Universal #416

Legacy number: 416

 Number  415
 Original  Affixes are ordered so that their increasing distance from the stem reflects decreasing semantic relevance to it.
 Standardized  Affixes are ordered so that their increasing distance from the stem reflects decreasing semantic relevance to it.
 Keywords  affix-order, stem, relevance
 Domain  inflection, semantics
 Type  mutual implication
 Status  achronic
 Quality  statistical
 Basis  sample of 50 languages in Bybee 1985a
 Source  Bybee 1985a, cited in Moravcsik 1994: 50

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Discussion
Notes
The more relevant, the closer; the less relevant, the more marginal.Others use "semantic scope" rather than "relevance" to predict relative affix ordering (e.g., Keren Rice).The relative chronology of univerbation is another predictor that has been suggested:The older the affix, the closer to the stem; the more recently univerbated, the more marginal.The interesting question is how well the relevance/scope predictions agree with the diachronic prediction.
Comment
Frans Plank · 3 Aug 2006
The more relevant, the closer; the less relevant, the more marginal.

Others use "semantic scope" rather than "relevance" to predict relative affix ordering (e.g., Keren Rice).

The relative chronology of univerbation is another predictor that has been suggested:
The older the affix, the closer to the stem; the more recently univerbated, the more marginal.

The interesting question is how well the relevance/scope predictions agree with the diachronic prediction.