-kan Valency Patterns: Choosing This Construction | Indonesian Grammar

Choose -kan when the event includes a conventional causative, caused-motion, caused-result, or benefactive relationship licensed by the base. Then choose actor voice, di- passive, or pronoun-agent object voice according to what the clause is about: the actor's intervention, the affected participant, or an established topic linked to a specific actor.

Those are two distinct decisions. The suffix shapes the participant frame; voice packages that frame for discourse. English often translates several Indonesian choices with the same sentence, but grammatical alternatives can answer different questions and carry different implications.

First decision: does the event need -kan?

Compare each base situation with the participant-enriched -kan frame.

Without -kan	With -kan	What changes
Ibu membaca buku	Ibu membacakan anak buku	a beneficiary/addressee becomes part of the reading frame
Kunci masuk ke lubang	Rina memasukkan kunci	a causer makes the key move inward
Meja itu bersih	Rina membersihkan meja	an actor brings about the clean result
Petugas membuka pintu	Petugas membukakan tamu pintu	a beneficiary of the opening is promoted

Ibu membaca buku cerita di ruang keluarga.

Mother reads a storybook in the family room.

Ibu membacakan adik buku cerita di ruang keluarga.

Mother reads my younger sibling a storybook in the family room.

Kunci kecil itu masuk ke bawah lemari.

The small key went under the cupboard.

Rina memasukkan kunci kecil itu ke saku jaket.

Rina puts that small key into her jacket pocket.

Meja rapat itu sudah bersih.

That meeting table is already clean.

Rina membersihkan meja rapat sebelum klien tiba.

Rina cleans the meeting table before the client arrives.

Petugas membuka pintu kaca pukul delapan.

The officer opens the glass door at eight.

Petugas membukakan tamu lanjut usia pintu kaca.

The officer opens the glass door for an elderly guest.

The unsuffixed clause is not a shorter synonym. Membaca need not include a beneficiary, masuk has no external causer, bersih predicates a state, and membuka does not promote someone helped by the opening.

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Use -kan only when its added or promoted role belongs to the intended event. It is not an optional marker of emphasis or politeness.

Second decision: what is the clause about?

Once the -kan frame is chosen, discourse determines voice.

Discourse center	Typical voice	Model
actor and intervention	meN- actor voice	Petugas memasukkan kunci
affected participant; actor secondary/unknown	di- passive	Kunci dimasukkan petugas
affected topic plus specific pronoun actor	bare-stem object voice	Kunci itu saya masukkan

Petugas memasukkan kunci lemari ke amplop bukti.

The officer puts the cabinet key into an evidence envelope.

Kunci lemari dimasukkan ke amplop bukti sebelum pemeriksaan dimulai.

The cabinet key is put into an evidence envelope before the examination begins.

Kunci lemari itu sudah saya masukkan ke amplop bukti.

I have put that cabinet key into the evidence envelope.

All three retain the moving-theme frame. The first naturally answers “What did the officer do?” The agentless passive answers “What happened to the key?” The object-voice sentence continues a known key and retains saya as a specific actor.

The two closest patient-oriented choices are di- passive and pronoun-agent object voice. Di- readily suppresses an actor or adds a third-person actor after the verb. Object voice is especially natural with saya, kami, kita, kamu, Anda, dia, or mereka immediately before the stem.

Meja itu dibersihkan setelah setiap sesi.

That table is cleaned after every session.

Meja itu kami bersihkan setelah setiap sesi.

We clean that table after every session.

The second sentence does more than reveal an omitted English by us: kami remains a tightly integrated pronominal actor while meja itu is the established topic.

Dialogue: presenting one reading event three ways

The same reading event can be packaged around the reader, beneficiary, or book.

A: Ibu sedang apa? B: Ibu sedang membacakan Dita buku tentang laut.

A: What is Mother doing? B: Mother is reading Dita a book about the sea.

A: Dita sedang apa? B: Dita sedang dibacakan buku tentang laut oleh Ibu.

A: What is Dita doing? B: Mother is reading her a book about the sea.

A: Bagaimana dengan buku tentang laut itu? B: Buku itu sedang Ibu bacakan untuk Dita.

A: What about that book about the sea? B: Mother is reading it to Dita.

The first answer is actor-centered. The second makes beneficiary Dita the passive subject. The third uses object voice with full-noun actor Ibu; this is common in conversation but more variable in edited prose than pronominal saya/kami + stem. A formal alternative is Buku itu sedang dibacakan Ibu untuk Dita.

News: presenting one key-handling event three ways

News writing chooses a frame according to the information being introduced or tracked.

Petugas laboratorium memasukkan kunci ruang penyimpanan ke kantong bukti pada Selasa pagi.

A laboratory officer put the storage-room key into an evidence bag on Tuesday morning. (news register)

Kunci ruang penyimpanan dimasukkan ke kantong bukti sebelum ruangan disegel.

The storage-room key was put into an evidence bag before the room was sealed. (news register)

Kunci tersebut kemudian mereka masukkan ke lemari pengamanan.

They then put the key into a security cabinet. (news register)

The first introduces the officer as actor; the second suppresses an irrelevant actor; the third continues the already mentioned key and uses pronominal object voice. None is merely a stylistic “active/passive rewrite”: each has a different continuity relation with the surrounding report.

Narrative: result and benefit as scene anchors

Narrative can foreground an actor's routine, a visible result, or a character who receives help.

Mira membersihkan meja kecil itu sambil menunggu kabar.

Mira cleaned the small table while waiting for news.

Meja kecil itu dibersihkan Mira sampai tak ada debu tersisa.

The small table was cleaned by Mira until no dust remained.

Meja kecil itu saya bersihkan setelah Mira pergi.

I cleaned that small table after Mira left.

Ketika kami tiba, penjaga membukakan kami pintu samping.

When we arrived, the guard opened the side door for us.

Ketika kami tiba, kami dibukakan pintu samping.

When we arrived, the side door was opened for us.

Ketika kami tiba, pintu samping dibukakan untuk kami.

When we arrived, the side door was opened for us.

The final two differ in subject choice. Beneficiary-subject kami dibukakan pintu makes our reception the point; theme-subject pintu dibukakan untuk kami makes the door or access route the point.

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Voice choice answers “Whose story is this clause continuing?” Actor, beneficiary, and theme are not interchangeable topics even when they belong to one real-world event.

Choosing between -kan and -i

When both suffixes exist, inspect the direct object. -Kan commonly selects a transferred or moving theme; -i commonly selects a recipient, goal, or location.

Saya mengirimkan berkas pendaftaran kepada Dedi.

I send the registration documents to Dedi.

Saya mengirimi Dedi berkas pendaftaran.

I send Dedi the registration documents.

Petugas memasukkan peralatan ke gudang.

The officer puts the equipment into the warehouse.

Petugas memasuki gudang untuk memeriksa atap.

The officer enters the warehouse to inspect the roof.

In mengirimkan, berkas pendaftaran is the selected theme; in mengirimi, Dedi is the selected recipient. In memasukkan, the equipment is caused to enter; in memasuki, the actor enters the selected location. This is an object-selection contrast, not a universal rule that -kan means motion and -i means location in every word family. The dedicated -kan versus -i guide handles lexical exceptions.

Definiteness, animacy, and topicality

Definiteness favors topical interpretation but does not mechanically select voice. Both actor voice and passive can contain definite or indefinite objects and subjects.

Petugas membersihkan meja itu setelah rapat.

The officer cleans that table after the meeting.

Sebuah meja dibersihkan untuk menyiapkan ruang wawancara.

A table is cleaned to prepare the interview room.

The definite meja itu remains an actor-voice object in the first sentence; the indefinite sebuah meja can introduce a passive subject in the second. Context, not a determiner rule, selects the voice.

Beneficiaries are prototypically animate because people and animals can benefit, but caused themes need not be animate.

Dokter membacakan pasien itu hasil pemeriksaan.

The doctor reads the patient the examination results.

Program ini membukakan jalan bagi usaha kecil untuk mengikuti pelatihan.

This program opens the way for small businesses to participate in training. (formal)

Sistem otomatis memasukkan data baru ke arsip utama.

The automated system puts new data into the main archive.

The second example uses lexical membukakan akses bagi..., not a bare double-object beneficiary. Institutions can be construed as beneficiaries, but lexical collocation determines the natural frame.

Lexical and register choices

Some -kan verbs are fully lexicalized. Choose melakukan penelitian, menggunakan alat, meninggalkan rumah, and menyelesaikan masalah because those are established phrases, not because an English paraphrase contains make or for.

Tim menyelesaikan masalah itu sebelum tenggat.

The team resolves the problem before the deadline.

Peneliti menggunakan metode yang sama untuk kedua kelompok.

The researcher uses the same method for both groups. (academic)

Colloquial -in often replaces standard -kan and -i in Jakarta-influenced speech, but it should not appear in an edited report.

Nanti gue masukin kuncinya ke tas.

I'll put the key in the bag later. (informal; Jakarta-influenced)

Kunci tersebut kemudian dimasukkan ke dalam tas bukti.

The key was then put into the evidence bag. (formal)

Common Mistakes

1. Adding -kan when there is no caused-moving theme

❌ Kami memasukkan gedung untuk mencari ruang rapat.

Incorrect for ‘enter the building’—the building is a location, not something caused to enter.

✅ Kami masuk ke gedung untuk mencari ruang rapat.

We enter the building to look for the meeting room.

2. Reading a beneficiary as a caused reader

❌ Ayah membacakan anak itu buku agar anak berlatih membaca sendiri.

Wrong frame for the intended practice—the father remains the reader in membacakan.

✅ Ayah menyuruh anak itu membaca buku agar ia berlatih sendiri.

Dad tells the child to read a book so that the child practices independently.

3. Mixing an actor subject with passive morphology

❌ Petugas meja itu dibersihkan sebelum siang.

Incorrect mixed frame—petugas cannot be the actor subject before a passive clause in this order.

✅ Petugas harus membersihkan meja itu sebelum siang.

The officer must clean that table before noon.

4. Treating active and passive as identical in context

❌ A: Apa yang terjadi dengan kunci itu? B: Petugas memasukkan kunci ke laci.

Grammatical in isolation, but poor topic continuity: the answer unexpectedly recenters the officer and repeats the key as an object.

✅ A: Apa yang terjadi dengan kunci itu? B: Kunci itu dimasukkan ke laci.

A: What happened to that key? B: It was put into the drawer.

5. Using colloquial -in in formal prose

❌ Petugas masukin kunci lalu bersihin meja sebelum pemeriksaan.

Incorrect register for an official report—use standard -kan stems.

✅ Dalam laporan resmi, petugas memasukkan kunci lalu membersihkan meja.

In the official report, the officer puts away the key and then cleans the table. (formal)

Key Takeaways

First choose the licensed -kan frame; then choose voice according to actor, beneficiary, or theme topicality.
Actor voice centers the intervention, di- can suppress or background the actor, and object voice retains a specific pronominal actor after the topic.
Beneficiary-subject and theme-subject passives package the same event differently and require different complement marking.
Definiteness and animacy influence discourse tendencies but do not mechanically determine grammatical voice.
Compare -kan and -i by object selection, and learn lexicalized verbs as complete frames.

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