Re: A few questions about linguistics concerning my new project

Nick:
<<
Actually, I did read that/your article on ergativity. I do understand
how
the antipassive works (and that it can apply in certain situations)
but, I
cannot yet grasp why you would need an antipassive in an ergative-
aligned
language to describe a 'passive' situation. Is it not possible to have a
passive by just marking it on the verb and using oblique like this:
/panda-OBL. pet-PASS./ ?
 >>

I never suggested that you'd use an antipassive to describe a
passive situation.  You use an antipassive to describe an antipassive
situation.  But here's a question: why you need to describe a
passive situation in an ergative-aligned language?  It seems that
there would either be no need, or that the morphology as it is
would provide you with a way of doing so without resorting to
any special construction.

-David
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"sunly eleSkarez ygralleryf ydZZixelje je ox2mejze."
"No eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn."

-Jim Morrison

http://dedalvs.free.fr/