Re: Active-Ergative langs (was Re: Ke'kh - degrees of volition)

The Gray Wizard wrote:

> Active languages, however, mark the arguments of a predicate
> according to the semantic role (agent, patient, experiencer,
> et. al.) they play and are thus context-sensitive.
Hmm. Not very often I think. Rather the semantics of the verb.
Hence that most active langs are head-marking. Though I think
Marcus Smith could talk quite a bit about the semantics vs.
the syntax. ;)

And the actual meaning of using either Actor or Undergoer (or
whatever you'd like to call the hyperroles) is often much more
subtle and varying than simply vol vs. non-vol or control vs.
non-control.

> Is there an active analog to this kind of constraint?  Do any active
> languages (nat- or con-) impose constraints on clause combination based
> on relations of semantic roles?  Anyone!
I wish there were! If anyone know of a natlang with active syntax,
please speak up now! That would be absolute coolness!

Kibrik (I sure talk a lot about him, don't I? :) writes about
Yagua: "...there are some discourse-governed conditions for
splitting the arguments of certain one-place verbs. If this
can be shown to haev syntactic consequences, then Yagua would
qualify as a syntactically active language." Anyone up for
some field work? :)

He also writes about syntactically active languages that "[t]he
lack of a real example may be due to my scant knowledge of
active languages, but it seems more plausible that their
absence or rarity is not random. The active strategy implies
two equally important hyperroles, A and U. This is incongruous
with the idea of absolute saliency of one NP as a syntactic
pivot." I think Kibrik - sadly - has a major point there.

This shouldn't stop us all from creating syntactive conlangs,
though. All the more reason to actually do it I say!

Daniel