No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
Active/Agentive Case Marking and Its Motivations
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 March 2026
Abstract
A kind of case marking—termed variously active, active-neutral, active-inactive, active-static, stative-active, agentive, agent-patient, split S. and split intransitive—is shown to be less arbitrary than is sometimes assumed. Its semantic bases can be missed if sought only in immediate one-to-one correspondences between meaning and form. Case systems of this kind are often the products of successive diachronic developments, each individually motivated. Several factors can obscure the motivations, including not only crosslinguistic differences in detail, but also shifts of defining features over time, grammaticization, and lexicalization. To explain why these case systems have the shapes they do, we must appreciate both the diversity of features that can underlie them and the dynamic processes that mold them.
Information
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © 1991 by Linguistic Society of America
References
Allen, Louis. 1931. Siouan and Iroquoian. International Journal of American Linguistics 6.185–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Franz, Boas., and Swanton, John R. 1911. Siouan (Dakota). Handbook of American Indian languages, Part 1, ed. by Boas, Franz, 875–966. (BAE bulletin 40.) Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
Boas, Franz, and Dlloria, Ella. 1939. Dakota grammar. Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences 23.Google Scholar
Booker, Karen. 1980. Comparative Muskogean: Aspects of Proto-Muskogean verb morphology. Lawrence: University of Kansas dissertation.Google Scholar
Boynton, Sylvia S. 1982. Mikasuki grammar in outline. Gainesville: University of Florida dissertation.Google Scholar
Buechel, Eugene. 1970. A dictionary of the Teton Dakota Sioux Language. Ed. by Rev. Manhart, Paul. Pine Ridge, SD: Red Cloud Indian School.Google Scholar
Burzio, Luige 1981. Intransitive verbs and Italian auxiliaries. Cambridge. MA: MIT dissertation.Google Scholar
Burzio, Luige. 1986. Italian syntax: A government-binding approach. Dordrecht: Reidel.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chafe, Wallace L. 1964. Another look at Siouan and Iroquoian. American Anthropologist 66.852–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chafe, Wallace L. 1970a. A semantically based sketch of Onondaga. Indiana University publications in anthropology and linguistics. Memoir 25. Bloomington.Google Scholar
Chafe, Wallace L. 1970b. Meaning and the structure of language. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Chafe, Wallace L. 1976. The Caddoan, Iroquoian, and Siouan languages. The Hague: Mouton.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chafe, Wallace L. 1977. The evolution of third person verb agreement in the Iroquoian languages. Mechanisms of syntactic change, ed. by Li, Charles N., 493–524. Austin: University of Texas Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chafe, Wallace L. 1980. Consequential verbs in the Northern Iroquoian languages and elsewhere. American Indian and Indoeuropean studies, ed. by Klar, Kathryn, Langdon, Margaret, and Silver, Shirley, 43–9. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Cruse, D. A. 1973. Some thoughts on agentivity. Journal of Linguistics 9.11–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dahlstrom, Amy. 1983. Agent-patient languages and split case marking. Berkeley Linguistics Society 9.37–46.Google Scholar
Davies, William D. 1986. Choctaw verb agreement and universal grammar. Dordrecht: Reidel.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
DeLancey, Scott. 1981. An interpretation of split ergativity and related patterns. Lg. 57.626–57.Google Scholar
DeLancey, Scott. 1985. On active typology and the nature of agentivity. Relational typology, ed. by Plank, Frans, 47–60. Berlin: Mouton.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dixon, R. M. W. 1972. The Dyirbal language of North Queensland. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dixon, Roland B. 1910. The Chimariko Indians and language. University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 5/5.293–380.Google Scholar
Dorsey, James Owen. 1890. The Cegiha language. (U.S. geographical and geological survey of the Rocky Mountain region contributions to North American ethnology, vol. 6.) Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
Dorsey, James Owen, and Swanton, John R. 1912. A dictionary of the Biloxi and Ofo languages. (BAE bulletin 47.) Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
Durie, Mark. 1987. Grammatical relations in Acehnese. Studies in Language 11/2.365–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elmendorf, William W. 1981. Features of Yukian pronominal structure. Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology Papers in Linguistics 3.3–16.Google Scholar
Foley, William A., and Van Valin, Robert D. Jr. 1984. Functional syntax and universal grammar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gregores, Emma, and Suarez, Jorge A. 1967. A description of colloquial Guaraní. The Hague: Mouton.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hale, Horatio. 1883. The Tutelo tribe and language. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 21/114.1–47.Google Scholar
Hamilton, William, and Irvin, S. M. 1848. An Ioway grammar. Indian Territory: Ioway and Sac Mission Press.Google Scholar
Hardy, Heather, and Davis, Philip W. 1992. The semantics of agreement in Alabama. Native languages of the Southeast: Representative studies, ed. by Scancarelli, Janine and Hardy, Heather. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, to appear.Google Scholar
Hoijer, Harry. 1931. Tonkawa: An Indian language of Texas. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Holisky, Dee Ann. 1978. Stative verbs in Georgian, and elsewhere. International Review of Slavic Linguistics 3.139–62.Google Scholar
Holisky, Dee Ann. 1979. On lexical aspect and verb classes in Georgian. Chicago Linguistic Society Parasession on the Elements/Non-Slavic Languages of the USSR, 390–401.Google Scholar
Holisky, Dee Ann. 1983. The privative nature of agent-marking in Bats (and English). Paper delivered to the LSA.Google Scholar
Holisky, Dee Ann. 1987. The case of the intransitive subject in Tsova-Tush (Batsbi). Lingua 71.103–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hollow, Hollow Robert Charles. 1970. A Mandan dictionary. Berkeley: University of California dissertation.Google Scholar
Horne, Laurence R. 1980. Affixation and the unaccusativity hypothesis. Chicago Linguistic Society 16.134–46.Google Scholar
Jelinek, Eloise. 1990. Predicate classes and ‘active/stative’ marking in Choctaw. Paper presented at the SSILA meeting, University of British Columbia, Vancouver.Google Scholar
Jensen, Cheryl. 1990. Cross-referencing changes in some Tupí-Guaraní languages. Amazonian linguistics: Studies in lowland South American languages, ed. by Payne, Doris, 117–58. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Kakamasu, James. 1986. Urubu-Kaapor. Handbook of Amazonian languages, vol. 1, ed. by Derbyshire, Desmond C. and Pullum, Geoffrey K., 326–403. Berlin: Mouton.Google Scholar
Kimball, Geoffrey David. 1985. A descriptive grammar of Koasati. New Orleans: Tulane University dissertation.Google Scholar
Klimov, G. A. 1973. Očerk obščej teorii ergativnosti [Outline of a general theory of ergativity]. Moscow: Nauka. (Reviewed in Comrie 1976.)Google Scholar
Klimov, G. A. 1974. On the character of languages of active typology. Linguistics 131.11–25.Google Scholar
Kroeber, A. L. 1911. The languages of the coast of California north of San Francisco. University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 9/3.273–435.Google Scholar
La Flesche, Francis. 1932. A dictionary of the Osage language. (Smithsonian Instiution Bureau of American Ethnology bulletin 109.) Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
Lagarde, Pierrette L. 1980. Le verb huron: Étude morphologique d'après une description grammaticale de la second moitié du XVIIe siècle. Paris: L'Harmatton.Google Scholar
Lawrence, Erma. 1977. Haida dictionary. Fairbanks: Society for the Preservation of Haida Language and Literature and The Alaska Native Language Center, University of Alaska.Google Scholar
Lesser, Alexander. 1977. Kitsai texts. Caddoan texts, ed. by Parks, Douglas R. (IJAL-NATS 2.1, 44–64. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Lupardus, Karen Jacque. 1982. The language of the Alabama Indians. Lawrence: University of Kansas dissertation.Google Scholar
McLendon, Sally. 1978. Ergativity, case and transitivity in Eastern Pomo. International Journal of American Linguistics 44.1–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Medicine Horse, Mary Helen. 1987. A dictionary of everyday Crow. Crow Agency, Montana: Bilingual Materials Development Center.Google Scholar
Merlan, Francesca. 1975. Noun-verb relationships in Ankara syntax. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico dissertation.Google Scholar
Merlan, Francesca. 1985. Split intransitivity: Functional oppositions in intransitive inflection. Grammar inside and outside the clause, ed. by Nichols, Johanna and Woodbury, Anthony C., 324–62. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Mithun, Marianne. 1986. Disagreement: The case of pronominal affixes and nouns. Proceedings of the Georgetown University Round Table Conference on Languages and Linguistics, ed. by Tannen, Deborah and Alatis, James E., 50–66. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.Google Scholar
Mithun, Marianne. 1987. Is basic word order universal? Coherence and grounding in discourse, ed. by Tomlin, Russell S., 281–328. Amsterdam: Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mithun, Marianne. 1989. The acquisition of polysynthesis. Journal of Child Language 16.285–312.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mithun, Marianne. 1991a. The development of bound pronominal paradigms. Comparative and historical linguistics, ed. by Lehmann, Winfred. Amsterdam: Benjamins, to appear.Google Scholar
Mithun, Marianne. 1991b. When grammaticization is superfluous. Grammaticization, ed. by Heine, Bernd and Traugott, Elizabeth. Amsterdam: Benjamins, to appear.Google Scholar
Mithun, Marianne. 1992. The implications of ergativity for a Philippine voice system. Grammatical voice: Its form and function, ed. by Fox, Barbara and Hopper, Paul. Amsterdam: Benjamins, to appear.Google Scholar
Moshinsky, Julius. 1974. A grammar of Southeastern Pomo. (University of California publications in linguistics 72.) Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Munro, Pamela, and Gordon, Lynn. 1982. Syntactic relations in Western Muskogean. Lg. 58.81–115.Google Scholar
Nathan, Michele. 1977. Grammatical description of the Florida Seminole dialect of Creek. New Orleans: Tulane University dissertation.Google Scholar
Nicklas, Thurston Dale. 1974. The elements of Choctaw. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan dissertation.Google Scholar
O'Connor, Mary Catherine. 1986. Semantics and discourse pragmatics of active case-marking in Northern Pomo. Proceedings of the First Annual Meeting of the Pacific Linguistics Conference, ed. by DeLancey, Scott and Tomlin, Russell R., 225–46. Eugene: University of Oregon.Google Scholar
O'Connor, Mary Catherine. 1987. Topics in Northern Pomo grammar. Berkeley: University of California dissertation.Google Scholar
Oswalt, Robert. 1960. A Kashaya Grammar. Berkeley: University of California dissertation.Google Scholar
Oswalt, Robert. 1964. Kashaya texts. (University of California publications in linguistics 36.) Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Perlmutter, David. 1978. Impersonal passives and the unaccusative hypothesis. Berkeley Linguistics Society 4.157–89.Google Scholar
Richardson, John. 1985. Agenthood and ease. Chicago Linguistic Society Parasession on Causatives and Agentivity, 21/2.241–51.Google Scholar
Riggs, Stephen Return. 1893. Dakota grammar, texts, and ethnography. (U.S. geographical and geological survey of the Rocky Mountain region contributions to North American ethnology, vol. 9.) Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
Rood, David S., and Taylor, Allan. 1976. Elementary bilingual dictionary. English-Lakhota, Lakhota-English. Boulder: University of Colorado Lakhota Project.Google Scholar
Rosen, Carol. 1984. The interface between semantic roles and initial grammatical relations. Studies in Relational Grammar 2, ed. by Perlmutter, David and Rosen, Carol, 38–77. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Sapir, Edward. 1917. Review of Uhlenbeck 1917. International Journal of American Linguistics 1.82–6.Google Scholar
Seki, Lucy. 1990. Kamairuá (Tupí-Guaraní) as an active/stative language. Amazonian linguistics: Studies in lowland South American languages, ed. by Payne, Doris L., 367–91. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Swadesh, Morris. 1946. Chitimacha. Linguistic structures of Native America, by Hoijer, Harry et al., 312–36. New York: Wenner-Gren.Google Scholar
Tsunoda, Tasaku. 1985. Remarks on transitivity. Journal of Linguistics 21.385–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tuite, Kevin J.: Asif Agha; and Graczyk, Randolph. 1985. Agentivity. transitivity, and the question of active typology. Chicago Linguistic Society Parasession on Causatives and Agentivity, 21/2.252–70.Google Scholar
Uhlenbeck, C. C. 1917. Het passieve karakter van het verbum transitivum of van het verbum actionis in talen van Noord-Amerika. Afdeeling Letterkunde, vijfde reeks, tweede deel, 187–216. Amsterdam: Johannes Müller.Google Scholar
Van Valin, Robert D. Jr. 1987. The unaccusative hypothesis versus lexical semantics: Syntactic versus semantic approaches to verb classification. Northeastern Linguistic Society 17.641–58.Google Scholar
Van Valin, Robert D. Jr. 1990. Semantic parameters of split intransitivity. Lg. 66.221–60.Google Scholar
Vendler, Zeno. 1967. Linguistics in philosophy. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilkie, John. 1831. Grammar of the Huron language. Transactions of the Literary and Historical Society of Quebec. [Reprinted in Fifteenth report of the Bureau of Archives for the Province of Ontario, ed. by Alexander Fraser, 725–77. Toronto, 1920.]Google Scholar
Williamson, Janis S. 1979. Patient marking in Lakhota and the unaccusative hypothesis. Chicago Linguistic Society 15.353–64.Google Scholar
Zaenen, Annie. 1988. Unaccusative verbs in Dutch and the syntax-semantics interface. Stanford, CA: Center for the Study of Language and Information, Stanford University.Google Scholar
- 47
- Cited by