Linguistics

Questions tagged [verbs]

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Part of speech whose members indicate an action or a state of being.

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1answer
105 views

What determines the valency of predicates?

According to this example, arrive takes only one subject valent. Can somebody specializes in syntax help me apprehend this notion of valence? Specifically, what factors are used to determine the ...
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1answer
60 views

Why does the pronoun and verb order vary in Polish language?

My go nie lubimy - we do not like him On nie kocha mnie - he does not love me Why in the first example go is followed by nie lubimy, but in the second sentence we have the opposite: nie kocha followed ...
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3answers
3k views

Is there a name for the type of word that the word, “scarecrow,” is? (a transitive verb conjoined with its object)

The English word, “scarecrow,” spontaneously came to mind the other day, and I realized just how similar this word is to other words and phrases in other languages. For example, there are many ...
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0answers
99 views

Is 'love' transitive?

I was just watching a linguistics video in which it was stated that in the sentence "John loves Mary", the verb love requires the direct object Mary, implying that it would be incorrect to ...
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0answers
68 views

Is there any database with English verb argument structure?

To simplify -- different verbs require different number of nouns to be complete. Some of arguments may be implicit in the real usage of language. So, my question is there any database containing many ...
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1answer
98 views

Languages with definite and indefinite conjugation

Apart from Hungarian, are there any other languages with definite and indefinite conjugation (verbal inflections)? For example (in Hugarian): Definite conjugation: I see the tree. – Látom a fát. ...
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2answers
114 views

Is there a universal (general) definition of gerund, infinitive and participle?

Is there a universal (general) definition of gerund, infinitive and participle applicable to all languages despite the differences between them?
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1answer
100 views

Why do verbs use 1st singular present active indicative instead of infinitive as the "canonical" or "representative" form in Latin?

I see many dictionaries use the 1st person singular present active indicative form as the "canonical" or dictionary entry for verbs in Latin. For example, a typical dictionary would show ...
2
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1answer
164 views

What do "finite" and "non-finite" mean in linguistics?

What do "finite" and "non-finite" mean in linguistics? I know that they occur in other languages and in some cases not only in verbs.
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0answers
53 views

what is the difference between reference time and event time

what is the difference between reference time and event time , also i am native Arabic speaker , i tried to translate by google translate two examples the reference time before and after event time ...
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1answer
79 views

Simple cases of gapping (verb ellipsis in coordinate structures)

What are some simple cases of V or Verb Phrase gaps? For instance: I love the location and the apartment. Is this considered a gap (missing 'love' in the second conjunct)? If not, why not? What about ...
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0answers
76 views

The aspect of imperative mood in English

What is the aspect of imperative mood in English? e.g., Go home! I know the mood of the verb is imperative here, but I am not sure about the aspect.
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1answer
67 views

Question about a specific grammatical feature

In one Conlang I am developing there is a feature where owned items are treated as the subject of a verb, and the owner as the Object. So, for example: Car sohi Amelia Would mean Amelia's Car, with ...
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0answers
52 views

What is the history behind the use of the infinitive form with an imperative function in Germany, Dutch, and other languages

In German, Dutch, and other languages, the imperative is distinct from the infinitive: Dutch would be doe mee! (singular), doet mee! (plural or formal, dated). German would be mach mit (singular) or ...
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2answers
84 views

What is meant by "s/he flies" in Plains Cree dictionary?

The Plains Cree Dictionary has things like this: ᐋᐦᑕᐦᐅᐤ âhtahow VAI-1 s/he flies to another place The VAI (animate intransitive verb) page doesn't have a description. In English we have verbs "...
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1answer
84 views

What is the term for the role of "believe", "think", and "feel" in a sentence?

I remember vaguely that there is an encompassing terms for these words when used in a sentence. Something that represent it is not a normal factual claim, but something that is subjective to the ...
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0answers
36 views

Are there such things as verbs that are experiential AND ditransitive?

Does any natural language have verbs that are both ditransitive and experiential? I'm working on a conlang in which ditransitive experiential verbs exist. For example, we could have verbs that mean &...
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4answers
121 views

What sort of "root" patterns do languages have that don't have infinitive verbs?

I am trying to gather the "base" form of verbs across languages. The form that is used to generate all the other various verb forms. But it seems some languages don't have infinitive forms ...
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3answers
268 views

How did verb conjugation by person, number and gender appear? Why do we still use it?

I'm Russian native,learning German and English. I'm interested in teaching myself some linguistics. Russian verb inflects for person, number in present and future tense; for gender in past tense. ...
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1answer
152 views

What is the reason for having irregular verbs?

Having irregular verbs makes the language more complex. Users have to memorize more rules. Is there a historical reason, or some other reason, that English had all these irregular verbs?
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49 views

Where do nominal sentences (null/lacking verb sentences) come from and what does their existence imply?

Nominal sentence is a grammatical feature of some languages that a grammatical correct sentence can have no explicit verb. The implicit verb at least in Arabic is simple present form of 'to be', e.g. ...
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0answers
100 views

Are there languages that mark mood but not tense or aspect?

Are there languages where verbs inflect for mood but don't inflect for tense and aspect? For instance, if a language had one set of indicative forms and another set of subjunctive forms, but didn't ...
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1answer
53 views

Is there a database out there for mapping verb tense to its base form?

Obviously, almost all the online dictionaries could map some verb forms like "spoke, spoken, speaking, speaks" to its base form "speak". I've searched this on github but didn't ...
2
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1answer
69 views

Are Turkish aorist (wide-tense) verbs originally finite or nonfinite?

There are countless examples in Turkish of third person aorist forms in -A/Ir or -mAz (negative form) which are employed as nouns: gelir (income), gider (spending), yazar (writter) or adjective su ...
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42 views

Across languages, what, if any, syntactic or semantic differences distinguish compound verbs from serial verb constructions?

Across languages, what semantic or syntactic differences distinguish serial verb constructions from compound verbs? Let's disregard phonological differences for the purposes of this question. Let's ...
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0answers
320 views

Are there any studies on some English passive verb constructions currently being replaced by new intransitive senses?

In the past couple of years I've noticed a new trend in younger generations of native English speakers, at least in American English and Australian English. But I can't find it discussed anywhere on ...
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1answer
120 views

What's the precisest term for verbs that belong to the same stem without any affixes?

RA Duff. Intention, Agency and Criminal Liability (1990). p 33.       Notice too the various cognates of 'intention' which are used in ordinary language. We talk of intending to ...
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1answer
153 views

Both subject and object of an act defined by same verb?

I have in my hand a rather ancient text in Arabic. There's a frequent construction which I couldn't grasp the full meaning. It is [ transitive verb + preposition ], in which the preposition is fixed ...
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0answers
39 views

Is there a principled reason behind differing compound verb stress in English?

Is there a principled difference between compound verbs in English with stress on the first root and those with stress on the second root? First root stress compound verbs: Dropkick Spoonfeed ...
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0answers
34 views

Is "in favour of John" a resultative here?

In the sentence, "The judge settled the dispute in favour of John", is "in favour of John" a resultative? I am being asked to explain what this string shows about the verb "settle". Thanks!
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0answers
78 views

Does anyone know the history of the infinitive?

I teach grammar, and I think it is no mystery to anyone that infinitives are strange. I think it might help me to know the history of this verb-cum-noun-adjectiv
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1answer
249 views

Why don't modern Romance languages have the verb "to stand"?

I noticed that modern Romance languages don't have a specific word for the verb "to stand", or - you could say - don't consider the notion of standing to be a verb. For example, in Spanish - you can ...
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1answer
203 views

Pattern of use of modal verbs across languages

So I am toying with language and understand how to treat basic verbs and nouns and adjectives. But I am stuck on modal verbs like "I should have gone home". I would like to know basically a cheat ...
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2answers
305 views

When an existential verb is used existentially as the predicate to a subject, is it true in all languages that it cannot take another predicate?

When an existential is used existentially verb as the predicate to a subject, is it true in all languages that it cannot take another predicate? In other words, when the existential to-be verb means '...
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2answers
296 views

Is there a linguistic term for replacing past tense verb with present tense?

In my dialect of English (North West England), we sometimes use the present tense of a verb when standard English employs the past tense, such as in the sentence below: "I waits for the bus ...
4
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2answers
306 views

What is the proper term for a verb that can be used transitively with the patient as object or intransitively with the patient as subject

For example: I am cooking the chicken The chicken is cooking in the oven Cp: I am building a sandcastle x The sandcastle is building on the beach
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1answer
419 views

Origin of -s verbs in Norwegian and Swedish

(Disclaimer: I am not a linguist.) I am learning Norwegian now, and they have some verb form when you attach -s to the end. It is often called passive voice (used in Present tense and in infinitive ...
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0answers
65 views

Is "be set to" a subject-to-subject raising predicate?

Consider the sentence "Conservative Party (is) Set to Win (a) Majority". Is it right that "set" in this case is a subject-to-subject raising? I don't think "set" has an agent theta role. However, all ...
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0answers
60 views

What was the role of "compound" verbs in Middle English?

I was just reading a book where it is said that when perfect started to acquire modern meanings, "compound" verbs appeared. Here are some examples (I`m assuming with "compound" verbs on the right): ...
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2answers
176 views

How regular were Latin verbs compared to Spanish?

Compared to English, Spanish is very consistent within its rules about verbs. The endings for the three kinds of verbs—grouped as -ar, -er, and -ir verbs—are pretty consistently regular, and few words ...
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2answers
233 views

Why can Japanese Godan verbs only have nine possible consonant sounds before the final -u?

The dictionary form of Japanese verbs always ends in a -u syllable. Ichidan (one row or single-step in German) verbs will always end in -る (-ru, e.g. 食べる, taberu, to eat) while godan (five rows or ...
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1answer
138 views

What can these verbs be called as a group?

I'm going to teach my students about different patterns of usage of these verbs: marry (e.g. get married, marry sb, marry to), die (e.g. die of , die from, die for), match (e.g. match (something), ...
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2answers
219 views

Is it normal for only one verb class to be productive in Indo-European languages?

In another question on this site, there is some discussion on the view that the so-called "strong verb" class in English is no longer "productive" - that is, newly formed or coined words (neologisms) ...
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2answers
191 views

why can't we have two main verbs in a sentence in syntax

Would you please exlain to me why can't we have two main verbs in a sentence in syntax? Thank you so much
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2answers
143 views

Where can you find a list of all nouns and verbs "forms" in each language? [closed]

The only languages for which I have found a book (not even a webpage) is for Hebrew and Arabic. Are there books or webpages that contain all the noun declensions and verb "conjugations" (or noun and ...
2
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0answers
38 views

How do languages express multiple simultaneous applicatives?

Some languages use an applicative voice construction exclusively for certain meanings. Applicatives may also be the only way of expressing such roles, as in the Bantu Chaga languages, where ...
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4answers
814 views

Is "imperatives have invisible subjects" a universal?

In English, it's widely held that imperative verbs have "invisible" subjects, on the syntactic level. For example, we see look at yourself in the mirror, rather than *look at you in the mirror, which ...
3
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1answer
114 views

Why a verb "to be" has a lot forms [duplicate]

I really can't understand why this verb changes to "am", "is", etc. The common answer is "just became as historical legacy", but how actually it happend?
4
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1answer
643 views

What kind of verbs take three arguments?

"The man paints the wall red". The verb to paint can take three arguments, the object, the subject and the colour of the paint. What kind of verb is this? "The man colours the paper blue". I think ...
2
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1answer
45 views

Indexing outside of NP

I am familiar with indexing and co-indexing NP's but I've come across indexing that looks like this: "Gregory(i) seems to enjoy (ti) Marvel Films." Does the (ti) indicate some kind of movement? ...

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