Case in Ingush syntax
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Johanna Nichols
Abstract
This paper reviews the morphological and syntactic patterns and the patterns of lexical derivation in Ingush (Nakh-Daghestanian, Caucasus) in pursuit of a typological generalization about alignment in the language. Morphological case paradigms are almost entirely ergative. Simple clause alignment is split among several salient and several minor patterns. Wherever constraints on syntactic phenomena refer to morphology (and many of them do), they are ergative (verb agreement, agreement climbing, argument sharing in serialization); if constraints are syntactic they refer almost exclusively to subjects (case climbing, reflexivization, control of infinitive). Patterns of lexical derivation are ergative for simplex verbs (a large but closed class) and varied for compound verbs. Overall, there is a good deal of what is at first glance syntactic ergativity but on closer analysis turns out to be due to ergative morphological constraints on syntactic processes.
Abstract
This paper reviews the morphological and syntactic patterns and the patterns of lexical derivation in Ingush (Nakh-Daghestanian, Caucasus) in pursuit of a typological generalization about alignment in the language. Morphological case paradigms are almost entirely ergative. Simple clause alignment is split among several salient and several minor patterns. Wherever constraints on syntactic phenomena refer to morphology (and many of them do), they are ergative (verb agreement, agreement climbing, argument sharing in serialization); if constraints are syntactic they refer almost exclusively to subjects (case climbing, reflexivization, control of infinitive). Patterns of lexical derivation are ergative for simplex verbs (a large but closed class) and varied for compound verbs. Overall, there is a good deal of what is at first glance syntactic ergativity but on closer analysis turns out to be due to ergative morphological constraints on syntactic processes.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Preface vii
- Determining morphosyntactic feature values 1
- Does Hungarian have a case system? 35
- Case in Ingush syntax 57
- Cases, arguments, verbs in Abkhaz, Georgian and Mingrelian 75
- The degenerative dative of Southern Norrbothnian 105
- Case compounding in the Bodic languages 127
- Leipzig fourmille de typologues : Genitive objects in comparison 149
- An asymmetry between VO and OV languages 167
- On the scope of the referential hierarchy in the typology of grammatical relations 191
- Does passivization require a subject category? 211
- The definiteness of subjects and objects in Malagasy 241
- Without aspect 263
- Author index 283
- Language index 285
- Subject index 287
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Preface vii
- Determining morphosyntactic feature values 1
- Does Hungarian have a case system? 35
- Case in Ingush syntax 57
- Cases, arguments, verbs in Abkhaz, Georgian and Mingrelian 75
- The degenerative dative of Southern Norrbothnian 105
- Case compounding in the Bodic languages 127
- Leipzig fourmille de typologues : Genitive objects in comparison 149
- An asymmetry between VO and OV languages 167
- On the scope of the referential hierarchy in the typology of grammatical relations 191
- Does passivization require a subject category? 211
- The definiteness of subjects and objects in Malagasy 241
- Without aspect 263
- Author index 283
- Language index 285
- Subject index 287
