A Diachronic Study of the Historical Present in English

초록

This paper aims to show the origin, characteristics, and diachronic changes of the historical present (HP) in particular and the simple present tense (SP) in general. SP is assumed to refer to psychological present tense describing mental as well as actual present events. Moreover, HP is one of the usages of SP, eliding the boundary between HP and SP, and thus, we find in Old English (OE) numerous examples of HP occurring with similar presents. We propose that HP in Middle English (ME) and Present-Day English (PE) is a continuation of HP in OE and that it is colloquial and informal, as claimed by Jespersen and shown for PE usage.

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