Cover not available
Part of
Usage-Based Studies in Modern Hebrew: Background, Morpho-lexicon, and Syntax
Edited by Ruth A. Berman
[Studies in Language Companion Series 210] 2020
► pp. 331–374

Chapter 10
Voice distinctions

| Hebrew University of Jerusalem

The category of voice in Modern Hebrew is perceived in the current study as displaying a set of oppositions between two or three binyanim (templates) for a single consonantal root, instantiating different argument structures that do not affect the inventory of semantic roles characterizing a given root as a lexical entry. These oppositions, once established, are examined for the complementary functional distribution of their members in a variety of contexts in written Hebrew. Although the semantic relationships between the binyanim are frequently unpredictable, the data show that systematic form-function oppositions can nonetheless be distinguished, denoting subtle voice distinctions as well as different degrees of argument participation in the event. These oppositions can play an important role in the text.

Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Active voice
  • 3.Passive voice
    • 3.1The actional passive system
    • 3.2Semantic constraints on the active-passive opposition
    • 3.3Discourse functions of the actional passive
    • 3.4Impersonal passives
  • 4.Middle voice
    • 4.1The non-actional passive
    • 4.2Participles of hitpa‛el and nif‛al as exponents of potentiality
    • 4.3Reflexivity
      • 4.3.1Synthetic versus analytic reflexives
      • 4-3-2Hitpa‛el interpreted as reflexive
    • 4.4Overlap between hitpa‛el and nif‛al
    • 4.5Reciprocality
  • 5.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 18 March 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.210.11tau
References
Alexiadou, Artemis & Doron, Edit
2012 The syntactic construction of two non-active voices: Passive and middle. Journal of Linguistics 48(1): 1–34. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Alexiadou, Artemis & Schӓfer, Florian
2013 Non-canonical passives. In Non-Canonical Passives [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 205], Artemis Alexiadou & Florian Schӓfer (eds), 1–19. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Arad, Maya
2005 Roots and Patterns: Hebrew Morpho-Syntax [Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 63]. Dordrecht: Springer.Google Scholar
Bakker, Egbert
1994 Voice, aspect and Aktionsart: Middle and passive in ancient Greek. In Voice: Form and Function [Typological Studies in Language 27], Barbara A. Fox & Paul J. Hopper (eds), 23–48. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bar-Asher Siegal, Elitzur A.
2015 The Semitic templates from the perspective of reciprocal predicates. In Quo Vadis Morphology? On-line Proceedings of the 10th Mediterranean Morphology Meeting, Jenny Audring, Francesca Masini, & Wendy Sandler (eds), 16–30. < [URL] > (31 December 2018).Google Scholar
Barber, Elizabeth J. W.
1975 Voice – beyond the passive. Berkeley Linguistics Society 1: 16–24.Google Scholar
Ben-Hayyim, Zeev
1992 be-milx̱amta šel lašon [The Struggle for a Language] . Jerusalem: The Academy of the Hebrew Language.Google Scholar
Benveniste, Émile
1966 Actif et moyen dans le verbe. In Problèmes de Linguistique Générale, Vol. 1 168–175. Paris: Éditions Gallimard.Google Scholar
Berman, Ruth A.
1979 Form and function: Passives, Middles and impersonals in Modern Hebrew. Berkeley Linguistics Society 5: 1–39. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1980 The case of an (S)VO language: Subjectless constructions in Modern Hebrew. Language 56(4): 759–776. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1993 Developmental perspectives on transitivity: A confluence of cues. In Other Children, Other Languages: Issues in the Theory of Acquisition Yonata Levy (ed.) 189–241. Hillsdale NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
2003 Childrens lexical innovations: Psycholinguistic perspectives on Hebrew verb-structure. In Language Processing and Language Acquisition in a Root-based Morphology [Language Acquisition and Language Disorders 28], Joseph Shimron (ed.), 243–291. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
2011 Revisiting impersonals in Modern Hebrew: Discourse-based perspectives. In Impersonal Constructions: A Cross-linguistic Perspective [Studies in Language Companion Series 124], Andrej Malchukov & Anna Siewierska (eds), 323–355. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2016 Typology, acquisition, and development: The view from Israeli Hebrew. In Acquisition and Development of Hebrew: From Infancy to Adolescence [Trends in Language Acquisition Research Series 19], Ruth A. Berman (ed.), 1–38. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Blau, Joshua
1996 ‘iyunim be-valšanut ‘ivrit [Studies in Hebrew Linguistics]. Jerusalem: Magnes Press.Google Scholar
Bolinger, Dwight E.
1977 Transitivity and spatiality: The passive of prepositional verbs. In Linguistics at the Crossroads [Testi e Studi 4], Ádám Makkai, Valerie Becker Makkai & Luigi Heilmann (eds), 57–78. Padova: Liviana Editrice & Lake Bluff, Illinois: Jupiter Press.Google Scholar
Bolozky, Shmuel
2003 The roots of denominative Hebrew verbs. In Language Processing and Language Acquisition in a Root-based Morphology [Language Acquisition and Language Disorders 28], Joseph Shimron (ed.), 131–146. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
2009 šxix̱ut u-foriyut be-maʿarexet ha-poʿal šel ha-ʿivrit ha-yisre’elit [Frequency and productivity in the verb system of Israeli Hebrew]. Lešonenu 71(1–2): 345–367.Google Scholar
Bydlowski, René M.
1981 L’expression de l’aspect et de la voix, et leur symmorphisme dans des types linguistiques différents: Étude comparative à partir de L’hébreu-Israélien et du Français. PhD dissertation, Université de La Sorbonne Nouelle – Paris 3.Google Scholar
Collinge, Neville E.
1963 The Greek use of the term Middle in linguistic analysis. Word 19(2) : 233–241. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Creissels, Denis
2006 Syntaxe générale: Une introduction typologique, Vol. 1. Paris: Hermes.Google Scholar
Doron, Edit
1999 The semantics of transitivity alternations. In Proceedings of the Twelfth Amsterdam Colloquium, Paul Dekker (ed.), 103–108. Amsterdam: Universiteit van Amsterdam, Institute for Logic, Language and Computation.Google Scholar
2003a  Agency and voice: The semantics of the Semitic templates . Natural Language Semantics 11(1): 1–67. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2003b Transitivity Alternations in the Semitic template system. In Research in Afroasiatic Grammar, II: Selected Papers from the Fifth Conference on Afroasiatic languages, Paris 2000 [Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 241], Jacqueline Lecarme (ed.) 127–149. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2008 trumato šel ha-binyan le-mašmaʿut ha-poʿal [The contribution of the template to verb meaning]. In Theoretical Hebrew Linguistics, Galia Hatav (ed.), 57–88. Jerusalem: Magnes.Google Scholar
2013 Binyanim: Modern Hebrew. In Encyclopedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics, Geoffrey Khan (ed.). Brill online.
CrossRef DOI logo with hyperlink to permanent DOI
Google Scholar
2015 Voice and valence change. In Syntax – Theory and Analysis: An International Handbook [Handbooks of Linguistics and Communication Science (HSK) 42/1], Tibor Kiss & Artemis Alexiadou (eds), 749–776. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar
Doron, Edit & Rappaport-Hovav, Malka
2009  A unified approach to reflexivization in Semitic and Romance . Brills Annual of Afroasiatic Languages and Linguistics 1(1): 75–105. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Faltz, Leonard
1977 Reflexivization: A Study in Universal Syntax. PhD dissertation, University of California, Berkeley.
Fox, Barbara A. & Hopper, Paul J.
1994 Voice: Form and Function [Typological Studies in Language 27]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Frajzyngier, Zygmunt
2000a Domains of point of view and coreferentiality: System interaction approach to the study of reflexives. In Reflexives: Forms and Functions [Typological Studies in Language 40], Vol. 1, Zygmunt Frajzyngier & Curl S. Traci (eds), 125–152. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2000b Coding of the reciprocal function: Two solutions. In Reflexives: Forms and Functions [Typological Studies in Language 41], Vol. 2, Zygmunt Frajzyngier & Traci S. Curl (eds), 179–194. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Geniušené, Emma
1987 The Typology of Reflexives [Empirical Approaches to Language Typology 2]. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Givón, Talmy
1979 On Understanding Grammar. New York NY: Academic Press.Google Scholar
2001 Syntax: An Introduction, Vol.1. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Goldenberg, Gideon
2007 Actants and diathesis, directions of transitivity etc.: Some Satzgestaltungen and their background in Semitics and elsewhere. In From beyond the Mediterranen: Akten des 7. internationalen Semitohamitistenkongresses (VII. ISHaK) Berlin 13. bis 15. September 2004 [Semitica et Semitohamitica Berolinensia (SSHB) 5], Rainer Voigt (ed.), 283–296. Aachen: Shaker.Google Scholar
2013 Semitic Languages: Features, Structures, Relations, Processes. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Halevy, Rivka
2011 maṣavey hadadiyut be-ʿivrit ben ha-tax̱bir la-leqsiqon [Reciprocal constructions between syntax and lexicon]. Lešonenu 73(3–4): 401–422.Google Scholar
2013a Reflexive. In Encyclopedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics, Geoffrey Khan (ed.). Leiden: Brill Online.
CrossRef DOI logo with hyperlink to permanent DOI
Google Scholar
2013b ha-kinuy ha-x̱ozer be-ʿivrit : ha-hebeṭ ha-sinxroni ve-ha-hebeṭ ha-diaxroni [The Hebrew reflexive pronoun: A synchronic and diachronic perspective]. Lešonenu 75(4): 479–493.Google Scholar
2013c Reciprocals. In Encyclopedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics, Geoffrey Khan (ed.). Leiden: Brill Online.
CrossRef DOI logo with hyperlink to permanent DOI
Google Scholar
Haspelmath, Martin
1990 The grammaticization of passive morphology. Studies in Language 14(1): 25–72. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1994 Passive participles across languages. In Voice: Form and Function [Typological Studies in Language 27], Barbara A. Fox & Paul J. Hopper (eds), 151–178. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hopper, Paul J. & Thompson, Sandra
1980 Transitivity in grammar and discourse. Language 56: 251–299. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Izreel, Shlomo
2009 Constructive constructions: Semitic verbal morphology and beyond. In Egyptian, Semitic and General Grammar: Studies in memory of H.J. Polotsky, Gideon Goldenberg & Ariel Shisha-Halevy (eds), 106–130. Jerusalem: The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities.Google Scholar
Jespersen, Otto
1924 The Philosophy of Grammar. London: George Allen & Unwin.Google Scholar
Joosten, Jan
2000 Actif et moyen en sémitique: Observations historiques et comparées à partir de l‛hébreu biblique. Comptes Rendus du Groupe Linguistique d’Études Chamito-Sémitiques 33(1999–2000): 201–220.Google Scholar
Khan, Geoffrey
2013 (Ed.) The Encyclopedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics. Leiden: Brill.Online.Google Scholar
Kastner, Itamar
2016 Nonactive voice in Hebrew and elsewhere: Between unaccusativity and agentivity. University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics 22(1): 167–176.Google Scholar
Keenan, Edward L. & Dryer, Matthew S.
2007 Passive in the worlds languages. In Language Typology and Syntactic Description: Clause Structure, Vol. 1, Timothy Shopen (ed.), 325–361. Cambridge: CUP. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kemmer, Suzanne
1993 The Middle Voice [Typological Studies in Language 23]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1994 Middle voice, transitivity and the elaboration of events. In Voice: Form and Function [Typological Studies in Language 27], Barbara A. Fox & Paul J. Hopper (eds), 179–230. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Klaiman, Miriam H.
1991 Grammatical Voice [Cambridge Studies in Linguistics 59]. Cambridge: CUP.Google Scholar
Kulikov, Leonid
2010 Voice typology. In The Oxford Handbook of Linguistic Typology, Jae J. Song (ed.), 368–398. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Laks, Lior
2013 Inchoative verb. In Encyclopedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics, Geoffrey Khan (ed.). Leiden: Brill Online.
CrossRef DOI logo with hyperlink to permanent DOI
Google Scholar
Langacker, Ronald W.
2008 Cognitive Grammar: A Basic Introduction. Oxford: OUP. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lehmann, Christian
1991 Predicate classes and participation. In Partizipation: Das sprachlische Erfassen von Sachverhalten, Hansjakob Seiler & Waldfried Premper (eds) 183–239. Tübingen: Gunter Narr.Google Scholar
Longacre, Robert E.
1983 The Grammar of Discourse. New York NY: Plenum Press.Google Scholar
Lyons, John
1968 Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics. Cambridge: CUP. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mandelbliet, Nili
2000 The grammatical marking of conceptual integration: From syntax to morphology. Cognitive Linguistics 11(3–4): 197–251.Google Scholar
Mel’čuk, Igor A.
1993 The inflectional category of voice: Towards a more rigorous definition. In Causatives and Transitivity [Studies in Language Companion Series 23], Bernard Comrie & Maria Polinsky (eds), 1–46. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Melnik, Nurit
2013 Impersonal constructions. In Encyclopedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics, Geoffrey Khan (ed.). Leiden: Brill Online.
CrossRef DOI logo with hyperlink to permanent DOI
Google Scholar
Meltzer, Aya
2007 Adjectival passives and adjectival decausatives in Hebrew. Anuario del Seminario de Filología Vasca “Julio de Urquijo” (ASJU) 41(2): 209–224.Google Scholar
Ravid, Dorit & Vered, Lizzy
2016 Hebrew verbal passives in later language development: The interface of register and verb morphology. Journal of Child Language 44(6): 1309–1336. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Reinhart, Tanya & Siloni, Tal
2005 The lexicon-syntax parameter: Reflexivization and other arity operations. Linguistic Inquiry 36(3): 389–436. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Roeper, Thomas
1987 Implicit argument and the head-complement relation. Linguistic Inquiry 18(2): 267–310.Google Scholar
Rosén, Haiim B.
1956 mefu‛al ba-‛ivrit ha-yisre‛elit (Mefu‛al in contemporary Hebrew). Lešonenu 20(2): 139–148.Google Scholar
1977 Contemporary Hebrew [Trends in Linguistics: States-of-the-Art Reports 11]. The Hague & Paris: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Schwarzwald, Ora Rodrigue
2002 praqim be-morfologya ‛ivrit (Studies in Hebrew Morphology). Tel Aviv: The Open University Press.Google Scholar
2008 The special status of nif‛al in Hebrew. In Current Issues in Generative Hebrew Linguistics [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 134], Sharon Armon-Lotem, Gabi Danon & Susan Rothstein (eds), 61–74. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
2009 Three related analyses in Modern Hebrew morphology. In Egyptian, Semitic and General Grammar: Studies in memory of H.J. Polotsky, Gideon Goldenberg & Ariel Shisha-Halevy (eds) 277–301. Jerusalem: The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities.Google Scholar
Shibatani, Masayoshi
1998 Voice parameters. Kobe Papers in Linguistics 1: 93–111. < [URL] > (10 January 2019).Google Scholar
Siewierska, Anna
1984 The Passive: A Comparative Linguistic Analysis. London: Croom Helm.Google Scholar
Sinha, Anjani K.
1974 How passives are passives. Papers from the Regional Meeting, Chicago Linguistic Society 10: 631–642.Google Scholar
Taube, Dana
1997a ha-mivne ha-savil ve-šimušav be-‛ivrit bat yamenu (The Passive Construction and its Functions in Contemporary Hebrew). PhD dissertation, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
1997b ifyun hitkavnut be-vinyane ha-savil be-‛ivrit bat yamenu (The marking of deliberate action in the Modern Hebrew). Masorot 9–11: 43–60.Google Scholar
1999 po‛al be-roš mišpaṭ: mivne savil mul mivne pa‛il šemusa’o be-rošo be-‛ivrit bat yamenu (Passive vs. complement-initial active construction in Modern Hebrew). Lešonenu 62(3–4): 285–299.Google Scholar
2007 Impersonal and passive constructions in Contemporary Hebrew. In Studies in Semitic and General Linguistics in honor of Gideon Goldenberg, Tali Bar & Eran Cohen (eds), 277–297. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag.Google Scholar
2009 The passive participle in Modern Hebrew. In Egyptian, Semitic and General Grammar: Studies in memory of H.J. Polotsky, Gideon Goldenberg & Ariel Shisha-Halevy (eds), 317–336. Jerusalem: The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities.Google Scholar
Toyota, Junichi
2008 Gradience in analysis: A case of presentative passive. Facta Universitatis: Linguistics and Literature 6(1): 1–14.Google Scholar
Yahalom, Yosef
1980 ha-pasiv ba-piuṭ: lešon ha-šir u-lešon ha-proza u-vinyene ha-po’al (The passive in poetry: Verbal themes in poetry and prose). Lešonenu 45(1): 17–31.Google Scholar