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In grammar, a reflexive verb is, loosely, a verb whose direct object is the same as its subject, for example, "I wash myself". More generally, a reflexive verb has the same semantic Theta role (typically represented syntactically by the subject and the direct object). For example, the English verb to perjure is reflexive, since one can only perjure oneself. In a wider sense, the term refers to any verb form whose grammatical object is a reflexive pronoun, regardless of semantics; such verbs are also more broadly referred to as pronominal verbs, especially in the grammar of the . Other kinds of pronominal verbs are reciprocal ( they killed each other), passive ( it is told), subjective, and idiomatic. The presence of the reflexive pronoun changes the meaning of a verb, e.g., Spanish language abonar , abonarse .
There are languages that have explicit morphology or syntax to transform a verb into a reflexive form. In many languages, reflexive constructions are rendered by followed by a reflexive pronoun, as in English -self (e.g., "She threw herself to the floor."). English employs reflexive derivation idiosyncratically as well, as in "self-destruct".
In the , there are nonemphatic clitic reflexive pronouns and emphatic ones. In Spanish language, for example, the particle se encliticizes to the verb's infinitive, gerund, and imperative (lavarse ), while in Romanian, the particle procliticizes to the verb (a se spăla ). Full reflexive pronouns or pronominal phrases are added for emphasis or disambiguation: Me cuido a mí mismo "I take care of myself" (mismo combines with the prepositional form of the pronoun mí to form an intensive reflexive pronoun).
The enclitic reflexive pronoun sa/ se/ si/ się is used in Western and South Slavic languages, while Eastern Slavic languages use the suffix - sja (-ся). There is also the non-clitic emphatic pronoun sebja/ 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 Slavic languages use the same reflexive pronoun for all persons and numbers, while the Romance and North Germanic ones have a special third person pronoun that cliticizes and the other Germanic ones do as well without cliticizing. This is illustrated in the following table for the word "to recall" (e.g., Je me souviens means "I recall", Tu te souviens means "You recall", and so on).
In all of these language groups, reflexive forms often present an obstacle for foreign learners (notably native speakers of English, where the feature is practically absent) due to the 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 some Slavic languages (which use an intransitive equivalent of sink), though for example Czech language and Slovak language do use a reflexive verb: "loď se potopila"/"loď sa potopila". Reflexive verbs can have a variety of uses and meanings, which often escape consistent classification. Some language-common identified uses are outlined below. For example, Davies et al. identify 12 uses for Spanish reflexive constructions, while Vinogradov divides Russian language reflexive verbs into as many as 16 groups.
Martin Haspelmath also has a useful distinction between the reflexive types mentioned below, which he calls introverted reflexives, and so-called extroverted reflexives, which are used for verbs that are usually not reflexive, like hate oneself, love oneself, hear oneself, and kill oneself. Some Indo-European languages have a different reflexive morpheme for extroverted reflexives. For example:
| Petras prausia save. |
In modern Scandinavian languages, the passive (or more properly mediopassive) voice is used for medial, especially reciprocal, constructions. Some examples from Danish are:
(The hypothetical form **kysses (kiss each other) is not often—if ever—seen in Danish; however, it will likely be understood by most native speakers, indicating that the mediopassive voice is still at the very least potentially productive in Danish. An expression like "de kysses uafladeligt" (they kiss each other all the time) could very well be used for humorous purposes.)
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."
| Čia gerai darbuojamasi. |
In many cases, there is a semantic overlap between impersonal/anticausative/autocausative constructs and the 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 canonical passive voice. On the other hand, those constructs can have slight semantic difference or markedness.
The same valence-reduction process occurs for the transitive wagil 'cut'
In each of these cases, the reflexively inflected verb now forms a new stem to which additional morphology may be affixed, for example waarmba-adhi 'returned' may become waarmba-adhi-lmugu (return-REFL+PST-NEG) 'didn't return.' As with many Pama–Nyungan languages, however, verbs in the lexicon belong to conjugation classes, and a verbs class may restrict the ease with which it can be reflexivized.
These reflexive morphemes are largely employed for expressing reciprocality as well; however, in cases where there is potential ambiguity between a reflexive and a reciprocal interpretation, Guugu Yimithirr has an additional means for emphasizing the reflexive (i.e., by the agent upon the agent) interpretation: namely, the /-gu/ suffix upon the grammatical subject. See for example the following contrast between the reciprocal and reflexive:
Or the reverse wherein an apparent reciprocal assertion has reflexive morphology:
In actuality, the broader function of the reciprocal verb is to emphasize the agentivity of the grammatical subject(s), sometimes to directly counteract expectations of an external agent--as in the first example above. The combination of the reciprocal verb with the reflexive pronoun highlights the notion that the subject acted highly agentively (as in a mutual/symmetric reciprocal event) but was also the undergoer of their own action (as in a reflexive event where agentivity is backgrounded e.g. "I soiled myself").
Conversely, the reflexive verb can have precisely this function of backgrounding the agentivity of the subject and bringing the focus to the effect that was wrought upon the undergoer(s) as in the second example above.
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