In:Non-Canonically Case-Marked Subjects: The Reykjavík-Eyjafjallajökull papers
Edited by Jóhanna Barðdal, Na'ama Pat-El and Stephen Mark Carey
[Studies in Language Companion Series 200] 2018
► pp. 241–256
Chapter 10Forty years in the search of a/the subject
Published online: 2 November 2018
https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.200.10mal
https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.200.10mal
Abstract
The present short discussion piece presents my personal view of the studies of the topics related to the notion of subject, oblique subject and non-canonical subject marking over the last years. The presentation is of course subjective insofar as it reflects my range of interests in this field. Equally subjective is the selected timeframe mentioned in the title (“forty years”) which is meant to refer to the time when the notion of subject has been in the spotlight of typological interest.
Article outline
- The quest for the subject
- Diachronic issues and their theoretical consequences
- Subject properties, biases and competing motivations
- A note on the oblique subject controversy
Acknowledgements Notes References
References (58)
Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y., Dixon, Robert M. W. & Onishi, Masayuki (eds). 2001. Non-canonical Marking of Subjects and Objects [Typological Studies in Language 46]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Allen, Cynthia L. 1995. Case Marking and Reanalysis: Grammatical Relations from Old to Early Modern English. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Anderson, Stephen. 1976. On the notion of subject in ergative languages. In Subject and Topic, Charles N. Li (ed.), 1–24. New York NY: Academic Press.
Baker, Mark C. 1988. Incorporation: A Theory of Grammatical Function Changing. Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press.
Barðdal, Jóhanna. 2006. Construction-specific properties of syntactic subjects in Icelandic and German. Cognitive Linguistics 17(1): 39–106.
. 2015. Valency classes in Icelandic: Oblique subjects, oblique ambitransitives and the actional passive. In Valency Classes in the World’s Languages, Vol. 1, Andrej Malchukov & Bernard Comrie (eds), 367–416. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.
Barðdal, Jóhanna & Eythórsson, Thórhallur. 2003. The change that never happened: The story of oblique subjects. Journal of Linguistics 39(3): 439–472.
. 2009. The origin of the oblique subject construction: An Indo-European comparison. In Grammatical Change in Indo-European Languages [Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 305], Vit Bubenik, John Hewson & Sarag Rose (eds), 179–193. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Barðdal, Jóhanna & Eythórsson, Tórhallur. 2012. ‘Hungering and lusting for women and fleshly delicacies’: Reconstructing grammatical relations for Proto-Germanic. Transactions of the Philological Society 110(3): 363–393.
Bhaskararao, Peri & Subbarao, Karumuri Venkata (eds). 2004. Non-nominative Subjects, Vols. 1–2 [Typological Studies in Language 60–61]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Bickel, Balthasar. 2011. Grammatical relations typology. In The Oxford Handbook of Linguistic Typology Jae Jung Song (ed.), 399–444. Oxford: OUP.
Brown, Dunstan, Chumakina, Marina & Corbett, Greville G. (eds) 2013. Canonical Morphology and Syntax. Oxford: OUP.
Cennamo, Michela, Eythórsson, Thórhallur & Barðdal, Jóhanna. 2015. The rise and fall of anticausative constructions in Indo-European: The context of Latin and Germanic. Linguistics 53 (4): 677–729.
Cole, Peter, Harbert, Wayne, Hermon, Gabriella & Sridhar, S. N. 1980. The acquisition of subjecthood. Language 56: 719–43.
Comrie, Bernard. 1981[1989]. Language Universals and Linguistic Typology: Syntax and Morphology. Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press.
. 1978. Ergativity. In Syntactic Typology: Studies in the Phenomenology of Language, Winfred P. Lehmann (ed.), 329–394. Austin TX: University of Texas Press.
Croft, William. 1991. Syntactic Categories and Grammatical Relations: The Cognitive Organization of Information. Chicago IL: The University of Chicago Press.
Donohue, Mark. 2008. Semantic alignment systems: What’s what, and what’s not. In Typology of Languages with Semantic Alignment, Mark Donohue & Søren Wichmann (eds), 24–75. Oxford: OUP.
Du Bois, John. 1985. Competing motivations. In Iconicity in Syntax [Typological Studies in Language 6], John Haiman (ed.), 343–366. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Eythórsson, Thórhallur & Jóhanna Barðdal. 2005. Oblique Subjects: A Common Germanic Inheritance. Language 81–4: 824–881.
van Gelderen, Elly. 2011. Valency changes in the history of English. Journal of Historical Linguistics 1(1): 106–143.
Givón, Talmy. 1997. Grammatical relations: An introduction. In Grammatical Relations: A Functionalist Perspective [Typologial Studies in Language 35], Talmy Givón (ed.) 1–85. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Haiman, John. 1985. Natural Syntax. Iconicity and Erosion. Cambridge: CUP.
Haspelmath, M. 1993. More on the typology of inchoative/causative verb alternations. In Causatives and Transitivity [Studies in Language Companion Series 23], Bernard Comrie & Maria Polinsky (eds), 87–120. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Haspelmath, Martin. 2001. Non-canonical marking of core arguments in European languages. In Aikhenvald, Dixon & Onishi (eds.), 53–85.
. 2010. Comparative concepts and descriptive categories in crosslinguistic studies. Language 86(3): 663–687.
Kazenin, Konstantin I. 1994. Split syntactic ergativity: Toward an implicational hierarchy. Sprachtypologie und Universalienforschung 47: 78–98.
Keenan, Edward L. 1976. Towards a universal definition of subject. In Subject and Topic, Charles N. Li (ed.), 303–333. New York NY: Academic Press.
. 2015. Two possible universals: The Major Biactant Construction; the twofold notion of subject. Linguistic Typology 19(1): 111–130.
Malchukov, Andrej. 2008. Split intransitives, experiencer objects and ‘transimpersonal’ constructions: (re-)Establishing the connection. In Typology of Languages with Semantic Alignment, Mark Donohue & Søren Wichmann (eds), 76–101. Oxford: OUP.
Malchukov, Andrej & Ogawa, Akio. 2011. Towards a typology of impersonal constructions: A semantic map approach. In Impersonal Constructions: A Cross-linguistic Perspective [Studies in Language Companion Series 124], Andrej L. Malchukov & Anna Siewierska (eds), 19–56. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Malchukov, Andrej. 2014. Resolving alignment conflicts: A competing motivations approach. In Competing Motivations in Grammar and Cognition, Brian MacWhinney, Andrej Malchukov & Edith Moravcsik (eds), 17–42. Oxford: OUP.
Manning, Christopher D. 1996. Ergativity: Argument Structure and Grammatical Relations. Stanford CA: CSLI.
Moravcsik, Edith. 1978. On the distribution of ergative and accusative patterns. Lingua 45: 233–279.
Nedjalkov, V. P. (ed.). 1988. Typology of resultative constructions. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Ottósson, Kjartan G. 2013. The anticausative and related categories in the Old Germanic languages. In Diachronic and Typological Perspectives on Verbs [Studies in Language Companion Series 134], Folke Josephson & Ingmar Söhrman (eds), 329–382. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Platzack, Christian. 2001. Multiple interfaces. In Conceptual Structure and its Interfaces with other Modules of Grammar, Urpo Nikanne & Emile van der Zee (eds), 21–53. Oxford: OUP.
Sands, Kristina & Campbell, Lyle. 2001. Non-canonical subjects and objects in Finnish. In Aikhenvald et al., 251–305.
Schachter, Paul. 1976. The subject in Philippine languages: Topic, actor, actor-topic, or none of the above. In Subject and Topic, Charles N. Li (ed.), 491–518. New York NY: Academic Press.
Shibatani, Masayoshi. 2001. Non-canonical constructions in Japanese. In Aikhenvald, Dixon & Onishi (eds), 307–355
Sigurðsson, Halldór Ármann. 2004. Icelandic non-nominative subjects: Facts and implications. In Bhaskararao & Subbarao (eds), Vol. 2, 137–159.
Seržant, Ilja. 2013. Rise of canonical subjecthood. In The Diachronic Typology of Non-canonical Subjects [Studies in Language Companion Series 140], Ilja A. Seržant & Leonid Kulikov (eds), 283–310. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Svenonius, Peter. 2002. Introduction. In Subjects, Expletives, and the EPP, Peter Svenonius (ed.), 1–25. Oxford: OUP.
Vajda, Edward, Nefedov, Andrey & Malchukov, Andrej. 2011. Impersonal constructions in Ket. In Impersonal Constructions: A Cross-linguistic Perspective [Studies in Language Companion Series 124], Andrej L. Malchukov & Anna Siewierska (eds), 439–458. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Van Valin Jr., Robert D. 1981. Grammatical relations in ergative languages. Studies in Language 5(3): 361–394.
Van Valin Jr., Robert D. & Lapolla, Randy J. 1997. Syntax: Structure, Meaning and Function. Cambridge: CUP.
Van Valin Jr., Robert D. 2004. Semantic macroroles in Role and Reference Grammar. In Semantische Rollen, Rolf Kailuweit & Martin Hummel (eds), 62–82. Tübingen: Narr.
Wiemer, Björn & Bjarnadóttir, Valgerður. 2014. On the non-canonical marking of the highest-ranking argument in Lithuanian and Icelandic: Steps toward a database. In Grammatical Relations and their Non-Canonical Encoding in Baltic [Valency, Argument Realization and Grammatial Relations in Baltic 1], Axel Holvoet & Nicole Nau (eds), 301–363. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Cited by (2)
Cited by two other publications
Van Valin, Robert D.
2018. Dative case and oblique subjects. In Non-canonically case-marked subjects [Studies in Language Companion Series, 200], ► pp. 115 ff.
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 3 december 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.
