Editing Nominative–accusative alignment (section)

===Case marking===
If a language exhibits morphological case marking, arguments S and A will appear in the [[nominative case]] and argument O will appear in the [[accusative case]], or in a similar case such as the [[oblique case|oblique]]. There may be more than one case fulfilling the accusative role; for instance, [[Finnish language|Finnish]] marks objects with the [[partitive case|partitive]] or the [[accusative case|accusative]] to contrast [[telicity]]. It is highly common for only accusative arguments to exhibit overt case marking while nominative arguments exhibit null (or absent) case markings. In Modern English, case marking is only found with first and (non-neuter) third person pronouns, which have distinct subject and object forms.

[[English language|English]]
{{interlinear|indent=3
|I walked.
|1SG:SBJ walk:PAST
|}}

{{interlinear|indent=3
|I saw them.
|1SG:SBJ see:PAST 3PL:OBJ
|}}

[[Japanese language|Japanese]]
{{fs interlinear|lang=ja|indent=3|glossing=link
|c1=<ref name=japanese>{{cite book|title=An introduction to Japanese linguistics|first1=Natsuko|last1= Tsujimura|publisher=Wiley-Blackwell|year= 2007|page=382|isbn=978-1-4051-1065-5}}</ref>
|花瓶が 壊れた
|Kabin-ga(S) kowareta
|vase-NOM broke
|‘A vase broke’}}

{{fs interlinear|lang=ja|indent=3|glossing=link
|私は 花瓶を 壊した
|Watashi-wa(S) kabin-wo(O) kowashita
|I-NOM vase-ACC broke
|‘I broke the vase’}}

[[Russian language|Russian]]
{{fs interlinear|lang=ru|indent=3|glossing=link
|Девушка-Ø работа-ет
|Dyevushka-Ø rabota-yet
|(adolescent-/youth-)girl-NOM work
|‘A/The (adolescent/youth) girl/young lady/young woman works/is working’}}

{{fs interlinear|lang=ru|indent=3|glossing=link
|Студент-Ø читает книг-у
|Studyent-Ø chitayet knig-u
|student-NOM read-3.SG.PRES book-ACC
|‘A/The student read/is reading a/the book’}}

[[Sanskrit]]
{{interlinear|indent=3|glossing=link
|Áśva-ḥ(S) aghnata
|horse-NOM slain
|‘A horse was slain’}}

{{interlinear|indent=3|glossing=link
|Vīrá-ḥ(S) áśva-m(O) ahan
|man-NOM horse-ACC slew
|‘The man slew a horse’}}

====Differential object marking (DOM)====
{{main|Differential object marking}}
Not all arguments are equally likely to exhibit overt case marking. In languages with nominative–accusative alignment, it is common to divide direct objects into two classes (with respect to overt case marking), a phenomenon called ‘differential object marking’ by Bossong (1985).