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In grammar, a ditransitive verb is a verb which takes a subject and two objects. According to certain linguistics considerations, these objects may be called direct and indirect, or primary and secondary. Grammar is the discovery, enunciation, and study of rules governing the use of language. ...
A verb is a part of speech that usually denotes action (bring, read), occurrence (decompose, glitter), or a state of being (exist, stand). Depending on the language, a verb may vary in form according to many factors, possibly including its tense, aspect, mood and voice. ...
The subject of a sentence is one of the two main parts of a sentence, the other being the predicate. ...
In linguistics, the object of a transitive verb is one of its core arguments, which generally represents the target of the verbs action. ...
In languages which mark grammatical case, it is common to differentiate the objects of a ditransitive verb using, for example, the accusative case for the direct object, and the dative case for the indirect object (but this morphological alignment is not unique; see below). In languages without morphological case (such as English for the most part) the objects are distinguished by word order and/or context. In linguistics, declension is a feature of inflected languages: generally, the alteration of a noun to indicate its grammatical role. ...
The accusative case of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a verb. ...
The dative case is a grammatical case generally used to indicate the noun to whom something is given. ...
English usage
English has a number of generally ditransitive verbs, such as give and grant, and many transitive verbs that can take an additional argument (commonly a beneficiary or target of the action), such as pass, read, bake, etc.: In grammar, a transitive verb is a verb that requires both a subject and an object. ...
- He gave Mary ten dollars.
- He passed Paul the ball.
- Jean read him the books.
- She is baking him a cake.
English grammar allows for these sentences to be written alternately with a preposition (to or for): It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with adposition. ...
- He gave ten dollars to Mary.
- Jean read the books to/for him., etc.
The latter form is grammatically correct in every case, but in some dialects the former (without a preposition) is considered ungrammatical, or at least unnatural-sounding, when both objects are pronouns (as in He gave me it).
Sometimes one of the forms is perceived as wrong for idiosyncratic reasons (idioms tend to be fixed in form) or the verb simply dictates one of the patterns and excludes the other: An idiom is an expression (ie. ...
- Give a break to me (grammatical, but always realized as Give me a break)
- He introduced Susan his brother (usually becomes He introduced his brother to Susan)
In certain dialects of English, many verbs not normally treated as ditransitive are allowed to take a third argument that shows a beneficiary, generally of an action performed for oneself. - Let's catch us some fish. (some fish for us)
Again, this usage is idiomatic and therefore arbitrary, learnt only with experience.
Passive voice Many ditransitive verbs have a passive voice form which can take a direct object. Contrast the active and two forms of the passive: In grammar, voice is the relationship between the action or state expressed by a verb, and its arguments (subject, object, etc. ...
Active:
- Jean gave the books to him.
Passive: - The books were given to him by Jean.
- He was given the books by Jean.
Attributive ditransitive verbs There is a different kind of ditransitive verbs, where the two objects are semantically an entity and a quality, a source and a result, etc. These verbs attribute one object to the other. In English, make, name, appoint, turn into and others are examples: - The state of New York made Hillary Clinton a Senator.
- I will name him Galahad.
Ditransitive/monotransitive alignment Just as the way the arguments of intransitive and transitive verbs are aligned in a given language allows one sort of typological classification, the alignment between arguments of monotransitive and ditransitive verbs allows another kind of classification. If the three arguments of a typical ditransitive verb are labeled D (for Donor; the subject of a verb like "to give" in English), T (for Theme; normally the direct object of ditransitive verb in English) and R (for Recipient, normally the indirect object in English), these can be aligned with the Agent and Patient of monotransitive verbs and the Subject of intransitive verbs in several ways, which are not completely predicted by whether the language is accusative, ergative, or active. Donor is always or nearly always in the same case as Agent, but different languages equate the other arguments in different ways: A nominative-accusative language (or simply accusative language) is one that marks the direct object of transitive verbs distinguishing them from the subject of both transitive and intransitive verbs. ...
An ergative-absolutive language (or simply ergative) is one that treats the subject of transitive verbs distinctly from the subject of intransitive verbs and the object of transitive verbs. ...
A nominative-absolutive language is one that marks the subject of a transitive verb or a voluntary subject of an intransitive verb distinctly from the object of a transitive verb or an involuntary subject of an intransitive verb. ...
In linguistics, declension is a feature of inflected languages: generally, the alteration of a noun to indicate its grammatical role. ...
- Indirect languages: D=A, T=P, with a third case for R
- Secondary languages: D=A, R=P, with a third case for T
- Split-P languages: D=A, some monotransitive clauses have P=T, others have P=R
See also In linguistics, morphosyntactic alignment is the system used to distinguish between the arguments of transitive verbs and intransitive verbs. ...
In grammar, a language in which transitive verbs show a distinction between primary and secondary objects, rather than between direct and indirect objects. ...
References - "Alignment of ditransitive with monotransitive case roles", a message to the CONLANG mailing list of 17 May 2005
- Another message of 3 Aug 2005, on the various combinations of ditransitive/monotransitive alignment and monotransitive/intransitive alignment actually attested in natural languages
- Person, Anna Siewierska (Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics, 2004)
- "Argument Marking in Ditransitive Alignment Types", Martin Haspelmath (2005)
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