Universals Archive
A database of proposed crosslinguistic laws and tendencies in grammar across the world’s languages. 2,029 published entries.
827 entries · page 6 of 17
| # | Standardized / Original | Domain | Type | Keywords |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 791 | IF there is a Primary Nasal Consonant other than apical /n/, THEN there is also a Primary Nasal Consonant /n/. | phonology | implication | nasal, consonant, apical, allophone |
| 792 | IF there are only two Primary Nasal Consonants, THEN the first one is apical (/n/), and the other is /m/, that is its most characteristic allophone is labial. | phonology | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | nasal, consonant, labial, apical, allophone |
| 794 | The preferred number of primary nasal consonants in a language is between two and four. | phonology | unconditional | nasal, consonant |
| 795 | IF there are Secondary Nasal Consonants, THEN there will be at least one Primary Nasal Consonant. | phonology | implication | nasal, consonant |
| 796 | IF there are n Secondary Nasal Consonants, THEN there will not be more than n Primary Nasal Consonants. | phonology | implication | nasal, consonant |
| 797 | IF there is only one place of articulation for a given type of consonant, THEN it is most likely to be the alveo/dental region. | phonology | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | consonant, alveolar, dental |
| 798 | There are more voiceless obstruents than voiced ones. | phonology | implication | consonant, obstruent, voice |
| 799 | IF there is a voiced obstruent, THEN most likely its voiceless counterpart is present as well. | phonology | implication | consonant, obstruent, voice |
| 800 | The preferred set of consonants in a given language is: /p, t, k, t∫, f, s, m, n/. | phonology | unconditional | consonant |
| 801 | IF there is tensedness, THEN adjectives are nouny. IF adjectives are nouny, THEN there is tensedness. |
morphosyntax | mutual implication | predicative adjective, noun, tensed |
| 802 | IF there is non-tensedness, THEN adjectives are verby. IF adjectives are verby, THEN there is non-tensedness. |
inflection, syntax | mutual implication | predicative adjective, verb, tensed |
| 803 | IF a language is isolating (with bound morphology lacking), THEN there tend to be noun classifiers rather than noun classes. IF there is agglutination or flexion (in languages with rich inflectional systems), THEN there tend to be noun classes rather than noun classifiers |
inflection, syntax | implication | agglutination, flexion, isolation, classifier, noun class |
| 804 | IF there is complex overall morphology, THEN there tend to be noun classes. | inflection, syntax | implication | agglutination, flexion, noun class |
| 806 | IF /h/ precedes unstressed syllables, THEN it also precedes secondary stressed syllables. IF /h/ precedes secondary stressed syllables, THEN it precedes primary stressed syllables. |
prosodic phonology | implication | /h/, stress, aspiration, syllable, unstressed, primary, secondary |
| 807 | IF there is postvocalic aspiration Vh, THEN there is prevocalic aspiration hV. | phonology | implication | /h/, aspiration, vowel |
| 810 | IF a phonemic category is complex, THEN its capacity to split is weak. IF a phonemic category is simple, THEN its capacity to split is strong. |
phonology | mutual implication | phoneme, complexity |
| 816 | Sibilants of different types tend not to cluster, or only across morpheme boundaries. | phonology, morphology | unconditional | consonant cluster, final, sibilant, morpheme boundary |
| 817 | IF a vowel (or diphthong) is long and tone is present, THEN that syllable is stressed. | prosodic phonology | implication | stress, syllable, diphthong, long, vowel |
| 820 | IF voiced > voiceless neutralization occurs in positions other than final, THEN it will occur in final position. Voiced > voiceless neutralization never occurs intervocally. |
phonology | implication | voice, neutralization, intervocalic |
| 821 | Normal hierarchy of increasing markedness in vowels: /E / ⇒ /a/ ⇒ /e/ ⇒ /i/ ⇒ /ü/ ⇒ /ö/ ⇒ /œ / (front set), /E / ⇒ /a/ ⇒ /o/ ⇒ /u/ (back set). | phonology | implicational hierarchy | hierarchy, markedness, vowel |
| 824 | IF relative clauses are prenominal, THEN relativization is primarily by gapping. |
syntax | implication | relative clause, order, gapping |
| 826 | IF postnominal relative clauses contain a distinctive verbal affix, THEN the verb appears in clause-initial position. |
inflection, syntax | implication | relative clause, order, verbal affix, verb-initial |
| 827 | IF a relative clause contains an initial relative pronoun, THEN it does not contain a personal pronoun form of the same NP. | syntax | implication | relative clause, relative pronoun, personal pronoun |
| 834 | In languages with two or more liquids, IF there is one non-lateral, THEN there will also be a lateral. | phonology | implication | lateral, liquid, non-lateral |
| 837 | In languages with more than two r-types, IF there are any other contrasts between them, THEN there will also be a contrast of place; and If there is a contrast of place, THEN there is very likely also some other contrast. |
phonology | implication | /r/ |
| 838 | IF there is any other liquid, THEN there will be a liquid with both lateral and non-lateral allophones. | phonology | implication | liquid, lateral, non-lateral |
| 839 | IF there is a voiceless /l/, THEN there will be a voiced /l/. | phonology | implication | consonant, voice, lateral, liquid |
| 840 | IF basic order is VSO, THEN there is very likely to be verbal person-number inflection or both person-number and tense-aspect-mood inflection, but not verbal tense-aspect-mood without person-number inflection. | syntax, inflection | implication | order, VSO, verb, person, number, tense, aspect, mood |
| 843 | IF there is a consonant cluster of length m (initially or finally), THEN there is at least one continuous subsequence of length m -1. | phonology | implication | consonant cluster |
| 847 | In initial clusters, IF there is at least one cluster consisting of a nasal (voiced or unvoiced) followed by a heterogenic obstruent, THEN there is at least one cluster consisting of a nasal (voiced or unvoiced) followed by a homorganic obstruent. | phonology | implication | consonant cluster, obstruent, nasal, heterogenic, homorganic, phoneme order, initial |
| 865 | In initial clusters, IF an unvoiced consonant or sequence of unvoiced consonants immediately precedes a vowel, THEN it will not itself be preceded by one or more voiced consonants. | phonology | implication | consonant cluster, initial, voice |
| 890 | IF morphology is agglutinative, THEN accent is primarily pitch. IF morphology is flexive, THEN the accent is primarily stress. |
prosodic phonology, morphology | implication | agglutination, flexion, accent, pitch, stress |
| 891 | IF basic order is OV, THEN there is mora-counting. IF basic order is VO, THEN there is syllable-counting. |
phonology, syntax | implication | order, VO, OV, rhythm, mora-counting, syllable-counting |
| 892 | IF the word order is OV, THEN there are suffixes. IF the word order is VO, THEN there are prefixes. |
morphology, syntax | implication | VO, OV, order, suffix, prefix |
| 893 | See Graphics for Iambic vs. Troachaic phrase accent and its many correlates | prosodic phonology, morphology, syntax | mutual implication | phrase accent, word canon, timing, mora, syllable, consonantism, vocalism, tone, verse, music, order, object, verb, adverb, auxiliary, adjective, noun, attributive, postposition, clitic, enclitic proclitic, affix-order, suffix, prefix, synthesis, analysis, agglutination, polysynthesis, flexion, isolation |
| 894 | see Graphics for Iambic vs. Trochaic languages | prosodic phonology, morphology, syntax | mutual implication | stress, syllable, unit, order, object, verb, subject, adverb, adjective, noun, attributive, agglutination, flexion, timing, stress, syllable, syllable structure, intonation contour, tone |
| 895 | See Graphics for Moderate rhythmic holism | inflection, prosodic phonology | mutual implication | syllable structure, stress, vowel harmony, vowel system |
| 896 | IF there is head-marking, THEN adjectives tend to be similar to verbs. | inflection, syntax | implication | head-marking, adjective, verb |
| 897 | IF there is dependent-marking, THEN adjectives tend to be similar to nouns. | inflection, syntax | implication | dependent-marking, adjective, noun |
| 904 | The more firmly individuated (definite, human, etc.) the agent and the object and/or the more complete (semantically pregnant, perfective, real. etc.) the process, the greater the chances the sentence will adopt the more grammatically transitive construction. See Graphics |
inflection, syntax | implication | definiteness, animacy, perfective, affectedness, transitivity |
| 912 | In a language with only a single genitive, when a transitive clause is nominalized, the subject’s prior claim to the genitive case is absolute. | syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | nominalization, genitive, case, subject |
| 914 | IF there is no direct object, THEN the embedded subject appears as direct object. IF there is direct object, but no indirect object, THEN the embedded subject appears as indirect object. IF there are both direct and indirect objects, THEN the embedded subject appears as one of the oblique cases (i.e. neither subject nor direct object nor indirect object) |
inflection, syntax | implicational hierarchy | causative, hierarchy, subject, direct object, indirect object, oblique object |
| 915 | IF verbs agree with inanimate NPs, THEN they also agree with animate NPs of the same grammatical relation, or even of a grammatical relation lower on the relational hierarchy which otherwise determines agreement preferences. | inflection, syntax | implication | agreement, animacy, grammatical relations |
| 916 | IF a plurality split occurs, THEN all NPs to the left from it will have the distinction of plurality and those to the right from it will lack it. | inflection | implicational hierarchy | hierarchy, animacy, split, number, plural |
| 917 | Whenever there is a plurality split in lexical nouns, the split in the 3rd person pronoun (if there is one) will be at the same place or lower down in the animacy hierarchy. | inflection | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | animacy hierarchy, split, number, plural, person pronoun, 3, noun |
| 919 | The more numerous the contrastive segments, the shorter the average length of a word. | phonology, morphology | mutual implication | word length, phoneme inventory |
| 920 | IF OV is a basic order, THEN there will be left-branching. IF VO is a basic order, THEN there will be right-branching. |
syntax | implication | order, VO, OV, left-branching, right-branching |
| 922 | IF there is the voiced velar fricative phoneme /©/, THEN there will be the voiceless velar fricative phoneme /x/. | phonology | implication | velar, fricative, voice |
| 923 | IF the voiceless stop /p/ is absent from the labial group, THEN the corresponding voiceless fricative /f/ must be present. IF the marked combination of features [-syllabic, +nonsyllabic, -voiced, stop, labial] has a frequency of zero in a system, THEN the marked combination of features [-syllabic, +nonsyllabic, +voiced, fricative, labial] has a frequency above zero. |
phonology | implication | velar, fricative |
| 924 | IF the voiced stop /g/ is absent from the velar group, THEN the corresponding voiced fricative /©/ must be present. IF the marked combination of features [-syllabic, +nonsyllabic, +voiced, stop, velar] has a frequency of zero in a system, THEN the marked combination of features [-syllabic, +nonsyllabic, +voiced, fricative, velar] has a frequency above zero. |
phonology | implication | velar, fricative, voice |