Abstract

The purpose of the paper is to explore the aspect system in Thali, a language spoken in Thal region, including district Layya, Bhakar and neighboring areas of Jhang, in Punjab province by a large number of people. This research paper presents comparisons and contrasts between Thali aspect system and English aspect system. There are only two aspects in Thali, namely, perfect and progressive. Perfect aspect can be categorized into past perfect and present perfect in terms of time dimensions. Similarly, progressive aspect is also categorized into past progressive and present progressive from time dimensions. All types of aspects in Thali are morphologically marked but aspect system in English is different by using morphological marking as well as several complex constructions like have + past participle, be + present participle, and have + been + present participle for perfect, progressive and perfect progressive, respectively. Thali has only four structures for aspect whereas English has 17 different types of aspectual structures described in examples (24–40). The analyses and data examined in the paper are basically drawn from the native speaker intuitions and grammar (Beames, 1872–79). It is really a challenging job for Thali learners to conceptualise these different structures. As a final point, this paper finds out EFL issues and proposes some pedagogical strategies for teaching and learning English aspect system as a foreign language to Thali EFL learners.

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