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Verb Valency Changes: Theoretical and typological perspectives
Edited by Albert Álvarez González and Ia Navarro
[Typological Studies in Language 120] 2017
► pp. 108–132

The semantics of Nahuatl tla- constructions

| Universidad de Sonora-CONACyT

Nahuatl tla- constructions are described as complex predicates formed by a verbal base and an unspecified object pronoun that has weakened its formal status in favor of an abstract semantic contribution. We propose that the formal status of tla- is that of a defective pronoun, which fails to make a formal contribution in favor of a semantic one and causes the verbal base to be interpreted in a specific fashion. Furthermore, we show that the meaning of the resulting complex constructions depends on both, the tla- semantic contribution and the verbal base semantic and configurational properties. Based on descriptive and theoretical background, we disagree with tla- being categorized as an antipassive marker – as others propose –, instead we suggest that tla- constructions are the result of an event modification process and that the outcome of this process depends on how the operation interacts with the verbal base lexical properties.

Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The Nahuatl tla- constructions
  • 3.The tla- formal status
  • 4.Types of tla- predicate constructions
    • 4.1The Hale & Keyser’s theory of Argument Structure
    • 4.2Transitive verbal bases for tla‑ constructions
    • 4.3Unergative verbal bases
    • 4.4Unaccusative verbal bases
  • 5.A note on the anti antipassivisation analysis of Nahuatl tla- constructions
  • 6.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 30 September 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/tsl.120.05nav
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Peregrina Llanes, Manuel, Albert Álvarez González & Zarina Estrada-Fernández
2017. Transitivity and valency-changing operations in Huasteca Nahuatl. In Verb Valency Changes [Typological Studies in Language, 120], ► pp. 82 ff. DOI logo

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