On the heterogeneity of deaccusative reflexives

Abstract

Abstract The article deals with the notions of deaccusative and antipassive reflexives. The term ‘deaccusative’ is used in the literature to refer to what appears to be a derivation reflexivizing a transitive verb and replacing its direct object with an oblique object. The term suggests a unitary operation, and its function has been identified, in recent work, as antipassive. The aim of this paper is to show that, though some ‘deaccusatives’ are antipassive, the group of verbs sometimes referred to as deaccusatives is, in fact, a heterogeneous conglomerate comprising a few minor constructions but also pairings of reflexive and non-reflexive verbs that are due to alternations in argument marking with specific lexical classes or simply to diachronic accident.