DATIVNA ALTERNACIJA HRVATSKIH GLAGOLA PLATITI I NAMIRITI
DATIVE ALTERNATION IN CROATIAN VERBS PLATITI AND NAMIRITI

Summary/Abstract: According to the theory of Role and Reference Grammar dative alternation refers to the variable expression of recipient. It is characteristic of verbs which denote a transfer of a theme between a willing agent and a recipient. This theory denies the existence of direct and indirect objects and lays the basis of grammatical relations specification on the semantic macroroles. Although Croatian is an inflectional language, in which case marking is obligatory, it exhibits dative alternation with ten verbs. This type of alternation in Croatian is described as a variation by which indirect objects of certain verbs are realized as direct objects. This paper analyzes dative alternation of Croatian verbs platiti and namiriti, based on examples from the Croatian National Corpus. It shows the relevance of semantic and pragmatic factors in describing and defining direct and indirect objects.

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