In Indo-Aryan languages, and Eastern Iranian languages, the direct case (abbreviated DIR) is the name given to a grammatical case used with all three core relations: the agent of transitive verbs, the patient of transitive verbs, and the argument of intransitive verbs. Such a case may also be called the nominative case, but some linguists reserve that term for cases that cover other roles or combinations of roles.
In languages of the Philippines and related languages with Austronesian alignment, the direct case, also called the absolutive, is the case of the argument of an intransitive clause, and may be used for either argument (agent or patient) of a transitive clause, depending on the voice of the verb. The other argument of a transitive clause may either be ergative or accusative, or in Tagalog a single case called indirect.
Famous quotes containing the words direct and/or case:
“As for your friend, my prospective reader, I hope he ignores Fort Sumter, and “Old Abe,” and all that; for that is just the most fatal, and, indeed, the only fatal weapon you can direct against evil ever; for, as long as you know of it, you are particeps criminis. What business have you, if you are an “angel of light,” to be pondering over the deeds of darkness, reading the New York Herald, and the like.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Half the testimony in the Bobbitt case sounded like Sally Jesse Raphael. Juries watch programs like this and are ready to listen.”
—William Geimer, U.S. law educator. New York Times, p. B18 (January 28, 1994)