Transitivity in Tukang Besi

The Tukang Besi language does not appear to display a clear distinction between transitive and intransitive clauses, as transitive verbs are freely able to appear without any overt object and degrees of intransitivity are to be found in the language. The ground between transitive and intransitive contains several points of interest in that eight different degrees of transitivity can be morphologically defined in the one language, allowing us to test the relative rankings of Hopper and Thompson's criteria for transitivity.