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In grammar, a 'reflexive verb' is a verb whose semantic agent and patient (typically represented syntactically by the subject and the direct object) are the same. For example, the English verb ''to perjure'' is reflexive, since one can only perjure ''oneself''. In a wider sense, it refers to any verb form whose grammatical object is a reflexive pronoun, regardless of semantics; such verbs are also referred to as 'pronominal verbs' (especially in grammar of Romance languages).
There are languages that have explicit morphology to transform a verb into a reflexive form. English employs reflexive derivation idiosyncratically, as in ''self-destroy''; Romance languages do the same with the prefix ''auto-''.
In many languages, reflexive constructions are rendered by transitive verbs followed by a reflexive pronoun, as in English ''-self'' (e.g., ''She 'threw herself' to the floor.'').

Contents

Romance and Slavic languages

"True"

Reciprocal

Anticausative

Autocausative

Inherent

Intransitive or Impersonal

Germanic languages

External links

References

See also

Romance and Slavic languages

Both Romance, Slavic and some Germanic languages make extensive use of reflexive verbs and reflexive forms.
In the Romance languages, there are non-emphatic clitic reflexive pronouns and emphatic ones. In Spanish, for example, the particle ''se'' is cliticized to the verb (''lavarse'' "to wash oneself"), while in Romanian, the particle precedes the verb (''a se spăla'' "to wash oneself"). Full reflexive pronouns or pronominal phrases are added for emphasis or to avoid ambiguity: ''Yo me cuido a mí mismo'' "I take care of myself" (''mí'' is the emphatic reflexive; ''mismo'' means "same", in the sense of "one's own (self)"). In French, the particle ''se'' is independent (''se laver'' "to wash oneself").
Clitic reflexive pronoun ''sa''/''se''/''si''/''się'' is used in Western and South Slavic languages, while Eastern Slavic languages use suffix -''sja'' (-ся). There is also the non-clitic emphatic pronoun ''sebe''/''себя'', used to emphasize the reflexive nature of the act; it is applicable only to "true" reflexive verbs, where the agent performs a (transitive) action on itself.
The principal syntactic difference between the three language groups is that Slavic languages use the same reflexive pronoun in all three persons, while the Romance and Germanic languages maintain the distinction only in 3rd person; for the 1st and 2nd person, appropriate personal pronoun in oblique case is used:

	French		Danish		Serbo-Croatian
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
1st person	Je 'me' souviens	Nous 'nous' souvenons	Jeg lægger 'mig'	Vi lægger 'os'	Ja 'se' sjećam	Mi 'se' sjećamo
2nd person	Tu 'te' souviens	Vous 'vous' souvenez	Du lægger 'dig'	I lægger 'jer'	Ti 'se' sjećaš	Vi 'se' sjećate
3rd person	Il 'se' souvient	Ils 'se' souviennent	Han lægger 'sig'	De lægger 'sig'	On 'se' sjeća	Oni 'se' sjećaju

In all three language groups, reflexive forms often present a great obstacle for foreign learners^[1][2] (notably, native English speakers, where the feature is practically absent) due to variety of uses. Even in languages which contain the feature, it is not always applicable to the same verbs and uses (although a common subset can be generally extracted, as outlined below). For example, the Spanish reflexive construct '''se hundió' el barco'' ("the boat sank") has no reflexive equivalent in Slavic languages (which use intransitive equivalent of ''sink'').
Reflexive verbs can have the variety of uses and meanings, which often escape consistent classification. Some language-common identified uses are outlined below^[3]. For example, Davies et al. identify 12 uses for Spanish reflexive constructions; Vinogradov ^[4] divides Russian reflexive verbs into as many as 16 groups.

"True"

"True" reflexive denotes that the agent is simultaneously the patient. The verb is typically transitive, and can be used in non-reflexive meaning as well.

Language	Examples	Compare
Spanish	Pedro ''se baña''.	Pedro ''baña'' al gato.
Italian	Pietro ''si lava''.	Pietro ''lava'' la gatta.
Serbo-Croatian	Petar ''se kupa''.	Petar kupa mačku.
Polish	Piotr ''kąpie się''.	Piotr ''kąpie'' kota.
Russian	Пётр ''купается''.	Пётр ''купает'' котa.
Danish	Peter ''vasker sig''.	Peter ''vasker'' katten.
English	Peter ''takes a bath''.	Peter ''washes'' the cat.

Reciprocal

"Reciprocal" reflexive denotes that the agents perform the mutual actions among themselves. In most cases, the transitive verbs are also used.

Language	Examples	Compare
Spanish	María y Pedro ''se besan''.	María ''besa'' a Pedro.
Italian	Maria e Pietro ''si baciano''.	Maria ''bacia'' Pietro.
Serbo-Croatian	Marija i Petar ''se ljube''.	Marija ''ljubi'' Petra.
Polish	Maria i Piotr ''całują się''.	Maria ''całuje'' Piotra.
Russian	Мария и Пётр ''целуются''.	Мария ''целуeт'' Петрa.
English	Мaria and Peter ''kiss''.	Maria ''kisses'' Peter

Anticausative

"Anticausative" reflexive denotes that the (usually, inanimate) patient of a causative verb becomes the subject, and the "", but the cause has been subtracted ^[5]

Spanish	La puerta ''se abrió''.
Italian	La porta ''si aprì''.
Serbo-Croatian	Vrata su ''se otvorila''.
Polish	Drzwi ''otworzyły się''.
Russian	Дверь ''открылась''.
English	The door ''opened.''

Autocausative

"Autocausative" reflexive denotes that the (usually, animate) "the referent represented by the subject combines the activity of actor and undergoes a change of state like a patient:

Language	Examples
Spanish	Pedro ''se ofendió''.
Italian	Pietro ''si offese''.
Serbo-Croatian	Petar ''se uvrijedio''.
Polish	Piotr ''obraził się''.
Russian	Пётр ''обиделся''.
English	Peter ''got offended''.

Inherent

"Inherent" (''inherently'' or ''essentially pronominal'') reflexive verbs lack the corresponding non-reflexive from which they can be synchronically derived. In other words, "''se'' is an inherent part of an unergative reflexive or reciprocal verb with no meaning of its own, and an obligatory part of the verb's lexical entry"^[6]:

Language	Examples
Spanish	Pedro ''se arrepintió''.		Maria y Pedro ''se separaron''.	Pedro ''se queja''.
Italian	Pietro ''si pentiva''.		Maria e Pietro ''si separarono''.	Pietro ''si lamenta''.
Serbo-Croatian	Petar ''se pokajao''.	Petar ''se smije''.	Marija i Petar su ''se rastali''.	Petar ''se žali''.
Polish		Piotr ''śmieje się''.	Maria i Piotr ''rozstali się''.	Piotr ''żali się''.
Russian	Пётр ''раскаялся''.	Пётр ''cмеётся''.	Мария и Пётр ''расстались''.	Пётр ''жалуeтся''.
English	Peter ''repented''.	Peter ''laughs''.	Maria and Peter ''parted''.	Peter ''complains''.

★ The corresponding verb is not reflexive

★ The verb is reflexive, but not inherently; the transitive equivalent means "to separate". Note the reciprocal semantics.

★ Only the Spanish ''quejarse'' exists only in reflexive form; however, in other languages, the corresponding non-reflexive verb has a different meaning, like "lament" or "mourn"

Intransitive or Impersonal

"Intransitive" form (also known as "reflexive impersonal", or mediopassive) take the intransitive verbs with omitted agent. In Slavic languages, practically "the only condition is that they can be construed as having a human agent. The applied human agent can be generic, or loosely specified collective or individual"^[7]. The grammatical subject is either omitted (in pro-drop languages) or dummy pronoun (otherwise). Thus, those verbs are defective, as they have only the 3rd person singular (masculine or neutrum, depending on language) form.

Language	Examples
Spanish	Aquí ''se trabaja'' bien.	''Se dice'' que...
Italian	Qui ''si lavora'' bene.	''Si dice'' che...
Serbo-Croatian	Tu ''se radi'' dobro.	''Smatra se'' da...
Polish	Tam ''pracuje się'' dobrze.	''Myśli się'', że...
Russian	Здесь хорошо ''работается''.	''Думается'', что...
English	Here ''[people] work'' well.	''It is thought'' that...

In many cases, there is a semantic overlap of the impersonal/anticausative/autocausative constructs with passive voice (also present in all Romance and Slavic languages). On one hand, impersonal reflexive constructs have a wider scope of application, as they are not limited to transitive verbs like the cannonical passive voice. On the other hand, those constructs can have slight semantic difference or markedness.

Germanic languages

Many Germanic languages express reflexivity in a similar way to English, but without an explicit reflexive suffix corresponding to ''-self'', i. e., simply using the accusative pronoun, as in German: ''Ich wasche mich'' ("I wash myself", lit. "I wash me").

External links

★ Changing valency: Case studies in transitivity edited by R. M. W. Dixon & A. Y. Aikhenvald

References

1. Syntactic features, register variation, and the language learner: the case of se in Spanish. Mark Davies, James Jones, Nicole Tracy .
2. Reflexive Verbs: An Introduction
3. On Impersonal se / się in Slavic María Luisa Rivero & Milena M. Sheppard
4. Russkiy Yazik V. V. Vinogradov
5. The Reinterpretation of the Reflexive in Piedmontese: Impersonal 'Se' Constructions Mair Parry
6. Alternating unaccusative verbs in Slovene, , Sabina, Grahek, Leeds Working Papers in Linguistics, 2002
7. Passive and Impersonal in English and Serbian Milja Djurkovic

See also

★ Reciprocal (grammar)

★ Passive voice