"engative verbs" ?

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Rho

#147729 Fri, 14 Oct 05 07:54 AM

Sorry paco, your definition of 'ergative verbs' is different from what I've learnt. I'm a bit puzzled. Let me quote from {{[link] its definition, just to be sure:
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unaccusative verb (another term is ergative verb):

GENERAL: Special kind of intransitive verb. Semantically, its subject does not actively initiate or is not actively responsible for the action of the verb; rather, it has properties which it shares with the direct object of a transitive verb (or better, with the grammatical subject of its passive counterpart). EXAMPLE: in English 'arrive,' 'die' and 'fall' are unaccusative verbs.

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Rho

Joined on Wed, Sep 28 2005

Junior Member (71)

Verbs, Direct Objects, Accusative

paco2004

#147824 Fri, 14 Oct 05 03:36 PM

Hello Roh

I don't think there is a big difference between the definition that I gave and the one that you gave. When ergative verbs are used intransitively, they are called "unaccusative verbs" (definition by Perlmutter). Unaccusative/ergative intransitive verbs are different from other kind of intransitive verbs (unergative verbs) in that the action is initiated not by the subject but we can assume a real agent that causes the intransitive action of the subject. Take "The ice melted". The ice's melting doesn’t happen due to the ice's own will. There must be something (like the sun) that caused the ice to melt. So "melt" is an unaccusative/ergative intransitive verb. Take "The boy fell from the tree" as another example. The action of "fall" does not take place because of the boy's will. There must be something that caused the boy to fall. So "fall" is an unaccusative/ergative intransitive verb. Take "dance" in "Mary danced" as an example of unergative intransitive verb. Mary danced because she wanted to dance. The action "dance" was initiated by the subject Mary. So "dance" is not an unaccusative/ergative verb but an unergative intransitive verb.

paco

paco2004

Joined on Wed, Nov 17 2004

Senior Member (4,095)

In Japan today even dogs are learning how to bow-wow in English.

Verbs, Difference Between, Accusative

Rho

#147847 Fri, 14 Oct 05 04:42 PM

Hello paco, thank you for your reply.
Apparently I was not in a very good mood when I made my post. Yes, I think, 'ergative verbs' include your verbs (only intransitive counterpart of those pairs, though, I'm afraid). I simply felt uneasy at your definition part:
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Some verbs can be used as both a transitive verb and an intransitive verb. If the object of the transitive of a verb can be the subject of its intransitive use, such a verb is called "ergative verb".
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Then, I thought, one of the most common ergative verbs, 'die' for example, wouldn't fall under your definition?!
That aside, ergative verbs ARE intransitive verbs, inevitably. And the most important feature is that 'its argument is in object position at D-structure, but has to move to subject position in order to receive (nominative) Case' (ibid).
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I've just read about 'anticausativization' in T. Kageyama(2001). Seems interesting. That concept is closely related to ergative verbs. Some example sentences wouldn't be a nuisance, I hope.
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{1} The farmer homogenized the milk.
{2}*The milk homogenized.

{3} The cook caramelized the suger.
{4} The suger caramelized.

{5} The storm broke the window.
{6} The window broke.

{7} He broke his promise.
{8}*His promise broke.

(I'm so sleepy now, see you later...)

Rho

Verbs, Nominative

paco2004

#147937 Fri, 14 Oct 05 11:33 PM

Hello Roro

First of all, please know that I am not a professional linguist. I learned the term "ergative verb" only a couple of years ago from a scholar on an English learners' forum for Japanese. So my knowledge is much more limited than yours. What I wrote in the previous message to the questioner is the definition by J. Lyons, 1964 I found in the Oxford English Dictionary. The dictionary says :

ergative, adjective
etymology: Greek έργάτης [workman+-ive]

definition : a term used of a grammatical case marking the subject of a transitive verb in languages such as Eskimo, Basque, and some others. Also ellipt.
1943 J. Marouzeau Lexique Terminol. Linguistique (ed. 2) 89 Ergatif (Ergativ, Ergative). Cas désignant l'agent dans les langues comme le basque. 1950 Archivum Linguisticum II. ii. 100 In syntactically transitional types of language like Georgian and Laz+the ergative and nominative are found side by side. 1964 E. Palmer tr. Martinet's Elem. Gen. Ling. vi. 179 This ending+was necessarily the morpheme of an ‘ergative’ case. 1968 J. Lyons Introd. Theoret. Ling. viii. 352 The term for the syntactic relationship that holds between (1) [the stone moved] and (3) [John moved the stone] is ‘ergative’: the subject of an intransitive verb ‘becomes’ the object of a corresponding transitive verb, and a new ergative subject is introduced as the ‘agent’ (or ‘cause’) of the action referred to.

Many dictionaries adopt this OED's quote as the definition of "ergative verbs" and some English learners' sites also follow the quote. For example, UsingEnglish.com says:

Ergative verbs are found in sentences where the verb affects the subject:
The sun melted the butter.
Here, we have a sentence with a standard subject, a transitive verb and a direct object.
The butter melted.
Here, the subject was the object of the original sentence. The butter didn't melt itself- it required the heat of the sun. This is an ergative verb use, where the subject of the intransitive form of the verb would be the object of the transitive form of the verb.

I feel the term "ergative verbs" thus defined would be used first in order to categorize transitive verbs. On the other hand, the concepts of "unaccusative" and "unergative" were created by professional linguists like Perlmutter (1978) when they analyzed the differences found among intransitive verbs. Our confusion would be due to that some of these scholars use "ergative intransitive verbs" for "unaccusative intransitive verbs". Methink so.

paco

paco2004

Verbs, Direct Objects, Nominative, Morphemes, Accusative

Rho

#147950 Sat, 15 Oct 05 12:11 AM

Hello paco. I'm Rho. (Roro?--who is it.)
I don't think I know something more than you here. Thank you for your information, it's great. Just I was thinking the term 'ergative verbs' would be more effective if we could understand the term from the point of view of verb semantics, not only from morphosyntactic point of view.

I just wanted to add my humble opinion above :）

Rho

Verbs

paco2004

#147953 Sat, 15 Oct 05 12:46 AM

Hello Roh

I'm sorry I misaddressed you. I thought you might be my old friend Roro/Viogner who once posted here a lot. Anyway it doesn’t matter whether you are she or not.

Personally I'm interested in the concept of "ergative" just to learn English. Some transitive verbs are rarely used in a passive construct. Why are they so? Some intransitive verbs can take a word order of <verb + subject> even in a predicate sentence like "There came the king". Why are they so? I am hoping I would find answers to those questions if I understand well the ergativity of verbs.

paco

paco2004

Verbs, Predicates, Word Order, Learn English

Anonymous

#162461 Fri, 25 Nov 05 08:21 AM

< It is said there are about 600 ergative verbs in English. Most of them are those used to describe either (1) movement of a thing or (2) change of the state of a thing.>

Thanks for the link to this post, Paco. Do you happen to have that list of 600 ergative verbs?

Anonymous

Verbs

Anonymous

#487692 Wed, 12 Mar 08 12:58 AM

Quite simply, an ergative verb affects the subject. They are found in both transitive & intransitive sentences.

Found this example on the web: The sun melted the butter.

To quote: "The butter didn't melt itself- it required the heat of the sun. This is an ergative verb use, where the subject of the intransitive form of the verb would be the object of the transitive form of the verb."

Anonymous

Verbs

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