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Indo-Aryan Ergativity in Typological and Diachronic Perspective
Edited by Eystein Dahl and Krzysztof Stroński
[Typological Studies in Language 112] 2016
► pp. 39–60

Looking for ergativity in Indo-Aryan

| Research Foundation Flanders – FWO | Ghent University
| Ghent University

Indo-Aryan languages are often described as ergative or split-ergative. The article investigates the extent of this claim, by looking at a number of constructions in 22 New Indo-Aryan languages. It is shown that ergative constructions are in general the minority, and that other mechanisms of alignment, such as transitivity-indicating agreement patterns, are as valuable to be studied as strictly ergative patterns. Our conclusion also applies to historical studies on the evolution of the Indo-Aryan alignment system, which sometimes seem to focus too much on specific ergative patterns, thus overlooking other motivations of alignment.

Published online: 14 June 2016
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https://doi.org/10.1075/tsl.112.02ver
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