Re: theory

Marcus wrote:

> Daniel, you've looked at more active languages than I have.
> Do you know of any active langs with passives?
Hmm. Sorry. I have specifically looked at just the active
part and the apparent ;) semantics behind it and nothing more.

I think Georgian has some kind of passive. _Mier_ can mark the
agent with passives, such as:

_vis mier daits'era?_ 'By whom was it written?'

But I think the passive is rather expressed with an infix _-i-_
which intransitivizes the verb, making it a Class 2 verb:

_da-ts'er-a_ 'He wrote it.'

_da-i-ts'er-a_ 'It was written.'

I don't know if you can interpret this as a passive construction
though. It looks like it really isn't.

Regarding North American langs, I think you, Marcus, have much
more to say about them. I have no idea about Acehnese and I seem
to have misplaced my Guaraní grammar. Bummer.

Actually I thought about including this in my thesis, but my
advisor thought it'd be too much work. I'm inclined to agree.
Perhaps something for an MA-thesis. ;)

Daniel

PS. Phew. Pure luck I didn't delete this. I'm SO after in
reading my mail due to massive work overload and getting
a new computer. I will answer y'all's personal mails as soon
as I can, hopefully in just a couple of days. I haven't
forgot you guys!