Category: Universals Archive

Universal 1517: OS ⇒ prepositions Original Subject-final languages are generally prepositional rather than postpositional. Standardized IF subject full noun phrases follow object full noun phrases,…

Universal 1533: verb-initial ⇒ Comp Stand Original In verb-initial languages the comparative form precedes the standard. Standardized IF word order is verb-initial, THEN the comparative…

Universal 1549: verb-initial ⇒ N Gen Original With great regularity possessor NPs follow the head NP in verb-initial languages. Standardized IF word order is verb-initial,…

Universal 1565: non-modal RC ⇒ modal RC Original Within the class of deagentive reflexive constrictions the following implications may be assumed: if there are non-modal…

Universal 1581: Original If there are productive complex affixes among the causative affixes, then by means of them causatives can also (or only) be derived…

Universal 1597: headless relative clause ⇒ verb-final Original Languages with headless relative clauses seem always to be verb-final, often strictly so. Standardized IF there are…

Universal 1613: VO & ModifierN ⇒ Modifier-N agreement Original Concord is common among VO languages, particularly when the order of constituents is modifier-Noun and thus…

Universal 1629: Original If the language has the basic order “focus-before-topic”, then the secondary topic would follow the focus. Correspondingly, in languages where object precedes…

Universal 1645: head-marking anywhere ⇒ head-marking at the clause level;dependent-marking at the clause level ⇒ > dependent-marking at the phrase level Original If a language…

Universal 1661: Original Proper name-like uses are much more frequent with certain kin terms, notably the ones that denote ascending relations, and in particular parental…