Is yesterday just the past tense form of now? Or are they different lexemes entirely?
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1Your hypothesis really makes me want to ask the question "what do you think today is then?".– LjLFeb 14, 2018 at 16:07
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I was inclined to parallel today and yesterday. Although, still consider them different lexemes as nouns do not inflect for tense. Someone in my class was arguing the above hypothesis and I figured the best way to back up my counterargument was with the help of people who knew much more than me!– EloisaFeb 15, 2018 at 11:25
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2 Answers
In English, only verbs have a past tense but the other parts of speech (nouns, adjectives, adverbs, ...) don't have one. The fact that you can express a notion of past-ness for some of them (e.g., former president or ex-wife) does not form a past tense.
Also now and yesterday aren't derivations from a common stem. While using common stems (or recognisably related stems) is not strictly necessary for a past tense (think of the past tense of the verb to be) it helps to have some morphological rules for forming a lot of past tense forms.
Together with the semantic arguments formulated by @curiousdannii there is no reason to think of now and yesterday as one lexeme.
answered Feb 14, 2018 at 14:25
Now can be analysed as a pro-preposition, a word standing in for a prepositional phrase. It isn't verbal, so the category of tense doesn't apply to it.
Now and yesterday are not parallel terms. Yesterday can refer to a whole day, but now doesn't even refer to a moment just before now. There's no reason to think that they're the same lexeme.
answered Feb 14, 2018 at 14:03
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Perhaps you mean that now doesn't refer to a day. It could be conceived of as an instant or an eon. (Having said that, yesterday doesn't always refer to a day either.) Feb 16, 2018 at 9:51
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Right. I meant that yesterday refers to a time within a one day period, as does today, but not now.– curiousdannii ♦Feb 16, 2018 at 11:37