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Can the recipient in a ditransitive construction be marked like the transitive patient?
Summary
As a ditransitive construction we consider constructions with verbs expressing a physical transfer of possession or a mental transfer of messages (give, lend, hand, feed, send, bring, show, tell, teach). A ditransitive construction must allow overt expression of an agent, a theme and a recipient/addressee as separate NPs. The morphological marking of these arguments (e.g. accusative case, dative case vs. adposition marking) is irrelevant for counting a construction as ditransitive.
‘Marking’ for the purposes of this feature includes both flagging (i.e. case and adposition marking) and indexing on the verb. 1 is primarily triggered by flagging. Only if there is no overt flagging for neither the P argument nor the recipient argument, indexing is considered. 1 covers both the ‘double-object construction’ and the ‘secondary-object construction’ of Haspelmath (2013).
Procedure
- Consider the section in the grammar that deals with argument flagging (i.e. case and adposition marking) and indexing. Check whether it discusses ditransitive verbs or ditransitive constructions. If not, search the grammar for examples with verbs expressing a physical transfer.
- If the overt flagging of the P argument and the recipient argument is identical, code as 1.
- If the P argument and the recipient are marked with different flags, code as 0.
- If only the P argument or only the recipient is overtly marked, code as 0.
- If neither the P argument nor the recipient are overtly marked, consider the indexing patterns on the verb.
- Code as 1 if the two arguments are indexed identically.
- If the indexing of the P argument differs from the indexing of the recipient, code as 0.
- If there is neither overt indexing not flagging for both P and the recipient, code as 1.
- Various relevant verbs might have different marking patterns. As the question is about the possibility of the recipient in a ditransitive construction to be marked like the transitive patient, code as 1 even if not all verbs follow this pattern and add a comment.
- Even if the author of the grammar explicitly states the language has no ditransitive verbs, still consider and code the marking of the arguments of verbs of a physical transfer.
Examples
Awa-Cuaiquer (ISO 639-3: kwi, Glottolog: awac1239)
Though only some Ps (pronouns and certain nouns) are overtly marked with the dative suffix in Awa-Cuaiquer (compare the marked P argument in (a) vs. the unmarked P argument in (b), this situation still counts as 1, as some P are identically marked with the recipient, as in (c).
a. Demetrio na-wa pyan-tɨ-tɨ-s
Demetrio 1SG-DAT hit-TERM-PST-LOCUT.P
‘Demetrio hit me.’ (Curnow 1997: 65)
b. Demetrio kuzhu pay-t kway-zi
Demetrio pig buy-t PFV-NLOCUT
‘Demetrio bought a pig.’ (Curnow 1997: 65)
c. na=na Santos=ta pashu mɨla-ta-w
1SG.NOM=TOP Santos=DAT daughter give-PST-LOCUT.SBJ
‘I gave my daughter to Santos.’ (Curnow 1997: 74)
Further reading
Haspelmath, Martin. 2013. Ditransitive constructions: The verb ‘give’. In Matthew S. Dryer & Martin Haspelmath (eds), The world atlas of language structures online. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
Malchukov, Andrej, Martin Haspelmath & Bernard Comrie. 2010. Ditransitive constructions: A typological overview. In Andrej Malchukov, Martin Haspelmath & Bernard Comrie (eds), Studies in ditransitive constructions: A comparative handbook, 1–64. Berlin: de Gruyter Mouton.
References
Curnow, Timothy. 1997. A grammar of Awa Pit (Cuaiquier): An indigenous language of south-western Colombia. Canberra: Australian National University. (Doctoral dissertation.)
Related Features
- GB071 Are there morphological cases for phonologically independent personal pronominal core arguments (i.e. S, A or P)?
- GB073 Are there morphological cases for phonologically independent oblique personal pronouns (i.e. not S, A or P)?
- GB093 Can the P argument be indexed by a suffix/enclitic on the verb in the simple independent clause?
- GB094 Can the P argument be indexed by a prefix/proclitic on the verb in the simple independent clause?
- GB103 Can a verb have a benefactive marker (applicative marker or index)?
- GB300 Does the verb for 'give' have suppletive verb forms?
Patron
Alena Witzlack-Makarevich