ErgativityAlthough there is only one ergative language in Europe (Basque), perhaps one-quarter of the world's languages show ergative properties, and pose considerable difficulties for many current linguistic theories. R. M. W. Dixon here provides a full survey of the various types of ergativity, looking at the ways they interrelate, their semantic bases and their role in the organisation of discourse. Ergativity stems from R. M. W. Dixon's long-standing interest in the topic, and in particular from his seminal 1979 paper in Language. It includes a rich collection of data from a large number of the world's languages. Comprehensive, clear and insightful, it will be the standard point of reference for all those interested in the topic. |
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
the universal syntacticsemantic primitives | 6 |
12 Introductory exemplification | 8 |
13 Other uses of the term ergative | 18 |
Syntactically based and semantically based marking | 23 |
21 Syntactically based marking | 25 |
22 Semantically based marking | 28 |
Both kinds of marking in one language | 35 |
51 Universal definition of subject | 113 |
52 Keenans discussion of subject | 127 |
53 Universal syntactic phenomena dependent on subject | 131 |
532 Can try begin want and similar verbs | 134 |
533 Control in reflexives | 138 |
534 Causatives | 139 |
535 Summary | 141 |
Interclausal or syntactic ergativity | 143 |
Intraclausal or morphological ergativity | 39 |
31 Types of marking of core syntactic relations | 40 |
312 Particles and adpositions | 41 |
313 Crossreferencing | 42 |
314 Two crossreferencing mechanisms | 45 |
32 Intraclausal constituent order word order | 49 |
33 Semantic basis | 52 |
34 Markedness | 56 |
341 Absolutive unmarked ergative marked | 58 |
342 Nominative unmarked accusative marked | 62 |
343 Marked nominative | 63 |
344 Marking in crossreferencing systems | 67 |
Types of split system | 70 |
411 SplitS systems | 71 |
412 FluidS systems | 78 |
42 Split conditioned by the semantic nature of NPs | 83 |
421 Bound versus free split | 94 |
43 Split conditioned by tenseaspectmood | 97 |
44 Main versus subordinate clause split | 101 |
45 Combinations of different kinds of split | 104 |
46 Summary | 108 |
Inventory of types of split | 109 |
The category of subject | 111 |
61 Passive and antipassive | 146 |
62 Syntactic pivots | 152 |
621 Basic framework for pivot investigation | 157 |
622 The SO pivot in Dyirbal | 160 |
623 Languages with morphological ergativity and an SA pivot | 172 |
624 Languages with mixed pivots | 175 |
63 Languages with ergative interclausal syntax | 177 |
Chamalal | 180 |
Language change | 182 |
71 Accusative to ergative | 187 |
72 Ergative to accusative | 193 |
73 General comments | 203 |
The rationale for ergativity | 207 |
82 What it means for a language to be ergative | 214 |
83 Summary | 223 |
84 Envoi | 229 |
A note on theoretical models | 232 |
References | 237 |
| 259 | |
| 263 | |
| 269 | |
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Common terms and phrases
absolutive accusative languages accusative system activity affixes agent allomorph antipassive antipassive derivation Australian languages banaga-n'u basic bura-n common NP Comrie constituent order coordination core NPs coreferential cross-referencing dative derived S function described discourse discussion Dixon Dyirbal English ergative languages ergative marking ergative pattern ergative system examples father fluid-S generalisation grammatical marking imperative inflection instance intra-clausal intransitive involves John Linguistics main clause markedness marker Mayan language mentioned morphological marking Nominal Hierarchy nominative-accusative nouns ŋuma omitted Papuan language Payne perfective aspect pivot condition prefix pronominal reference reflexive relative clause S/O pivot S₁ second clause see-NONFUT semantic semantically based marking sentence speakers split-ergative split-S split-S language structure subordinate clauses suffix syntactic ergativity syntactic function syntactic pivot syntactic relations syntactically based marking tense third person transitive clause transitive subject transitive verbs underlying A NP University unmarked verbal Warrgamay yabu-gu Yidin Yukulta