[SynSem] Neige Rochant (U. Lausanne)

retour Séminaire Syntaxe et Sémantique

Neige Rochant (U. Lausanne)

What does the causative do in Andi?

Andi is a Nakh-Daghestanian language spoken by approximately 20,000 speakers living in or resettled from 9 villages of the Botlikh district of the Republic of Dagestan, Russia (Aglarov 2002: 3). At first glance, this ergative language exhibits just three primary valency classes: intransitive, affective, and labile.  The causative derivation—Andi’s sole overt valency-altering process—introduces an A-argument to verbs of any valency. This presentation explores the theoretical and grammatical significance of this derivation in greater depth. On the one hand, causativization in Andi reveals a broader range of semantico-syntactic classes, encompassing not only transitive verbs, but also unergative and inaccusative ones. On the other hand, a closer examination of the various outcomes of causativization indicates that the causative does not target uniformly all verb classes, with certain classes appearing to be preferred over others.

This talk is part of CauLaGeNet talk series organised by the SFL SynSem group (UMR 7023 -SFL CNRS & U. Paris 8) and LLING, (CNRS & U. Nantes).