Re: Non-accusative, non-ergative, non-active

Breaking down your post re. Fillmore into a down-to-earth oservations:

1. Attributive vs. Applicative

The door is an device that is an inalienable attribute of the house (cf.
person--mouth). Water is a device that is applied into the bucket (cf.
person--food) and may become its attribute (cf. clothes--stain,
field--plants, etc.).

house--door--door_opening--door_board--opening_angle:
the house opens (its openings)
the door opens
the shutters open (rotate on their hinges, slide in their groove, etc.)
the door opens on the room (gives access to the room)
the door is wide open *with space

bucket--content--filling:
the bucket is filling (cf. "to draw a bath") (fr. le seau se remplit)
the water fills the bucket (fr. l'eau remplit le seau)
the bucket is filled with water (fr. le seau est rempli d'eau)
the bucket is full with water (fr. le seau est plein d'eau)
+ fill in, fill up, fill out, a mouthful etc.

2. Polarity:
open--closed
full--empty

3. Quality vs. Quantity:

open > angle > wide_open--ajar
fill > quantity > full--?

4. Prospective vs. Retrospective

(i) English considers "full" and "broken" as the results of "filling" and
"breaking" (final or resultative case). (ii) Other natlangs consider
"filling" and "breaking" as the attempts to make "full" and "broken"
(inchoative aspect). (iii) Sometimes "full" is a state taken aside of any
process but "broken" can't because it implies a first, "integral" state.
Examples:

(i) break > broken
pecah < memecahkan (indo)

(ii) fill > full
michiru < mitasu (jap)

(iii) penuh // mengisikan (indo)

5. Active vs. Passive

Passive State:
"closed"---ditutup(kan) (indo)---shimetearu (jap)
"opened"---dibuka(kan) (indo)--aketearu (jap)
(Reflexive makes passive into active.)

Active State:
"open"---buka (indo)---aku/aiteiru (jap)
"????"---tutup (indo)---shimaru/shimatteiru (jap)
(Inchoative makes stative into active.)


Roger Mills <romilly@...> wrote:
---------
Typical example:  the "verb" _full_:
Stative:  The tank is full.  O V
Inchoative (become...):  The tank is filling/ The tank filled. O inch-V
Causative (actually caus.+Inch., agent subj.) John filled the tank. A V O
Causative (instrumental subj.) The water filled the tank. I V O

According to Fillmore's system, "full" allows the following arguments:
Obligatory: patient (or call it object) O
Optional:  agent A, instrument I
The underlying specification of Engl. "full" is--
FULL [O (A) (I)]
Any of these can be used as "subject"

It's language-specific whether a given language marks the subject in some
way (case endings, word order), or marks the verb (by a derivational
morpheme, or lexically, or not at all). Or paraphrase (is open vs.
trans/intr. open). Or some combination of the two.

Consider Spanish--
El vaso está lleno 'the glass is full'
El vaso se llenó 'the glass filled'
Juan llenó el vaso 'John filled the glass'

English tends to use word order, with occasional changes to the verb
(lexical--die-kill-- or old derivations in some cases like fill-full,
hot-heat).  But OE, Latin et al. marked "subject" with the nominative case.

Kash uses verbal derivatives--
Base/stative: tuwi yafasan 'the soup is hot'
soup 3s-hot
(cf. tuwi fasan 'hot soup')

Inchoative: tuwi ya-çu-fasan (3s-inch.-hot_
'the soup is heating, getting hot'

Causative: indemi  ya-rum-fasan tuwi (3s-caus-hot >yarupasan) 'My mother is
heating the soup"

The Kash system is probably a lot more consistent that what is seen in any
natlang, AFAIK.  I've never been sure whether causative verbs can have
non-human Instrument subjects-- ?*huça yarupasan tuwi ?'the fire heated the
soup'

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