1. A grammatical property of certain languages in which the subject of an intransitive verb is treated the same as the object of a transitive verb, rather than like the subject of a transitive verb.
Usage: linguistics; technical term used in linguistic analysis

Examples

• Basque is known for its ergativity, where the agent of a transitive verb receives different grammatical marking than the subject of an intransitive verb.
• Linguists study ergativity to understand how different languages organize grammatical relationships.
• The ergativity of Ergative-Absolutive languages contrasts with the nominative-accusative system found in English.
• Many indigenous languages of the Americas display ergativity in their grammatical structure.