The Basic Word Order Typology: An Exhaustive Study

The Basic Word Order Typology: An Exhaustive Study

Harald Hammarstr?m 3 May 2015, Leipzig

Hammarstrom

Basic Word Order Typology

3 May 2015, Leipzig 1 / 43

The Basic Word Order Typology

One of typology's most celebrated themes,

popularized by Greenberg (1963) in a study

comprising 30 languages.

Since then, basic-word-order statistics from ever wider arrays of languages have been

presented

Hawkins 1983: 336 languages Tomlin 1986: 402 languages Haarmann 2004: 636 languages Dryer 2005: 1228 languages

Today we will look at statistics from 5230 languages

Hammarstrom

Basic Word Order Typology

3 May 2015, Leipzig 2 / 43

Dention of Basic Word Order #1

Transitive declarative main clause Both subject and object involve an overt noun phrase (not just a pronoun)

[The woman] S

chased V

[the man] O

Note: Subject: The more agent-like of the arguments Object: The more patient-like of the arguments So SVO is really better labeled AVP

Hammarstrom

Basic Word Order Typology

3 May 2015, Leipzig 3 / 43

Dention of Basic Word Order #2

Language Has Basic Word Order: Only one order is grammatically possible OR Several orders are possible AND

There is a dierence in meaning and one of the orders can be considered neutral There is no dierence in meaning but there one order is MUCH more frequent than the others

Language Doesn't Have Basic Word Order: Several orders possible and common/neutral Several orders occur, not freely, but conditioned by morphosyntax (e.g., the presence of an auxiliary)

Hammarstrom

Basic Word Order Typology

3 May 2015, Leipzig 4 / 43

Status of Documentation of the World's Languages

MED type long grammar grammar grammar sketch specic feature phonology dictionary text wordlist minimal overview

# lgs 1403 1015 1931

346 277 143

93 1631

516 174 7529

18.6% 13.4% 25.6% 4.5% 3.6% 1.8% 1.2% 21.6% 6.8% 2.3%

I was able to get word order data from 5230 languages

For 82 lgs there is data but I have not been access it (yet)

For the remaining 2219 lgs there is no published data on word order

Hammarstrom

Basic Word Order Typology

3 May 2015, Leipzig 5 / 43

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