Tibetan Grammar - verbs - notes
WORK IN PROGRESS: the grammar articles are being edited for wiki publication. During editing, the content might be incomplete, out of sequence or even misleading.
| Articles on Tibetan Grammar |
| 1. Introduction |
| 2. Formation of the Tibetan Syllable |
| 3. Formation of the Tibetan Word |
| 4. First case: ming tsam |
| 5. agentive particle |
| 6. Connective Particle |
| 7. La don particles |
| 8. La don particles—Notes |
| 9. Originative case |
| 10. Verbs |
| 11. Verbs—Notes |
| 12. Syntactic particles |
by Stefan J. E.
Verbs—Notes
How the categories of 'transitive' and 'intransitive' are used here
In order to categorize Tibetan verbs according to their grammar the categories of 'transitive' and 'intransitive' will be used. The way it will be determined if a verb should be labeled 'transitive' or 'intransitive' will not entirely match the general rule for these categories.
Generally:
- Intransitive: Not passing over to an object; expressing an action or state that is limited to the agent or subject.
- Transitive: Passing over to an object; expressing an action which is not limited to the agent or subject.
The categorization will be in regard to the presence of an agent in the agentive case. In a number of cases this will lead to differences in regard to their English counterparts.
| For instance the English word "love" is transitive. There is 'somebody / thing' that is loved. In Tibetan "love" is an unintentional verb and has no agent marked with the agentive case (it is classified in as ཐ་མི་དད་པ་). Having these characteristics it will be categorized as an intransitive verb, in the category "verbs of emotion / attitude verbs" and its grammar described as: | ||||
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In most cases this way of dealing with Tibetan verbs leads to a straight forward way of categorizing them. Yet it does lead to problems with some 'transitive verbs with la don' (see below) and can obscure the fact that divalent intransitive verbs are simply the unintentional counterpart of intentional transitive (divalent) 'verbs with la don' (see below).
Classification as Patient, subject-object, and valency: advantages and problems
Patient
- Patient here is used as a convenient term for the
- subject of an intransitive verb and the
- object of a transitive verb.
These two are mostly in the ming tsam case—marked by no particle—'just the word'.[1] The term Patient is stretched beyonds its definition from thematic relations; e.g. it will also include theme—undergoes the action but does not change its state, and experiencer—the entity that receives sensory or emotional input. Patient is also used with static verbs.[2]
In general the patient is that which experiences the action. In many cases[3] it is equal to the object of a transitive verb. The difference between it and an object is that patient is based explicitly on its relationship to the verb, whereas the object is defined primarily through its relationship to the subject.
In Tibetan where the type of verb governs the usage of the respective particles for their agent, patient and particular qualifiers it can be fitting to use these verb dependent categories (of patient and agent) in order to describe the grammar of verbs.[4]
Moreover it is much easier to explain Tibetan using a single term that covers the subject of an intransitive verb and the object a transitive verb. In Tibetan the patient is in 90+% of all cases in ming tsam, which makes the use of "patient" an advantage for beginners. It is easy to keep in mind that one needs to look for 'something' in ming tsam in order to find the patient of the clause / sentence. (Whereas looking for the subject of a transitive verb could be quite disheartening, given that it is so often omitted.)
In the most part it is straight forward to classify the grammar of verbs using the cases in which their patient, qualifier and agent, if present, are in. It is also easy to describe verb-verb relations in terms of a verb with either a patient (complement) or a qualifier.
However some verbs are problematic when using 'patient'. In order to see where these problems come from there will be an overview of Tibetan verbs with an attempt to use valency as a way of ordering them.
Tibetan verbs in a valency matrix
Valency
The term valency or valence[5] refers to the property of a word 'to bind' other words to it, 'to demand' complements. The study of valency structures can be quite detailed.[6]
The concern here is the obligatory complements. Obligatory complements are complements which have to be expressed in a grammatical sentence to enable the use of the predicator (verb), the verb requires all of the arguments (complements) in a well-formed sentence. However verbs sometimes undergo valency reduction or expansion.[7]
Types of valency
- Monovalent verb takes one argument, e.g. "He sleeps."
- Divalent verb takes two, e.g. "He hit the king."
- Trivalent verb takes three, e.g. "He gave her a ring."
- Zero valency: When a complement status is not attributed to "it" (even though that it is certainly to be regarded as a property of the governing verb that it takes "it" as its subject) then one needs to add zero valency, the avalent verb that take no arguments, e.g. "It rains.", with the explanation that "it" is only a dummy subject and a syntactic placeholder—"it" has no true meaning. No other subject can replace it.
Valency and Tibetan
Valency comes from the study of languages that generaly don't have the ability to omit the same amount of components of a sentence as Tibetan does. In Tibetan a sentence does not become ungrammatical or poorly formed by omitting parts that are to be understood from context, even if it is the subject or object of the sentence. It could even be bad style to state them.
For that reason the way valency will be used here is to look at the number of obligatory complements of a sentence without omissions. When counting obligatory complements there might be some debate with questions like "What can't be left out?" and "What needs to be always assumed?". For instance with the verb "to look" is it assumed that there is always something which is looked at? If it is, with verbs of living is it assumed that there is always a place where one stays?
The valency model is used here as merely an aid to illustrate the main differences between Tibetan verbs, with the 'divalent verbs with la don' as the main topic. In this context the verbs of perception are treated as divalent whereas verbs of living and motion as monovalent.
Note: The category of zero valency (see above) which is used in the great work "Lhasa Verbs"[8] will not be used. Compound verbs like ཆར་པ་འབབ་ "to rain" will be treated as the monovalent verb འབབ་ "to fall" with the noun ཆར་པ་ "rain".
Tibetan verb valency-particle-volition matrix
This section is in particular about transitive verbs with their patient / object marked by la don. For that reason other divalent verbs like verbs of separation that have a qualifier-what one is separated from-are excluded.
The examples:
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| སྙིང་ནས་གྲོལ་བ་དོན་དུ་གཉེར་བའི་གང་ཟག་གིས། བདག་མེད་པའི་ལྟ་བ་རྣམ་པར་དག་པ་ཁོང་དུ་ཆུད་པའི་ཐབས་ལ་འབད་དགོས། |
| heart liberation seek persons selflessness view completely pure understand means effort need |
| Persons who from the depths of their hearts seek liberation must work at the means of understanding the correct view of selflessness. |
| valency | type of verb | agentive case | ming tsam | lad don | verb example |
| monovalent | unintentional, intransitive |
patient / subject ཉི་མ་ |
intransitive verbs ཤར་ (ཐ་མི་དད་པ་) | ||
| intentional, intransitive |
patient / subject ཁོ་ཚོ་ |
verbs of motion སོང་ (ཐ་མི་དད་པ་) | |||
| divalent | unintentional, intransitive |
patient / subject ལུག་རྫི་ |
qualifier ལུག་ལ་ |
attitude verbs བྱམས་ (ཐ་མི་དད་པ་) | |
| unintentional, transitive |
agent / subject བདག་གིས |
patient / object ཆོས་ |
"fruitional" verbs རྙེད་ (ཐ་མི་དད་པ་) | ||
| intentional, transitive |
agent / subject སངས་རྒྱས་ཀྱིས་ |
patient / object ཆོས་ |
transitive verbs བསྟན་ (ཐ་དད་པ་) | ||
| intentional, transitive |
agent / subject ཁོས་ agent / subject བདག་གིས་ |
patient / object དཔེ་དེབ་ལ་ patient / object གཞན་ལ་ |
transitive verbs བལྟས་ (ཐ་དད་པ་) verbs of benefit ཕན་ (ཐ་མི་དད་པ་) | ||
| intentional, "?" |
agent / subject གང་ཟག་གིས |
qualifier ཐབས་ལ་ |
verbs expressing "to make effort" འབད་ (ཐ་དད་པ་) | ||
| trivalent | intentional, transitive |
agent / subject སྨན་པས་ |
patient / object སྨན་ |
recipient / indirect object ནད་པ་ལ |
ditransitive verbs སྟེར (ཐ་དད་པ་) |
When looking at which particle marks what, the agentive case always marks an agent, and ming tsam always a patient, so why do the la don seem to be 'multitasking', marking qualifier for unintentional and patient for intentional verbs? Or, is there even a real difference between what they are marking for unintentional and intentional divalent verbs?
Divalent verbs with la don
La don do have a wide range of functions, but they all fall into the category of marking some kind of qualifier. This comes from their origin of being words of location and direction.[9] Which would make the complement of the transitve divalent verbs the 'direction' the action is directed towards and not the patient.
For example, Peter Schwieger treats these verbs as intransitive, pointing out that even though they are ཐ་དད་པ་ classified they have their object marked with the la don and are not transitive.[10] The examples are འཛེག་, "to climb", བརྩོན་, "to stirve" and གནོད་, "to harm". The {{gtib|ཐ་དད་པ་{ verbs ལྟ་བ་, "to look", གནོད་པ་, "to harm" which both use la don are placed with 'intentional (controllable) intransitive verbs'.[11]
The examples:
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When looking at those unintentional and intentional divalent verbs one can say that they are the unintentional and intentional counterpart of each other. With that view it follows logically that the agent of the intentional verbs would be the one doing and experiencing the action just as the patient of the unintentional verbs does. The agent would substitute the patient, or be the patient.
Being the patient or agent should be mutially exclusive and is only possible here due to the way these terms are used as terms of convenience. The patient being the one undergoing the action, and the agent the one marked with the agentive case.
When following the rule that the patient is in ming tsam one option is to take the agent as the substitute for the patient. That is done in the case of "verbs expressing 'to make effort, to engage'". It is not used with any of the other intentional divalent verbs. The next sections explains why.
Intentional divalent verbs with la don and the 'labeled' patient
Keeping with the way of labeling verbs described above, all verbs that have an agent marked with the agentive case are categorized as transitive. As a result the intentional divalent verb are labeled as transitive too. In most cases this label is appropriate because the majority of these verbs have a complement that one would usually consider to be an object rather than a qualifier.
A generic example:
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| divalent, unintentional, ཐ་མི་དད་པ་ classified |
divalent, intentional, ཐ་དད་པ་ classified |
Endnotes
- ↑ S. V. Beyer: The Classical Tibetan Language, p.259-260: "Intransitive verbs occur with a patient; transitive verbs occur with both a patient and an agency. [...] Tibetan—syntactically identify the intransitive and transitive patients. In Tibetan they both given the patient role particle.
- ↑ In S. V. Beyer's approach, ibid., p.263: "The patient of an event is the participant that suffers, endures, or undergoes the particular state, process, or action; the patient is the one the event happens to"
- ↑ It is for instance not the case in English passive constructions. For example, in the active voice phrase "The snow leopard bites the dog", the dog is both the patient and the direct object. By contrast, in the passive voice phrase "The dog is bitten by the snow leopard", the dog is still the patient, but now stands as the phrase's subject; while the snow leopard is only the agent.
- ↑ This is far less useful, if at all, for spoken Tibetan where the subject is the ruling factor for the auxiliary verbs and with the occurrence of a fluid-S Split ergative in regard to the degree of volition.
- ↑ The linguistic meaning of valence derives from the definition of valency in chemistry, where it is is a measure of the number of bonds formed by an atom of a given element.
- ↑ There can be the quantitative and qualitative syntactic and semantic valency, and categories of obligatory complements, optional complements, contextually optional complements, and adjuncts.
- ↑ E.g.: Divalent "He is drinking a coffee.", may be reduced to monovalency in "He is drinking."
- ↑ Lhasa Verbs, A Practical Introduction, by Tibetan contributors: Pema Gyatso, Dawa, Dekyi; created and produced by: Geoff Bailey and Christopher E. Walter
- ↑ Walter Simon: Certain Tibetan Suffixes and Their Combinations, Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, Vol. 5, No. 3/4. (Jan., 1941), p.378 ff. "3. la: There is an Old Tibetan form laḥ for la, as we had naḥ for na, and there is the verb lan̂ "to rise," a secondary form of ldan̂. Does then la-lan̂ form a pair to match na-nan̂ and ste-sten̂? I believe it does, [...] To discuss finally the meaning for la as a suffix, there can be no doubt that it has acquired a very generalised meaning, but I believe that the meaning "above, upon, on top" can still be felt in many cases..." See p.380 ff. for "4. du (tu, r(u), su)"
- ↑ Peter Schwieger: Handbuch zur Grammatik der klassischen tibetischen Schriftsprache p.75, "Häufig wird die Unterterscheidung von ཐ་དད་པའི་བྱ་ཚིག་ und ཐ་མི་དད་པའི་བྱ་ཚིག་ pauschal mit der Unterscheidung von transitiven und intransitiven Vernen gleichgesetzt. Diese Gleichsetzung trifft zwar in vielen Fällen zu, ist pauschal aber unzulässig. Es finden sich nähmlich eine Reihe von Verben, die zwar als ཐ་དད་པ་ klassifiziert werden, i.d.R. aber die Suffigierung ihres Objectes mit la oder tu bzw. seinen Allomorphen fordern...."
"The differentiation between ཐ་དད་པའི་བྱ་ཚིག་ and ཐ་མི་དད་པའི་བྱ་ཚིག་ are often treated to be the same as the differentiation between transitive und intransitive verbs. While this equivalence applies in many cases it is not possible to use it as a general rule. Because there are a number of verbs that even though classified as ཐ་དད་པ་ require the suffixation of their object with la or tu and its respective allomorphs." - ↑ Ibid., p.77, "b) kontrollierbare intransitive Verben"