Causatives 317
3.1 Causatives of stative intransitive verbs
Stative transitive verbs regularly form causatives through affixation of pa-. This
is illustrated in (123) and (124), as well as in (127-129).
(127) Mutmainah ma-sossa ca-kanca-na.
Mutmainah AV.CS-sad RED-friend-DEF
‘Mutmainah made her friends sad.’
(128) Rokip ma-bungo tembo'.
Rokip AV.CS-blue wall
‘Rokip made the wall blue.’
(129) Lar-olar ma-tako' Hosen.
RED-snake AV.CS-afraid Hosen
‘Snakes scare Hosen.’
In each case, in the actor voice form, both causer and causee are core argu-
ments, subject and object respectively.
As described above, in many instances affixation of -agi or -e with such
verbs also derives a causative. Thus, (130-132) are possible alternatives for
(127-129).
(130) Mutmainah nyossa'-agi ca-kanca-na.
Mutmainah AV.sad-AGI RED-friend-DEF
‘Mutmainah made her friends sad.’
(131) Rokip a-bungo-wagi tembo'.
Rokip AV-blue-AGI wall
‘Rokip made the wall blue.’
(132) Lar-olar nako'-e Hosen.
RED-snake AV.afraid-LOC Hosen
‘Snakes scare Hosen.’
In the main, the two forms of the causatives are completely synonymous. How-
ever, it is not the case that both forms are equally acceptable to all speakers.
While the pa- causatives here are accepted by all and preferred by most, not all
speakers accept all of the suffixed forms. Many accept (128) with mabungo
‘make blue’, but reject (131) with abungowagi.
The forms with the causative prefix pa- are considered more proper Ma-
durese, the forms with -agi and -e seeming to bear a Javanese or Indonesian