Re: Ergative and Nominative Languages.

From: Glen Gordon
Message: 1485
Date: 2000-02-14

Mark Odegard:
>Having said this, the idea is fascinating. Switching from being an
> >ergative language to being a nominative language is a huge >innovation,
>one that suggests a very small group of people in >isolation, which seems
>to be the only scenario where such a >fundamental linguistic re-analysis
>could occur. From what I've read, >the suggestion is that such an ergative
>period would be deeply >ancient PIE, even pre-PIE, in that such a change
>would represent a >clean break from the previous, ancestral language
>family.

Yes! Interesting. I view "Eurasiatic" to be the ancestor of Sumerian,
Elamite, Dravidian and ProtoSteppe (Uralic, Altaic, IE, Etruscan,
EskimoAleut, ChuckKam). ProtoSteppe undeniably has an accusative *-m across
the board. Dravidian too. The only question I have is whether Eurasiatic is
accusative or whether only Dravidian/Steppe are accusative. If the latter,
it would confirm your view about a small (or perhaps thin) population having
innovated upon a language, Mark, since this group would have spread from the
Fertile Crescent all the way to the Steppe around the time of this change.

Mark:
>So. Is there any evidence in Uralic for an equally ancient ergative
> >system?

Well, I guess I've just answered this question in remarks to Marc, Mark. I
would say yes and the subjective/objective is the key in reference to my
last message. I have to drum up a page about this like right now because my
thoughts on this are extensive and could potentially be of interest here for
further discussion on IE grammar.

- gLeN

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