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The imperfective (abbreviated , , or more ambiguously ) is a grammatical aspect used to describe ongoing, habitual, repeated, or similar semantics roles, whether that situation occurs in the past, present, or future. Although many languages have a general imperfective, others have distinct aspects for one or more of its various roles, such as progressive, habitual aspect, and . The imperfective contrasts with the perfective aspect, which is used to describe actions viewed as a complete whole.
A contrast between the progressive and imperfective is seen with . In English, stative verbs, such as know, do not use the progressive ( *I was knowing French is ungrammatical), while in languages with an imperfective (for instance, French), stative verbs frequently appear in the imperfective.
| होना
honā
to be | होता होना
hotā honā
to happen | होता रहना
hotā rêhnā
to keep happening | होता जाना
hotā jānā
to keep on happening | होता आना
hotā ānā
to have been happening | हो रहा होना
ho rahā honā
to be happening | हो रहा रहना
ho rahā rêhnā
to stay happening |
| करना
karnā
to do | करता होना
kartā honā
to be doing | करता रहना
kartā rêhnā
to stay doing | करता जाना
kartā jānā
to keep doing | करता आना
kartā ānā
to have been doing | कर रहा होना
kar rahā honā
to be doing | कर रहा रहना
kar rahā rêhnā
to stay doing |
| मरना
marnā
to die | मरता होना
martā honā
to be dying | मरता रहना
martā rêhnā
to stay dying | मरता जाना
martā jānā
to keep dying | मरता आना
martā ānā
to have been dying | मरा रहा होना
mar rahā honā
to be dying | मर रहा रहना
mar rahā rêhnā
to stay dying |
Now, these copula verbs (besides होना honā) can themselves be converted into their participle forms and put into one of the three different aspects of Hindi-Urdu, which are Habitual aspect, progressive, and perfective aspects, hence generating sub-aspectual infinitive forms. This way a verb form combining two grammatical aspects is constructed. The table below shows the combined aspectual forms:
| होता रहता होना
hotā rêhtā honā
to regularly keep happening | होता रहा होना
hotā rahā honā
to have been regularly happening | होता रह रहा होना
hotā rêh rahā honā
to stay being happening | होता जाता होना
hotā jātā honā
to continuously keep happening | होता जा रहा होना
hotā jā rahā honā
to continuously keep happening | होता आ रहा होना
hotā ā rahā honā
to have been continuously kept happening | हो रहा रहता होना
ho rahā rêhtā honā
to continuously stay happening progressively |
| करता रहता होना
kartā rêhtā honā
to regularly keep doing | करता रहा होना
kartā rahā honā
to have been regularly doing | करता रह रहा होना
kartā rêh rahā honā
to stay being doing | करता जाता होना
kartā jātā honā
to continuously keep doing | करता जा रहा होना
kartā jā rahā honā
to continuously keep doing | करता आ रहा होना
kartā ā rahā honā
to have been continuously kept doing | कर रहा रहता होना
kar rahā rêhtā honā
to continuously stay doing progressively |
| मरता रहता होना
martā rêhtā honā
to regularly keep dying | मरता रहा होना
martā rahā honā
to have been regularly dying | मरता रह रहा होना
martā rêh rahā honā
to stay being dying | मरता जाता होना
martā jātā honā
to continuously keep dying | मरता जा रहा होना
martā jā rahā honā
to continuously keep dying | मरता आ रहा होना
martā ā rahā honā
to have been continuously kept dying | मर रहा रहता होना
mar rahā rêhtā honā
to continuously stay dying progressively |
In narrative, one of the uses of the imperfective is to set the background scene ("It was midnight. The room was dark. The rain was beating down. Water was streaming in through a broken window. A gun lay on the table."), with the perfective describing foregrounded actions within that scene ("Suddenly, a man burst into the room, ran over to the table, and grabbed the gun.").
English does not have these aspects. However, the background-action contrast provides a decent approximation in English:
'Was reading', however, is different. Besides being the background to 'entered', the form 'reading' presents "an internal portion of John's reading, with no explicit reference to the beginning or to the end of his reading." This is the essence of the imperfective aspect. Or, to continue the quotation, "the perfective looks at the situation from the outside, without necessarily distinguishing any of the internal structure of the situation, whereas the imperfective looks at the situation from inside, and as such is crucially concerned with the internal structure of the situation, since it can both look backwards towards the start of the situation, and look forwards to the end of the situation, and indeed it is equally appropriate if the situation is one that lasts through all time, without any beginning and without any end."
This is why, within the past tense, perfective verbs are typically translated into English as simple past, like 'entered', whereas imperfective verbs are typically translated as 'was reading', 'used to read', and the like. (In English, it is easiest to illustrate aspect in the past tense. However, any tense is possible: Present "John is reading as I enter", future "John will be reading when I enter", etc.: In each tense, the aspectual distinction is the same.)
This aspectual distinction is not inherent to the events themselves, but is decided by how the speaker views them or wishes to present them. The very same event may be described as perfective in one clause, and then imperfective in the next. For example,
The perfective and imperfective need not occur together in the same utterance; indeed they more often do not. However, it is difficult to describe them in English without an explicit contrast like "John was reading when I entered."
Here each sitting is an unanalyzed whole, a simple event, so the perfective root of the verb 'sat' is used. However, the clause as a whole describes an ongoing event conceived of as having internal structure, so the imperfective suffix -eshe is added. Without the suffix, the clause would read simply as In the evening he sat on the veranda.
where the two forms of 'to read' refer to the same thing. In 'John read that book yesterday', however, John's reading is presented as a complete event, without further subdivision into successive temporal phases; while in 'while he was reading it', this event is opened up, so that the speaker is now in the middle of the situation of John's reading, as it is in the middle of this reading that the postman arrives.
Combination
The two aspects may be combined on the same verb in a few languages, for perfective imperfectives and imperfective perfectives. Georgian and Bulgarian, for example, have parallel perfective-imperfective and aorist-imperfect forms, the latter restricted to the past tense. In Bulgarian, there are parallel perfective and imperfective stems; aorist and imperfect suffixes are typically added to the perfective and imperfective stems, respectively, but the opposite can occur. For example, an imperfect perfective is used in Bulgarian for a simple action that is repeated or habitual:"Bulgarian", Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, ed. 2
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