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Universal 309:

Posted in Universals Archive

Universal 309:

Original
In the overwhelming majority of languages the citation form belongs to the syntactical form of the nominative*.
Standardized
The citation form of the noun tends to be the nominative case form.
Keywords
noun, case, nominative, markedness
Domain
inflection, syntax
Type
unconditional
Status
achronic
Quality
statistical
Basis
languages surveyed in Kozinsky 1981
Source
Kozinsky 1981
Counterexamples
In systems with “marked nominative”, it is the unmarked accusative case that is used in citation forms; see #6.

One Comment

  1. FP
    FP

    1. Cf. #1109. 2. A sequence of a stem and all related synsemantic and semisynsemantic morphemes can function in a clause as follows: subject of transitive verb (S), subject of intransitive verb of state (SIntrS), or action (SIntrA), direct object (O). The sequence is determined as a syntactic form (SF) in a matrix of the 4 above mentioned constituents, where “+” means that it is possible, and “-” that it is impossible to express a certain part of a sentence with this sequence.SF indefinitive: +S+SIntrA+SIntrS+O ex. Russian: stol (table), kenguru (kangaroo);SF subjective: +S+SIntrA+SIntrS-O ex. Russian: reka (river), otec (father);SF accusative: -S-SIntrA-SIntrS+O ex. Russian: rek-u, otc-a;SF absolutive: -S+SIntrA+SIntrS+OSF transitive: +S-SIntrA-SIntrS+OSF intransitive: -S+SIntrA+SIntrS-OSF active: +S+SIntrA-SIntrS-OSF stative: -S-SIntrA+SIntrS+O.Moreover, while SF of indefinitive, subjective, absolutive, intransitive, and stative have some features in common, it is nice to have a common term for all of them: SF nominative ±S±SIntrA +SIntrS±O.

    1. May 2020

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