Universal #1872

Legacy number: 1872

 Number  1867
 Original  Baby talk is also characterized by:
high percentage of questions;
frequent use of tags;
here-and-now semantics;
high semantic continuity between pairs of utterances;
striking shifts in pronoun use (especially in alternatives for YOU).
 Standardized  Baby talk is also characterized by:
high percentage of questions;
frequent use of tags;
here-and-now semantics;
high semantic continuity between pairs of utterances;
striking shifts in pronoun use (especially in alternatives for YOU).
 Keywords  baby talk
 Domain  discourse
 Type  unconditional
 Status  achronic
 Quality  statistical
 Basis  27 lgs, high in IE, low in African and Oceanic lgs: Bengali, Marathi (both Indic, IE), Dutch, English, German (all Germanic, IE), Greek (Greek, IE), Brazilian Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish (all Romance, IE), Serbo-Croatian (Slavic, IE), Latvian (Baltic, IE), Syrian Arabic, Neo-Aramaic, Maltese (all Semitic, Afro-Asiatic), Berber (Berber, Afro-Asiatic), Cocopa, Pomo (both Hokan), Comanche (Uto-Aztecan), Hidatsa (Siouan), Hungarian (Ugric, Uralic), Japanese (Japanese-Ryukyuan), Kannada (Havyaka) (Dravidian), Kipsigis (Nilotic, Nilo-Saharan), Luo (Eastern Sudanic, Nilo-Saharan), Nivkh (Isolate), Samoan (Oceanic, E. Malayo-Polynesian), Tzeltal (Mayan)
 Source  Ferguson 1978a: 211

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