,
when combined with the progressive, rarely has the objective meaning ‘at all times
possible’, as we shall see clearly in the following discussion of this type.
3. The three types of subjective progressives in Early
and Late Modern English
Apart from this type of subjective progressive, the combination of progressive +
ALWAYS (type ), we can distinguish two more types of subjective progressives,
namely subjective progressives without ALWAYS (type 2) and the interpretative
progressive (type 3), i.e., the use of the progressive to signal that a more basic
4. One should underline, however, that it is impossible to find a ‘panchronic core meaning’ for
the progressive from OE to PDE, double or otherwise, as Rydén ( 997) endeavoured to, since
the construction underwent decisive changes in regard to its functions from OE to ModE.
. This means adverbials referring to the concept expressed by always, perpetually, forever
and similar adverbs and adverbial phrases such as day and night, all the time. In OE among
the adverbs most commonly occurring with the progressive are for instance simle, æfre, aa
(cf. Nickel 966: passim).