Details
General
| Morphemic form: | V{-ðau}V (Combinations) |
| New orthography: | -taavoq, -saavoq, -gaavoq |
| Proto-eskimoic root: | |
| Constituents: | V{-ðaq}N + N{-u}V |
| Morpheme type: | Verbal modifier |
| Left sandhi: | Special (see description) |
| Right sandhi: | None |
Description
Form and usage:
This affix is formed by a combination of passive participle V{-ðaq}N and copula N{-u}V. This combined affix is used to create a stative passive construction: It only makes sense on divalent stems, and it reduce the valency to yield a monovalent stem.
Stative passive contrasts with dynamic passive, which is expressed with the affix V{nəqaq}V.
The stative passive focuses on the state of having been Vb'ed, whereas the dynamic passive focuses on the Patient being Vb'ed.
This difference is very clear in Greenlandic, and also in a language like Danish, but unfortunately not in English.
It can be illustrated thus:
- 'the dog is/gets killed (by someone)', dynamic passive
- 'the dog is/was killed (so we need a new one)', stative passive
In stative passive, the meaning is 'is/was', so it denotes a state of being, whilst in dynamic passive the meaning is 'is/gets', which instead denotes a transition to a new state. See the AITWG, chapter 9, for a detailed description of the difference between these two kinds of passive constructions.
Left sandhi:The first component, V{-ðaq}N, has some very peculiar left-sandhi rules, so see it for examples and explanations.
Verb stem
| Right sandhi: | Regular |
| Valency: | Valency-reducing |
| Diathesis: | Subjective (intransitive) |
Meaning(s)
| Meaning | Notes | |
|---|---|---|
Patient is/was Vb'ed |
Examples |