Re: Ergativity

Markus Miekk-oja <torpet@...> wrote:

>  Here's the fault of my theory: anybody who knows what
> ergative is probably knows a bit more of language than the average man,
> making it probable that the guy knows of Basque being a language of its own,
> completely.
No, there are many people (I dare not call them wackos) who know a lot
more than you and me about ergativity and such, but prefer to construct
bizarre theories (I gather Basque is a favourite, especially if you
can also throw in some 'Ancient Egyptian' and maybe aliens (!?)).

>
> Theory II, which probably is even as much faulty:
> could bilingual basque/spanish people've evolved ergative spanish (with the
> accusative preposition as absolutive marker?) dialects?
> Basque are proud of their language aren't they?
I guess they are. In most ergative languages, however, the absolutive
is unmarked (in both the senses of the word). If this is a 'universal'
(and it sounds likely and 'correct' to me) then this absolutive mark
would be strange. IIRC the shift from accusative->ergative languages
often involves transforming a (subject marked as) instrumental into
ergative.


--Pablo Flores
  http://www.geocities.com/pablo-david/index.html
  http://www.geocities.com/pablo-david/draseleq.html