Editing Ergative–absolutive alignment (section)

{{Short description|Pattern relating to the subject and object of verbs}}
{{Technical|date=March 2025}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2023}} 
{{Linguistic typology topics}}
In [[linguistic typology]], '''ergative–absolutive alignment''' is a type of [[morphosyntactic alignment]] in which the [[subject (grammar)|subject]] of an [[intransitive verb]] behaves like the [[object (grammar)|object]] of a [[transitive verb]], and differently from the subject of a transitive verb.<ref>Comrie (1989), p. 110ff.</ref> Examples include [[Basque language|Basque]], [[Georgian language|Georgian]], [[Mayan languages|Mayan]], [[Standard Tibetan|Tibetan]], [[Sumerian language|Sumerian]], and certain [[Indo-European languages]] (such as [[Pashto]] and the [[Kurdish languages]] and many [[Indo-Aryan languages]] like [[Hindustani language|Hindustani]]). It has also been attributed to the [[Semitic languages|Semitic]] [[modern Aramaic]] (also called Neo-Aramaic) languages. Ergative languages are classified into two groups: those that are morphologically ergative but syntactically behave as [[Nominative–accusative alignment|accusative]] (for instance, Basque, Pashto and [[Urdu]]) and those that, on top of being ergative morphologically, also show ergativity in syntax. Languages that belong to the former group are more numerous than those to the latter.{{efn|[[Dyirbal language|Dyirbal]] is said to be the only representative of syntactic ergativity, yet it displays accusative alignment with certain pronouns.{{Clarify|date=June 2024|reason=The previous sentence implies that there are multiple languages with syntactic ergativity.}}}}

The ergative-absolutive alignment is in contrast to [[nominative–accusative alignment]], which is observed in [[English language|English]] and most other Indo-European languages, where the single argument of an intransitive verb ("She" in the sentence "She walks") behaves grammatically like the agent ([[subject (grammar)|subject]]) of a transitive verb ("She" in the sentence "She finds it") but different from the object of a transitive verb ("her" in the sentence "He likes her"). When ergative–absolutive alignment is coded by [[grammatical case]], the case used for the single argument of an intransitive verb and the object of a transitive verb is the [[absolutive case|absolutive]], and the case used for the agent of a transitive verb is the [[ergative case|ergative]]. In nominative-accusative languages, the case for the single argument of an intransitive verb and the agent of a transitive verb is the [[nominative case|nominative]], while the case for the direct object of a transitive verb is the [[accusative case|accusative]].

Many languages have ergative–absolutive alignment only in some parts of their grammar (e.g., in the case marking of nouns), but nominative-accusative alignment in other parts (e.g., in the case marking of pronouns, or in [[person agreement]]). This is known as [[split ergativity]].