Vocab

Causative alternation is a cross-linguistic phenomenon in which certain verbs that express a change of state (or a change of degree) can be used transitively or intransitively. A causatively alternating verb, such as "open", has both a transitive meaning ("I opened the door") and an intransitive meaning ("The door opened"). When causatively alternating verbs are used transitively they are called causatives since, in the transitive use of the verb, the subject is causing the action denoted by the intransitive version. When causatively alternating verbs are used intransitively, they are referred to as anticausatives or inchoatives because the intransitive variant describes a situation in which the theme participant (in this case "the door") undergoes a change of state, becoming, for example, "opened".Basic exampleExample of the causative alternation with the English verb 'break':

(1) English (1a) Transitive Use (Causative): John broke the vase.

(1b) Intransitive Use (Anticausative): The vase brokeThe general structure of the causative and anticausative variants of the causative alternation in English:

(2) The Causative Alternation: (2a) Causative: agent Verb-transitive theme(2b) Anticausative: theme Verb-intransitive

The causative alternation is a transitivity alternation. The verb “break” demonstrates causative alternation because it can alternate between transitive (in the causative) and intransitive use (in the anticausative) and the transitive alternate “John broke the vase’' indicates the cause of the intransitive alternate “the vase broke.” In other words, the transitive use denotes that it was John that caused the vase to break. The causative alternative has an external argument (“John”), which bears the theta role agent which is not present in the intransitive alternative. The object of the causative alternative (“the vase”) bears the same thematic role of theme as the subject of the anticausative alternative (also “the vase”).

Principle characteristicsCross-linguistically, the verbs that participate in the causative alternation are anticausatives which denote movement or a change of state or degree.AnticausativesThis flow chart shows that alternating unaccusatives (anticausatives) can participate in causative alternation. It is a visual representation based on information discussed in Schäfer.Under one possible and fairly common analysis (called the Unnacusative Hypothesis), unaccusatives and unergatives form the two subclasses of intransitive verbs. Unaccusative verbs cannot assign case to their deep-structure object which bears the theme/patient thematic role; because of this, the object moves to the subject position in the surface form in order to obtain case in accordance with Burzio's generalization. The movement of "the book" from object position to subject position is traced in example (3a). Therefore, unaccusative verbs take a semantic theme or patient subject. On the other hand, unergative verbs take a semantic agent or initiator subject.

(3)(3a) The booki fell ti (unaccusative)(3b) The child laughed (unergative)

Most unaccusative verbs participate in the causative alternation. The unaccusatives that do causatively alternate are anticausative verbs (like “break”) which make up a subclass of unaccusative verbs called alternating unaccusatives. The other subclass of unaccusative verbs, pure unaccusatives, consists of all other unaccusatives (like “fall”) that do not take part in causative alternation.Though some unaccusative verbs can undergo causative alternation (anticausatives), it is never the case that an unergative (like “laugh”) can.

(4) Non-Alternation of Unergatives(4a) The crowd laughed.(4b)*The comedian laughed the crowd. (Intended meaning: The comedian made the crowd laugh.)[2]

Change of state verbsIn various languages, it is seen that the verbs participating in the causative alternation are verbs that denote movement or a change of state or degree. However, not all change of state verbs are anticausatives and therefore, not all change of state verbs participate in the causative alternation.[1][2] For instance, a change of state verb like 'bloom' does not show causative alternation as it is a pure unnacusative. It is possible to say that "The cactus bloomed," but it is ungrammatical to say that "The warm weather bloomed the cactus."[2]

(5) Examples of causatively alternating change of state verbs[1](5a) Roll Verbs: "roll", "bounce", "swing"(5b) Break Verbs: "break", "chip", "crack"(5c) Bend Verbs: "bend", "crease", "crinkle"(5d) Amuse-Type Psych Verbs: "cheer", "delight", "thrill"(5e) Zero-Related to Adjective Verbs: "blunt", "clear", "clean"(5f) Change of Color Verbs: "blacken", "redden", "grey"

This flow chart shows that alternating unaccusatives (anticausatives) can participate in causative alternation. It is a visual representation based on information discussed in Schäfer.

These trees are representations given by Schäfer

English (1a): John broke the vaseEnglish (1b): The vase broke

(5g) -en Verbs: "awaken", "brighten", "broaden"(5h) -ify Verbs: "solidify", "stratify", "emulsify"(5i) -ize Verbs: "democratize", "decentralize", "crystallize"(5j) -ate Verbs: "accelerate", "ameliorate", "operate"(6) Examples of non-causatively alternating change of state verbs[1](6a) Change of Possession Verbs: "give", "donate", "owe"(6b) Cutting Verbs: "cut", "carve", "slice"(6c) Contact by Impact Verbs: "hit", "swat", "bludgeon"(6d) Touch Verbs: "caress", "graze", "touch"(6e) Destroy Verbs: "annihilate", "decimate", "destroy"(6f) Killing Verbs: "kill", "shoot", "eliminate"(6g) Verbs of Appearance, Disappearance, and Occurrence: "appear", "disappear", "occur"

Accusative verb: a verb that can be used transitively or intransitively, with the subject of the transitive verb becoming the sole argument of the intransitive verb. Some examples in English are eat, see, win.

Ergative: relating to or denoting a case of nouns (in some languages, e.g. Basque and Eskimo) that identifies the doer of an action as the object rather than the subject of a verb.

Ergative verb: a verb that can be either transitive or intransitive, and whose subject when intransitive corresponds to its direct object when transitive.In English, most verbs can be used intransitively, but ordinarily this does not change the role of the subject; consider, for example, "He ate the soup" (transitive) and "He ate" (intransitive), where the only difference is that the latter does not specify what was eaten. By contrast, with an ergative verb the role of the subject changes; consider "it broke the window" (transitive) and "the window broke" (intransitive).Ergative verbs can be divided into several categories: Verbs suggesting a change of state — break, burst, form, heal, melt, tear, transform Verbs of cooking — bake, boil, cook, fry Verbs of movement — move, shake, sweep, turn, walk Verbs involving vehicles — drive, fly, reverse, run, sailSome of these can be used intransitively in either sense: "I'm cooking the pasta" is fairly synonymous with both "The pasta is cooking" (as an ergative verb) and "I'm cooking", although it obviously gives more information than either.Unlike a passive verb, a nominalization, an infinitive, or a gerund, which would allow the agent to be deleted but would also allow it to be included, the intransitive version of an ergative verb requires the agent to be deleted: "The window was broken" or "The window was broken by the burglar." "[…] to break the window […]" or "[…] for the burglar to break the window […]" "[…] the breaking of the window […]" or "[…] the breaking of the window by the burglar […]" "The window broke" but not *"The window broke by the burglar."Indeed, the intransitive form of an ergative verb almost suggests that there is no agent. With some non-ergative verbs, this can be achieved using the reflexive voice: "He solved the problem." "The problem was solved" or "The problem was solved by him." "The problem solved itself" but not *"The problem solved itself by him."In this case, however, the use of the reflexive voice strongly indicates the lack of an agent; where "John broke the window, or maybe Jack did — at any rate, the window broke" is understandable, if slightly unidiomatic, *"John solved the problem, or maybe Jack did — at any rate, the problem solved itself" is completely self-contradictory. Nonetheless, some grammarians would consider both "The window broke" and "The problem solved itself" to be examples of a distinct voice, the middle voice.A particularly odd English ergative verb is "graduate": "he graduated from school" and "school graduated him" mean the same thing, although the latter usage has passed out of vogue, and one meets with occasional criticism of the intransitive form.[1] With the latter usage, the verb is transitive, but with the former, the verb is intransitive.The significance of the ergative verb is that it enables a writer or speaker not only to suppress the identity of the outside agent responsible for the particular process, but also to represent the affected party as in some way causing the action by which it is affected. This can be done neutrally when the affected party can be considered an institution or corporate entity and the individual member responsible for the action is unimportant, for example "the shop closed for the day". It can also be used by journalists sympathetic to a particular causative agent and wishing to avoid assigning blame, as in "Eight factories have closed this year."

Inchoative: denoting an aspect of a verb expressing the beginning of an action, typically one occurring of its own accord.

Inchoative verb: sometimes called an "inceptive" verb, shows a process of beginning or becoming.

Unaccusative verb: an intransitive verb whose syntactic argument is not a semantic agent; that is, it does not actively initiate, or is not actively responsible for, the action of the verb; or it treats the argument like the accusative argument of a transitive verb. Unaccusative verbs thus contrast with unergative verbs. An unaccusative verb's subject is semantically similar to the direct object of a transitive verb, or to the subject of a verb in the passive voice. English unaccusative verbs include die and fall, but not run or resign, which are unergative. They are called unaccusative because, although the subject has the semantic role of a patient, it is not assigned accusative case.Tests for unaccusativityAs mentioned above, the unaccusative/unergative split in intransitive verbs can be characterized semantically. Unaccusative verbs tend to express a telic and dynamic change of state or location, while unergative verbs tend to express an agentive activity (not involving directed movement). While these properties define the "core" classes of unaccusatives and unergatives, there are intermediate classes of verbs whose status is less clear (for example, verbs of existence, appearance, or continuation, verbs denoting uncontrolled processes, or motion verbs).A number of syntactic criteria for unaccusativity have also been identified. The most well-known test is auxiliary selection in languages that use two different temporal auxiliaries (have and be) for analytic past/perfect verb forms (e.g. German, Dutch, French, Italian; even Early Modern English). In these languages, unaccusative verbs combine with be, while unergative verbs combine with have.

French:

unaccusative: Je suis tombé. lit. "I am fallen." (= "I have fallen.")unergative: J'ai travaillé. "I have worked."Italian:unaccusative: È arrivato. lit. "[He] is arrived." (= "He has arrived.")unergative: Ha telefonato. "[He] has phoned."

From one language to another, however, synonymous verbs do not always select the same auxiliary, and even within one language, a single verb may combine with either auxiliary (either depending on the meaning/context, or with no observable semantic motivation, sometimes depending on regional variation of the language). The auxiliary selection criterion therefore also identifies core classes of unaccusative and unergatives (which show the least variation within and across languages) and more peripheral classes (where variation and context effects are observed).Other tests that have been studied involve passivization (see Impersonal passive voice), ne/en cliticization in Italian and French, and impersonal, participial, and resultative constructions in a wide range of languages. In Japanese, the grammaticality of sentences that appear to violate syntactic rules may signal the presence of an unaccusative verb. According to transformational models of grammar, such sentences contain a trace located in the direct object position that helps to satisfy the mutual c-command condition between numeral quantifiers and the noun phrases they modify (Tsujimura, 2007).Unaccusativity in EnglishModern English only uses one perfect auxiliary (have), although archaic examples like "He is fallen/come" reflect the use of be with unaccusative verbs in earlier stages of the language.The identification of unaccusative verbs in English is therefore based on other criteria. For example, many unaccusatives alternate with a corresponding transitive construction where the unaccusative subject appears in direct object position:

The ice melted. ≈ The sun melted the ice.The window broke. ≈ The golf ball broke the window.

Unaccusative past participles can be used as nominal modifiers with active meaning, while unergative past participles cannot:unaccusative: the melted snow, the departed guests, the fallen soldiersunergative: *the shouted victim, *the slept child, *the hesitated leader

Finally, unaccusative subjects can generally be modified by a resultative adjunct. This is a property shared by direct objects and passive subjects, but not shared by the subjects of unergative and transitive verbs.

unaccusative subject: The vase broke into pieces.direct object: John broke the vase into pieces.passive subject: The vase was broken into pieces.unergative subject: *John dined full/to death/two pounds heavier.subject of transitive verb: *John ate the brownies full/to death/two pounds heavier.

Unergative verb: an intransitive verb (which is not unaccusative)[1] distinguished semantically by having an agent argument, or that treats the argument like the ergative argument of a transitive verb. For example, in English, run, talk and resign are unergative verbs (while fall and die are unaccusative).Some languages treat unergative verbs distinctly from other intransitives in morphosyntactical terms. For example, in some Romance languages these verbs use different auxiliaries when forming the compound tenses. See the article on unaccusative verbs for details.Besides the above, unergative verbs differ from unaccusative verbs in the fact that, in some languages, they can be passivized to a limited extent.In other words, unergatives are truly intransitive, ergatives are not.

Special kind of intransitive verb. Semantically, unergative verbs have a subject perceived as actively initiating or actively responsible for the action expressed by the verb. EXAMPLE: in English run, talk and resign are unergative verbs. In syntax, unergative verbs are characterized as verbs with an external argument (argument of a predicate X, which is not contained in the maximal projection of X. In general, this is the subject of a predicate. EXAMPLE: in (i) John [VP buys books], John is the external argument of the verb buy, and is not part of its maximal projection VP. An argument of a predicate X which is contained in its maximal projection is called the internal argument. In (i) the NP books is the internal argument of the verb buy.).

References!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causative_alternation