Austronesian alignment
E45257
Austronesian alignment is a morphosyntactic alignment system, common in many Philippine and related languages, where verbal voice and focus mark different core arguments in ways that do not fit neatly into standard nominative–accusative or ergative–absolutive patterns.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Austronesian alignment canonical | 2 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T357004 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Austronesian alignment Context triple: [Cebuano language, alignmentType, Austronesian alignment]
-
A.
Austronesian languages
Austronesian languages are a large and widely dispersed language family spoken across maritime Southeast Asia, Madagascar, the Pacific Islands, and parts of mainland Asia.
-
B.
Austroasiatic
Austroasiatic is a large and ancient language family of mainland Southeast Asia and parts of South Asia, including languages such as Khmer, Vietnamese, and Mon.
-
C.
Polynesian outliers
Polynesian outliers are small, culturally Polynesian communities located on islands outside the main Polynesian Triangle, primarily in Melanesia and Micronesia.
-
D.
Penutian languages
Penutian languages are a proposed family of Native American languages spoken primarily in the western United States, noted for their controversial genetic relationships and inclusion of several distinct regional language groups.
-
E.
Central Malayo-Polynesian languages
The Central Malayo-Polynesian languages are a proposed group of Austronesian languages spoken mainly in eastern Indonesia, characterized by shared phonological and grammatical innovations that distinguish them from neighboring Malayo-Polynesian branches.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Austronesian alignment Target entity description: Austronesian alignment is a morphosyntactic alignment system, common in many Philippine and related languages, where verbal voice and focus mark different core arguments in ways that do not fit neatly into standard nominative–accusative or ergative–absolutive patterns.
-
A.
Austronesian languages
Austronesian languages are a large and widely dispersed language family spoken across maritime Southeast Asia, Madagascar, the Pacific Islands, and parts of mainland Asia.
-
B.
Austroasiatic
Austroasiatic is a large and ancient language family of mainland Southeast Asia and parts of South Asia, including languages such as Khmer, Vietnamese, and Mon.
-
C.
Polynesian outliers
Polynesian outliers are small, culturally Polynesian communities located on islands outside the main Polynesian Triangle, primarily in Melanesia and Micronesia.
-
D.
Penutian languages
Penutian languages are a proposed family of Native American languages spoken primarily in the western United States, noted for their controversial genetic relationships and inclusion of several distinct regional language groups.
-
E.
Central Malayo-Polynesian languages
The Central Malayo-Polynesian languages are a proposed group of Austronesian languages spoken mainly in eastern Indonesia, characterized by shared phonological and grammatical innovations that distinguish them from neighboring Malayo-Polynesian branches.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (49)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
linguistic alignment pattern
ⓘ
morphosyntactic alignment system ⓘ syntactic phenomenon ⓘ |
| affects |
argument extraction restrictions
ⓘ
case-marking of core arguments ⓘ word order possibilities ⓘ |
| alsoKnownAs |
Austronesian-type voice system
ⓘ
Philippine-type alignment ⓘ |
| associatedWithLanguageFamily | Austronesian languages ⓘ |
| characterizedBy |
focus system on verbal morphology
ⓘ
lack of clear ergative–absolutive pattern ⓘ lack of clear nominative–accusative pattern ⓘ multiple transitive voices ⓘ symmetrical voice alternations ⓘ voice system marking different core arguments ⓘ |
| contrastedWith |
ergative–absolutive alignment
ⓘ
nominative–accusative alignment ⓘ |
| difficultToAnalyzeAs |
purely accusative
ⓘ
purely ergative ⓘ |
| hasExampleLanguage |
Formosan languages
ⓘ
surface form:
Atayal
Cebuano language ⓘ
surface form:
Cebuano
Ilocano language ⓘ
surface form:
Ilocano
Kapampangan ⓘ Kavalan ⓘ Malagasy ⓘ Seediq ⓘ Tagalog ⓘ |
| hasKeyConcept |
actor voice
ⓘ
circumstantial voice ⓘ locative voice ⓘ patient voice ⓘ pivot argument ⓘ voice-marked argument ⓘ |
| involves |
alternation of which argument is privileged
ⓘ
morphological marking of semantic roles ⓘ |
| marksOn | verb ⓘ |
| privilegedArgumentCalled |
pivot
ⓘ
subject (in some analyses) ⓘ |
| privileges | one core argument per clause ⓘ |
| relatedTo | voice and focus systems in Austronesian linguistics ⓘ |
| resembles | Philippine-type voice system ⓘ |
| studiedInField |
linguistic typology
ⓘ
morphology ⓘ syntax ⓘ |
| usedIn |
Formosan languages
ⓘ
many Philippine languages ⓘ some Bornean languages ⓘ some Indonesian languages ⓘ some Oceanic languages ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Austronesian alignment Description of subject: Austronesian alignment is a morphosyntactic alignment system, common in many Philippine and related languages, where verbal voice and focus mark different core arguments in ways that do not fit neatly into standard nominative–accusative or ergative–absolutive patterns.
Referenced by (2)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.