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Асимметрия ‘близкого’ и ‘далекого’: темпоральные значения
This paper considers temporal meanings of Russian spatial adverbs and adjectives. We demonstrate the asymmetry between the temporal meanings of proximal and distal spatial words and analyze its semantic sources. One of the main manifestations of this asymmetry is the preferred future reference in the words denoting closeness (cf. blizkie kanikult ‘close vacations’ = ‘holidays are in the future’) and the preferred past reference in the words denoting remoteness (cf. dalekie gody ‘distant years’ = ‘years are in past’). However, this general trend is complicated by other factors. For example, short forms of the adjective blizkij ‘close’ have temporal usages, (Pobeda blizka ‘The victory is close’), while short forms of dalekij ‘far’ do not (?Pobeda daleka ‘The victory is far’). However, predicative adverb blizko ‘close’ cannot be used temporally in the construction with a preposition do ‘up to’ (*do Novogo goda blizko ‘It is close to the New Year’), while this usage is typical for adverbs daleko ‘far’ and nedaleko ‘not far’ (Do Novogo goda (ne)daleko ‘It is s still far / already close to the New Year’). Interestingly, in this usage, the temporal reference of dalekij ‘far’ changes: it indicates not the past, but the future. Surprisingly, tut ‘here’ and tam ‘now’ demonstrate the opposite trend: the former points primarily to the past, while the latter to the future (Idu ja po ulitse, i tut mne navstrechu medved’ ‘I walk along the street, and here I meet a bear’; Vesna pridet, a tam i leto ‘Spring is coming, and then there is summer’). However, the asymmetry still holds: tut usually indicates immediate succession, and tam larger time intervals. The lack of predictability and the non-linear nature of the asymmetry between ‘far’ and ‘near’ is manifested in all the words considered in this paper.