Word Order Typology

1. Word Order Typology (based on Comrie 1981, Song 2011) МД

2. Founding father: the 60s Joseph Greenberg (1963 talk at First Dobbs Conference on Language Universals) - ts-ts! • 30 (+140) languages • 1966 ‘Some universals…’ – 45 universals • Universal 1: In declarative sentences with nominal subject and object, the dominant order is almost always one in which the subject precedes the object • VSO -> prepositional (almost absolute)

3. Methodological preliminaries Issue of basicness: • Full NPs, prototypical definite S and O, independent clause, stylistically neutral… • Pronominal clitics misbehave • Main and dependent clauses diverge • Interrogative may have special orders • etc. • Frequencies, morphological unmarkedness • Flexible word orders not considered

4. Methodological preliminaries Misnomer: • Not worder order typology • Rather, order of major constituents • Cf. Greenberg’s order of meaningful elements • We’ll have to live with it, though

5. Methodological preliminaries A model topic for cross-linguistic research: • Typological patterns with no apparent language specific validity • We may not care about what basic word order is while describing an individual language • But: present-day processing-based theories of explanation (Hawkins) may be relevant for individual grammars

6. Main lines of research: • Possible orders of clause constituents • SOV, SVO, VSO, VOS, OVS, OSV • All attested, but unequally • Correlation: looking for universal implications between orders of different types of constituents • Adpositions, adjectives, possessors, RelClauses • Explanation: looking for basic principle of constituency • Branching? Processing?

7. Dominant orders: kiho-ka saca-lɨl cha-ass-ta (Korean) Keeho-NOM lion-ACC kick-PST-IND ‘Keeho kicked the/a lion.’ khon níi kàt mǎa tua nán (Thai) man this bite dog CLF that ‘This man bit that dog.’ Lladdodd draig ddyn (Welsh) killed dragon man ‘A dragon killed a man.’ (cited after Song 2011)

8. Rare orders: manasa ny lamba ny vehivavy (Malagasy) wash the clothes the woman ‘The woman is washing the clothes.’ piʔ kokampö unkiʔ (Panare) child washes woman ‘The woman washes the child.’ samũũy yi qa-wùh (Nadёb) howler-monkey people eat ‘People eat howler-monkeys.’ (cited after Song 2011)

9. From correlations to explanations VSO / SVO / SOV ~ Pr / Po ~ NG / GN ~ NA / AN • Out of combinations only 15 attested, and only 4 widespread: • VSO & Pr & NG & NA • SVO & Pr & NG & NA • SOV & Po & GN & AN • SOV & Po & GG & NA • Invites for generalizations! From unilateral implications to language types / profiles • S as a bad predictor – S dismissed 24 O follows V O precedes V

10. Lehmann (70s) FPP: Fundamental Principle of Placement • Concomitance: V & O vs. O & V • Modifiers are placed on the other side of the “Concomitant” • Adj, Gen, Rel • Inconsistent languages = languages under change • Profiles “VO” and “OV”rather than literal VO/OV • Persian – “VO”, but (S)OV

11. Vennemann (70s) PNS: Principle of natural serialization • Head (“operand”) vs. modifiers, or dependents (“operator”) • Order <dependent,head> determined by <O,V> • Theory-dependent: adpositions should be considered heads

12. Vennemann (70s) OPERAND verb verb auxiliary noun noun noun noun noun comparison marker comparative adjective adposition OPERATOR object adverbial main verb adjective relative clause genitive numeral determiner adjective standard of comparison noun phrase

13. Vennemann (70s): Der Teufel steckt im detail - overgeneralization VSO / SVO / SOV ~ Pr / Po ~ NG / GN ~ NA / AN • Out of 24 combinations, Vennemann allows only 3: • VSO & Pr & NG & NA • SVO & Pr & NG & NA • SOV & Po & GN & AN • SOV & Po & GN & NA • Hawkins counts that this accounts for slightly less than 50% of his sample • But: Comrie’s ammendment: scale rather than two binary classes • SVO – bad predictor (nonce in Greenberg’s universals) • But: Dryer’s larger sample show that the factor is overestimated: SVO do pattern with VSO, on the whole (SOV --- SVO – VSO)

14. Hawkins 1983 Make no exception for me, please! Complicated system of multi-conditioned implications • Pr -> (NA -> NG) • Pr -> (NDem -> NA) • Pr -> (NNum -> NA), следовательно: • Pr -> (Ndem -> NG), Pr -> (NNum -> NG) • Two exceptions! Ammendment: • Pr & -SVO -> (NDem -> NG) • Pr & -SVO -> (NNum -> NG)

15. Hawkins 1983 • Shift from clause to NP constituents; implications translated into HSP: • Heaviness Serialization Principle • in a Prep language, the heavier the constituent, the less likely it is located to the left of the head noun • light Det,Num < Adj < Gen < Rel heavy • + Det/Num N Gen/Rel • - Gen/Rel N Det/Num • Incipient functional motivation: the ease of processing • Further elaborated in Hawkins 1994, 2004 • More complicated with Post languages • +mobility principle(

16. Dryer 1992 • Large and principled sampling • 600 lgs (1500 in his WALS map) • weighted for geneology • Rehabilitation of VO~OV typology • Including arguing for SVO to be indeed VO • Arguing against head – dependent explanations

17. Dryer 1992 • Against head – dependent explanations • AN~NA order is unpredictable • Article, auxiliary are predicted in a wrong way • From dependency to “patterning” • V-patterners vs. O-patterners • genitives and relative clauses are O-patterners • determiners and numerals are V-patterners • adjective are none-patterners • Uh-uh… calls for explanation!

18. Dryer 1992 Branching direction theory (BDT). In a [XY] constituent: • the V-patterner is the non-branching (non-phrasal) constituent (e.g. noun, article, numeral) • the O-patterner is the branching (phrasal) consituent (e.g. genitive phrase, relative clause) • in adjective + noun, none is branching… • at least, none is recursively branching

19. WOT cornerstones: a typology of typologies • Greenberg: order in the clause (SOV etc.) • Lehman: order in the clause (“OV”~“VO”) • Vennemann: order in the clause (OV~VO) • Hawkins (early): adposition based, implications and hierarchies • Dryer: back to OV~VO

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