Re: Question

>but i was thinking of a case that i thought i had heard of (although i may
>have dreamt it)
>it was a finnish case and it has "marry" as action being received and "have
>sex" as the non-received version
>i dunno
>it came to me while i was cleaning tables at work
Yes, this is called a telic/atelic distinction and it's present in many
Uralic langs. The telic, or completed, or resultativ action is marked with
the object in the plain accusativ (which, as I just wrote in another thred,
usually looks like a singular genetiv or a plural nominativ), while the
atelic, or uncompleted, or irresultativ form is marked with the object in
the partitiv case.

The verb you had herd of - _naida_ - indeed works like that, but usually the
semantic gap between the two meanings is narroer. Another commonly cited
example is the verb for "to shoot": when telic, the meaning is approximately
"to shoot dead"; when atelic, approximately "to shoot at". Or, randomly
chosen example, "to look": usually atelic (because there is nothing to
finish), but the telic form is used for constructions like "to watch the TV
program (all the way to the end)", "to look for a place for something (and
find it)", or "to check that smTN is doing smTN" (a bit arcaic)

You may have noticed that the difference usually does not involve the
object's volition to receive the action, however. Not even in cases where
this is explicitely possible and likely, like "to convert, to turn away" in
the passiv form:
_Harri käännytettiin_ "Harry.NOM was converted" (successfully - but
brainwashing is not out of the question)
_Harria käännytettiin_ "Harry.PART was being converted" (still underway -
ambiguous to whether it will be successful or not)

But if you want the recipient's volition to be the part that matters, a
similar construction indeed could work. I'm not sure what you could call it tho.

John Vertical

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