What is it about?
This study examines how different languages around the world express valency-increasing causative constructions. It compares 44 languages to investigate the morpho-syntactic means they use, the productivity of these constructions, and their distribution across different areas and language types. The study focuses particularly on how the person being caused to act (the “causee”) is represented in these constructions, identifying four main patterns used across languages. Finally, it explores the factors that influence these patterns, including grammatical constraints and the agency of the causee in the action.
Featured Image
Photo by Jonathan Velasquez on Unsplash
Why is it important?
This study is important for its relatively large-scale, typologically balanced investigation of valency-increasing causative constructions across 44 languages representing isolating, agglutinative, fusional, and polysynthetic types. The findings contribute to a deeper understanding of how languages structure causative events and adjust argument structure when an additional participant is introduced across different morphological language types.
Perspectives
This article, based on a chapter of my doctoral project: Valency Alternations and Linguistic Typology, further explores the relationship between the morphological expression of valency-increasing causatives and language typology, as well as how the introduction of an additional participant affects syntactic restructuring and the coding of participants. I hope readers will find this article inspiring.
Pingping Ge
Nanjing Forestry University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: 增价型使役态的形态句法研究, International Journal of Chinese Linguistics, June 2025, John Benjamins,
DOI: 10.1075/ijchl.00056.ge.
You can read the full text:
Contributors
The following have contributed to this page
