Universals Archive
A database of proposed crosslinguistic laws and tendencies in grammar across the world’s languages. 2,029 published entries.
157 entries · page 4 of 4
| # | Standardized / Original | Domain | Type | Keywords |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1947 | Provided an infix has alternative positions outside the stem, that external position is always at that edge of the stem in relation to which the infix is positioned. (left edge infixes → prefixes, right edge infixes → suffixes) | morphology | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | affix, infix, order |
| 1949 | IF indicators of any persons combine to form new pronouns, THEN the combination of 1st and 2nd person singular also occurs. | morphology | implication | pronoun, personal pronoun, 1st person, 2nd person |
| 1963 | IF there are consonant clusters CiCj, THEN there are also stems of the form CiVCj. | phonology, morphology | implication | phonotactics, consonant cluster |
| 1964 | IF the basic word form is stem+suffix, THEN word stress, provided it is fixed, is on a non-final syllable. IF the basic word form coincides with the stem (i.e., is without suffix), THEN word stress, provided it is fixed, is on final syllable. |
phonology, morphology | implication | word stress, suffix |
| 1965 | IF a phonotactic constraint holds for a syllable-edge, THEN it also holds for a corresponding word edge, but not vice versa. | phonology, morphology | implication | word, syllable, phonotactic constraint |
| 2000 | All grammars leak. | phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, etc. | unconditional | analogy, iconicity, economy, plumbing |
| 2003 | When gender is assigned according to morphological properties of nouns (such as declension class, or other inflectional or derivational categories) or to phonological properties of nouns, this is always secondary, being limited to residues of semantic assignment or being overruled by semantic assignment rules. | phonology, morphology | unconditional | gender, gender assignment, declension |