The applicative voice (; abbreviated or ) is a grammatical voice that promotes an oblique argument of a verb to the core object argument. It is generally considered a valency-increasing morpheme. The Applicative is often found in agglutinative languages, such as the Bantu languages and Austronesian languages. Other examples include Nuxalk, Ubykh, and Ainu. Behavior Prototypically, applicatives apply to intransitive verbs. They can also be called "advancements" or "object promotion" because they bring a peripheral object to the centre as a direct object. This object is sometimes called the applied object. For transitive verbs, the resulting verb can be ditransitive, or the original object is no longer expressed. If the original object is no longer expressed, it is not a valency-increasing operation Multiple applicatives A language may have multiple applicatives, each corresponding to such different roles as comitative, locative, instrumental, and benefactive. Sometimes various applicatives will be expressed by the same morphological exponence, such as in the Bantu language Chewa, where the suffix -ir- forms both instrumental and locative applicatives. Some languages, such as Luganda, permit a 'second applicative' (known in Luganda as the "augmentative applied"), formed by a double application of the suffix. In this case, the second applicative is used to give an alternative meaning. Applicatives may also be the only way of expressing such roles, as in the Bantu Chaga languages, where instrumental, benefactive, malefactive, and locative are formed solely by applicatives. In other languages, applicatives coexist with other methods of expressing said roles. They are often used to bring a normally oblique argument into special focus, or as in Nez Percé, to keep humans as core arguments. Similar processes Applicatives have a degree of overlap with causatives, and in some languages, the two are realized identically. A similar construction known as dative shift, though different from true applicatives, occurs in other languages. Also, the benefactive case is commonly expressed by means of an applicative. Examples English English does not have a dedicated applicative prefix or suffix. However, prepositions can be compounded with verbs for an applicative effect. For example, from Jack ran faster than the giant, the intransitive verb ran can be made transitive, and the oblique noun giant the object: Jack outran the giant. The applicative verb can be made passive, something which is not possible with ran: The giant was outrun by Jack. German The German prefix be- is considered an applicative by some,