Universal #1649

Legacy number: 1649

 Number  1644
 Original  There is a strong tendency for SOV languages to display verb concatenation rather than verb phrase serialization, despite the presence of a verb phrase constituent.
 Standardized  IF basic order is SVO, THEN there will be verb concatenation rather than verb phrase serialization.
 Formula  SOV ⇒ ¬ verb phrase serialization
 Keywords  order, VSO, serial verb
 Domain  syntax
 Type  implication
 Status  achronic
 Quality  statistical
 Basis  languages surveyed by Shiller 1990
 Source  Shiller 1990: 396

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Discussion
Counterexamples
Ijo (Ijoid, Niger-Congo), Barai (Trans-New Guinea), Lahu, and Yi (both Burmese-Lolo, Tibeto-Burman). However, none of these languages conform completely to the definition of canonical serial verb construction employed by Shiller [for definition see Comments]. These SOV languages do, however, have some kind of subordinating serial verb constructions. These constructions differ from the canonical serial verb constructions in a variety of ways (Shiller 1990).
Notes
A CANONICAL SUBORDINATING SERIAL VERB CONSTRUCTION is defined as a subordinating serial verb construction which has verb phrases appearing in the syntax in an order which conforms to underlying word order in terms of the both the semantic and the syntactic head. In other words, in VO languages one expects that the phrase containing the semantic head will precede the subordinate material, and that in an OV language it will follow subordinate material.
Comment
Frans Plank · 3 Aug 2006
A CANONICAL SUBORDINATING SERIAL VERB CONSTRUCTION is defined as a subordinating serial verb construction which has verb phrases appearing in the syntax in an order which conforms to underlying word order in terms of the both the semantic and the syntactic head. In other words, in VO languages one expects that the phrase containing the semantic head will precede the subordinate material, and that in an OV language it will follow subordinate material.