文档介绍：The term ' ergativity' is used to describe a grammatical pattern in which
the subject of an intransitive clause is treated in the same way as the object
of a transitive clause, and differently from transitive subject. It is thus
complementary to the familiar pattern of accusativity. Although there is
only one ergative language (Basque) among the familiar languages of
Europe, perhaps one-quarter of the world's languages show ergative
properties, and therefore pose considerable difficulties for many current
linguistic theories. R. M. W. Dixon here provides a full survey of
morphological ergativity splits, and investigates their semantic bases.
There is discussion of how an ergative system can change into an
accusative one, and vice versa; of the discourse basis of ergativity; and
briefly of the problems that ergative systems pose for a number of current
theoretical models.
CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN LINGUISTICS
General Editors:
J. BRESNAN, B. COMRIE, W. DRESSLER,
R. HUDDLESTON, R. LASS, D. LIGHTFOOT,
J. LYONS, P. H. MATTHEWS, R. POSNER,
S. ROMAINE, N. V. SMITH, N. VINCENT
Ergativity
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