Dogri to Gujarati: a similar marker can identify a different role
Dogri ne in the cited perfect is an agent marker
Sawhney’s Dogri example of Ram eating food labels ne on Ram as ergative. In Irimia’s analysis of Gujarati, the ergative marker in the examined perfective constructions is -e, while -ne can mark certain direct objects as well as being a dative marker. Similar-looking forms across the languages therefore cannot be used as a direct guide to who acts and who is affected.
For an original Dogri report about a person scolding another person, identify the actor and affected person from the complete source construction. A Gujarati target -ne on a personal name may identify the affected object, not reproduce the Dogri agent marker. Copying a syllable’s presumed role could reverse who scolded whom even when both names and the action are otherwise retained.
A marked Gujarati direct object can still control agreement
Irimia documents Gujarati perfective examples in which a differentially marked object agrees with the verb despite its oblique-looking -ne marker. In one cited example, a female affected person is associated with feminine agreement while the male actor is ergative-marked. The object marker is not proof that agreement must ignore the object or default to the actor.
This is especially relevant because Sawhney’s Dogri perfect examples also illustrate agreement associated with an object. The resemblance is useful only after the actual roles are established; it does not make the case markers identical. In a transfer or reprimand report, first recover who performed the action and what or whom it concerned. Then choose the Gujarati case and agreement pattern for that construction rather than mapping Dogri ne directly onto Gujarati -ne.
A grammatical gender difference need not change the people involved
The Gujarati study distinguishes agreement patterns and notes variation involving nonreferential objects and default neuter agreement. It does not reduce every perfective sentence to one universal rule. A Dogri noun’s gender and its agreement pattern therefore cannot by themselves dictate the Gujarati ending, particularly when the target noun differs in grammatical gender or the object has a different referential structure.
An original Dogri statement about searching for books as a general activity differs from searching for a particular already identified book. The Gujarati study uses object interpretation in analysing such contrasts. A translation should retain which kind of search the source describes rather than pick an ending solely because it appears beside the same dictionary noun. Conversely, a target default form in one documented environment does not mean that the actor is neuter or that the object has disappeared. Read the entire predicate and its arguments. For this direction, the crucial safeguard is to keep surface resemblance, participant role, grammatical gender and object interpretation as separate pieces of evidence.
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