Re: Greenberg's Word Order Universals

> Date:         Thu, 14 Sep 2000 16:42:38 -0400
> From:         John Cowan <jcowan@...>
>
> Robert Hailman wrote:
>
> > My hunch is to assume it means that the unmarked form of a noun is never
> > the plural [...]
No, it means that if there is one of the numbers that has only
unmarked forms, it's the singular. You can have any of these:

  All nouns take marks for both singular and plural.

  Some nouns have a marked singular, some have a marked plural, some
  have both.

  Some nouns have a marked singular, some have a marked plural, none
  have both. (Old French was almost like this at one stage, I think).

  All nouns have an unmarked singular and a marked plural. (Spanish).

  All nouns have an unmarked singular, some have an marked plural.
  (English).

But not this:

  Some or all nouns have a marked singular, none have a marked plural.

> It also means that there is always some way to mark the plural, if only
> in the pronouns (as in Mandarin).  Some languages have a mark for the
> singular, some don't.  Languages with dual (exactly two) and trial
> (exactly three) numbers almost always have marks for them.
>
> ...where "mark" means suffix, or prefix, or change of vowels, or suppletion,
> or what have you.
And if a language only marks number in the pronouns, and does it by
suppletion (different stems, like English I/we, she/they), you might
wonder how one of them can be said to be more marked than the other.

Never fear, your friendly neighbourhod theorist will tell you that the
singular is the underlying form --- which he knows because he writes
it as -plural --- and thus unmarked, so that the universal holds.

Lars Mathiesen (U of Copenhagen CS Dep) <thorinn@...> (Humour NOT marked)