The purpose of this study is to propose the temporal interpretation rule of subordinate clause in narrative texts, and to testify the theoretical validity of the proposal in narrative texts. It is argued that several prior frameworks of the semantics ...
The purpose of this study is to propose the temporal interpretation rule of subordinate clause in narrative texts, and to testify the theoretical validity of the proposal in narrative texts. It is argued that several prior frameworks of the semantics of English tense markers need to be revised, and the temporal interpretation rule of tense markers in subordinate clauses according to contexts can be proposed. Thus, the temporal interpretation rule of subordinate clause (1) is proposed in this study.
(1) Temporal Interpretation Rule of Subordinate Clause(SC)
Given a sequence of clauses C1, C2....Cn in a narrative text, the event Ei of SC Ci(for i such that 1<i<n) is interpreted as follows :
(a) Ei is subordinate(or simultaneous) to main clause Ei-1 iff Ei-2(or 3) is the antecedent of Ei-1 which is the antecedent of Ei+1(or 2).
(b) Ei is posterior to main clause Ei-1 iff Ei-2(or 3) is the antecedent of Ei-1 and Ei is the antecedent of Ei+1(or 2).
(c) Ei is anterior to main clause Ei-1 iff Ei-2(or 3) is the antecedent of Ei and Ei-1 is the antecedent of Ei+l(or 2)
(d) Ei includes main clause Ei-1 iff stative Ei includes Ei-2 (or 3)or Ei+1(or 2).
It is shown that the rule can explain the various meaning interpretations of relationship between main clauses and subordinate clauses. The corredspondence between the rule and the application will be proved in the narrative texts.