Wikibooks: Conlang/Advanced/Grammar/Alignment/Ergative

• Format: Book
• Language: English
• Subjects: aleut; eskimo*; Eskimo–Aleut
• Online Access: https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Conlang/Advanced/Grammar/Alignment/Ergative

Navlist/Top The Ergative alignment formally known as Absolutive Ergative alignment is a rather common grammatical case system. Absolutive Ergative differentiates between the Agent it being marked in the Ergative case from the Subject with the fusion of both seen in Nominative Accusative systems. The Absolutive case marks the Object and Subject the same often leaving them unmarked. =Distribution and Spread= The Absolutive Ergative system is almost absent in Indo European languages which are by far mostly Nominative Accusative. In Europe the only Ergative language is Basque. Ergative languages are spread thinly throughout the world with certain pockets that contain a high concentration of Ergative languages. While Absolutive Ergative languages cover an area from north Canada to Tibet and Iran one of the main concentrations are in the Caucasus languages (think Georgian) Australian ones and Eskimo Aleut. Other Ergative languages exist and Tibetan is a good example. Navlist/Bottom