Re: Never violate a universal unless it seems like a good idea at the time

>First of all, I think very few if any OSV languages are well-studied.
>The best-studied object-initial language is Hixkaryana, which is OVS.
>
>Also, most or all object-initial languages are spoken in the Amazon
>Basin (including Hixkaryana, which is in the Carib language family.),
>in several different language families.  As far as I understand, none
>of these language families have predominantly object-initial languages.
>
>The book I have access to* has some suggestions as to how
>object-initial order might arise, but I don't have the patience to read
>and summarize them right now, especially as it probably deals mostly
>with OVS order, not OSV order, which you're most interested in.  If you
>want the info and don't have access to the book, I could extract some
>information on request, but it may have to wait a week or two.
>
>Don't know if this helps, but I hope it does.
Yes, it does help.  It answers some of the questions that I asked about
OSV.  I can see if the University of Kentucky either has the book or can
obtain it on interlibrary loan for me.  Otherwise, I'll need your summary,
if you would be so kind, and I can easily wait several weeks or more for
it.  (I'm still working on the phonology of the language that is a
candidate for OSV word order.

Anything that anyone can point me to in terms of OSV would be appreciated.

Isidora


>Estel
>
>*"Hixkaryana and Linguistic Typology", by Desmond C. Derbyshire (1985)
>
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