Eskaleut languages
Morphosyntactic alignment

Ergative–absolutive language: Eskaleut follows the basic word order of subject–object–verb (SOV).

Eskimoan is an ergative–absolutive language. This means subjects of intransitive verbs and objects of transitive verbs are marked with the absolutive case, while subjects of transitive verbs are marked with the ergative case.

Aleut is not an ergative–absolutive language. It does not matter if the verb is transitive or intransitive—subjects and objects are not marked differently.

If a transitive object or an object of possession is openly communicated, ergative case marking will not be expressed. If a transitive object or object of possession is not openly communicated, then ergative case marking will be expressed.

Example of case marking in Aleut:

Tayaĝu-x̂

man- ABS

qa-x̂

fish

qa-ku-x̂

eat- IND - 3SG

Tayaĝu-x̂ qa-x̂ qa-ku-x̂

man-ABS fish eat-IND-3SG

'The man eats the/a fish'

Tayaĝu-m

man- ERG

qa-kuu

eat- 3SG / 3SG. IND

Tayaĝu-m qa-kuu

man-ERG eat-3SG/3SG.IND

'The man eats it'
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