Ergativity

[wakeagainstthefall]

I don't get it.

[yaSBP]

I think, though somebody else may correct me on this, that it's when a language treats the argument of an intransitive clause as an object rather than a subject. So, it's the difference between "I sleep" (nominative-accusative) and "sleep me" (ergative-absolutive).

[wakeagainstthefall]

Can you show me an example without using pronouns?

[yaSBP]

Not really, pronouns are the only English words to exhibit different cases, and ergativity is a description of how cases are used, therefore I can't show you ergativity in English without using pronouns. I don't know how to make a better example, but I'll try describing it better. An intransitive verb is a verb which only has one noun associated with it. So, "sleep" and "died" are intransitive verbs, because I say "I sleep" and "I died", as opposed to verbs like "killed", which usually have another noun, as in "I killed a cat". Many languages change the nouns to explain whether they are the ones doing the verb or having the verb done to them. Hence, "I killed them", but "they killed me"; the words changed cases to show their purpose. However, with an intransitive verb, there's only one noun, so do you change the noun to be the subject (I, they), or the object (me, them)? Nominative-absolutive languages treat it as the subject, while ergative-absolutive languages treat it as the object.

[Avo]

I strongly recommend you to read this paper if you're really interested in ergativity.

I think, though somebody else may correct me on this, that it's when a language treats the argument of an intransitive clause as an object rather than a subject. So, it's the difference between "I sleep" (nominative-accusative) and "sleep me" (ergative-absolutive).

It's way more than that. How ergativity is reflected in the grammar varies from language to language, and then it's not just about using different pronouns.

[Solarius]

Can you show me an example without using pronouns?

Okay, although pronouns are easier because they have case already. I'm going to cheatby using examples from other languages.
Now, in English, we have the sentences:

The piranha died.
The piranha spoke Pirahã.

If you look at the sentence above, you can see that the bolded and underlned words are akin, as they are in the same position in both sentences. The italicised word is by itself. This is how Nominative-Accusative languages work. Other languages work this way too, such as Japanese, German, Hebrew, and Navajo. Not all languages use word order to mark this. For example, in my conlang Seyores, those sentences would translate as:

!i-piranha otu
!i-piranha sa-Pirahã e|ija

!i- marks the Nominative, and sa- marks the accusative.

However, other languages work differently. For example, in Basque:

Gizona etorri da.
Gizonak mutila ikusi du

These are the english equivalent sentences:

The man has arrived.
The man saw the boy.

See the difference? Unlike English and Seyores, where the bold and underlined nouns are in the same case, Basque puts the bold and italicized nouns in the Absolutive case. The underlined noun is put out in the Ergative case. Basque is an ergative language. Others are Tibetan, Walpiri, Inukitut, Nahuatl, and Sumerian. Like Nominative languages, Ergative languages can also use word order to indicate cse roles, although this is, for some reason, rare. The few languages that do this appear to be found mostly in Autralia. Most Ergative languages order sentences like Nominative languges.

Not all languages are just Ergative or just absolutive. A language can be mixed. Languages like this include Hindi, Samoan (I think), Georgian, and Guarani.

Does this help?

[Solarius]

This also helps.

[Micamo]

http://wals.info/chapter/98

There's really nothing more to get. What exactly is confusing you?

[wakeagainstthefall]

I just don't understand when the ergative or absolutive case is used.

[wakeagainstthefall]

Not really, pronouns are the only English words to exhibit different cases, and ergativity is a description of how cases are used, therefore I can't show you ergativity in English without using pronouns. I don't know how to make a better example, but I'll try describing it better. An intransitive verb is a verb which only has one noun associated with it. So, "sleep" and "died" are intransitive verbs, because I say "I sleep" and "I died", as opposed to verbs like "killed", which usually have another noun, as in "I killed a cat". Many languages change the nouns to explain whether they are the ones doing the verb or having the verb done to them. Hence, "I killed them", but "they killed me"; the words changed cases to show their purpose. However, with an intransitive verb, there's only one noun, so do you change the noun to be the subject (I, they), or the object (me, them)? Nominative-absolutive languages treat it as the subject, while ergative-absolutive languages treat it as the object.

And which case would the "object" of an intransitive verb be in in an ergative/absolutive language?

[Solarius]

Not really, pronouns are the only English words to exhibit different cases, and ergativity is a description of how cases are used, therefore I can't show you ergativity in English without using pronouns. I don't know how to make a better example, but I'll try describing it better. An intransitive verb is a verb which only has one noun associated with it. So, "sleep" and "died" are intransitive verbs, because I say "I sleep" and "I died", as opposed to verbs like "killed", which usually have another noun, as in "I killed a cat". Many languages change the nouns to explain whether they are the ones doing the verb or having the verb done to them. Hence, "I killed them", but "they killed me"; the words changed cases to show their purpose. However, with an intransitive verb, there's only one noun, so do you change the noun to be the subject (I, they), or the object (me, them)? Nominative-absolutive languages treat it as the subject, while ergative-absolutive languages treat it as the object.

And which case would the "object" of an intransitive verb be in in an ergative/absolutive language?

Absolutive.

[Micamo]

Not really, pronouns are the only English words to exhibit different cases, and ergativity is a description of how cases are used, therefore I can't show you ergativity in English without using pronouns. I don't know how to make a better example, but I'll try describing it better. An intransitive verb is a verb which only has one noun associated with it. So, "sleep" and "died" are intransitive verbs, because I say "I sleep" and "I died", as opposed to verbs like "killed", which usually have another noun, as in "I killed a cat". Many languages change the nouns to explain whether they are the ones doing the verb or having the verb done to them. Hence, "I killed them", but "they killed me"; the words changed cases to show their purpose. However, with an intransitive verb, there's only one noun, so do you change the noun to be the subject (I, they), or the object (me, them)? Nominative-absolutive languages treat it as the subject, while ergative-absolutive languages treat it as the object.

And which case would the "object" of an intransitive verb be in in an ergative/absolutive language?

I.ABS slept
I.ERG stabbed you.ABS

[wakeagainstthefall]

So "I" in "I slept" is considered the object?

[Trailsend]

Precisely.

[Systemzwang]

Precisely.

Generally not. Having the same marking as the object != being considered the object, and in many ergative languages, there is a difference.

[Trailsend]

Generally not. Having the same marking as the object != being considered the object, and in many ergative languages, there is a difference.

I don't quite understand your objection (it could be one of at least two things, and I'm not sure which). I meant that the "I" in "I slept" is encoded the same way as a canonical P argument, however that encoding happens—not that it had to do with a specific type of marking. Was that your objection, or have I misunderstood?

[Xing]

Generally not. Having the same marking as the object != being considered the object, and in many ergative languages, there is a difference.

I don't quite understand your objection (it could be one of at least two things, and I'm not sure which). I meant that the "I" in "I slept" is encoded the same way as a canonical P argument, however that encoding happens—not that it had to do with a specific type of marking. Was that your objection, or have I misunderstood?

What I think Systemzwang means is that "I" would not the object in "I sleep". In an ergative language, it would still be the subject, just that it would take the same marking as the (direct) object in a transitive clause.

1SG.ERG 3SG.ABS hug - this clause has a subject (ergative) and a direct object (absolutive)
1SG.ABS sleep - this clause has a subject (absolutive), and no direct object.

But, maybe some languages allow for yet another type of clause:

1SG.ABS hug - this could be a transitive clause with a null subject.

(Systemzwang, you may correct me if I'm wrong!)


******

The difference between a nominative and an ergative language:
-In a nominative language, all subjects, regardless of the transitivity of the verb, take the same marking (be it case or whatever)
-In an ergative language, subjects to a transitive verb take a different marking from subjects to an intransitive verb. Subjects to an intransitive verb take the same marking (be it case or whatever) as the direct object to a transitive verb.

But the subject to an intransitive verb does not become an object.

[Systemzwang]

My point is this:

(oh, a nota bene first: "!=" reads "does not equal".)

Being "an object" is not just the same as 'being marked with the same case as a direct object is marked with'. Being an object often also has other correlations - often things like verb congruence, things in coordinating constructions, etc.

An example of the letter is this often quoted example:
in a syntactically ergative language, the following phrase (provided the verbs were considered to have the same properties as they have in English):
"the boy kicked the dog and ran away" would have the dog doing the running away.

It turns out most ergative languages that permit this kind of coordination have the interpretation where the coordinated subject is the same for both verbs. There apparently exist other indications as well that the absolutive and ergative subjects in ergative languages most often actually are the same whereas the absolutive object is something else.

[Valoski]

The Subject of a Clause is the doer of a Verb that is intransitive.
The Agent of a Clause is the doer of a Verb that is transitive.
The Patient of Clause is the Object.

Just like Nominative represents both Subject and Agent, with Accusative being the Patient, Absolutive is the Subject and the Patient, with Ergative being the Agent. Easy.

[Systemzwang]

The Subject of a Clause is the doer of a Verb that is intransitive.
The Agent of a Clause is the doer of a Verb that is transitive.
The Patient of Clause is the Object.

Just like Nominative represents both Subject and Agent, with Accusative being the Patient, Absolutive is the Subject and the Patient, with Ergative being the Agent. Easy.

This doesn't really make anything more clear.