Category: Universals Archive

Universal 999: Original Terminal intonations are almost universally low or falling for finality and assertion, and high or rising for the opposite, including yes-no questions.…

Universal 1015: Original If there are analogical changes in their inflectional paradigms, the forms (stems and affixes) of cardinal numerals replace more likely the forms…

Universal 1031: Original The climactic poles of the three accentual features tend to correlate with each other. Thus, e.g., where stress is predictable from vowel…

Universal 1047: Original If there is tonal ascent, then there is also tonal descent. Standardized IF there is tonal ascent, THEN there is also tonal…

Universal 1063: Original When stress is phonologically predictable (i.e., demarcative), it mostly falls on initial syllables, somewhat less commonly on final syllables or on penultimate…

Universal 1079: Original Aspiration tends to be stronger in initial and/or pre-tonic position antevocalically. Standardized Aspiration tends to be stronger in initial and/or pre-tonic position…

Universal 1095: mono-valent resultative formed from bi-valent verb ⇒ bi-valent resultative formed from tri-valent verb Original If there are mono-valent resultatives formed from bi-valent verbs…

Universal 1111: ¬ inflectional morphology ⇒ fixed word order of nominal arguments; Original Lack of inflectional morphology implies fixed word order of direct nominal arguments.…

Universal 1127: Original When nouns and pronouns can be incorporated, they have a special incorporated form (uninflected in the case of nouns) as distinct from…

Universal 1143: Original A causative can become a passive, but a passive cannot become a causative. Standardized A causative can become a passive, but a…