Questions tagged [verbs]
Part of speech whose members indicate an action or a state of being.
201
questions
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2answers
113 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 '...
0
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2answers
206 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 ...
3
votes
1answer
150 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
5
votes
1answer
102 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 ...
0
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0answers
17 views
Automated Verb Correction for Subject Agreement Using Penn Treebank Tags
I'm working on a software method to correct the verb in an English sentence based on the subject count (singular or plural) and using a corpus of verbs tagged with their Penn Treebank Tags. (I have ...
0
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0answers
54 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 ...
2
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0answers
45 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):
...
0
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2answers
87 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 ...
3
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2answers
125 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 ...
1
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1answer
104 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), ...
7
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2answers
124 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
151 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
87 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
29 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 ...
3
votes
4answers
645 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
105 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
votes
1answer
175 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
votes
1answer
43 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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1answer
172 views
How to understand semelfactive aspect of a verb? How is it varied/similar to iterative aspect?
How semelfactive aspect of a verb that represents a single occasion of an event like knock,hit etc..is perfective and moment defined.
whereas,iterative aspect is event that is repeated on single ...
7
votes
1answer
91 views
Name for a verb form meaning “feign or pretend to do sth”
Is there an accepted name for a derivational process applied to a verb which conveys the meaning "feign or pretend to do sth".
As a corollary, is anyone aware of any languages (especially non-...
1
vote
1answer
164 views
Does each verb have a corresponding noun with the same meaning
I believe that each main verb has (at least) one corresponding noun with the same meaning that is formed from gerund and derivation. For examples, discovery is from discover; reading is from read; ...
1
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1answer
109 views
If you can use nouns as verbs for different languages
Along the same lines of If you can use Chinese nouns as verbs, or vice versa, I am wondering if you can treat nouns as verbs or verbs as nouns in languages such as these:
Inuktitut
Hebrew
Japanese
...
9
votes
2answers
519 views
Do most languages have the same basic verb tenses?
I am a student learning languages who is interested in linguistics! In trying to keep myself organized with my own study sheets, I wanted to know, do all languages have the same basic verb tenses? I'm ...
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0answers
20 views
Cross-linguistic study of distribution of number of verbal arguments
I think I remember reading once that cross linguistically, at least in "normal" spoken or written language, verbs almost never take more than ~4-5 obligatory arguments. This seems to be true in my ...
2
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1answer
48 views
Where can I find an analysis of the semantic overlap of English “to have” and “with”?
For years I've understood via my native speaker intuition and my interest in languages and linguistics that the preposition "with" can carry the semantic meaning of the verb "to have".
The man who ...
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2answers
102 views
Why some verbs have -tion while others don't, when being nounified
Verbs like animate become a noun animation, and others like graduate become graduation. But then there are verbs that are just straight converted into nouns, like capture the verb and a capture the ...
0
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1answer
64 views
The most different meanings a verb has been found to have
After considering How we can use the same word in multiple different ways and distinguish it so easily, I'm wondering now how complex it can get. I'm wondering what an example is from any language ...
1
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3answers
193 views
How Nesting Verbs Works (and if it is Even Possible)
Wondering the different ways you can nest verbs, and what is technically allowed from a mental perspective, not necessarily from a grammatical perspective b/c I imagine it would vary significantly ...
7
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3answers
181 views
Is there a language where another verb form is simpler/more basic than the imperative?
Imperative tends to be the simplest verb form, cf. Latin dic, fac. English is not very inflecting, so other verb forms can be just as simple as the imperative. Nevertheless, is there a language, where ...
0
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2answers
193 views
Stolen, part of speech
I've checked several dictionaries for the word "stolen" only to find it labeled a verb. Virtually all of the examples sentences use it in a manner that I would have considered an adjective:
"The ...
1
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2answers
93 views
Is there a language where semantic aspect determines which tense is unmarked in a verb?
For every language there is a tense that is morphologically closest to the root, e.g. English present is more basic than perfect since perfect either adds a suffix -(e)d or has ablaut as tense marker. ...
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0answers
60 views
Resource for getting agentive noun from verb automatically
I am trying to get (in some automated fashion) the agentive noun of a given verb. For instance we have
buy, buyer
sell, seller
invest, investor
I was wondering whether there is some resource that ...
7
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4answers
9k views
What is the past tense of 'yeet'?
Yeet (/ji:t/) is a recently coined verb in English that seems to have taken on the characteristics of a strong verb, as seen in this hilarious urban dictionary definition.
In English, the strong ...
0
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1answer
262 views
Why is there not passive imperative? [closed]
It doesn’t exist. I have the proof. Look. It’s missing.
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0answers
49 views
English verbs requiring PP
Are there a set of English verbs that require a prepositional phrase? For example:
"The set consists of A and B." = GOOD
"The set consists" = BAD
Is there a name for this type of verb? They seem to ...
5
votes
1answer
106 views
(A)Telicity & Events
Dowty's (1979) classified predicates into:
1. States 'the woord is burning' ---Atelic
2. Activities 'Mary pushed the cart' ---Atelic
3. Accomplishments 'Mary melted the chocolate' ---Telic
4. ...
5
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3answers
246 views
Is there any language where the past tense is the base form of a verb?
The fictional language Flaidish has this feature. But I recently found out about a natural language (Mixtec) where the present isn't the base form of a verb, its the future tense.
I found this ...
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3answers
107 views
What functional motivations are there for the choice of light verb constructions over full verbs?
I am doing a reasearch on light verbs and wondered if anyone could give some opinions on why people tend to use light verb cosntructions, such as "take a shower", "make a decision" etc., over the ...
2
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1answer
93 views
Is there a language in which personal suffix precedes the temporal suffix in conjugation?
A fictional example:
zelun (zel- (verb stem: "to make leather") + u (personal suffix, 3rd person sg.) + n (temporal suffix, present))
vs. zelud (u (3rd sg.) + d (preterite))
zelun = "He/She/It is ...
5
votes
1answer
133 views
What is the concept of verb agreement with passive-active level in Hebrew?
In this Duolingo discussion, 'S.Liebermann' mentions that in Hebrew and Arabic, "the verb needs to agree with the level of passive/active" and "Hebrew has 7 degrees of passive/active, while Arabic has ...
0
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1answer
136 views
Periphrastic verb forms in Gothic
What periphrastic verb form are attested in the Gothic language, the oldest Germanic language we have substantial records from?
Skimming through a grammar of Gothic I found that for the past tense ...
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3answers
213 views
Is there a natural language that doesn’t use an action verb to describe death?
English uses “activity” verbs such as the verb “to be” to describe that a person is dead, as in “He is dead,” or “He died.” Is there a language that doesn’t do this?
I know that some languages have ...
3
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1answer
68 views
Are copulas object/complement heads? P&P & LFG
In P&P, I assume that 'be' occupies the head of VP as P&P doesn't allow for empty heads. From that I assume that copulas head objects/complements in the same way that a lexical verb would?
In ...
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0answers
72 views
Does a main verb undergo inversion in “Has he any shame?”
My undergraduate textbook builds a case to posit separate classes of verbs as lexical, auxiliary, modal in nature. One criterion is how auxiliary and modals (unlike main verbs) undergo inversion but ...
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0answers
40 views
When was the concept of verbs' principal parts codified, and by whom?
For example, I'm wondering whether the Greek/Roman grammarians already wrote about six/four basic forms based on which a Greek/Latin verb can be conjugated in all its forms.
If they did, did they ...
4
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1answer
86 views
Romance-like pronominal verbs elsewhere
Romance languages are known to have lots of so-called pronominal verbs, which are always conjugated with a reflexive pronoun even though the action is not actually reflexive: for example, Spanish irse,...
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1answer
100 views
Is there a term for an adjective or noun becoming a verb, like “to adult”?
Is there a term for a word that is traditionally an adjective or noun becoming a verb over time? A word I'm thinking of is "adult", which Merriam-Webster has reported has become increasingly used as a ...
2
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0answers
55 views
What explains the semantic sameness in 'Verb + preposition + Direct Object' and 'Verb + Direct Object'?
Why can prepositions following a verb not affect the meaning of Verb Phrases that differ by only a preposition? I.e., what explains the semantic sameness between Verb Phrases that differ by only a ...
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0answers
199 views
Are there any languages that either effectively don't have verbs or that somehow get around using a “standard” verb system?
By this, I'm asking whether there are languages (natural or constructed) which somehow function without verbs, relying instead upon other types of words like prepositions or something like that.
...
3
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2answers
177 views
Verb pairs similar to “buy” and “sell”?
"buy" and "sell" that are basically the same action/event, but reverse arguments (subject of one, the object of the other):
X sold his car to Y.
Y bought a car from X.
Is there a any special name ...
