linguistics Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. It is called a scientific study because it entails a comprehensive, systematic, objective, and precise analysis of all aspects of language, particularly its nature and structure. Lingu ...

, semelfactive is a class of aktionsart or lexical aspect (verb aspects that reflect the temporal flow of the denoted event, lexically incorporated into the verb's root itself rather than grammatically expressed by inflections or auxiliary verbs). The event represented by a semelfactive verb is punctual (instantaneous, taking just a moment),

perfective The perfective aspect ( abbreviated ), sometimes called the aoristic aspect, is a grammatical aspect that describes an action viewed as a simple whole; i.e., a unit without interior composition. The perfective aspect is distinguished from the i ...

(treated as a complete action with no explicit internal temporal structure), and

atelic In linguistics, telicity (; ) is the property of a verb or verb phrase that presents an action or event as having a specific endpoint. A verb or verb phrase with this property is said to be ''telic''; if the situation it describes is ''not'' ...

(not having a goal). Semelfactive verbs include "blink", "sneeze", and "knock". The idea of semelfactive as a category of lexical aspect was first posited by

Bernard Comrie Bernard Sterling Comrie, (; born 23 May 1947) is a British-born linguist. Comrie is a specialist in linguistic typology, linguistic universals and on Caucasian languages. Early life and education Comrie was born in Sunderland, England on 23 Ma ...

in addition to the more commonly known categories such as verbs of Activity, Accomplishment, Achievement, and State. The term's use in the realm of grammatical aspect is analogous in meaning to "

iterative Iteration is the repetition of a process in order to generate a (possibly unbounded) sequence of outcomes. Each repetition of the process is a single iteration, and the outcome of each iteration is then the starting point of the next iteration. ...

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