SILGLOBALGlossary of
Linguistic Terms

Glossary term E

Ergative Case

Definition

Ergative case is the case of nouns in ergative-absolutive languages that would generally be the subjects of transitive verbs in the translation equivalents of nominative-accusative languages such as English.

Discussion

Ergative case is more likely to be formally marked on the noun than absolutive case is.

See also

Noun Subject Transitive Verb Verb (Linguistics) Translational Equivalence Absolutive Case

Sources 4

  1. Crystal 1980, 134
  2. Hartmann and Stork 1972, 78
  3. Pei and Gaynor 1954, 67
  4. Andrews, A. 1985, 138
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