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This thesis aims to find out how animacy affects sentence structure choice in Turkish learners of L2 English. The study compares three different L2 English proficiency levels with each other as well to L1 English and L1 Turkish. In this way the effect of English, a rigid word order language, and Turkish, a free word order language on sentence structure choice have been compared. A picture description task was applied on 94 participants. The pictures depicted a transitive action taking place between an inanimate agent and an animate patient (animate condition) or between an inanimate agent and an inanimate patient. The subjects were given handouts with the pictures and were asked to write down what is happening in each picture. There were 60 Turkish learners of L2 English and 14 English participants in the study. Turkish learners of English belonged to level-1 (16 students), level-2 (25 students) and level-3 (19 students). In addition, 20 Turkish speakers were consulted for their knowledge of Turkish. It was hypothesized that in L2 English, animate entities would be accessed first and this will directly affect sentence structure choice through grammatical subject assignment or through word order. Thus, it was expected that when the learners are shown a picture depicting a transitive action taking place between an animate patinet and an inanimate agent, they would tend to use the passive in English, which assigns both a sentence-initial position and a subjecthood role to the animate entity. L2 proficiency level and native language were expected to play a role in determining the role of animacy on sentence structure choice. Chi-square analysis and odds ratio calculations were made. The results showed that animacy of the patinet affected sentence structure choice in L2 English by triggering the passivce usage in only level-3 (the most advanced group). Animacy of the patient affected native speakers of English in the same way, i.e. native English speakers tended to use the passive voice in the animate condition. No such effect was found in lower level learners of L2 English (i.e. level-1 and level-2) and Turkish native speakers. It was found that in the animate condition, Turkish native speakers tended to use the OSV word order more frequently than they did in the inanimate condition. This result suggested that in Turkish, animacy of the patient triggers the use of the OSV (Object, Subject, Verb) order rather than the passive voice. In short, the research results suggested that L2 proficency level and native language could play a role in determining how animacy affects sentence structure choice in L2.

This thesis explores the nature of voice in Malagasy, a language spoken in Madagascar. In chapter 2, it is claimed that different passives promote arguments from different structural positions. Evidence is provided for a particular position, [Spec, v2P], where a certain class of elements ("displaced themes") may be generated. One particular passive, the a-prefix, promotes to subject elements in this position. In chapter 3, arguments are presented in favour of a structural analysis of circumstantial topic (CT). CT morphology licenses all arguments of the verb. Due to a requirement that all clauses have a subject (the Extended Projection Principle), some element other than a DP structurally Case marked by the verb must raise to subject. Finally, chapter 4 addresses the left periphery in the Malagasy clause, in particular the structural positions of topic and focus.

This thesis investigates the question of how the arguments of a given verb are linked to positions in a phrase structure. Through a study of passives, psych verbs, and ditransitive verbs in Japanese, it provides empirical support for the hypothesis that arguments having particular thematic roles are associated with particular syntactic positions systematically. / Chapter 2 deals with passives, in particular, two types of passive constructions, direct and indirect passives. Following some previous works, it is argued that the subject of a direct passive is generated in the same position as an object of the corresponding active verb, having the same thematic role, whereas the subject of an indirect passive is projected as an argument of a separate predicate. Several pieces of evidence for this hypothesis which are not given in the literature are provided here. / Chapter 3 is concerned with psych verbs, focusing on those that participate in a causative alternation. It is proposed that causative counterparts of these verbs can have two different structures that are parallel to the two types of passives discussed in Chapter 2. The subject of one type is generated in the same position as the object of the noncausative counterpart, having the same thematic role, whereas the subject of the other type is projected as an argument of a separate predicate. / Chapter 4 takes up ditransitive verbs, specifically, those that have inchoative counterparts, which do not project the subject of the ditransitive construction. There are two types of such verbs: one promotes the accusative argument of the ditransitive construction, rather than the dative one, to the subject of the inchoative counterpart, while the other chooses the dative argument over the accusative one for the subject of the inchoative counterpart. It is argued that this reflects the difference in the base-generated position of the dative argument between the two types of verbs. Moreover, the dative arguments of the two are distinguished in terms of thematic role. / This research is meant to contribute toward having a further understanding of how the participants of an event are expressed in grammatical forms.

This thesis brings together two different lines of research, the nature of passive voice, the nature of readability. Commonly, languages have a range of tools for detransitivisation, topicalisation, and impersonalisation, of which passivisation is one (Givón, 1981). Passives have important roles in our language, and prescribing against their use lacks a full understanding of these roles. Much of the concern around passives from writers, editors, and teachers is no more than folklore that has not clearly analysed various writing and reading problems. Many awkward sentences are not awkward because they use passives but because they are wordy, clumsy, or pretentious. Most criticisms have little basis in linguistic theory, and rarely is there more than passing mention of the important role that passives play in communication. Some uses of passives are inappropriate, being vague, ambiguous, or even deceitful. These inappropriate uses of passive voice give the construction a bad name. They have become ammunition for prescriptive grammarians to fire at all uses of passives, often with weak analysis and minimal reference to linguistic theory. ‘Avoid passives’ has become a mantra. I tentatively suggest that there is unlikely to be a cost to processing passives. Given the speed at which the brain processes clauses, any differences in readability (if they exist) must be miniscule. Consequently, I suggest that any differences are unimportant relative to the benefits that appropriately used passives bring to readability. Furthermore, appropriately used passives may actually improve readability, especially when there is greater interest in the passive subject than the active subject, and when the passive serves to connect clauses or sentences.

M.A. (African Languages) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

This thesis reports on the use of active and passive voice in the workplace and classroom through analysis of surveys completed by 37 employees and 66 students. The surveys offered six categories of business writing with ten sets of two sentences each, written in active and passive voice. Participants selected one sentence from each set and gave a reason for each selection. The participants preferred active over passive 47 to 46 percent of opportunities, but they preferred mixed voice over both, 49 percent. The participants preferred active only for memos to supervisors; in the other five categories they preferred passive or mixed voice. Both males and females preferred mixed voice, and age appeared to influence the choices. They cited context as the most common reason for using passive.

This in-depth study investigates the acquisition of the passive construction by Setswana-speaking pre-schoolers. My original contribution to knowledge is that Setswana-speaking preschoolers acquire the passive early on some tasks but not others. This shows that acquisition is a multifacted task that needs to be fine-tuned. These are important facts that need to be considered by Speech-Language Therapists in order to accurately identify language-impaired children. Setswana is the fourth most commonly spoken language in South Africa. However, only four linguistic studies have been conducted on Setswana since 2000 and none of these investigated acquisition of Setswana processes in children. Setswana is a language that belongs to the South-eastern Bantu Zone of languages. Languages in this group are structurally closely related to one another and mutually intelligible. Studies of the acquisition of the passive in Sesotho and Zulu have shown that the passive develops much earlier (3 years) than in Indo-European languages (5 years). More tools are needed to explore language acquisition and language impairment in South Africa. It is essential that these tools focus on issues of poverty and diversity. The research methods used should be suitable for the communities being explored and should inform the delivery of appropriate services. Endeavors should be made to provide information that improves scientific research in terms of language acquisition and access to speech-language therapy services. The passive voice is considered to be one of the most well researched yet controversial linguistic structures. In Setswana the construction of the passive occurs when the subject of the active clause is expressed in the passive in the form of an agentive adverb with the prefixal formative ké- which forms an optional by-phrase. The verb is marked as passive using a passive extension by suffixing –w or –iw. How this is acquired is the focus of this study. A total of 114 children divided into 3 age groups 2.6 – 3.5 years, 3.6 – 4.5 years and 4.6 – 5.5 years were the participants in this study. Their performance was compared to that of a group of 11 adult verifiers. The aim of this study was to investigate Setswana-speaking children’s comprehension and production of the passive in terms of age, passive categories and length variables. Tasks used to examine these variables were Comprehension 2 and 3 Character tasks and Elicited Production and Imitation tasks. The participants were divided into two different participant groups. There were 52 participants on the Elicited Imitation tasks and 62 on the Comprehension and Elicited Production tasks. Participants were tested at 3 crèches in the peri-urban area of Pankop, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa. On the Comprehension 2 character tasks significant differences between age groups (age group 1, 34% and 3, 49%) were noted. However, no significant developmental trends were found on Comprehension 3 character or Elicited Production tasks amongst the children. On Elicited Imitation tasks there was a significant difference between the youngest group (69%) compared to the middle (83%) and oldest age group (81%). . The results showed much variability among tasks. The results for Comprehension 2 and 3 Character tasks were at above chance level. The Elicited Production task was unsuccessful as children found great difficulty with this task with 2.6 to 3.6 year old children scoring 7% and the oldest group 14%. However, the Elicited Imitation task was extremely successful and confirmed the diagnostic value of such a measure. The type of passive did influence performance but this was task dependent. The participants’ knowledge of the passive categories, for Comprehension 2 character and Elicited Imitation tasks followed the same order, with best performance on inanimate categories followed by negatives, reversible and then non-actional passives. On Elicited Production tasks children also scored the best on inanimate tasks. A weakness of this study is that Elicited Imitation tasks were not administered at the same time as the other tasks and therefore a different group of participants was used even though subject selection criteria was the same. The impact of sentence length on performance also showed much variability. For the non-actional negative category on Set A Comprehension 2 Character tasks participants’ scored significantly better for short sentences than long sentences and vice versa for Comprehension 3 Character tasks. On Elicited Production tasks children scored better on long passive sentences. On Elicited Imitation tasks short sentences were easier than long passives. The results of this study confirms the important effect of task-type in assessing passive comprehension and production. Also, the results of this study suggest that the passive is not an early acquired structure in Setswana with the exception of the Elicited Imitation task. The results therefore support the A-chain Deficit Hypothesis, i.e., that the passive is a late acquired structure with difficulties with non-actional categories except when an Elicited Imitation task was used. Explanations may link to the complex sociolinguistic context of developing children in South Africa. This study confirms the important effect of task when testing child language, and the potential value of Elicited Imitation as a viable and relevant measure of assessing language in the South African context.

Esta pesquisa investiga alguns aspectos das vozes verbais nas gramáticas normativas de língua portuguesa. Alguns conceitos como o de voz passiva e de partícula apassivadora são objeto de discussão por parte de diferentes autores da gramaticografia de língua portuguesa que tem adotado pontos de vista distintos e até antagônicos sobre cada um destes aspectos. Este trabalho também busca demonstrar que a gramática normativa de língua portuguesa atual não renovou a sua teoria sobre as vozes verbais, que remonta a Dionísio o Trácio com seu manual escrito há mais de dois mil anos atrás, e que necessita, deste modo, identificar as fragilidades de sua teoria e renová-la com o instrumental teórico de que dispõe as modernas correntes da linguística. / This research investigates some aspects of the verbal voices in the normative grammar of portuguese language. Some concepts like passive voice and the clitic SE are discussed by many authors in the portuguese language gramaticography that have adopted different and opposite points of view about each one of these aspects. This work also intends to demonstrate that the normative grammar of portuguese language nowadays did not renew its theory about verbal voices, which remonts to Dionísio of Trácia with his manual which was written two thousand years ago, and it needs identify the fragilities of normative grammar theory and needs to renew it with the theorical instrumental available in the modern linguistics currents.