Antipassive Morphology and Case Assignment in Inuktitut

Ergativity and Change in Inuktitut

“…It also predicts that where a language makes an aspectual split between seemingly nominativeaccusative and ergative-absolutive properties, that the nominative-accusative, and not the ergative-absolutive, will be associated with the imperfective. Spreng (2001;this volume) Recall that an overt antipassive morpheme is associated with an indefinite quantity feature in little v. We find a parallel in verb roots which are inherently atelic, or unbounded, i.e. activity predicates.…”

“…with the little v analysis of Spreng (2001). It turns out that aspect is part of the VP, except that, when it heads little v, it is no longer only an aspectual element but also a "case assigner" in the sense that it is in a syntactic position which can satisfy the uninterpretable features of the case feature in light k. Homophony with actual aspect markers, complementary distribution with unergative roots, and meaning variation all derive from this distinction.…”

“…13 Siegel (1998) The fact that the same features are involved, but in different positions, predicts that the genuine aspect morpheme will be optional, as would be expected of an inceptive, but that the antipassive morpheme is obligatory in contexts where little v must be filled (see Spreng 2001). It also explains the difference in interpretation of antipassive vs. ergative clauses.…”

Antipassive and ergativity in Tagalog

“…Analyses along these lines have also been put forth for antipassives in ergative Inuit languages (Benua, 1995;Bittner, 1994;Spreng, 2006).…”

Eskimo‐Aleut Languages

“…I have provided only a brief sketch of a number of the typological characteristics within this language family that are currently receiving a great deal of attention. There are many additional fascinating properties of which I will mention but a few: intonation (see Taff and Wegelin 1997; Taff 1999); phonology (Kaplan 1981); dual number; antipassive (see Spreng 2006); noun incorporation (Sadock 1980; van Geenhoven 1998; Johns 2007).…”