Abstract

The paper investigates a light verb construction in Yiddish in which the light verb combines with a verbal stem to produce a special aspectual meaning, the exact nature of which depends on the event type denoted by the stem. Though the specific interpretations associated with the stem construction vary, I show that they have in common the property of denoting an event which is minimized in time. I analyze the semantics of the stem construction in terms of an aspectual operator (located in an inflectional head) which modifies the properties of the event argument of the stem, yielding an appropriately truncated event in each case