Salmoneus wrote:
What kind of thing?
I was thinking, pre-theoretically, that the pairs were all to do with the transmission of something to someone/something/ somewhere.
Teach-learn A transmits knowledge to B
Send-receive A transmits a parcel to B
Come-go A "transmits themselves" to location B
In each case the thing transmitted goes away from A towards B, hence the appeal of Dewrad's suggestion: andative-venitive (i.e. go versus come).
I can see from things people have said above that
come-go is different - it's intransitive for one, though languages often group things together that linguists would say were separate strictly speaking, reflexives with middle voice, agents with experiencers and so on. I guess I'm looking for a plausible
operative concept.
Salmoneus wrote:
For me, "teach" and "learn" refer to the same event, but I can send a letter today and you can receive it tomorrow. "Send" has two passive uses - the 'indirect' passive you're talking about to me is not equivalent to 'receive' at all. I can have been sent something last week, but not receive it until today (or not at all!).
I agree that sending and receiving can take place at different times, or the receiving may not happen at all, but similarly not everything taught is learnt immediately or at all. I think on balance we should put aside the possibility of time delays and failures, as they get in the way of an analysis in terms of actions and arguments.
Salmoneus wrote:
Austronesian
Absolutely! A neat alignment system that's always attracted me. I'd like to do a trigger language one day, but am just working with accusative-secundative alignment at present. This means that Terra's"Take-give" polarity is an interesting term as that takes us into ditransitive territory. (See me pre-theoretical analysis above). Thanks for the extra examples too, Terra.
Valdeut's Causative v. Anti-Causative analysis sounds promising. I shall have to think about that.