Month: May 2020

Universal 1585: dependent-marked possession ⇒ alienable possession;head-marked possession ⇒ inalienable possession Original The inalienables take marking which is more nearly head-marking or less dependent-marking than…

Universal 1584: kin terms and/or body parts > part-whole and/or spatial relations > culturally basic possessed items Original Semantic scale of inalienable possession: kin terms…

Universal 1583: Original The following four causative oppositions: (1) laugh – make laugh, amuse; (2) boil – bring to boil; (3) burn – ignite (of…

Universal 1582: Original If a language has a causative morpheme which expresses permissiveness, this morpheme usually combines with a larger group of verbal stems in…

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 1580: Original If a language has several causative affixes, the means for deriving causatives from intransitives are more varied than those for forming causatives…

Universal 1579: Original If there are causative affixes in a language which serve to form causative verbs from transitives, then this language also has causative…

Universal 1578: Original If both the reflexive marker and the causative marker in a language are affixes, both are: (a) either prefixes (cf. Abkhaz, Amharic,…

Universal 1577: Original If there is a reflexive verb meaning ‘to laugh’ it is usually not derived from the transitive base meaning ‘to make somebody…

Universal 1576: Original If a language has a complex system both of reflexive constructions and causative constructions (with lexical or analytical causatives), the former tends…