Pluractionality

Pluractionality, or verbal number, is a grammatical device that indicates that the action or participants

Verb argument

In linguistics, a verb argument is a phrase that appears in a syntactic relationship with the verb in a clause. In English, for example, the two most important arguments are the subject and the direct object....

 of a verb

Verb

kalleah hit meIn syntax, a verb is a word that usually denotes an action , an occurrence , or a state of being . Depending on the language, a verb may vary in form according to many factors, possibly including its tense, aspect, mood and voice...

 are plural

Grammatical number

In linguistics, grammatical number is a grammatical category of nouns, pronouns, and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions ....

. This differs from frequentive or iterative aspects

Grammatical aspect

In linguistics, the grammatical aspect of a verb defines the temporal flow in the described event or state...

 in that the latter have no implication for the number of participants of the verb.

Often a pluractional transitive verb

Transitive verb

In syntax, a transitive verb is a verb that requires both a direct subject and one or more objects.-Examples:Some examples of sentences with transitive verbs:*Harry sees Adam....

 indicates that the object is plural, whereas in a pluractional intransitive verb

Intransitive verb

----In grammar, an intransitive verb does not take an object. In more technical terms, an intransitive verb has only one argument , and hence has a valency of one. For example, in English, the verbs sleep and die, are intransitive...

 the subject

Agent (grammar)

In linguistics, a grammatical agent is the participant of a situation that carries out the action in this situation. Also, agent is the name of the thematic role with the above definition...

 is plural. This is sometimes taken as an element of ergativity in the language. However, the essence of pluractionality is that the action of the verb is plural, whether because several people perform the action, it is performed on several objects, or it is performed several times. The exact interpretation may depend on the semantics of the verb as well as the context in which it is used. The lack of verbal number does not generally mean that the action and participants are singular, but rather that there is no particularly notable plurality; thus it may be better described as paucal vs. multiple rather than singular vs. plural.

Although English does not have verbal number as a grammatical device, many English verbs such as stampede and massacre are used when one of the participants involves a large number.

In Ainu

The Ainu language

Ainu language

Ainu is an Ainu language spoken by members of the Ainu ethnic group on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaidō....

 of Japan has a closed class

Closed class

In linguistics, a closed class is a word class to which no new items can normally be added, and that usually contains a relatively small number of items. Typical closed classes found in many languages are adpositions , determiners, conjunctions, and pronouns.Contrastingly, an open class offers...

 of 'count verbs'. The majority of these end in -pa, an iterative suffix which has become lexicalized on some verbs. For example, kor means 'to have something or a few things', and kor-pa 'to have many things'; there are also causative

Causative

A causative form, in linguistics, is an expression of an agent causing or forcing a patient to perform an action or to be in a certain condition--salient cause, is an expression of a patient involves in a non-volitional event that registers the changes of its state--salient effect, is an...

 forms of the latter, kor-pa-re 'to give (one person) many things', kor-pa-yar 'to give (several people) many things'. The -pa may occur more than once; this may be a case of the pluractional verb in its iterative aspect:

hosip-pa-pa "everyone came back"

There are also suppletive forms:

Ainu suppletive pluractionals

Paucal	Multiple	Trans.
an	oka(y)	to be
as	roski	to stand
a	rok	to sit
arpa, oman	paye	to go
ek	arki	to come
rayke	ronnu	to kill
uk	uyna	to take

In addition to literal number, pluractionality can be used for politeness, much as plural pronouns are in many languages. (See T-V distinction

T-V distinction

In sociolinguistics, a T-V distinction describes the situation wherein a language has second-person pronouns that distinguish varying levels of politeness, social distance, courtesy, familiarity, or insult toward the addressee.-History and usage:...

.)

In Georgian

Georgian

Georgian language

Georgian is the native language of the Georgians and the official language of Georgia, a country in the Caucasus.Georgian is the primary language of about 3.9 million people in Georgia itself, and of another 500,000 abroad...

 shows an illuminating distinction between verbal and nominal number. Georgian verbs may be suppletive for tense and animacy as well as number. When a noun occurs with a numeral in Georgian, it takes the singular form regardless of its semantic number. Verbal agreement is syntactic, and therefore is also singular. However, the pluractionality of the verbal root remains plural. Thus,

Singular participant, singular verb:

ivane

da-ǧd-a

John( Pluractionality, or verbal number, is a grammatical device that indicates that the action or participants Verb argument In linguistics, a verb argument is a phrase that appears in a syntactic relationship with the verb in a clause. In English, for example, the two most important arguments are the subject and the direct object....  of a verb Verb kalleah hit meIn syntax, a verb is a word that usually denotes an action , an occurrence , or a state of being . Depending on the language, a verb may vary in form according to many factors, possibly including its tense, aspect, mood and voice...  are plural Grammatical number In linguistics, grammatical number is a grammatical category of nouns, pronouns, and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions .... . This differs from frequentive or iterative aspects Grammatical aspect In linguistics, the grammatical aspect of a verb defines the temporal flow in the described event or state...  in that the latter have no implication for the number of participants of the verb. Often a pluractional transitive verb Transitive verb In syntax, a transitive verb is a verb that requires both a direct subject and one or more objects.-Examples:Some examples of sentences with transitive verbs:*Harry sees Adam....  indicates that the object is plural, whereas in a pluractional intransitive verb Intransitive verb ----In grammar, an intransitive verb does not take an object. In more technical terms, an intransitive verb has only one argument , and hence has a valency of one. For example, in English, the verbs sleep and die, are intransitive...  the subject Agent (grammar) In linguistics, a grammatical agent is the participant of a situation that carries out the action in this situation. Also, agent is the name of the thematic role with the above definition...  is plural. This is sometimes taken as an element of ergativity in the language. However, the essence of pluractionality is that the action of the verb is plural, whether because several people perform the action, it is performed on several objects, or it is performed several times. The exact interpretation may depend on the semantics of the verb as well as the context in which it is used. The lack of verbal number does not generally mean that the action and participants are singular, but rather that there is no particularly notable plurality; thus it may be better described as paucal vs. multiple rather than singular vs. plural. Although English does not have verbal number as a grammatical device, many English verbs such as stampede and massacre are used when one of the participants involves a large number. In Ainu The Ainu language Ainu language Ainu is an Ainu language spoken by members of the Ainu ethnic group on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaidō....  of Japan has a closed class Closed class In linguistics, a closed class is a word class to which no new items can normally be added, and that usually contains a relatively small number of items. Typical closed classes found in many languages are adpositions , determiners, conjunctions, and pronouns.Contrastingly, an open class offers...  of 'count verbs'. The majority of these end in -pa, an iterative suffix which has become lexicalized on some verbs. For example, kor means 'to have something or a few things', and kor-pa 'to have many things'; there are also causative Causative A causative form, in linguistics, is an expression of an agent causing or forcing a patient to perform an action or to be in a certain condition--salient cause, is an expression of a patient involves in a non-volitional event that registers the changes of its state--salient effect, is an...  forms of the latter, kor-pa-re 'to give (one person) many things', kor-pa-yar 'to give (several people) many things'. The -pa may occur more than once; this may be a case of the pluractional verb in its iterative aspect: hosip-pa-pa "everyone came back" There are also suppletive forms: Ainu suppletive pluractionals Paucal Multiple Trans. an oka(y) to be as roski to stand a rok to sit arpa, oman paye to go ek arki to come rayke ronnu to kill uk uyna to take In addition to literal number, pluractionality can be used for politeness, much as plural pronouns are in many languages. (See T-V distinction T-V distinction In sociolinguistics, a T-V distinction describes the situation wherein a language has second-person pronouns that distinguish varying levels of politeness, social distance, courtesy, familiarity, or insult toward the addressee.-History and usage:... .) In Georgian Georgian Georgian language Georgian is the native language of the Georgians and the official language of Georgia, a country in the Caucasus.Georgian is the primary language of about 3.9 million people in Georgia itself, and of another 500,000 abroad...  shows an illuminating distinction between verbal and nominal number. Georgian verbs may be suppletive for tense and animacy as well as number. When a noun occurs with a numeral in Georgian, it takes the singular form regardless of its semantic number. Verbal agreement is syntactic, and therefore is also singular. However, the pluractionality of the verbal root remains plural. Thus, Singular participant, singular verb: ivane da-ǧd-a John( Pluractionality, or verbal number, is a grammatical device that indicates that the action or participants Verb argument In linguistics, a verb argument is a phrase that appears in a syntactic relationship with the verb in a clause. In English, for example, the two most important arguments are the subject and the direct object....  of a verb Verb kalleah hit meIn syntax, a verb is a word that usually denotes an action , an occurrence , or a state of being . Depending on the language, a verb may vary in form according to many factors, possibly including its tense, aspect, mood and voice...  are plural Grammatical number In linguistics, grammatical number is a grammatical category of nouns, pronouns, and adjective and verb agreement that expresses count distinctions .... . This differs from frequentive or iterative aspects Grammatical aspect In linguistics, the grammatical aspect of a verb defines the temporal flow in the described event or state...  in that the latter have no implication for the number of participants of the verb. Often a pluractional transitive verb Transitive verb In syntax, a transitive verb is a verb that requires both a direct subject and one or more objects.-Examples:Some examples of sentences with transitive verbs:*Harry sees Adam....  indicates that the object is plural, whereas in a pluractional intransitive verb Intransitive verb ----In grammar, an intransitive verb does not take an object. In more technical terms, an intransitive verb has only one argument , and hence has a valency of one. For example, in English, the verbs sleep and die, are intransitive...  the subject Agent (grammar) In linguistics, a grammatical agent is the participant of a situation that carries out the action in this situation. Also, agent is the name of the thematic role with the above definition...  is plural. This is sometimes taken as an element of ergativity in the language. However, the essence of pluractionality is that the action of the verb is plural, whether because several people perform the action, it is performed on several objects, or it is performed several times. The exact interpretation may depend on the semantics of the verb as well as the context in which it is used. The lack of verbal number does not generally mean that the action and participants are singular, but rather that there is no particularly notable plurality; thus it may be better described as paucal vs. multiple rather than singular vs. plural. Although English does not have verbal number as a grammatical device, many English verbs such as stampede and massacre are used when one of the participants involves a large number. In Ainu The Ainu language Ainu language Ainu is an Ainu language spoken by members of the Ainu ethnic group on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaidō....  of Japan has a closed class Closed class In linguistics, a closed class is a word class to which no new items can normally be added, and that usually contains a relatively small number of items. Typical closed classes found in many languages are adpositions , determiners, conjunctions, and pronouns.Contrastingly, an open class offers...  of 'count verbs'. The majority of these end in -pa, an iterative suffix which has become lexicalized on some verbs. For example, kor means 'to have something or a few things', and kor-pa 'to have many things'; there are also causative Causative A causative form, in linguistics, is an expression of an agent causing or forcing a patient to perform an action or to be in a certain condition--salient cause, is an expression of a patient involves in a non-volitional event that registers the changes of its state--salient effect, is an...  forms of the latter, kor-pa-re 'to give (one person) many things', kor-pa-yar 'to give (several people) many things'. The -pa may occur more than once; this may be a case of the pluractional verb in its iterative aspect: hosip-pa-pa "everyone came back" There are also suppletive forms: Ainu suppletive pluractionals Paucal Multiple Trans. an oka(y) to be as roski to stand a rok to sit arpa, oman paye to go ek arki to come rayke ronnu to kill uk uyna to take In addition to literal number, pluractionality can be used for politeness, much as plural pronouns are in many languages. (See T-V distinction T-V distinction In sociolinguistics, a T-V distinction describes the situation wherein a language has second-person pronouns that distinguish varying levels of politeness, social distance, courtesy, familiarity, or insult toward the addressee.-History and usage:... .) In Georgian Georgian Georgian language Georgian is the native language of the Georgians and the official language of Georgia, a country in the Caucasus.Georgian is the primary language of about 3.9 million people in Georgia itself, and of another 500,000 abroad...  shows an illuminating distinction between verbal and nominal number. Georgian verbs may be suppletive for tense and animacy as well as number. When a noun occurs with a numeral in Georgian, it takes the singular form regardless of its semantic number. Verbal agreement is syntactic, and therefore is also singular. However, the pluractionality of the verbal root remains plural. Thus, Singular participant, singular verb: ivane da-ǧd-a John({{sm Singular Singular may refer to:* A grammatical number denoting a unit quantity * SINGULAR, a computer algebra system* gravitational singularity* technological singularity... ) sg}})-3 Third person Third person may refer to:* A grammatical person, he, she, and they in the English language* Third-person narrative, a perspective in storytelling... {{sm|sg}} "John sat down" Plural participant, plural verb: čem-i mšobl-eb-i da-sxd-nen my-{{sm {{sm Plural Plural, commonly abbreviated pl., is a grammatical number, typically referring to more than one of the referent in the real world. In the English language, singular and plural are the only grammatical numbers.-English:... -{{sm>abs}} pfv}}-sit({{sm|pl}})-3{{sm|pl}} "My parents sat down" Grammatically singular but semantically plural participant, mixed verb: čem-i sam-i megobar-i da-sxd-a abs}} abs}} sg}})-{{sm|abs}} pfv}}sit({{sm|pl}})-3{{sm|sg}} "My three friends sat down" (See Interlinear gloss to explain the format of these examples.) In Muskogean Muskogean languages Muskogean languages Muskogean is an indigenous language family of the Southeastern United States. Though there is an ongoing debate concerning their interrelationships, the Muskogean languages are generally divided into two branches, Eastern Muskogean and Western Muskogean...  such as Koasati have a three-way distinction, with singular, dual, and plural verbs. However, it is not clear if this is pluractionality or simply suppletive verbal agreement for number. See Koasati language Koasati language Koasati is a Native American language of Muskogean origin. The language is spoken by the Coushatta people, most of whom live in Allen Parish north of the town of Elton, Louisiana, though a smaller number share a reservation near Livingston, Texas with the Alabama people...  for details. In Hopi In Hopi Hopi language Hopi is a Uto-Aztecan language spoken by the Hopi people of northeastern Arizona, USA, although today some Hopi are monolingual English speakers.The use of the language gradually declined over the course of the 20th century... , dual Dual number In linear algebra, the dual numbers extend the real numbers by adjoining one new element ε with the property ε2 = 0 . The collection of dual numbers forms a particular two-dimensional commutative unital associative algebra over the real numbers. Every dual number has the form z = a + bε...  nouns as subjects take the suffix -vit and singular verbs. Hopi does not have dual pronouns, but the plural pronouns may be used with singular verbs with a dual meaning. However, it is not clear if this is pluractionality or simply number agreement on the verb. See Hopi language Hopi language Hopi is a Uto-Aztecan language spoken by the Hopi people of northeastern Arizona, USA, although today some Hopi are monolingual English speakers.The use of the language gradually declined over the course of the 20th century...  for details. In Pomoan The Central Pomo language Pomoan languages Pomoan is a family of endangered languages spoken in northern California by the Pomo people on the Pacific Coast. According to the 2000 census, there are 255 speakers of the languages...  of California distinguishes {{IPA|ʔčʰá·w}} 'sit, stay' and pluractional {{IPA|napʰów}} for more than one person. The perfective suffix -w on these verbs may be replaced with -t for a plural object: háyu š-čé-w dog pfv}} "He tied up the dog." háyu š-čé-t dog pfv.pl}} "He tied up the dogs." As in Ainu, pluractionality may be used for politeness. In Hausa Chadic languages Chadic languages The Chadic languages constitute a language family spoken across northern Nigeria, Niger, Chad, Central African Republic and Cameroon, belonging to the Afroasiatic phylum...  such as Hausa Hausa language Hausa is the Chadic language with the largest number of speakers, spoken as a first language by about 24 million people, and as a second language by about 15 million more.-Classification:...  use reduplicated verbs with "a general meaning of a repeated action, an action simultaneously performed by several agents, and action performed on more than one object, or various combinations of these 'plural' meanings" (Eulenberg 1971). There are also derived forms: naa aikee su 'I sent them' naa a”aikee su 'I sent({{sm|pl}}) them' The first implies that I sent them all together, whereas the second means that I sent them at different times or to different places. In Papuan languages Pluractionality is not uncommon in New Guinea. The Koiarian language Barai has suppletive forms: fi 'one sits'   kari 'many sit' abe 'take one' ke 'take many' In American Sign Language {{main|American Sign Language grammar#Verbal number}} In American Sign Language American Sign Language American Sign Language is the dominant sign language of the Deaf community in the United States, in the English-speaking parts of Canada, and in some regions of Mexico... , verbal number is expressed through reduplication Reduplication Reduplication, in linguistics, is a morphological process by which the root or stem of a word, or part of it, is repeated.Reduplication is used in inflections to convey a grammatical function, such as plurality, intensification, etc., and in lexical derivation to create new words... . There are several verbal aspects using modified reduplication that indicate frequent or iterative action; these are unusual cross-linguistically in that transitive verbs loose their transitivity. In addition, transitive verbs may be reduplicated to show plurality of their object; the motion of the verb is either extended or repeated to cover the spatial locations of multiple objects or recipients. These are true duals Dual number In linear algebra, the dual numbers extend the real numbers by adjoining one new element ε with the property ε2 = 0 . The collection of dual numbers forms a particular two-dimensional commutative unital associative algebra over the real numbers. Every dual number has the form z = a + bε...  and plurals, and so may perhaps be best thought of as object incorporation Object incorporation Object incorporation is a linguistic valency-decreasing operation employed by a number of languages, in particular those with highly synthetic morphologies. Object incorporation is a kind of noun incorporation, more common than the similar process of subject incorporation.As a formal process,... rather than pluractionality. For example, {{sm|ask someone a question}} is signed by flexing the index finger of an upright G hand in the direction of that person; the dual involves flexing it at both object loci (sequentially with one hand or simultaneously with both), the simple plural involves a single flexing which spans the object group while the hand arcs across it, and an individuated plural involves multiple rapid flexings while the hand arcs.