Cover not available

Article published In: Studies in Language
Vol. 49:3 (2025) ► pp.587–644

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload PDF
EPUB logo with download linkDownload EPUB
authorization required

Why is middle voice the way it is?

Revisiting its lexical-grammatical duality based on Sinitic linguistic evidence

ORCiD logo with link | Shanghai Jiao Tong University
Published online: 2 June 2025
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/sl.24017.xia
Abstract
The middle voice defies definitive characterization due to its dual nature, straddling both oppositional (grammatical) and non-oppositional (lexical) properties. Data from eight Sinitic languages reveal an emerging middle marker derived from passives, whose distribution is restricted by four features: [+non-agentive], [+subject affected], [+change of state], and [+adverse]. Over time, this marker expands to additional predicate classes while becoming obligatory with some predicates, thus becoming more “grammatical” on the one hand and more “lexical” on the other. An “overlap-and-bleach” mechanism is at work, in which a grammatical element dependent on a semantically similar lexical element undergoes semantic bleaching due to its secondary discourse status and semantic redundancy. Partial semantic overlap preserves some of the marker’s oppositional meaning, while complete overlap results in complete bleaching and yields non-oppositional middles when combined with frequency effects. This diachronic process driven by the overlap-and-bleach mechanism may account for middle voice’s dual nature.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The (pre-)middle constructions in eight Sinitic languages
    • 2.1The data
    • 2.2Southwestern Mandarin
      • 2.2.1Chongqing
      • 2.2.2Liupanshui
      • 2.2.3Yibin
      • 2.2.4Xuanwei
      • 2.2.5Summary
    • 2.3Min
      • 2.3.1Chaoyang Southern Min
        • 2.3.1.1The distribution of the middle marker
        • 2.3.1.2Predicates obligatorily marked by the middle marker
        • 2.3.1.3Summary
      • 2.3.2Jieyang Southern Min
      • 2.3.3Taiwan Southern Min
      • 2.3.4Puxian Min
      • 2.3.5Summary
    • 2.4An implicational hierarchy of the middle-marked predicates
    • 2.5Review of previous characterizations
  • 3.Development of Sinitic (pre-)middle constructions
    • 3.1From passive to pre-middle
      • 3.1.1Previous accounts
      • 3.1.2An alternative account
      • 3.1.3The “initial state” of the pre-middle construction
    • 3.2Subsequent development of the pre-middle marker
      • 3.2.1The overlap-and-bleach mechanism
      • 3.2.2The more “grammatical” development
      • 3.2.3The more “lexical” development
  • 4.Why is middle voice the way it is?
    • 4.1The heterogeneity problem is actually the duality problem
    • 4.2The problem of lexical-grammatical duality
  • 5.Concluding remarks
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • References
References (60)
References
. 2021. On the relationship between middles and passives: A polyfunctional analysis of-eci in contemporary Korean. Language and Linguistics 22(2). 213–242.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bahrt, Nicklas N. 2021. Voice syncretism. Berlin: Language Science Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Barber, Elizabeth JW. 1975. Voice — beyond the passive. Proceedings of the First Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics 11. 16–24.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bentley, Delia. 2024. The causative alternation in Italian: A case study in the parallel architecture of grammar. In Edward Gibson & Moshe Poliak (eds.), From fieldwork to linguistic theory: A tribute to Dan Everett, 225–273. Berlin: Language Science Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Boye, Kasper, Roelien Bastiaanse, Peter Harder & Silvia Martínez-Ferreiro. 2023. Agrammatism in a usage-based theory of grammatical status: Impaired combinatorics, compensatory prioritization, or both? Journal of neurolinguistics 651. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Boye, Kasper & Peter Harder. 2012. A usage-based theory of grammatical status and grammaticalization. Language 88(1). 1–44. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bybee, Joan L. 2010. Language, usage and cognition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cai, Guomei. 2006. A study on Pu-Xian dialect — its features as a transitional dialect. Fujian Normal University PhD thesis.
. 2016. Minyu Puxian fangyan “qi” de houqiyanhua [On the later semantic development of “qi” in puxian dialect]. Hanyu Xuebao 56(4). 71–77.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Chappell, Hilary M. 2015. Linguistic areas in China for differential object marking, passive, and comparative constructions. In Hilary M. Chappell (ed.), Diversity in Sinitic languages, 13–52. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Chen, Weirong & Foong Ha Yap. 2018. Pathways to adversity and speaker affectedness: On the emergence of unaccusative “give” constructions in Chinese. Linguistics 56(1). 19–68. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Comrie, Bernard. 1977. In defense of spontaneous demotion: The impersonal passive. In P. Cole & J. M. Sadock (eds.), Grammatical relations (Syntax and semantics 8), 47–58. New York: Academic Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Croft, William. 2000. Explaining language change: An evolutionary approach. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2022. Morphosyntax: Constructions of the world’s languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Croft, William A., Bat Zeev Skyldkrot & Suzanne Kemmer. 1987. Diachronic semantic processes in the middle voice. In Anna Giacalone Ramat, Onofno Camiba & Giuliano Bernini (eds.), Papers from the 7th international conference on historical linguistics (Current issues in linguistic theory, 48), 179–192. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
DeLancey, Scott. 1997. Mirativity: The grammatical marking of unexpected information. Linguistic Typology 1(1). 33–52. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dixon, Robert M. W. & Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald. 2000a. Introduction. In Robert M. W. Dixon & Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald (eds.), Changing valency: Case studies in transitivity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2000b. A typology of causatives: Form, syntax and meaning. In Robert M. W. Dixon & Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald (eds.), Changing valency: Case studies in transitivity, 30–83. Cambridge University Press Cambridge. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Geniušienė, Emma. 1987. The typology of reflexives. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Givón, Talmy. 1981. Typology and functional domains. Studies in Language 5(2). 163–193. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haspelmath, Martin. 1987. Transitivity alternations of the anticausative type. Institut für Sprachwissenschaft. Universität zu Köln.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1990. The grammaticization of passive morphology. Studies in Language 14(1). 25–72. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1995. The middle voice by Suzanne Kemmer. Language 71(2). 372–374. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2003. The geometry of grammatical meaning: Semantic maps and cross-linguistic comparison. In Michael Tomasello (ed.), The new psychology of language: Cognitive and functional approaches to language structure (vol. 2), 211–242. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2016. Universals of causative and anticausative verb formation and the spontaneity scale. Lingua Posnaniensis 58(2). 33–63. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Huang, C.-T. James. 2013. Variations in non-canonical passives. In Artemis Alexiadou & Florian Schäfer (eds.), Non-canonical passives, 95–114. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Huang, Yanxuan. 2021. The development of the affective construction in the Chaozhou dialect since the 19th century. Journal of Chinese Linguistics 49(2). 460–506. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Inglese, Guglielmo. 2021. Towards a typology of middle voice systems. Linguistic Typology 26(3). 489–531. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Keenan, Edward L. & Matthew S. Dryer. 2007. Passive in the world’s languages. In Timothy Shopen (ed.), Language typology and syntactic description (second edition), vol. I: Clause struture, 325–361. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kemmer, Suzanne. 1993. The middle voice. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Keyser, Samuel Jay & Thomas Roeper. 1984. On the middle and ergative constructions in English. Linguistic Inquiry 15(3). 381–416.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kittilä, Seppo. 2005. Remarks on involuntary agent constructions. Word 56(3). 381–419. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Klaiman, Miriam H. 1991. Grammatical voice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kulikov, Leonid. 2011a. Voice typology. In Jae Jung Song (ed.), The Oxford handbook of linguistic typology, 368–398. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2011b. Passive to anticausative through impersonalization. In Andrej Malchukov & Anna Siewierska (eds.), Impersonal constructions: A cross-linguistic perspective, 229–254. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lakoff, George. 1987. Women, fire, and dangerous things: What categories reveal about the mind. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lin, Huei-Ling. 2011. Pure unaccusatives with hoo i in Taiwan Southern Min. Lingua 121(14). 2035–2047. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lyons, John. 1969. Introduction to theoretical linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Malchukov, Andrej. 2005. Split intransitives, experiencer objects and “transimpersonal” constructions: (Re-)establishing the connection. In Mark Donohue & Søren Wichmann (eds.), The typology of semantic alignment, 76–100. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Matthews, Stephen, Huiling Xu & Virginia Yip. 2005. Passive and unaccusative in the Jieyang dialect of Chaozhou. Journal of East Asian Linguistics 14(4). 267–298. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nedjalkov, Vladimir P. & Sergej Je. Jaxontov. 1988. The typology of resultative constructions. In Vladimir P. Nedjalkov & Bernard Comrie (eds.), Typology of resultative constructions, 3–62. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nuyts, Jan. 2016. Analyses of the modal meanings. In Jan Nuyts & Johan van der Auwera (eds.), The Oxford handbook of modality and mood, 31–49. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Perlmutter, David M. 1978. Impersonal passives and the unaccusative hypothesis. In Proceedings of the 4th annual meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society, 157–190. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Rosch, Eleanor & Carolyn B. Mervis. 1975. Family resemblances: Studies in the internal structure of categories. Cognitive Psychology 7(4). 573–605. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Shibatani, Masayoshi. 1985. Passives and related constructions: A prototype analysis. Language 61(4). 821–848. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2002. Introduction: Some basic issues in the grammar of causation. In Masayoshi Shibatani (ed.), The grammar of causation and interpersonal manipulation, 1–22. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2004. Voice. In G. Booij, C. Lehmann & J. Mugdan (eds.), Morphology: A handbook on inflection and word formation, vol. 2, 1145–1165. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2006. On the conceptual framework for voice phenomena. Linguistics 44(2). 217–269. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Siewierska, Anna. 2008. Introduction: Impersonalization from a subject-centred vs. Agent-centred perspective. Transactions of the Philological Society 106(2). 115–137. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Xiao, Yang & Gerner, Matthias. 2024. Middle voice in Cháoyáng Mǐn. Folia Linguistica. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Xu, Huiling. 2007. Aspect of Chaozhou grammar: A synchronic description of the Jieyang variety. Journal of Chinese Linguistics (Monograph Series Num.22).Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Yap, Foong Ha & Mikyung Ahn. 2019. Development of grammatical voice marking in Korean: On the causative, middle and passive uses of suffix -i. Lingua 2191. 1–23. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Yap, Foong Ha & S. Iwasaki. 2008. From causatives to passives: A passage in some East and Southeast Asian languages. In E. H. Casad & G. B. Palmer (eds.), Cognitive linguistics and non-Indo-European languages, 419–446. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Yue-Hashimoto, Anne. 1993. Comparative Chinese dialectal grammar: Handbook for investigators. Paris: Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Centre de Recherches Linguistiques sur l’Asie Orientale.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zhang, Jingfen. 2017. Guangdong Yun’ao minnanfangyan teshude “qiyi” jiegou [A peculiar construction with koi in Yun’ao Southern-Min dialect, Guangdong province]. Fangyan 35(4). 468.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zhang, Liulin. 2017. Lability of verbs and the change-of-state construction in Chinese. University of Hawai’i at Manoa PhD dissertation.
Zúñiga, Fernando & Seppo Kittilä. 2019. Grammatical voice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue