Paper at OV-IS 2019 Corrélâts de l’ordre OV et structure de l’information 20-21.11.2019, Inalco, Paris, 2019
This paper presents ongoing research on post-predicate elements in a pilot sample of languages fr... more This paper presents ongoing research on post-predicate elements in a pilot sample of languages from the Western Asian Transition Zone (WATZ, Haig & Khan 2018). Exploratory data from 8 spoken-language corpora, from five high-level genetic groups (Kartvelian, Turkic, Armenian, Semitic (Neo-Aramaic) and Iranian), are investigated, containing a total of approx. 6200 tokens (constituents coded for position vis-à-vis the predicate). Three argument types are considered: Direct objects (DO), expressions of static location (PLACE), and destinations or goals of movement, or cause movement (GOAL). With regard to DO, three types emerge: >90% pre-verbal DO (OV); <15% pre-verbal (VO); mixed OV/VO. PLACE arguments generally pattern with DO in the respective language; GOAL arguments on the other hand do not pattern with other arguments in OV languages. Instead, there is an overall trend towards GOALs Last: rates of post-predicate GOALs are never lower than DO or PLACE, and in the Iranian languages, reach 60-80%, yielding the OVG dominant word order typical for the western Iranian languages. This typologically unusual trait diffuses readily across genetic boundaries, affecting varieties of Turkic under heavy Iranian influence.
As yet no convincing explanation for GOALs Last has been proposed, except to link it to an iconic ordering principle in syntax, according to which event endpoints tend to map onto clause endpoints (Haig 2014). GOALs Last is potentially in competition with two other (non-categorical) principles: (1) the principle of Uniform Head Directionality, which preferentially places all verbal arguments (including GOALs) on the same side of the predicate, and (2) the principle of Verb-Object Adjacency, which preferentially leaves direct objects immediately adjacent to the predicate. In VO languages, all three principles align to yield a fully harmonic VOG order, which is in fact the almost exclusively preferred option in VO languages (Hawkins 2008). With OV languages, however, conflict is inevitable. The OVG order so characteristic of Iranian is one possible outcome of this conflict, which violates (1) Uniform Head Directionality, while respecting GOALs Last and Verb-Object Adjacency. I suggest that compromise solutions of this nature are most likely to occur in Transition Zones, the areas of overlap between major typological macro-areas.
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Drafts by Geoffrey Haig
As yet no convincing explanation for GOALs Last has been proposed, except to link it to an iconic ordering principle in syntax, according to which event endpoints tend to map onto clause endpoints (Haig 2014). GOALs Last is potentially in competition with two other (non-categorical) principles: (1) the principle of Uniform Head Directionality, which preferentially places all verbal arguments (including GOALs) on the same side of the predicate, and (2) the principle of Verb-Object Adjacency, which preferentially leaves direct objects immediately adjacent to the predicate. In VO languages, all three principles align to yield a fully harmonic VOG order, which is in fact the almost exclusively preferred option in VO languages (Hawkins 2008). With OV languages, however, conflict is inevitable. The OVG order so characteristic of Iranian is one possible outcome of this conflict, which violates (1) Uniform Head Directionality, while respecting GOALs Last and Verb-Object Adjacency. I suggest that compromise solutions of this nature are most likely to occur in Transition Zones, the areas of overlap between major typological macro-areas.
Papers by Geoffrey Haig
As yet no convincing explanation for GOALs Last has been proposed, except to link it to an iconic ordering principle in syntax, according to which event endpoints tend to map onto clause endpoints (Haig 2014). GOALs Last is potentially in competition with two other (non-categorical) principles: (1) the principle of Uniform Head Directionality, which preferentially places all verbal arguments (including GOALs) on the same side of the predicate, and (2) the principle of Verb-Object Adjacency, which preferentially leaves direct objects immediately adjacent to the predicate. In VO languages, all three principles align to yield a fully harmonic VOG order, which is in fact the almost exclusively preferred option in VO languages (Hawkins 2008). With OV languages, however, conflict is inevitable. The OVG order so characteristic of Iranian is one possible outcome of this conflict, which violates (1) Uniform Head Directionality, while respecting GOALs Last and Verb-Object Adjacency. I suggest that compromise solutions of this nature are most likely to occur in Transition Zones, the areas of overlap between major typological macro-areas.