Re: G'amah antipassive

FFlores wrote:
> d'ul lli-nhach n'ana- hoh
> eat  AD  cat   AI.DUP mouse
> 'the cat eats mice'
>
> becomes
>
> ad'ul    lli-nhach bu
> AP.comer AD  gato  APO
> 'the cat eats'
Interesting that you used English glosses the first time, and Spanish
glosses the second time.  :-)  I'm assuming AD and AI mean "artículo
[definite]" and "artículo [indefinite]"?

> 2. In langs with passive voice, the demoted subject
> can be mentioned with an oblique complement. What
> would happen with antipassive objects? Any natlang
> precedents of such a construction?
Yes.  Greenlandic (IIRC) uses the commitative case, some languages use
instrumentals or other cases.  Instrumental is used in W for the demoted
ergative.  It differs from the normal instrumental in that it cannot be
incorporated into the verb, while "simple" (unmodified) instrumentals
can.

> In that case,
> what would its connotations be? (In passive voice,
> the idea is to emphasize the object and making
> the subject irrelevant -- what about antipassive?).
Similar.  Passives can also be used for concord purposes, consider:

John hit Bill and left (i.e., John left)

with

Bill was hit by John and left (i.e., Bill left)

For languages with ergative syntax (keep in mind that some languages
have ergative marking, but accusative syntax), Bill (being the
absolutive) would be the subject (absolutive) of the second verb, so to
make John the subject of "left" you'd have to have something like

John-ABS hit-AP Bill-OBL and left

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