Printer Friendly
The Free Dictionary
990,165,692 visitors served.
?
Dictionary/
thesaurus
Medical
dictionary
Legal
dictionary
Financial
dictionary
Acronyms
 
Idioms
Encyclopedia
Wikipedia
encyclopedia
?

ergativity
(redirected from ergative)

    Also found in: Dictionary/thesaurus, Wikipedia 0.01 sec.

ergativity

Tendency of a language to pair the subject, or agent, of an intransitive verb with the object, or patient, of a transitive verb. This contrasts with the situation in nominative-accusative languages such as Latin or English, in which the subjects of both transitive and intransitive verbs are paired grammatically and distinguished from the object of a transitive verb. Languages or language families that display ergativity to varying degrees include Sumerian, Caucasian languages, Eskimo-Aleut, Maya, Australian Aboriginal languages, and many American Indian languages.
?Page tools
Printer friendly
Cite / link
 Email
Feedback
? Mentioned in ? References in periodicals archive
No references found
 
Finally, Hook's "On Identifying the Conceptual Restructuring of Passive as Ergative in Indo-Aryan" evaluates the Old Indo-Aryan passive and the New Indo-Aryan ergative constructions in the context of a typological discussion of similar structures in other language families.
Paninian Studies: Professor S.D. Joshi Felicitation Volume by Salomon, Richard / Pacific Affairs
More results
 
Encyclopedia browser? ? Full browser
 
 
Encyclopedia
?

Disclaimer | Privacy policy | Feedback | Copyright © 2008 Farlex, Inc.
All content on this website, including dictionary, thesaurus, literature, geography, and other reference data is for informational purposes only. This information should not be considered complete, up to date, and is not intended to be used in place of a visit, consultation, or advice of a legal, medical, or any other professional. Terms of Use.