ergative

adj
/ˈɜːɡətɪv/UK/ˈɝɡətɪv/US

Etymology

From Ancient Greek ἐργᾰ́της (ergắtēs, “labourer, worker”) + English -ive (suffix meaning ‘belong or relating to; of the nature of; serving to; tending to’ forming adjectives).

  1. derived from ἐργᾰ́της — “labourer, worker

Definitions

  1. With the subject of a transitive construction having grammatical cases or thematic…

    With the subject of a transitive construction having grammatical cases or thematic relations different from those of an intransitive construction.

    • The case systems of ergative languages are counter-intuitive to speakers of many Indo-European languages.
  2. Ellipsis of ergative case (“a grammatical case used to indicate the agent of a transitive…

    Ellipsis of ergative case (“a grammatical case used to indicate the agent of a transitive verb in ergative-absolutive languages”).

  3. An ergative verb or other expression.

    • Unlike those with subjectivized ergatives, such locative clauses naturally do not allow for imperatives (*Contain the apples).
    • Ergatives share close similarities with agentless passives: Both are intransitive, both lack an agent, while the patient appears in the subject position. As the acquisition data show, learners seem to treat ergatives like passives.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for ergative. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA