Re: Copula

On 19/03/07, Jim Henry <jimhenry1973@...> wrote:
> On 3/19/07, R A Brown <ray@...> wrote:
> > Jim Henry wrote:
> > > ...If the language has a passive voice at all, that is?
> > > If a language has no active/passive voice marking,
> >
> > Does such a natlang actually exist among nominative-accusative
> > languages? (Obviously ergative languages behave differently - and, of
> > course, with conlangs anything is possible).
>
> I thought I had heard of such a language somewhere,
> but since I can't remember details it's likely enough that
> I'm misremembering -- probably the languages I've
> read about as having no passive voice are
> ergative or active or tripartite.
>
I suspect there are languages that have no passive but have free word
order, since the point of a passive is to make an object
topic-prominent. I can also imagine a language which is
ergative/active/tripartite and has a passive

Jeff
--
Q: What will happen in the Aftermath?

A: Impossible to tell, since we're still in the Beforemath.

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