Verbal nouns

[Alon]

In English, several verbal nouns referring to a process can also be used to refer to its outcome. Examples:

Creation
Building
Painting
Drawing
Sculpture
Invention
Innovation
Computation
Calculation
Entrance

This does not seem to be regular or productive. Of note, manufacturing is only the process, and the outcome is a manufacture. Similarly, construction vs. structure. Making and disruption refer only to the process (something that's been invented is an invention, but something that's been disrupted is not a disruption). Production can refer to an arbitrary process, and can also refer to the outcome in creative areas, such as theater: a film is a production, an airplane is a product.

In Hebrew, the same is true. In the form pa'al, the verbal noun is pe'ila or pe'ula, where the e is epenthetic and drops in nearly all circumstances, depending on sonority hierarchy. In the form pi'el, it is pi'ul. In the form hif'il, it is haf'ala. In the form nif'al, it is again pe'ila, with epenthetic e. We then have:

yatsar (make, create) -> yetsira, which means both the act of making something and the resulting product
khishev (compute, calculate) -> khishuv, which means both the act of computing and the resulting computation
tsiyer (draw, paint) -> tsiyur, which means both the act of painting or drawing and the resulting work of art
hemtsi (invent), root MTsʔ -> hamtsa'a, which means both the act of inventing and the resulting invention
nichnas (enter) -> knisa, which means both the act of entering and a door or other portal through which one enters

Marginally, the noun referring to a structure, binyan, can also be used for construction in the abstract sense of the construction industry, but the construction of the building uses the regular verbal noun bnia (the verb to build is bana, root BNH).

As in English, this is not consistent. Thus, from pisel, to sculpt, we get pisul, which invariably means the act of sculpting, whereas the final product is called pesel.

Does this pattern exist in other languages? How common is it? In neither English nor Hebrew is it productive.

[KathTheDragon]

As far as I know, the same is true generally in Indo-European, though given the Hebrew example, I am tempted to wonder if it's not a general fact that action nouns can also be result nouns.

[Salmoneus]

In English, several verbal nouns referring to a process can also be used to refer to its outcome. Examples:

Creation
Building
Painting
Drawing
Sculpture
Invention
Innovation
Computation
Calculation
Entrance

This does not seem to be regular or productive. Of note, manufacturing is only the process, and the outcome is a manufacture. Similarly, construction vs. structure. Making and disruption refer only to the process (something that's been invented is an invention, but something that's been disrupted is not a disruption). Production can refer to an arbitrary process, and can also refer to the outcome in creative areas, such as theater: a film is a production, an airplane is a product.

Some quibbles:
- "a construction" is a result as well as a process
- "a disruption" is a result too (note: a disruption may continue long after the cause has finished disrupting things)
- you're confused there: no, something that's been disrupted isn't a disruption, but there's nothing that says that the product or result of a verb is the same as its object. Likewise, something that's copied isn't a copy, but a copy is still a result of copying.

Does this pattern exist in other languages? How common is it? In neither English nor Hebrew is it productive.

It's certainly present in Latin, too, and PIE (separately, iirc). It may well be universal.

More generally, almost all these verbal nouns can be divided into three kinds, it seems to me:

1. processes, behaviours, and performances
2. relationships

These two kinds of verbs share the property that they are fundamentally intransitive, with neither a definition effect on an object nor a definite physical product. An entrance, a performance; and a copy, an imitation, a relation, a recognition, etc. A few of these verbs can be transitive, but the verbal noun is mostly intransitive: you yourself mention the distinction between factitive 'product' and performative 'production'. But in general the thing to note, I think, is the conceptual confusion. It is not clear whether imitation is an abstract relationship or a concrete act, and so the word can refer to both. "To gather" is a verb... but does the gathering end when people are gathered (making the subsequent gathering of people a result), or do people continue to gather while they are in a gathering (making the gathering an ongoing process)? [you don't gather a gathering, but a gathering does gather, and they're still a gathering after they've gathered, whether or not they have been gathered] The difference between imitation and an imitation, or indeed between dancing and a dance, is not really one of action vs result, but just abstract/universal vs concrete/particular.

I think it's almost inevitable that many if not all verbs of this type will be prone to ambiguities between processes and results, because there is simply not an obvious end-point of the process/relation, meaning that there is no clear distinction between actions and results for these verbs.
[When I say 'relation' - sometimes these are a bit broader than that. For example: fastenings. The fastening isn't the relation per se, but it signifies a certain relation - a fastening keeps things fastened to one another, and so long as the relation of being fastened to one another pertains, there is a fastening. Likewise, when you are limited, you are prevented from doing something, and so long as the relation of being unable to do it pertains you are subject to a limitation. Maybe easier to specify processes, relation OR state?]

And of course sometimes words drift over into related things. "Entrance", for instance, can be either the performance or the location associated with one. "Relation" can be either the relation (abstract or particular) or the object of the relation. "Fastening" can be either the relation-imposition or the instrument of it.


And then there's 3. factitives. Verbs where the 'object' is actually produced by the verb. So building builds buildings, for instances, and painting paints paintings: the particular verbal noun is the item produced by the abstract verbal noun.

These seem to be quite different conceptually, and it's easier to believe that a language would have dedicated morphology for products as distinct from processes.


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In general, though: words are vague things and tend to stick to anything found in the same sort of circumstance as the original meaning. I wouldn't get too hung up on it.

[clawgrip]

Japanese is all over the place with nominalized verbs:

Some represent the action itself:

heru decrease (v)
heri decrease (n); reduction

uketoru receive
uketori recept (the act of receiving of something, not the paper)

wa o nageru throw a ring
wanage ring toss (game)

Sometimes it's the subject of an intransitive verb:
kōru freeze
kōri ice

enpitsu o kezuru sharpen a pencil
enpitsukezuri pencil sharpener

Sometimes it's the object or something similar, which could in some cases be considered the product, but usually not:
hanasu speak
hanashi conversation/story

kazaru decorate
kazari decoration

kiru wear
-gi suffix for types of clothing

tsuzuru spell
tsuzuri spelling

Then there are verbalized nouns.

These can often indicate the process/act or result:
sotsugyō graduation
sotsugyō suru graduate

hakken discovery
hakken suru discover

ōpun opening (of a store, etc., for the first time)
ōpun suru open (a store, etc., for the first time)

I don't know what to make of it. Just whatever word seems most closely associated with the verb, I guess.

[Magb]

In North Germanic some verbal nouns are formed with the suffix -ning(ur) instead of the normal -ing(ur) to indicate the outcome instead of the process. I believe this is a North Germanic innovation that originated with verbs whose stems already end in -n.

Examples in Norwegian:
bygging - the act of building, bygning - a finished building
lading - the act of charging, ladning - a charge/load
holding - the act of holding, holdning - an attitude

Most verbal nouns just take -ing like in English though. The -ning suffix isn't productive, at least not IMD.

[WeepingElf]

In North Germanic some verbal nouns are formed with the suffix -ning(ur) instead of the normal -ing(ur) to indicate the outcome instead of the process. I believe this is a North Germanic innovation that originated with verbs whose stems already end in -n.

Examples in Norwegian:
bygging - the act of building, bygning - a finished building
lading - the act of charging, ladning - a charge/load
holding - the act of holding, holdning - an attitude

Most verbal nouns just take -ing like in English though. The -ning suffix isn't productive, at least not IMD.

In German, a similar distribution exists between the suffixes -en and -ung:

das Halten 'the act of holding' - die Haltung 'the attitude'
das Laden 'the act of loading/charging' - die Ladung 'the load/charge'

[Valdeut]

In North Germanic some verbal nouns are formed with the suffix -ning(ur) instead of the normal -ing(ur) to indicate the outcome instead of the process. I believe this is a North Germanic innovation that originated with verbs whose stems already end in -n.

Examples in Norwegian:
bygging - the act of building, bygning - a finished building
lading - the act of charging, ladning - a charge/load
holding - the act of holding, holdning - an attitude

Most verbal nouns just take -ing like in English though. The -ning suffix isn't productive, at least not IMD.

The distinction you're describing might be a Norwegian innovation, actually. The suffix -ning is indeed a common North Germanic innovation, orginating in verbs ending in -n (such as the class of inchoative verbs in -na) but in Swedish and (I think) Danish, there is a formal rather than semantic difference between -ning and -ing. The suffixes are basically allomorphs conditioned by the form of the verb stem. The most common form is -ning, but -ing is used after certain clusters or after unstressed, but not stressed, r.

bygga > bygg-ning*
ladda > ladd-ning
hålla > håll-ning
spola > spol-ning
handla > handl-ing
skära > skär-ning
bättra > bättr-ing
legera > leger-ing

I believe that Norwegian also has some phonological circumstances where -ning is not allowed, even if there can be a semantic contrast in other cases. The allomorphic suffix -(n)ing, which is productive in Swedish, could be used both to refer to the action and to the result.

At one point, North Germanic seems to have had many related suffixes, some of which had different purposes and some of which just formal variants. There were forms with and without n (plus a related derivation with l). The vowel could be i, u or (rarely) a, and the ending could be masculine –ʀ, nom.pl. –aʀ, masculine –i, nom.pl. –jaʀ, and feminine –0, nom.pl. –aʀ. Many of the possible combinations seems to have occured.

The later NG languages have lost many variants. The i-vowel have tended to replace the other vowels. The feminine derivation seems to have been most common for deriving abstract action nouns (which could then be extended to concrete result nouns), with the masculine forms mostly referring to people. So it's the feminine forms that are most relevant to this thread (although in languages where the masculine and feminine have merged, there may be little difference). When it comes to the forms with or without n, there seams to be some variation between the NG languages.

Swedish seems to have used the -ning form as the default for native words already in the earliest Old Swedish texts, although -ing was sometimes used in loans from Low Geman. There are dialects where -ing is more common. Originally, only verbs of certain conjugation classes tended to form nouns with -(n)ing.

In Old West Norse, I think the choice of suffix also mostly depended on the conjugation class. Strong verbs and 3rd weak verbs tended to have -ning, and no i-umlaut, while other weak verbs tended to have -ing.

In addition to the -(n)ing-derivation, Modern Swedish has a productive derivation of neuter action nouns in -ande/-ende[/i (the base form looks like the present participle but it can be declined like a noun: ett springade, springandet, flera springanden, springandena). Unlike the derivation in -(n)ing, these aren't generally used for the result noun (otherwise, the two forms often compete, although there is sometimes an aspectual difference). From what I understand, Norwegian does not really have a productive counterpart. I think Danish might have this derivation although it may be less common than in Swedish. Danish also makes more use of derivations in -else (of Low German origin) than the other NG languages.

*The form byggning is rare. Byggnad is the most common term for a concrete building (a closed structure), but it can also refer to the act of building, at least in some circumstances. I think the latter use may be more common in compounds such as stadsbyggnad ‘city building, urban planning’ (it could also refer to a city building in the sense of a building that is in a city). There are also other verbal nouns such as byggnation and bebyggelse.

[Magb]

The distinction you're describing might be a Norwegian innovation, actually.

Interesting stuff, thanks. I'd noticed that Swedish would sometimes have -ning where -ing would be required (semantically speaking) for the Norwegian counterpart word, but I did think Swedish had the same formal distinction for at least some words. Now that you mention it, Icelandic definitely doesn't have it, since although it has some feminine nouns in -ing and some masculine ones in -ningur I don't think there are any cases where forms with both exist. I'm fairly sure Danish has the same distinction, though.

I should mention that there are also cases in Norwegian where the forms can be used interchangeably, e.g. riding / ridning ("riding"). Generally these are words where the nature of the verb is such that it's hard to distinguish between the action and the result in the first place.

[Valdeut]

The distinction you're describing might be a Norwegian innovation, actually.

Interesting stuff, thanks. I'd noticed that Swedish would sometimes have -ning where -ing would be required (semantically speaking) for the Norwegian counterpart word, but I did think Swedish had the same formal distinction for at least some words. Now that you mention it, Icelandic definitely doesn't have it, since although it has some feminine nouns in -ing and some masculine ones in -ningur I don't think there are any cases where forms with both exist. I'm fairly sure Danish has the same distinction, though.

I should mention that there are also cases in Norwegian where the forms can be used interchangeably, e.g. riding / ridning ("riding"). Generally these are words where the nature of the verb is such that it's hard to distinguish between the action and the result in the first place.

It's one of those small differences between the Scandinavian languages that can be quite noticeable. Reading about the distribution in Norwegian, it seems very complicated:
https://books.google.se/books?id=mINlCw ... &q&f=false
(in English)

I don't think Danish has the semantic distinction either. From what I've been able to find, the choice of suffix is phonologically conditioned:
https://books.google.se/books?id=mINlCw ... &q&f=false
(in English)

I had trouble finding any good information about what the condtioning factors are, though. But according to a blog post:
"Her fik jeg forklaringen, at dannelse af verbalsubstantiver med ing/ning-endelser til dels følger bestemte regler. For det første er ning-endelsen den mest almindelige på dansk, men alle verber, der ender på r bruger ing-endelsen. Men ellers er reglen, at har verbets rod en lang vokal, skal man bruge ing-endelsen, og har verbets rod en kort vokal, så skal man bruge ning-endelsen."
http://blog.pludr.dk/?page_id=251
(in Danish)

So the conditions are not quite the same as in Swedish. Also, a reference from 1826:
https://books.google.se/books?id=WTpVAA ... &q&f=false
(in Danish)

[hwhatting]

In German, a similar distribution exists between the suffixes -en and -ung:

das Halten 'the act of holding' - die Haltung 'the attitude'
das Laden 'the act of loading/charging' - die Ladung 'the load/charge'

Just for clarification - while the nominalized infinitive in -en normally only indicates the process, the suffix -ung can indicate both process and result, e.g. for process die Haltung von Hühnern in der Wohnung ist verboten "the keeping of chicken is prohibited in the appartment".

[Valdeut]

In German, a similar distribution exists between the suffixes -en and -ung:

das Halten 'the act of holding' - die Haltung 'the attitude'
das Laden 'the act of loading/charging' - die Ladung 'the load/charge'

Just for clarification - while the nominalized infinitive in -en normally only indicates the process, the suffix -ung can indicate both process and result, e.g. for process die Haltung von Hühnern in der Wohnung ist verboten "the keeping of chicken is prohibited in the appartment".

This is very similar to the Swedish nominalized participle in "-ende/-ande" (usually only process), versus the forms in "-(n)ing" (process or result). I recall reading that this use of the nominalized participle, which I think is rare in other Scandinavian languages, was influenced by the German nominalized infinitive, and perhaps used to translate it.

"hållandet" = "das Halten" — "hållningen" = "die Haltung"
"laddandet" = "das Laden" — "laddningen" = "die Ladung"
(the verb "ladda" is borrowed from Middle Low German)

[Alon]

Bumping this to ask a different question about factitives. In Hebrew and English, they're quite often identical to verbal nouns describing process, as I noted in the OP. In German and Swedish, they're (sometimes) distinguished.

Is there any language in which factitives are formed from passive participles? In that case, a building would be rendered as "a built," a painting as "a painted," an invention as "an invented," and so on.

[kodé]

regarding the OP: all these verbs are accomplishments, consisting of dynamic processes leading up to a goal or telos and an ensuing result state. since both the process and the result are encoded by these verbs, a verbal noun (in some languages) can refer to either part of the verb.

Bumping this to ask a different question about factitives. In Hebrew and English, they're quite often identical to verbal nouns describing process, as I noted in the OP. In German and Swedish, they're (sometimes) distinguished.

Is there any language in which factitives are formed from passive participles? In that case, a building would be rendered as "a built," a painting as "a painted," an invention as "an invented," and so on.

it seems like this would be incredibly common. in chukchansi yokuts (penutian language of central california), these would usually be expressed by nominalizations of the passive form of the verb. the only one i can think of off the top of my head is:

[wash-han-a-']
tell.a.story-passive-nominalization-nominative
"story" (lit. "a story-told thing")