Fw: Error Condition Re: Re: transitivity, etc,

[Koontz John E]

On Sun, 29 Sep 2002, Shannon West wrote:
> I'm wondering about this too. Given that I do have to work with a
> 'subject', a work-around is going to be in order. Is there any chance
> that the either the subject or object of these verbs is different in
> some way? A dative perhaps? (I'm grasping at straws). Also, is there
> some ordering difference with these? I have a set that is completely
> incomprehensible to me.

Rood & Taylor discuss some aspects of this in the draft version of their
Lakhota Sketch, but I couldn't locate the section in the published version
in HBNAI 17.

In OP there seems to be a constraint against having two patient
pronominals, with the experiencer taking precedence over the theme.  If
an experiencer is among the arguments, only it can be personal.  In
Dakotan there were at least some stems that allowed both arguments to be
pronominals, but the second person was always first (outer), as I recall
it.

Whatever principles or diagnostics enable you to select as subject the
agent if present, and the patient if not, will probably support the
experiencer as subject, too.