| dbo:abstract
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- In linguistics and grammar, Avalency refers to the property of a predicate, often a verb, taking no arguments. Valency refers to how many and what kinds of arguments a predicate licenses—i.e. what arguments the predicate selects grammatically. Avalent verbs are verbs which have no valency, meaning that they have no logical arguments, such as subject or object. Languages known as pro-drop or null-subject languages do not require clauses to have an overt subject when the subject is easily inferred, meaning that a verb can appear alone. However, non-null-subject languages such as English require a pronounced subject in order for a sentence to be grammatical. This means that the avalency of a verb is not readily apparent, because, despite the fact that avalent verbs lack arguments, the verb nevertheless has a subject. According to some, avalent verbs may have an inserted subject (often a pronoun such as it or there), which is syntactically required, yet semantically meaningless, making no reference to anything that exists in the real world. An inserted subject is referred to as a pleonastic, or expletive it (also called a dummy pronoun). Because it is semantically meaningless, pleonastic it is not considered a true argument, meaning that a verb with this it as the subject is truly avalent. However, others believe that it represents a quasi-argument, having no real-world referent, but retaining certain syntactic abilities. Still others consider it to be a true argument, meaning that it is referential, and not merely a syntactic placeholder. There is no general consensus on how it should be analyzed under such circumstances, but determining the status of it as a non-argument, a quasi-argument, or a true argument, will help linguists to understand what verbs, if any, are truly avalent. A common example of such verbs in many languages is the set of verbs describing weather. In providing examples for the avalent verbs below, this article must assume the analysis of pleonastic it, but will delve into the other two analyses following the examples. (en)
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| rdfs:comment
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- In linguistics and grammar, Avalency refers to the property of a predicate, often a verb, taking no arguments. Valency refers to how many and what kinds of arguments a predicate licenses—i.e. what arguments the predicate selects grammatically. Avalent verbs are verbs which have no valency, meaning that they have no logical arguments, such as subject or object. Languages known as pro-drop or null-subject languages do not require clauses to have an overt subject when the subject is easily inferred, meaning that a verb can appear alone. However, non-null-subject languages such as English require a pronounced subject in order for a sentence to be grammatical. This means that the avalency of a verb is not readily apparent, because, despite the fact that avalent verbs lack arguments, the verb ne (en)
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