Diathèse

The term of diathèse is used in Linguistique to indicate what one more commonly understands by verbal “voice” .

In Medicine, (in particular under the influence of German), it is used to describe a propensity of an organization to develop particular diseases, such as for example the hemophilia.

In linguistics, it is a describing grammatical Trait how are organized the semantic roles reserved for the Actant S compared to the statement; she considers especially how are distributed those of actor patient statement and (if necessary). To change the diathèse of a verb when the operation is possible should not modify the direction of the statement deeply. The term of voice is reserved for the verbal morphology: it describes the Forme which the verb takes to mean diathèse.

Certain verbs are intrinsically stripped of any concept of diathèse: they are mainly the verbs of state (like to be , to appear , to seem , to remain , to remain , French etc); those are indeed external with the concept of actance. They are combined however with the active voice (which is the voice not marked in French). To distinguish voice from diathèse is thus necessary in the analysis of details.

It is considered that there exist two diathèses principal that one can permute, the active voice and the passive voice. It is however not only.

Active voice

Passive voice

Agentif liability

This diathèse is generally felt as secondary compared to the active voice (which would be a “degree zero” of expression); it is about the transformation of an active statement, in which the patient object of the credit becomes the prone patient (“prone grammatical who undergoes the action”), while the subject actor becomes the agent verb. What shows well the secondary character of this diathèse in certain languages, it is the possibility of building a agentif passive statement (starting from a verb which lends itself to it) while creating a sentence which “would not be said”; let us take the example of French: the sauerkraut is eaten by me is a valid statement but artificial compared to I eat the sauerkraut .

The verb itself can change form in the inflected languages (it is put at the passive voice). According to the languages, the agent is often introduced by a preposition:

Active: = agent ¹ = prone actor + = statement + = agent ² = patient object;
Passive: = agent ¹ = prone patient + = statement (+) + = agent ² = of agent.

Il is heard that the order in which the agents are followed depends on the langue.

Examples of transformation passivates preceding statements:

: the mouse patient is eaten in the passive by the cat of agent;
: the patient foam is eaten in the passive by the cat of agent;
: 老鼠 patient 被貓 of invariable agent 吃了 ( lǎoshǔ / EIB / māo / chīle );
Greek old: ὁ μῦς patient: [[personal|nomin.]] ἔδεται in the passive (ὑπὸ) τοῦ αἰλύρου of agent: case obliques ( Ho mũs / édetai / hupò / toũ ailúrou ;
: ねずみは patient 猫に of agent たべられます in the passive ( nezumi-wa / neko-nor / taberaremasu );
xhosa: impuku patient ityawa in the passive yikati of agent.

One considered the cases here where the sentence passivates would be the result of the transformation of an active sentence. The agent is thus obligatory there, since it takes again the subject of the active sentence. Consequently, only the transitive verbs direct (i.e. the bi- or trivalent) can undergo this transformation (one cannot consider valid transformations as I speak to him > *il is spoken with by me ; on the other hand, this language is spoken by thousands about speakers is valid, since one uses the verb to speak in a direct transitive way). Therefore one speaks about passive agentif .

Nonagentif liability

There exist however passive constructions which do not result from such transformations and in which the agent is not necessary even impossible. If the patient subject of a statement in the passive nonagentif continues “to undergo the action”, the semantic subject of the statement (that which really acts) is not indicated. In certain languages (English, Latin, Greek in a less share) a verb can be put in the passive nonagentif whereas it is intransitive or transitive indirect; it can even receive a patient object. In this case, the nonagentif liability is used as impersonal form, indicated in the following examples by the translation by means of one .

Examples:

: the mouse patient is eaten transitive direct in the passive;
:

the patient foam is eaten transitive direct in the passive,
this bed patient has been slept in intransitive in the passive = “*ce reads was slept in” = “ one slept in this bed”,
Marc transitive recipient was given in the passive has knife patient = “*Marc was given a knife” = “ one gave to Marc a knife”;

Latin:

amor transitive in the passive = “I am loved”,
laboratur intransitive in the passive = “*il is given evil” = “ one gives myself evil”;

Greek old:

φιλοῦμαι transitive in the passive ( philoũmai ) = “I am loved”,
βεϐοήθηται transitive indirect in the passive indirect μοι ( beboếthêtai ) = “it to me was carried help” = “ one carried me help”;

他被打了 transitive + accomplished ( tā EIB dǎle ) = “it/by/to have struck” = “it was struck”,
老鼠 or transitive subject acting 吃了 + accomplished ( lǎoshǔ chīle ) = “the mouse/to have eaten” = “the mouse was eaten” or “the mouse ate”.

It is seen, the nonagentif liability is undoubtedly the most complex form of liability; its employment enormously varies from one language to another and its employment allows sometimes untranslatable statements directly.

Average voice

See also: average Voice

Much less widespread, the average voice is an especially Indo-European diathèse, which only was seldom preserved in the derived modern languages. It indicates that the subject-agent achieves the action in its own interest; it is in agent kind and patient of the statement. Certain uses of the average voice thus recut those of reflexive construction (like I wash myself ). It would be however erroneous of speaking about average voice for French (more especially as pronominal turning is not limited to this diathèse). The means meets mainly in Greek old, Sanskrit, Icelandic (old and modern) and Latin for a weak share (this one having transformed the average diathèse into liability). It is notable that historically the Indo-European opposed the credit to the means and often did not know the liability, which was only one late development, starting from the means itself (as in Latin). Thus, in old Greek the means and the liability are identical except to two times, future and aorist: therefore one often speaks about médio-passive voice . In Sanskrit, the liability and the means are distinguished mainly only at the present; elsewhere, it is the means which is used to mean one or the other voice. In Icelandic, finally, the average verbs are obtained by the suffixation of - St (which comes from - sk as old Icelandic, itself resulting from sik , the accusative of the reflexive pronoun “oneself”) and are not inherited the Indo-European. They have several values, among which a considered value (even average), reciprocal, passivates, or perfective, inter alia. It is seen, one names “average voice” a diathèse which is not inevitably of median value but can borrow the values of the others diathèses.

Moreover, certain verbs of the same Indo-European languages are exclusively conjugated with the means; they are named media-tantum (only average) or déponents (this last term being especially reserved with Latin and the Greek). If there exist well some verbs media tantum of passive value, in the majority of the cases this one is average, active or intransitive. Moreover, considering in of Latin the average diathèse became passivates, the media tantum which preserved an average direction are particularly notable.

Examples:

Greek old:

θύομαι “I sacrifice for me” (median value),
κεῖμαι “I gis” (media tantum of intransitive value),

Sanskrit:

यज॑ते yájate “it sacrifices for itself” (median value),
शेते॑ śéte “it to lie” (media tantum of intransitive value),

Latin:

inquinor “I dirtied” (media tantum with median value),
uēlor “I cover myself” (media tantum with median value),
sequor “I am” (media tantum with active value),

matast “to eat” (intransitive value),
sjást “to be considering” (passive value),
klæðast “to get dressed” (median value),
iðrast “repentance” (media tantum),
skjátlast “to mistake” (media tantum).

Reflection

to supplement

Ergatives constructions

One speaks about Ergativité when, in a diathèse activates, the grammatical subject is the semantic patient; it is the case of sentences like:

: the branch patient broke ;
: the branch patient broke .

What proves that one deals with patient subjects is the possibility of changing the diathèse verb without reversing the agents: the branch breaks and the branch is broken are semantically identical (contrary to baby eats and baby is eaten ). One can obtain the same kind of constructions with verbs as to hang (“the watch hangs with its wrist” = “… is hung with its wrist”) or to plant (“the software still plants” = “… is still planted”).

In certain languages (languages of the Caucasus, Basque, Inuktitut), the ergativity is not limited to some constructions but belonged to the system of the language.

Pragmatic of the use of the French liability

By carrying out statistical tests on groups of subjects, one could highlight preferences for the active form or passivates, according to the case, within couples of sentences in French, and inférer the more or less conscious motivations.

Here a synthesis of the examples and explanations suggested by Jean Costermans in his work Psychology of the language :

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