Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-01T01:47:20.914Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Consistency, markedness and language change: on the notion ‘consistent language’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

N. V. Smith
N. V. Smith
Affiliation:
Department of Phonetics and Linguistics, University College, London
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

To avoid the triviality of mere taxonomy in which languages are classified by such arbitrary criteria as ‘is/is not tonal’, ‘does/does not have unbounded movement rules’, ‘has prefixes/suffixes’, etc., language typology needs to be able to make implicational statements of the sort usually associated with the name of Greenberg.1 For instance, one wants to be able to say of a language not only that it is VSO, but also that it THEREFORE will have prepositions, will place modifying adjectives after rather than before the noun, will put titles before proper names, and so on. Likewise, if a language has the word-order SOV, then an interesting typology should allow one to predict that it will ipso facto be postpositional, put attributive adjectives before the noun, etc.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Linguistics , Volume 17 , Issue 1 , March 1981 , pp. 39 - 54
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1981

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Bach, E. (1970). Is Amharic an SOV language? JEthS 8. 9–20.Google Scholar
Bach, E. (1974). Syntactic theory. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.Google Scholar
Bynon, Th. (1977). Historical linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chafe, W. L. (1977). The evolution of third person verb agreement in the Iroquoian languages. In Li, C. N. (ed.), 493–524.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chiat, S. (In press). Specificity in the development of language structure. Journal of Psycholinguistic Research.Google Scholar
Chomsky, N. (1977). On Wh-movement. In Culicover, P., Wasow, T. & Akmajian, A. (eds), Formal syntax. New York: Academic Press. 71–132.Google Scholar
Derbyshire, D. (1979). Hixkaryana. Lingua Descriptive Studies, 1.Google Scholar
Derbyshire, D. & Pullum, G. K. (In press). Object-initial languages. IJAL.Google Scholar
Friedrich, P. (1977). The Devil's case: PIE as Type II. In Juilland, A. (ed.), Linguistic studies offered to Joseph Greenberg. Vol. 3 Syntax. Saratoga: Anma Libri. 463–480.Google Scholar
Gazdar, G. (1979). Constituent structure. Unpublished mimeo. University of Sussex.Google Scholar
Givón, T. (1975). Serial verbs and syntactic change. In Li, C. N. (ed), 47–112.Google Scholar
Greenberg, J. (1963). Some universals of grammar with particular reference to the order of meaningful elements. In Greenberg, J. (ed), Universals of language. Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. Press. 73–113.Google Scholar
Greenberg, J. (1978). Diachrony, synchrony and language universals. In J., Greenberg (ed), Universals of human language. Stanford University Press. Vol. I. 61–91.Google Scholar
Harris, M. (1976). A typological approach to word-order change in French. In Harris, M. (ed), Romance syntax: synchronic and diachronic perspectives. Salford: University of Salford. 33–53.Google Scholar
Harris, M. (1978). The evolution of French syntax: a comparative approach. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Harris, M. (1979). NPs and VPs in Romance. Paper read to the Philological society, 01 1979.Google Scholar
Hawkins, J. (1980). On implicational and distributional universals of word order. JL 16. 193–235.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hetzron, R. (1975). The presentative movement or why the ideal word order is VSOP. In Li, C. N. (ed), 345–388.Google Scholar
Hodge, C. (1970). The linguistic cycle. Language Sciences 13. 1–7.Google Scholar
Hyman, L. (1975a). Phonology: theory and analysis. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.Google Scholar
Hyman, L. (1975b). On the change from SOV to SVO: Evidence from Niger–Congo. In Li, C. N. (ed.), 113–147.Google Scholar
Johnson, D. (1977). On Keenan's definition of ‘Subject of’. L. In 8. 673–692.Google Scholar
Kachru, B. B. (1969). A reference grammar of Kashmiri. Urbana: University of Illinois.Google Scholar
Keenan, E. (1978). The syntax of subject final languages. In Lehmann, W. (ed), 267–327.Google Scholar
Kiparsky, P. & Menn, L. (1977). On the acquisition of phonology. In Macnamara, J. (ed), Language and thought. New York: Academic Press 47–78.Google Scholar
Klima, E. (1975). Sound and its absence in the linguistic symbol. In Kavanagh, J. & Cutting, J. (eds.), The role of speech in language. Cambridge, Mass: M.I.T. Press. 249–270.Google Scholar
Koch, M. (1974). A demystification of syntactic drift. Montreal Working Papers in Linguistics 3. 63–114.Google Scholar
Kuno, S. (1974). The position of relative clauses and conjunctions. L.In 5. 117–136.Google Scholar
Lambton, A. K. S. (1974). Persian grammar (Paperback edition). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Lehmann, W. (1973). A structural principle of language and its implications. Lg 49: 47–66.Google Scholar
Lehmann, W. (ed.), (1978). Syntactic typology: studies in the phenomenology of language. Texas: Texas University Press.Google Scholar
Li, C. N. (ed.), (1975). Word order and word order change. Texas: Texas University Press.Google Scholar
Li, C. N. (ed.), (1977). Mechanisms of syntactic change. Texas: Texas University Press.Google Scholar
Lightfoot, D. (1979 a). Principles of diachronic syntax. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Lightfoot, D. (1979 b). Review of Li, C. N. (ed.) Mechanisms of syntactic change. Lg. 55:381–395.Google Scholar
Loving, R. (1966). Awa phonemes, tonemes and tonally differentiated allomorphs. PL A. 7: 23–32.Google Scholar
Masica, C. (1976). Defining a linguistic area: South Asia. Chicago: Chicago University Press.Google Scholar
Matthews, P. (1972). Inflectional morphology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Miller, D. G. (1975). Indo-European: VSO, SOV, SVO or all three? Lingua 37, 31–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Osgood, C. & Tanz, C. (1977). Will the real direct object in bitransitive sentences please stand up? In Juilland, A. (ed), Linguistic studies offered to Joseph Greenberg. Saratoga: Anma Libri. 537–590.Google Scholar
Petrovici, E. (1957). Kann das Phonemsystem einer Sprache durch fremden Einfluss umgeslaltet werden? The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar
Ruhlen, M. (1975). A guide to the languages of the world. Stanford: University of California.Google Scholar
Sanders, G. (1975). On the explanation of constituent order universals. In Li, C. N. (ed.), (1975). 389–436.Google Scholar
Schaller, H. W. (1975). Die Balkansprachen: Eine Einführung in die Balkanphilologie. Heidelberg:Carl Winter Universitätsverlag.Google Scholar
Slobin, D. (1977). Language change in childhood and in history. In Macnamara, J. (ed.), Language, learning and thought. New York: Academic Press. 185–214.Google Scholar
Slobin, D. (1978). Universal and particular in the acquisition of language. Paper presented for workshop on language acquisition: state of the art. University of Pennsylvania, 05 1978.Google Scholar
Smith, N. V. (1975). An ontogenetixc correlate of word-order universals. Unpublished mimeo.Google Scholar
Smith, N. V. (1980). Review of Lehmann. Syntactic typology. JL 16. 150–164.Google Scholar
Smith, N. V. & Wilson, D. (1979). Modern linguistics: The results of Chomsky's revolution. Harmondsworth: Penguin.Google Scholar
Steele, S. (1976). A law of order: word order change in Classical Aztec. IJAL 42, 31–45.Google Scholar
Tai, J. (1973). Chinese as an SOV language. PCLS 9, 655–671.Google Scholar
Timberlake, A. (1977). Reanalysis and actualization in syntactic change. In Li, C. N. (ed), 141–177.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trudgill, P. (1979). On the rise of the creoloid. Paper presented to the Historical linguistics symposium at Stanford.Google Scholar
Tucker, A. & Bryan, M. (1974). The Mbugu anomaly. BSOAS 37, 188–207.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vennemann, T. (1975). Topics, subjects and word-order: from SXV to SVX via TVX. In Anderson, J. & Jones, C. (eds.), Historical linguistics. Amsterdam: North Holland. 339–376.Google Scholar
Vennemann, T. (1975). An explanation of drift. In Li, C. N. (ed), 269–305.Google Scholar
Vincent, N. (1976). Perceptual factors and word order change in Latin. In Harris, M. (ed), Romance syntax. 54–68.Google Scholar