Nominativising

Nominativising, often spelled nominativisation, is a linguistic process in which a word or phrase is restructured or reinterpreted to function as a nominative noun. The term is most frequently encountered in the study of non‑English language grammars, where certain predicates or verbal phrases acquire nominal characteristics. By default, the nominative case marks the subject of a clause or the head of a noun phrase. In nominativising, a clause or an adjective can shift into a nominal status, thus allowing it to occupy the syntactic position reserved for a noun.

The phenomenon is attested in many language families, including Slavic, Germanic, and Afroasiatic. In some Slavic languages, a past‑tense verbal phrase can be turned into a noun-like structure by the addition of a nominal suffix, effectively giving the phrase a subject‑like role. In German, verb complementation through *lopez* can exhibit nominativising properties, where a verb phrase can be promoted to a nominal function without morphological change. Missionary scholars and grammarians have also documented nominativising in languages of the Pacific, wherein the reflexive or reciprocal forms are nominalised by way of case marking.

Linguists are interested in nominativising because it illuminates processes of grammaticalization, case assignment, and the interaction between syntax and morphology. It helps explain how a language, over time, can shift from purely verbal predicates to nouns that embody the same semantic content. By studying nominativising, researchers gain insight into typological differences across languages and the mechanisms that drive syntactic change across cultures.