Language Typology and Syntactic Description, Volume I: Clause Structure, Second edition
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Lgg Typology, Synt Description v. I - Clause structure
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William A. Foley
Table 7.1 Summary of passive constructions pivotless languages: Marathi Ulcha Nanai [ – A ] unchanged Backgrounding passives pivot languages: Dutch (impersonal) Sama [ + A ] = [+oblique]/ φ pivotless languages: Chickasaw Fijian [ – A ] assumes properties pivot languages: Mam KiSwahili -ik passive Indonesian ter- passive [ – A ] unchanged – none; given definition of foregrounding passive, impossible Foregrounding passives [ – A ] assumes properties pivot languages: English and other Western European languages KiSwahili-w passive properties due to prominence now accrue to the sole [ −oblique] np, the [−a] argument. This parameter of variation, of course, is not available in foreground- ing passives, the [ −a] being required in all cases to assume the grammatical properties of prominence ceded by the [ +oblique] [+a] argument. To do other- wise would be senseless, to fly in the face of what defines a foregrounding passive. Even a cursory study of the world’s languages reveals that not all have passive constructions, so an obvious question is: how do languages that lack a passive express the obviously useful function of backgrounding the [ +a] argument? The usual way is to have a nonreferential np filling the role of the [ +a] argument. European languages like French and German have special impersonal pronouns to perform exactly this function: A typology of information packaging 429 (157) (a) on parle fran¸cais i¸ci one speaks French here ‘French is spoken here’ (b) Mann spricht Deutsch one speaks German ‘German is spoken’ Of course, French and German possess passive constructions, but some Amerindian languages which lack passive constructions have impersonal pronominal verbal affixes to fulfil this function, such as Caddo: (158) diiwikkudah -yi- ʔ awidakud-ah 3sg[ −a]-realis.impersonal[+a]-fire- perf ‘One has fired him’ = ‘He’s been fired’ Chafe (1990) 4.2 Antipassive constructions Antipassives are those verbal lexical derivations which background the other [ −oblique] argument of a transitive verb, the [−a] argument. An affix to the verb or verbal complex derives an intransitive antipassive verb form and the [ −a] argument necessarily appears as [+oblique] or is suppressed entirely. As an intransitive form, the [ +a] argument will now be indicated in the same morphological form as the sole [ −oblique] argument of an intransitive verb. Antipassives are most prototypical of asymmetrical ergative–absolutive pivot languages. Consider these examples from the Mayan language Mam: (159) (a) o chi-tzaj t-tzyu- ʔ n Xwan xiinaq past 3pl.abs[ −a]-dir 3sg.erg-grab-dir John[+a] man[−a] ‘John grabbed the men’ (b) o -tzyuu-n Xwan ky-e xiinaq past 3sg.abs-grab-antipass John[ +a] 3pl.poss-[+oblique] man[−a] ‘John grabbed the men’ England (1988) Example (159b) is the intransitive antipassivized version of (159a). Example (159a) is a normal transitive clause: the verbal expression has pronominal affixes for both [ −oblique] arguments, chi- (3pl.abs[−a]) and t- (3sg.erg[+a]), and both full nps are [ −oblique], with no case marking or adpositions. In the antipas- sive (159b), the [ −a] argument xiinaq ‘man’ is now [+oblique] marked with the adposition ky-e (3pl.poss-[ +oblique]); note it fails to have a co-occurring pronominal affix on the verb. The [ +a] argument Xwan ‘John’ is still [−oblique] and co-occurs with the zero third person pronominal absolutive affix, as the sole |
