On degree of Endophoricity

Abstract

Brecht (1974) notes that the was in (5) has as its point of orientation the speech time. (1) Mary said that Tom was unwell. In other words, the past tense of was indicates that the situation concerned (i.e., Tom's being unwell) takes place in the past relative to the speech time. He calls ezophoric the tense of a subordinate clause that has the speech time as its point of orientation. Tenses of the italicized verbs of sentences in (2) are all exophoric tenses. In (Za) his being in Europe is in the past relative to the speech time and in (2b) it is at the present relative to the speech time. The pastness of embedded tenses in (2c,d) is also relative to the speech time. Thus, English embedded tense is mostly exophoric, i.e., speech-timebased. There is another type of embedded tense which has as its point of orientation the time of the matrix clause. Examples of such embedded tenses are easily found in Korean. Consider the following.