ON THE ARGUMENT STRUCTURE OF THE ‘GIVE’ VERBS IN NGANASAN AND IN SELKUP
The verb ‘to give’ belongs to the group of the so-called ditransitive verbs. The verb's behaviour can firstly be investigated based on the argument structure, that is how the recipient and the theme, i.e. the object, are coded by the language. Secondly, this phenomenon can also be studied regarding the form of the verb. This work will focus on this point of view, but the form of the two arguments will also be discussed. There are two verbs with the meaning ’to give’ in the Samoyedic languages. Despite the distinction in meaning there is a strong tendency in the distribution of the two verbs determined by the person of the receiver, which is well reflected in the reconstruction of the verbs. A distribution similar to the one in Nganasan can be detected in the Enets, the Nenets and the Selkup languages.
Keywords: Nganasan, Selkup, ditransitive construction
Issue: 1, 2013
Series of issue: Issue № 1
Rubric: LINGUISTICS
Pages: 27 — 37
Downloads: 1314