Antipassives
From: | Ian Spackman <ianspackman@...> |
Date: | Thursday, July 17, 2003, 12:58 |
How common are antipassives?
I'm sure I once read (whether it's true or false) that passives approach
universality (presumably in nominative languages). Is this true? Does the
same hold for antipassives in ergative languages?
The reason I ask is that I don't have an antipassive in Holic, and nor do I
see a likely way to construct one. Any former antipassive would have been
lost in the Old Holic period, and I can't see how a replacement would have
arisen. So the question is, is this a problem?
Or, I suppose: is there a reason that (anti)passives are especially useful
that hasn't occurred to me?
Ian
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