Re: Middle voice

-----Mensaje original-----
De: Pablo Flores <fflores@...>
Fecha: Viernes 25 de Septiembre de 1998 14:10
Asunto: Middle voice


> A question to whoever knows out there:
> What is "middle voice" in verbs?
>
> I know what active and passive voice are, but this is something I've never
imagined. I don't know where I read about it, or what language was mentioned
to have it. If someone could answer and give me an example in any language,
I'd be grateful.

> --Pablo Flores

As I understand it, in transitive verbs, with agent and patient, for
example, the active voice is when the subject is the agent, and the patient
is the object.
  John burn his house.

If you want to make the patient as subject, then you can use pasive:
  The house was burned.
If you want to mention who did it, you can introduce the agent as am
oblique:
  The house was burned by John.
Note that "by John" is not an object.

Some languages has an invert voice
  His house John Burned

A middle voice is similar to pasive, when the patient acts like subject like
  The house burned
But when is implied that there is an agent who would be grammatically
incorrect to mention.
  *The house burned by John
  *The house burned John

As English has no middle voice the example is not very good.
  The house burned
means what finnaly happend to the house, and there is no gramatically
evidence that John or someone else caused it.

-- Carlos Th