English grammar - Roger Berry 2012
C7 Ergativity
Section C Exploration
Section C6 investigated the concept of transitivity in some detail, finding that the distinction between transitive and intransitive verbs is not a simple one. A number of relationships were identified, for example
□ verbs which can be both transitive and intransitive, but with a difference (or differences) in meaning
□ verbs which include or do without an object ’at the drop of a hat’
This section looks at one more relationship.
Activity C7.1
Look at these two extracts.
a) A master and servant are talking.
’I have . . . ruined my clothes’.
’They will clean, sir.’
(from a historical novel, Dissolution, by C.J. Sansom)
b) Some men are discussing a ship.
The fuss that was made while that ship was building.
(from a short story by Joseph Conrad, ’The Brute’)
How can you explain the use of clean and build here? Are they intransitive verbs? What do ’they’ and ’the ship’ refer to?
Verbs such as clean and build, where the ’object’ replaces the subject without any other change, are called ’ergative’. Ergative verbs are both transitive and intransitive (though the term is usually applied to the latter use). In the transitive/intransitive verbs that we have seen so far it is the object that is left out when a transitive verb becomes intransitive:
I sang a song. / I sang.
I’m learning to drive a car. / I’m learning to drive.
But with ergative verbs it is the subject that is omitted, to be replaced by the object.
They started the game. / The game started.
He moved his head. / His head moved.
Ergativity is common with verbs involving movement and change of state where the thing affected may be more important than the agent or doer, for example
The glass suddenly shattered.
Prices have doubled in the last month.
Ergatives look very similar to passives without a by phrase:
The door was slowly opened.
And the meaning is similar, in that both avoid mentioning the agent, but there is a difference. The passive implies an action with an ’agent’ (the person or thing that causes an action - see A8) even if not mentioned, while the ergative suggests a spontaneous event without an agent:
The door slowly opened.
In many European languages the equivalent sentence would be constructed with a reflexive pronoun (’The door opened itself.’).
Sometimes a verb is used ergatively only if there is an adverbial:
This car drives beautifully.
The book is selling like hot cakes.
Your essay reads well until the conclusion.
And some ergative verbs have a restricted range of subjects:
Then the bell/alarm rang/sounded.
Activity C7.2
Decide what patterns (intransitive, transitive, transitive/intransitive, ergative) these verbs have:
fall, bounce, show, die, boil, dance
Think of examples of each use. (NB: By calling a verb ’ergative’ we are saying that it is both transitive and intransitive, but in the way described above.)
Activity C7.3
Look at the concordance lines for various forms of the verb improve. Identify those which are transitive, and those which, while intransitive, are in an ergative relationship to the transitive form. What do you notice about the subjects in each case?
1. ... it’s done very well indeed to improve its profits . . .
2. So people tried to set up unions to improve living and working conditions . . .
3. ... many head injured patients will fail to improve and could even get worse.
4. But it has to be applied properly or it will not improve the quality of education.
5. ... we will continue to look for ways to improve the nutritional properties of our products.
6. ... only when government took action did situations improve at all.
7. Some have received large capital grants to improve their buildings . . .
8. Until recently most pundits expected the market to improve in the spring . . .
9. What do we want to improve most of all?
10. Current video printers . . . are improving all the time.
11. ... with a clear objective of increasing sales and improving customer service.
12. Their health improved and a cure was claimed in many cases.
13. Imaging quality has now been vastly improved . . .
14. Gradually agricultural tools improved as well.
15. ... we’ve marginally improved our market share.
Activity C7.4
Look at the concordance lines for closed below. Identify those which are transitive, and those which, while intransitive, are in an ergative relationship to the transitive form. Note also that some instances of closed are adjectives.
1. ... he worked at the Admiralty . . . until it closed 10 years ago.
2. ... it’s been closed for a couple of years now . . .
3. ... when the whistle went for nine o’clock that door was closed . . .
4. ... even more Midlands pits could be closed down.
5. The nitric acid plant has closed down . . .
6. ... I heard that the house would be closed for renovation.
7. The house is currently closed for extensive conservation works . . .
8. ... a silent Locomotive Shed with its doors closed for the last time . . .
9. The Opera House closed for two weeks.
10. ... US markets were largely closed for a holiday.
11. On Wednesday night the main runway was closed for maintenance . . .
12. On 1 May 1956 this branch finally closed, having been opened to passenger and freight traffic in 1856.
13. ... it has not yet closed its books for the first quarter . . .
14. ... the line has been closed only thirty-five years.
15. No, we’re closed Saturday.
16. One of the girls ran and closed the door . . .
17. ... the chairman closed the meeting at ten past ten.
18. Its cavernous classrooms became silent in 1977 when the school closed.
19. It remained closed until the idea of a union was forgotten.
20. The evening closed with questions to the Speaker . . .
And finally a story:
The broken window, or how grammar can get you out of trouble Four boys were playing football in their school playground - where it was not allowed. One of them mis-kicked the ball and it smashed a window in one of the schoolrooms.
Now they were honest lads and, instead of running away and hiding, they decided to report the broken window to the principal. But first they discussed how to describe the breakage.
The first one, who was a little naive linguistically, suggested I’m sorry; we have broken the window. But the other three said that it was much too obvious; it would get them into lots of trouble.
The second student, who had taken a basic course in English grammar and knew something about the passive, suggested The window has been broken by us. ’It focuses more on the thing affected than on those responsible for the action’, he said. But the other two said it was still too obvious who was responsible.
The third student, more advanced, knew that the actor could be omitted in the passive. So he suggested The window has been broken. The first two nodded their agreement, but the fourth said ’But the principal will still know that someone did it and will ask “Who by?” ’
Now this fourth student had read this book and so he knew all about the ergative, and how it could be used to present an action as a happening without any ’actors’. So he suggested The window has broken. The other three looked at him in awe, and agreed. So that is what they said when they went to see the principal; and the principal just nodded and thanked them for telling him.
Moral: grammar is good for you. (© Roger Berry 2012)
Comments
Activity C7.1:
In a) They refers to the clothes. We would normally expect clothes to be the object of clean, but here they are the subject and there is no object. Similarly, in b) the ship would normally be the object of build, or the subject of a passive ( . . . was being built), but here it is the subject.
So although clean and build are normally transitive verbs, they are intransitive here, but intransitive in a different way from other verbs that we have already seen.
Activity C7.2:
Activity C7.3:
Transitive: 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 9 (interrogative), 11, 13 (passive), 15
Ergative (intransitive): 3, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14
With the transitive sentences the subjects are basically agents (as discussed in A8 and D8), though in 11 and 13 the agent is not stated. With the ergatives, the subjects are basically people or things affected by the process of improvement.
Activity C7.4:
Transitive: 3 (passive), 4 (passive), 13, 16, 17
Ergative (intransitive): 1, 5, 9, 12, 18, 20
On lines 2, 7, 8, 10, 14, 15, 19 closed is an adjective; see C5.
Lines 6 and 11 are ambiguous; they could be transitive (passive) or adjective.
Note the phrasal verb closed down (which can be ergative, just like close)
Note that close can also be intransitive with an object omitted: She closed (her talk) by saying . . . Here it is not ergative.