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From: mmar@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP (Mitchell Marks)
Newsgroups: net.nlang
Subject: Re: Query on ergative languages
Message-ID: <906@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 29-Jul-85 02:22:08 EDT
Article-I.D.: sphinx.906
Posted: Mon Jul 29 02:22:08 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 31-Jul-85 01:29:00 EDT
References: <6312@ucla-cs.ARPA> <853@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP>, <713@rlgvax.UUCP>
Organization: U Chicago -- Linguistics Dept
Lines: 11

Examples like
		This boat seats five.
		This pizza chews a little tough.
(those are different) resemble not so much the ergative constructions as
something called the `mediopassive' or middle voice.  This is not marked
by a special verb inflection in English, but in some languages (e.g. classical
Greek) it is, and gives a third alternative to the active and passive voices.
-- 

            -- Mitch Marks @ UChicago 
               ...ihnp4!gargoyle!sphinx!mmar