The Semantics of -ketun in Korean

Abstract

The conditional connective -ketun in Korean has some restrictions in both the antecedent clause and the consequent clause. In the antecedent clause the event or state denoted by the predicate must be perceptible. There are some exceptions to this restriction. The exceptional cases are where the event or state denotes a personal feeling on the part of the addressee (or addresser, in some cases). From these observations, it is concluded that the antecedent clause must be an event or state which can be directly experienced by the addressee (or, addresser). In the consequent clause, the mood must be imperative, hortative or promissive. When the mood is declarative or interrogative, the modality must be volitional. These moods or modality can be characterized as something that can be satisfied by some action on the part of the addresser or addressee. The relation between these two restrictions is that the antecedent clause changes the knowledge state of the addresser or addressee based on direct experience of something, and the addresser or addressee sets a goal and a plan for achieving the goal. And the consequent clause is an action included in the plan. This is the basic semantics of the conditional connective -ketun. I give a more specific representation of this semantics in this paper.