Perfektive

Perfektive, or the perfective aspect, is a grammatical category used in many languages to mark actions as complete or bounded in time. It contrasts with the imperfective aspect, which describes actions as ongoing, habitual, or lacking a defined endpoint. The distinction is common in Slavic languages, Baltic languages, and some Caucasian and Indian languages, among others.

Formally, the perfective is realized differently across languages. In many Slavic languages it is marked by prefixation, stem changes, or by selecting a different verb pair. For example, in Russian the imperfective читать means to read, while прочитать means to finish reading; Я прочитал книгу expresses a completed action. In Czech and Polish, verb pairs such as psát vs napsat or pisać vs napisać express the same contrast.

Telicity: The perfective typically treats events as bounded and terminated, emphasizing the endpoint or the result, while the imperfective describes duration, repetition, or general aspects. However, perfective forms can sometimes have non-final readings, and some verbs are inherently perfective or imperfective due to lexical semantics rather than morphology.

Usage: In narratives and past tense constructions, perfective verbs often denote completed actions, whereas imperfective verbs set the stage for ongoing background activity or repeated actions. Some languages require a perfective for single-event pasts and an imperfective for habitual pasts.

Notes: The term perfektive also appears in typological literature; in standard English linguistic usage the form is perfective. Some reference works retain 'perfektive' to align with other languages or with German-influenced terminology.