Universal 379:
- Original
- Every language has cleft constructions, either wh-clefts or it-clefts or both.
- Standardized
- Every language has cleft constructions, either wh-clefts or it-clefts or both.
- Keywords
- topic, cleft, wh-cleft, it-cleft
- Domain
- syntax, pragmatics
- Type
- unconditional
- Status
- achronic
- Quality
- absolute
- Basis
- a sample of 30 languages, see Gundel 1988: 210
- Source
- Gundel 1988: 231
- Counterexamples
1. Wh-cleft or pseudocleft (= topic-comment cleft constructions), e.g. in Japanese (Japanese-Ryukyuan):Mado o watta no wa Taro da [window obj broke top be] “The one who broke a window was Taro”.2. It-cleft constructions where comment precedes topic have the form [(it)(BE) NP][NP], where the first NP is focus and the second NP is a headless relative clause that describes the topic, e.g. in Russian:Eto Ivana ja videl [it/that ACC I saw“It (was) Ivan I saw”.