| Ergative-absolutive Language |
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An ergative-absolutive Language (or simply '''ergative''') is one that treats the Agent of Transitive Verb s distinctly from the argument of Intransitive Verb s and the Object of transitive verbs. Ergative vs. accusative languages The distinguishing feature of an ergative language is that it maintains an equivalence between the object of a transitive verb and the argument of an intransitive verb, while treating the agent of a transitive verb differently. This contrasts with ''nominative-accusative'' languages (such as English), where the subject of transitive and intransitive verbs are treated like each other but distinctly from the object of a transitive verb. These different arguments can be symbolized as follows:
The relationship between ergative and accusative systems can be schematically represented as the following: ''See Morphosyntactic Alignment for a more technical explanation and a comparison with Nominative-accusative Language s.'' Realization of ergativity Ergativity can be found in both in Morphology and Syntactic behavior. Morphological ergativity If the language has morphological Case , then the Verb Argument s are marked thus:
The following Basque examples demonstrate ergative-absolutive case marking system: In Basque, ''gizona'' is "the man" and ''mutil'' is "boy". ''Gizona'' has a different case marking depending on whether it is the argument of a transitive or intransitive verb. The first form is in the absolutive case, marked here by a Null Morpheme ''(-∅)'' and the second form is in the ergative case, marked by a ''-k'' suffix. The argument of the intransitive sentence and the object of the transitive sentence both have the same absolutive case, while ergative case appears only on the transitive agent. In contrast, Japanese , a nominative-accusative language, marks nouns with a different case marking system: In this language, the subject ''otoko'' of intransitive and transitive sentences is marked with the same Nominative Case ''ga''. However, the object of transitive sentence ''kodomo'' is marked with the Accusative Case ''wo''. If there's no case marking, ergativity can be marked through other means, such as in verbal morphology. For instance, Abkhaz has no morphological ergative case, but its verbal agreement structure is ergative. In languages with ergative-absolutive systems, the absolutive form is usually the most Unmarked form of a word. A number of languages have both ergative and accusative morphology. A typical example is a language that has nominative-accusative marking on verbs and ergative-absolutive case marking on nouns. Georgian also has an ergative alignment, but the agent is only marked with the ergative case in the past tense (also known as the "aorist Screeve "). Compare: Katsi vashls chams. Katsma vashli chama. ''Kats-'' is the root of the word "man". In the first sentence (present continuous tense) the agent is in the nominative case ''(katsi).'' In the second sentence, which shows ergative alignment, the root is marked with the ergative suffix ''-ma''. However, there are some intransitive verbs in Georgian that behave like transitive verbs, and therefore employ the ergative case in the past tense. Consider: Katsma daatsemina. Although the verb ''sneeze'' is clearly intransitive, it is conjugated like any other transitive verbs. In Georgian there are a few verbs like these, and there has not been a clear-cut explanation as to why these verbs have evolved this way. One explanation is that verbs such as "sneeze" did use to have a direct object (the object being "nose" in the case of "sneeze") and over time lost these objects, yet kept their transitive behavior. Syntactic ergativity Ergativity may be manifested through syntax in addition to through morphology, as there are no attested cases of syntactic ergativity in the world's languages occuring without also having morphological ergativity. As with morphology, syntactic ergativity can be placed on a continuum, whereby certain syntactic operations may pattern accusatively while other ergatively. The degree of syntactic ergativity is then dependent on the number of syntactic operations that treat the Subject like the Object.
Split ergativity See Also: Split ergativity The term ''ergative-absolutive'' is considered unsatisfactory by some, since there are very few languages without any patterns that exhibit Nominative-accusative Alignment . Instead they posit that one should only speak of ''ergative-absolutive systems'', which languages employ to different degrees. Many languages classified as ergative in fact show split ergativity, whereby syntactic and/or morphological ergative patterns are conditioned by the grammatical context, typically person or the tense/aspect of the verb. In Urdu and Hindi , ergative case is marked on agents in the perfective aspect for transitive and ditransitive verbs, while in other situations agents appear in the nominative case. :लड़का किताब ख़रीदता है laRkaa kitaab khariidtaa hai :boy-NOMINATIVE book-NOMINATIVE buy-IMPERFECT be-PRESENT ¹ :"The boy buys a book." :लड़के ने किताब ख़रीदी laRke ne kitaab khariidii :boy-ERGATIVE book-NOMINATIVE buy-PERFECT ¹ :"The boy bought a book." ::''(¹) The grammatical breakup has been simplified to show the features relevant to the example.'' In Dyirbal , pronouns are morphologically nominative-accusative when the agent is first or second person, but ergative when the agent is a third person. Distribution of ergative languages Prototypical ergative languages are, for the most part, restricted to specific regions of world: the Caucasus , parts of North America and Mesoamerica , and Australia . Some specific languages are the following:
Many other languages have more limited ergativity, such as Pashto and Hindi , ( Indo-Iranian ), where ergative behavior occurs only in the perfective. Traces of ergativity in English English does show a trace of something that could be regarded as ergativity. With an intransitive verb, adding the suffix ''-ee'' to the verb produces a label for the person performing the action: :"John has retired." → "John is a retiree." :"John has escaped." → "John is an escapee." :"John is standing." → "John is a standee." However, with a transitive verb, adding ''-ee'' does not produce a label for the person doing the action. Instead, it gives us a label for the person to whom the action is done: :"Mike employs Susie." → "Susie is an employee." :"Mike has inducted Susie." → "Susie is an inductee." :"Mike has appointed Susie" → "Susie is an appointee." The differing effect of the "-ee" suffix, depending on the transitivity of the verb, can be considered ergativity. (Etymologically, the sense in which "-ee" denotes the object of a transitive verb is the original one, arising from French Past Participle s in "-é". This would still be considered the prevalent sense in UK English: the intransitive uses are all 19th century American coinages and all except "escapee" are still marked as "chiefly U.S." by the ''Oxford English Dictionary''.) English also has a number of so-called Ergative Verb s, which allow the object of a transitive clause to become the subject of an intransitive clause. Philippine languages as ergative Tagalog (Schachter 1976, 1977; Kroeger 1993). See also Bibliography
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