Category: Universals Archive

Universal 692: Original Assimilation rule: a nasal consonant assimilates to its following consonant concerning its place of articulation.This rule is universal in two respects: it…

Universal 708: Original […] eine Sprache, die es […] liebt, modifizierende oder grammatische Elemente in großer Zahl dem Wortstamm unterzuordnen, wird keine Neigung zu einem…

Universal 724: Original A descending pitch ramp follows a voiceless obstruent; a rising pitch ramp follows a voiced obstruent. Standardized IF an obstruent is voiceless,…

Universal 740: Original The Universal of Adjectival V/N-Switching:In languages with verbal-nominal switching for adjectives, the nominal option will always encode the more time-stable reading. Standardized…

Universal 756: Original I know of no language with more than four injective obstruents. Standardized There are at most four injective obstruents. Keywords consonant, obstruent,…

Universal 772: Original In a given language the number of primary fricatives is very unlikely to be greater than the number of stops and affricates…

Universal 788: Original If in a given language there is only one Primary Nasal Consonant, it is /n/, that is, its most characteristic allophone is…

Universal 804: Vh ⇒ hV; orpostvocalic aspiration ⇒ prevocalic aspiration Original The sequence hV occurs more often than Vh. Standardized IF there is postvocalic aspiration…

Universal 820: Rel N ⇒ ¬ relative pronoun;N Rel ⇒ personal pronoun/relative pronoun Original Prenominal relative clauses never use relative pronouns and only sporadically present…

Universal 836: Voiceless l ⇒ Voiced l Original If there is a voiceless l, there will be a voiced l as well. Standardized IF there…