Aspect in English and Russian flashback discourses

Abstract

An important issue that often comes up in research on Russian aspect concerns the puzzling choice of the imperfective versus the perfective aspect in cases where both seem to be possible and seem to have similar meanings. This paper investigates flashback discourses, which often exemplify such cases and reveal criteria for how the choice is made. I provide an analysis of the two aspects in Russian based on these criteria, as well as a comparison of these two aspects to the English perfect and progressive.