Transitive vs. Intransitive

[txmmj]

Do any of you have a special way in your conlang to represent the difference between the two? Do you have different conjugations? Are there two different words of each? Is there no difference?

In mine, I decided to represent a transitive verb by adding a specific suffix, while adding a prefix when it's transitive (and I'm think about also making transitive verbs represent the passive...)

[Matt]

(and I'm think about also making transitive verbs represent the passive...)

What do you mean by this? A transitive verb has two required arguments (subject and object). Passivization decreases the number of required arguments by one (move the object to the subject position and you can drop the original subject). That is, passivization turns a transitive verb into an intransitive verb.

[Rik]

(and I'm think about also making transitive verbs represent the passive...)

What do you mean by this? A transitive verb has two required arguments (subject and object). Passivization decreases the number of required arguments by one (move the object to the subject position and you can drop the original subject). That is, passivization turns a transitive verb into an intransitive verb.

This is true in English.

I agree the OP needs to clarify his proposal for his conlang as, at the moment, "[...] represent a transitive verb by adding a specific suffix, while adding a prefix when it's transitive (and I'm think about also making transitive verbs represent the passive...)" reads nonsensically.

As to my conlangs ...

Gevey makes a distinct differentiation between transitive and non-transitive verbs and ... well, it gets kinda complex (as all good things should).

[Corundum]

My conlang keeps argument structure to the morphology and not the lexicon.

Code: Select all

die-STAT-NFOC-PAT X    "X is dead"
die-DYN-NFOC-PAT X     "X die"
die-DYN-NFOC-AoP X Y   "X kill Y"
die-DYN-NFOC-AP X      "X commit suicide"

have-STAT-FOC-PAT X Y  "X have Y"
have-DYN-FOC-PAT X Y   "X get Y"
have-DYN-FOC-AoP X Y Z "X give Y Z"
have-DYN-FOC-AP X Y    "X take Y"

know-STAT-FOC-PAT X Y  "X know Y"
know-STAT-NFOC-PAT X   "X is knowledgeable"
know-DYN-FOC-PAT X Y   "X learn Y"
know-DYN-NFOC-PAT X    "X become knowledgeable"
know-DYN-FOC-AoP X Y Z "X inform Y Z"

[/size]
This shows the morphological breakdown for some words.

(Naturally, the English translations aren't exact, and I'm not going into detail explanation of the morphemes, but leave it as an exercise for whoever reads this)

[WeepingElf]

In Old Albic, transitive verbs have two personal affixes, one for the object and one for the subject.

[Vardelm]

Code: Select all

die-STAT-NFOC-PAT X    "X is dead"
die-DYN-NFOC-PAT X     "X die"
die-DYN-NFOC-AoP X Y   "X kill Y"
die-DYN-NFOC-AP X      "X commit suicide"

have-STAT-FOC-PAT X Y  "X have Y"
have-DYN-FOC-PAT X Y   "X get Y"
have-DYN-FOC-AoP X Y Z "X give Y Z"
have-DYN-FOC-AP X Y    "X take Y"

know-STAT-FOC-PAT X Y  "X know Y"
know-STAT-NFOC-PAT X   "X is knowledgeable"
know-DYN-FOC-PAT X Y   "X learn Y"
know-DYN-NFOC-PAT X    "X become knowledgeable"
know-DYN-FOC-AoP X Y Z "X inform Y Z"

[/size]

Do I detect the influences of Rick Morneau's Lexical Semantics?

[Chuma]

In Rammy, there is no distinction; actually all verbs can be considered optionally transitive. I don't know of any natlang which does this, oddly enough.

In the Choir Conlang, the verb is inflected to specify each argument, like a combination of voice and person agreement; for transitive verbs this has to be done for both agent and patient. Therefore, intransitive verbs have a pile of voices, but transitive verbs have a pile squared.

[txmmj]

(and I'm think about also making transitive verbs represent the passive...)

What do you mean by this? A transitive verb has two required arguments (subject and object). Passivization decreases the number of required arguments by one (move the object to the subject position and you can drop the original subject). That is, passivization turns a transitive verb into an intransitive verb.

Oops, I actually meant to write intransitive. But what I mean is that instead on distinguishing the passive voice and the intransitive in my conlang, they'd be the same conjugation, but the passive gives the option of saying what was done by whom.

But I'll give some examples of how I'm thinking of making it work in my conlang (not 100% yet):

Lokken onn valokké. - He dropped the book.
Lokken évalokk. - The book fell.
In lokken évalokk. - The book was dropped by him.

valokka - to drop or to fall
lokken - the book
in - him (acc.)

[Curlyjimsam]

I don't have any totally systematic way in any of my conlangs (probably ought to get around to a conlang that does systematically make the distinction, actually ... be kind of cool to have a language that has a different paradigm for each type), though some do have derivational processes for deriving one from the other, e.g. in Greater Atlian the suffixes -poyi and -(i)keyi, or the prefix i can be used to increase the valency of any verb by one, for example kuyi “to die” > ikuyi “to kill”.

I had an idea today of a language which doesn't use intransitive verbs per se at all, but rather treats such concepts as nouns, and uses a copula construction where we'd use "experiencer+verb". So for "the man is walking" you'd say "the man-NOM be-PRES walking-NOM" or something like that. Don't know if I'll take this anywhere, though.

[Corundum]

Do I detect the influences of Rick Morneau's Lexical Semantics?

Yes. The two main sources of inspiration/influence for my conlang are Biblical Hebrew and his Latejami.

[Simmalti]

In Filtxe, the second consonant of the verb is doubled and an epethetic shwa is inserted:

Littu pukli - I eat
Littu pukkyli x - I eat x

[Rui]

I had an idea today of a language which doesn't use intransitive verbs per se at all, but rather treats such concepts as nouns, and uses a copula construction where we'd use "experiencer+verb". So for "the man is walking" you'd say "the man-NOM be-PRES walking-NOM" or something like that. Don't know if I'll take this anywhere, though.

I'm working out a system where there's no intransitive verbs at all either, but in a different way. Basically, every verb will have at least one argument (the subject), and then most verbs will also have a second argument (direct object). For verbs that don't, a reflexive pronoun is used that agrees with the subject in person/number. As the language progresses, I'm planning to level it out to just the accusative forms of the 3sing pronouns (vunò/vò/äśśò, for m/f/n. Yes, I know it says "ass" if you get rid of the diacritics, get over it). Eventually, I hope this turns into a clitic/prefix that can be used to distinguish transitive/intransitive verbs (normal DOs follow the verb rather than precede), probably in a reduced form (I was thinking vno-/vo-/śo-). And then maybe have it turn into something like da-/wo- compounds in German (except with verbs, obviously), where you can use the intransitive form when the object is a pronoun.

Or something. I feel like something like this has done before or has showed up in a natlang...

So for example, with the verb lyduàre (to read), you would say Lyduàrṇei sxorr munnalöř 'I read the words' (read-1sing the word-PL, pretty basic. Also I'm too lazy to create a word for 'book' right now), but then Äśśò lyduàrṇei 'I am reading' > śolyduàrṇei 'I am reading' OR 'I am reading it'
> lyduàre 'to read (trans.)' vs. śolyduàre 'to read (intrans.); to read it'

[TaylorS]

In Alpic any intransitive verb can be made transitive by adding an advebal suffix

Njanos.
njano-s
sleep-3SG.A
"He/She is sleeping"

Njantires do nakto.
njano-tire-s do nakto
sleep-PERLATIVE-3SG.A DEF night
"He/She is sleeping through the night"

[Plusquamperfekt]

... (not up to date anymore)

[TomHChappell]

Do any of you have a special way in your conlang to represent the difference between the two?

Yes.

Do you have different conjugations?

No.

Are there two different words of each?

Don't understand the question.

Is there no difference?

There is a difference.

[Matt]

In Alpic any intransitive verb can be made transitive by adding an advebal suffix

Njanos.
njano-s
sleep-3SG.A
"He/She is sleeping"

Njantires do nakto.
njano-tire-s do nakto
sleep-PERLATIVE-3SG.A DEF night
"He/She is sleeping through the night"

Are there different advebal ('adverbial'?) suffixes? Like, could you say sleep-LOCATIVE-3SG.A DEF bed to mean 's/he is sleeping in the bed'? That's a neat valence-increasing operation; it's like incorporating the prepositions into the verb so that you can treat an oblique argument like a direct object.

[TaylorS]

In Alpic any intransitive verb can be made transitive by adding an advebal suffix

Njanos.
njano-s
sleep-3SG.A
"He/She is sleeping"

Njantires do nakto.
njano-tire-s do nakto
sleep-PERLATIVE-3SG.A DEF night
"He/She is sleeping through the night"

Are there different advebal ('adverbial'?) suffixes? Like, could you say sleep-LOCATIVE-3SG.A DEF bed to mean 's/he is sleeping in the bed'? That's a neat valence-increasing operation; it's like incorporating the prepositions into the verb so that you can treat an oblique argument like a direct object.

Yup, There are a whole set of adverbial suffixes, they are derived from adverbs, hence the name.

So, "She is sleeping in the bed" would be:

Njantas do lektu.
njano-ta-s do lektu
sleep-LOC-3SG.A DEF bed

[Yng]

Are there different advebal ('adverbial'?) suffixes? Like, could you say sleep-LOCATIVE-3SG.A DEF bed to mean 's/he is sleeping in the bed'? That's a neat valence-increasing operation; it's like incorporating the prepositions into the verb so that you can treat an oblique argument like a direct object.

They're called applicatives - even English can do this to some extent, as well.

[Foolster41]

Is this the difference between say "looking" and "seeing" (passive)? I was actually about to ask about this.

I was recently working on Salthan and I realized that I don't really distinguish the two: "|aolanys dasana chisani" could either mean "we wasn't looking at the girl" or "he didn't see the girl". Does it matter that there would be no distinction? Would it be too confusing?

[Matt]

Is this the difference between say "looking" and "seeing" (passive)? I was actually about to ask about this.

That's more of a distinction on the semantic role of the subject. "Looking (at)" implies more of a conscious and volitional action; the subject is more agent-like. "Seeing" implies more of an unintentional action, like something entered your field of vision; the subject is more of an experiencer. The verbs "Listen (to)" and "hear" function similarly.

And not all languages make this distinction, so if your conlang doesn't either, it's not something to worry about.

[Chuma]

It sounds like a very reasonable ambiguity. You might want to have some phrase for when you want to clarify, like "try to see" instead of "look".

[Foolster41]

Matt: Ok. thanks.

Chuna: Good point.

[Salmoneus]

Somebody should point out: this conversation is really mostly about valency, not about transitivity, it seems. In large chunks of the world (ie north and south america and to a lesser extent the pacific) these are not the same thing at all - it's possible to have intransitive bivalent verbs and transitive univalent verbs.

[Nortaneous]

How does that work?

[Salmoneus]

It varies with the language. Particles, prepositions, case marking, voice marking, or just transitivity marking on the verb. Two things I've seen with Oceanic languages are changing the case marking on the subject (iirc Tongan uses the nominative for subjects of intransitives but the ergative for subjects of transitives) and encoding the object as an obligatory oblique if the verb is univalent. Iirc, North American languages are more likely just to stick a morpheme on the verb, as usual...