Re: V2
| From: | Matt Pearson <jmpearson@...> |
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| Date: | Friday, November 12, 1999, 23:21 |
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> I was filling out Jeffrrey's survey for a language I'm working on, which
>reminded me of a question I've had for some time but never asked: what
>exactly is a "V2" language? I know it stands for "verb second" but does that
>mean the verb always immediately follows the subject in all clauses, or what?
> I can't find much on the topic, figured someone on the list might know...
V2 is distinct from, say, SVO, in that the verb always comes after the
first constituent (roughly, the first phrase) in the sentence, which may be
the subject, or it may be something else. All of the Germanic languages except
English are V2. The Celtic language Breton is also allegedly V2, as is the
Indic language Kashmiri.
To give some examples, if English were V2, then each of the following
sentences would be grammatical (here square brackets are used to indicate
constituents):
[ John ] GAVE [ the book ] [ to Daniel ] [ yesterday ]
[ the book ] GAVE [ John ] [ to Daniel ] [ yesterday ]
[ to Daniel ] GAVE [ John ] [ the book ] [ yesterday ]
[ yesterday ] GAVE [ John ] [ the book ] [ to Daniel ]
In other words, V2 languages can be SVOX, OVSX, or XVSO.
Matt.