THE LAALI PERFECTIVENESS OPERATION

his paper is concerned with the analysis of perfective in Laali. It strengthens Chomsky’s Universal Grammar hypothesis since it shows that perfectiveness is a cross-linguistic issue. Indeed, it proves that even among languages sharing the same family or zone, parameters can be observed. The analysis shows that the Laali perfective aspect is purely syntactic as it is expressed by the merge of the auxiliary oba (to be) in finite form and a subsequent finite verb form. It also proves that at the Phonetic Form level, oba can be omitted and leave the expression of perfectiveness to the only past tense form of the verb.