Re: Transitive vs. Intransitive
Posted: Mon May 16, 2011 12:52 pm
I can't speak for American or Pacific langs, but in the NWC languages transitivity and valence are important to keep separate, and since they mark arguments (in the verb and to a lesser extent nominals) ergatively, it's very easy to tell—if there is something ergative, the verb is transitive; if not, intransitive.
Here's a trivalent intransitive from Abaza. Applicatives increased its valence:
s-wə-z-lə-ts-tsa-jt’
1S.ABS-2S.DAT-BEN-3S.F.DAT-COM-go-PRES.DYN
"I'm going with her for you"
There are some verbs that take a meaningless object marker. I don't know if any are taken as an absolutive, though. This is Kabardian.
s-ja-saʁɕ
1S.ABS-3S.DAT-swam
"I swam"
There are also some unexpected things you can do by changing a verb from transitive to intransitive but keeping its valence. Again, Kabardian.
ɕ’aːla-m | txʲəɬ-ər | Ø-j-a-dʒ
boy-OBL(ERG) | book-ABS | 3.ABS-3S.ERG-PRES-read
"The boy reads the book" (telic)
ɕ’aːla-r | txʲəɬ-əm | Ø-ja-aw-dʒa
boy-ABS | book-OBL(DAT) | 3.ABS-3S.DAT-PRES.INTR-read
"The boy is reading the book" (atelic)
This example is somewhat complicated, but pretty cool:
səmadʒa-m | məʔaresa-r | Ø-j-a-ʃxʲ
sick.man-OBL(ERG) | apple-ABS | 3.ABS-3S.ERG-PRES-eat
“The sick man eats the apple”
səmadʒa-m | məʔaresa-r | Ø-Ø-xʷ-aw-ʃxʲ
sick.man-OBL(DAT) | apple-ABS | 3.ABS-3S.DAT-POT-PRES.INTR-eat
“The sick man can eat the apple”
The verb is first detransitivitized, so we go from ERG/ABS marking in the subject/object to ABS/DAT. Then the potentiality morpheme causes case inversion so we have DAT/ABS. Because Kabardian the dative and ergative case are marked with the same ending, this gives the illusion that the verb marks its arguments as if it were intransitive, but the nominals are marked transitively.
Here's a trivalent intransitive from Abaza. Applicatives increased its valence:
s-wə-z-lə-ts-tsa-jt’
1S.ABS-2S.DAT-BEN-3S.F.DAT-COM-go-PRES.DYN
"I'm going with her for you"
There are some verbs that take a meaningless object marker. I don't know if any are taken as an absolutive, though. This is Kabardian.
s-ja-saʁɕ
1S.ABS-3S.DAT-swam
"I swam"
There are also some unexpected things you can do by changing a verb from transitive to intransitive but keeping its valence. Again, Kabardian.
ɕ’aːla-m | txʲəɬ-ər | Ø-j-a-dʒ
boy-OBL(ERG) | book-ABS | 3.ABS-3S.ERG-PRES-read
"The boy reads the book" (telic)
ɕ’aːla-r | txʲəɬ-əm | Ø-ja-aw-dʒa
boy-ABS | book-OBL(DAT) | 3.ABS-3S.DAT-PRES.INTR-read
"The boy is reading the book" (atelic)
This example is somewhat complicated, but pretty cool:
səmadʒa-m | məʔaresa-r | Ø-j-a-ʃxʲ
sick.man-OBL(ERG) | apple-ABS | 3.ABS-3S.ERG-PRES-eat
“The sick man eats the apple”
səmadʒa-m | məʔaresa-r | Ø-Ø-xʷ-aw-ʃxʲ
sick.man-OBL(DAT) | apple-ABS | 3.ABS-3S.DAT-POT-PRES.INTR-eat
“The sick man can eat the apple”
The verb is first detransitivitized, so we go from ERG/ABS marking in the subject/object to ABS/DAT. Then the potentiality morpheme causes case inversion so we have DAT/ABS. Because Kabardian the dative and ergative case are marked with the same ending, this gives the illusion that the verb marks its arguments as if it were intransitive, but the nominals are marked transitively.