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Re: Voice question

From:Andreas Johansson <andjo@...>
Date:Tuesday, December 30, 2003, 19:24
takatunu is misattributing here; I did not wrote the piece he's quoting. I
don't remember who did, unfortunately. Robert Jung?

                                                        Andreas

Quoting takatunu <takatunu@...>:

> Andreas Johansson <andjo@...> wrote: > > > I ask because I'm currently working on a language that has strict word > > order (SOV, S-PO-SO-V for ditransitives), and a couple of voice > > suffixes: a passive that demotes the subject and promotes the object(s) > > (of transitives; intransitives end up ambient), and something I've been > > calling an "antipassive/applicative" that demotes the primary object > > (and promotes the secondary object to primary object position in > > ditransitives). I'm not sure how plausible this is. It's supposed to be > > like the difference between "He gave the dog a bone" and "He gave a bone > > (to the dog)" but marked with a suffix. > > Very plausible indeed and exists in the best possible IAL---Indonesian (of > course :-)) > That was part of a recent thread, I think--and I gave the example of the > Indonesian suffixes -kan/-i. > > Petani me-nanam-i sawah. The peasant plants the paddy. > Petani me-nanam(-kan) nasi. The peasant plants the rice. > Sawah di-tanam-i (dengan) nasi oleh petani. The paddy is planted (with) rice > by the peasant. > Nasi di-tanam(-kan) di sawah oleh petani. The rice is planted in the paddy > by the peasant. > > There's also a very handy resultive passive: > Sawah ter-tanam. The paddy is "planted up". > > BUT I wish Indonesian was more consistant enough to allow the following: > *Sawah ter-tanam-i. > *Nasi ter-tanam-kan. > > OBCONLANG > > After trying a hundred tricks I ended up doing exactly the same in my > conlang (although the suffixes and clitics change their endings every second > day): > > Kitali-pomiki a milamilato-tai pasila. The peasant plants the paddy. > Kitali-pomiki a milamilato(-nai) pitona. The peasant plants the rice. > Pasila a mi-milamilato-tai (ipai) pitona ikai kitali-pomiki. The paddy is > planted (with) rice by the peasant. > Pitona a mi-milamilato(-nai) itai pasila ikai kitali-pomiki. The rice is > planted in the paddy by the peasant. >