Editing Ditransitive verb

{{Short description|Verb which takes a subject and two objects}}
{{more footnotes|date=November 2010}}
{{Transitivity and Valency}}
In [[grammar]], a '''ditransitive''' (or '''bitransitive''') '''verb''' is a [[transitive verb]] whose contextual use corresponds to a [[subject (grammar)|subject]] and two [[object (grammar)|object]]s which refer to a [[Thematic relation|theme]] and a recipient. According to certain linguistics considerations, these objects may be called ''direct'' and ''indirect'', or ''primary'' and ''secondary''.  This is in contrast to [[monotransitive verb]]s, whose contextual use corresponds to only one object<!--not necessarily direct or primary-->.

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 or context.

==In English==
English has a number of generally ditransitive verbs, such as ''give'', ''grant'', and ''tell'' and many [[transitive verb]]s that can take an additional argument (commonly a beneficiary or target of the action), such as ''pass'', ''read'', ''bake'', etc.:

:''He gave Mary ten dollars.''
:''He passed Paul the ball.''
:''Jean read him the books.''
:''She is baking him a cake.''
:''I am mailing Sam some lemons.''

Alternatively, English grammar allows for these sentences to be written with a [[preposition]] (''to'' or ''for''): (See also [[Dative shift]])

:''He gave ten dollars to Mary.''
:''He passed the ball to Paul.''
:''Jean read the books to/for him.''
:''She is baking a cake for him.''
:''I am mailing some lemons to Sam.'', 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 the direct object is a pronoun (as in ''He gave me it'' or ''He gave Fred it'').

Sometimes one of the forms is perceived as wrong for idiosyncratic reasons ([[idiom]]s tend to be fixed in form) or the verb simply dictates one of the patterns and excludes the other:

:''*Give a break to me'' (grammatical, but always phrased ''Give me a break'')
:''*He introduced Susan his brother'' (usually phrased ''He introduced his brother to Susan'')

In certain dialects of English, many verbs not normally treated as ditransitive are allowed to take a second object that shows a beneficiary, generally of an action performed for oneself.

:''Let's catch ourselves some fish'' (which might also be phrased ''Let's catch some fish for ourselves''{{Citation needed|date=June 2010}})

This construction could also be an extension of a reflexive construction.

In addition, certain ditransitive verbs can also act as monotransitive verbs:<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ucl.ac.uk/internet-grammar/function/ditr.htm|title=Ditransitive Verbs @ The Internet Grammar of English}}</ref>

:"David told a story to ''the children''" – Ditransitive
:"David told ''a story'' – Monotransitive

===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:

Active:
:''Jean gave the books to him.''
:''Jean gave him the books.''

Passive:
:''The books were given to him by Jean.''
:''He was given the books by Jean.''

Not all languages have a passive voice, and some that do have one (e.g. [[Polish language|Polish]]) do not allow the indirect object of a ditransitive verb to be promoted to subject by passivization, as English does. In others like Dutch a passivization is possible but requires a different auxiliary: "krijgen" instead of "worden".

E.g. ''schenken'' means "to donate, to give":

:Active: ''Jan schonk hem de boeken'' – John donated the books to him.
:Passive: ''De boeken '''werden''' door Jan aan hem geschonken'' – The books were donated to him by John.
:Pseudo-passive: ''Hij '''kreeg''' de boeken door Jan geschonken'' – He got the books donated [to him] by John.

===Attributive ditransitive verbs===

Another category of ditransitive verb is the attributive ditransitive verb in which 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'', ''consider'', ''turn into'' and others are examples:

*''The state of New York made Hillary Clinton a Senator.''
*''I will name him Galahad.''

The first object is a [[direct object]]. The second object is an [[Complement (linguistics)|object complement]].<ref>Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.</ref><ref>Huddleston, Rodney. 1984. Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.</ref>

Attributive ditransitive verbs are also referred to as [[resultative]] verbs.<ref>Fordyce-Ruff, Tenielle. 2015. Beyond the basics: Transitive, intransitive, ditransitive and ambitransitive verbs. Advocate. Online: https://commons.cu-portland.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1015&context=lawfaculty{{Dead link|date=February 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

==Morphosyntactic alignment==
The [[morphosyntactic alignment]] between arguments of monotransitive and ditransitive verbs is explained below. 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 predicted by whether the language is [[Nominative–accusative language|nominative–accusative]], [[Ergative–absolutive language|ergative–absolutive]], or [[Active–stative language|active–stative]].  Donor is always or nearly always in the same [[Grammatical case|case]] as Agent, but different languages equate the other arguments in different ways:{{citation needed|date=June 2019}}

* Indirective languages: D&nbsp;=&nbsp;A, T&nbsp;=&nbsp;P, with a third case for R
* [[Secundative language|Secundative]] languages: D&nbsp;=&nbsp;A, R&nbsp;=&nbsp;P (the 'primary object'), with a third case for T (the 'secondary object')
* Neutral or double-object languages: D&nbsp;=&nbsp;A, T&nbsp;=&nbsp;R&nbsp;=&nbsp;P
* Split-P languages: D&nbsp;=&nbsp;A, some monotransitive clauses have P&nbsp;=&nbsp;T, others have P&nbsp;=&nbsp;R

==See also==
*[[Instrumental case]]
*[[Intransitive verb]]
*[[Morphosyntactic alignment]]
*[[Secundative language]]
*[[Transitive verb]]
*[[Transitivity (grammar)]]
*[[Valency (linguistics)]]

==Notes==
{{Reflist}}

==References==
*Cheng, L. L.-S., Huang, C.-T. J., Audrey, Y.-H., & Tang, C.-C. J. (1999). Hoo, hoo, hoo: Syntax of the causative, dative, and passive constructions in Taiwanese. ''Journal of Chinese Linguistics Monograph Series, 14'', 146–203.
*Lee, Hui-chi. (2011). Double object construction in Hainan Min. ''Language and Linguistics, 12''(3), 501–527.
*[[Martin Haspelmath|Haspelmath, Martin]]. (2005). [https://zenodo.org/record/831387 Argument marking in ditransitive alignment types]. ''Linguistic Discovery, 3''(1), 1–21.
*Haspelmath, Martin. (2008). Ditransitive Constructions: Towards a New Role and Reference Grammar? In R. D. Van Valin (Ed.), ''Investigations of the Syntax–Semantics–Pragmatics Interface'' (pp. 75–100). John Benjamins.
*Haspelmath, Martin. (2013). Ditransitive Constructions: The Verb 'Give'. In M. S. Dryer & M. Haspelmath (Eds.), ''The World Atlas of Language Structures Online''. Retrieved from http://wals.info/chapter/105
*Haspelmath, Martin. (2015). Ditransitive constructions. ''Annual Review of Linguistics, 1'', 19–41.
*Huang, Chu-Ren & Ahrens, Kathleen. (1999). The function and category of GEI in Mandarin ditransitive constructions. ''Journal of Chinese Linguistics, 27''(2), 1–26.
*Huang, Han-Chun. (2012). Dative Constructions in Hakka: A Constructional Perspective. ''Journal of Hakka Studies, 5''(1), 39–72.
*Liu, Feng-hsi. (2006). Dative Constructions in Chinese. ''Language and Linguistics, 7''(4), 863–904.
*Malchukov, A., Haspelmath, M., & Comrie, B. (2010). [https://zenodo.org/record/3678526 Ditransitive constructions: A typological overview]. In A. Malchukov, M. Haspelmath, & B. Comrie (Eds.), ''Studies in Ditransitive Constructions: A Comparative Handbook'' (pp. 1–64). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
*''Person'', Anna Siewierska (Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics, 2004)
*Paul, Waltraud & Whitman, John. (2010). Applicative structure and Mandarin ditransitives. In M. Duguine, S. Huidobro, & N. Madariaga (Eds.), ''Argument Structure and Syntactic Relations: A cross-linguistic perspective'' (pp. 261–282). John Benjamins.
*张美兰 (Zhang Mei-Lan). (2014). ''汉语双宾语结构:句法及其语义的历时研究''. Beijing: Tsinghua University Press (清华大学出版社).

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[[Category:Transitivity and valency]]