accusative and ergative languages

[Ralf-Stefan Georg]

>S wrote:

>> How do you live with the fact that some "ergative languages" have
>> independent passives ?

>Pat asks:

>Generalities are somewhat interesting but specifics would be even more
>interesting.

Sorry, deeply sorry, but I'm not able to believe that we are discussing
ergativity here, the existence of splits of some sort in every language
conventionally dubbed "ERG", the question whether ERG-constructions are
really passive constructions and stuff like that, without you knowing that
the phenomenon I alluded to in passing exists. I don't believe it.
I don't think that anyone here will need examples for this, so I'll only
give them when you explicitly express that you doubt/know better/reject the
fact that ergative constructions and passives can coexist in a language.
One hint to spare you some energy: the name of the first language which
comes to my mind in this respect sounds pretty close to my last name ...

>> And, as far as I remember, this whole brouhaha started with me asserting
>> that all known "ergative languages" have some split, followed by you
>> prompting we to show such a thing in Sumerian. I'm not a mind-reader, but
>> this could be interpreted as a challenge aiming at the gist of my
>> assertion, n'est-ce pas ? I managed to show those splits,

>Pat interjects:

>To my knowledge, you did not.

I did, Larry did, Wolfgang did (put me last on this list). However, I never
actually expected you to concede this, nor will you ever, no matter what.
So why should I bother to try to make you change your mind ? Each time
something is shown which does not square with your notion of ergativity (or
inflection, or whatnot) you change the definition. Let's begin (all over
again, sigh) by answering Wolfgang's questionnaire. I think this will be
the only way to get somewhere. You start, of course.

>> although the
>> discussion got a bit swamped under some hassle over maru:- and
>> HamTu-conjugations, but I managed to do it. At least I got you to accept,
>> late in coming, though, that my initial assertian still stands up.

>Pat responds:

>I did *not* accept your initial assertion. Re-read my concession.

Well, you are right here. Actually, if you *had* accepted it, I would have
to look for a flaw in *my* argumentation ;-)

St.

Stefan Georg
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