In ergative-absolutive languages, the ergative case identifies the subject of a transitive verb. In such languages, the ergative case is typically marked (most salient), while the absolutive case is unmarked. New work in case theory has vigorously supported the idea that the ergative case identifies the agent (intentful doer of action) of a verb (Woolford 2004). Furthermore, the agent has been shown to have a fixed location in which it is base-generated in the specifier of a light-verb projection within X-bar theory.
Certain Australian Aboriginal languages possess an intransitive case and an accusative case along with an ergative case, and lack an absolutive case.
See also
Sources:
Woolford, Ellen. ‘Lexical Case, Inherent Case, and Argument Structure.’ Aug. 2004
Online: http://people.umass.edu/ellenw/
