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Is there a productive morphological pattern for deriving an agent noun from a verb?

Summary

An agent nominalization derives from a verb and functions like a noun or noun phrase. The result denotes the agent of an action. In English, we can exemplify this with the productive -er suffix (bak-er, fish-er, garden-er, etc.). This feature targets phonologically bound overt nominalizers, including affixes, clitics, tonal markers, reduplication, ablaut, etc. This derivation pattern needs to be productive. Compounds of a verb root and a noun meaning 'person' are likely not agent nominalizations.

Procedure

  1. Code 1 if there is an element that attaches to verbs to form an agentive nominalization such as singer from sing and if it is not stated that the element is a noun meaning ‘person’.
  2. Do not code 1 if the relevant nouns are stated to be nouns in their own right and not derived.
  3. If nominalization is not discussed whatsoever, code ?.
  4. If nominalization is discussed at some length, but agent nominalization is not mentioned, code 0.

Examples

Chukchii (ISO 639-3: ckt, Glottolog: chuk1273)

The suffix -lʔ in Chukchii derives an agent noun from a verb, and is labeled "active particle" in the description. For example, with the verb ‘to go’:

təle ‘to go’ 

təle-lʔ-ə-n
go-NMLZ-ə-3SG.ABS 
‘the one who goes’ (Dunn 1999: 138–139)

Chukchii is coded as 1 for this feature.

Further reading

Baker, Mark & Nadya Vinokurova. 2009. On agent nominalizations and why they are not like event nominalizations. Language 85(3): 517–556.

References

Dunn, Michael J. 1999. A grammar of Chukchi. Canberra: Australian National University. (Doctoral dissertation.)

Related Features

Patron

Hedvig Skirgård