Theiling Online    Sitemap    Conlang Mailing List HQ   

Re: Greenberg's Word Order Universals

From:Nik <fortytwo@...>
Date:Saturday, September 16, 2000, 3:52
J Matthew Pearson wrote:
> Greenberg may have been referring to the fact that verb-initial languages almost > always allow topicalized and/or focussed noun phrases to precede the verb.
W would require a cleft for that, something like: Faklátassi nús Ján fakassáttas wifkál Was John read book It was John who read the book As opposed to: Fakassáttas núsal Jánal wifkál Read John-erg book Does that count for the universal? Just placing the noun in front would be ungrammatical and quite probably confusing in running text, as it would sound like "John, who read the book". There's no words like "that" or "which" (can't remember the term), clauses are always verb-initial.
> Greenberg might have been referring to languages where certain body parts have an > unmarked dual form and a marked singular. E.g., the most basic form for "eye" in > the language might be a word meaning "pair of eyes"; to form the word meaning "a > single eye", an affix would be added.
Ah, that makes sense. Very interesting idea! -- Dievas dave dantis; Dievas duos duonos God gave teeth; God will give bread - Lithuanian proverb ICQ: 18656696 AIM Screen-Name: NikTailor