Questions tagged [vso]
VSO: verb - subject - object word order.
7 questions
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Are there any languages with dominant VSO word order that DON'T switch to VOS in copular sentences?
VSO languages are few and hard to find. The few I know of all switch to VOS order in copular sentences. Is this universal or are there exceptions? Do humans really dislike de-coupling V and O so much ...
user43283
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What are the general word order trends of VO languages
I’ve heard that some scholars collapse SVO, VSO, and VOS into one general category of VO.
From what I understand, these VO languages allegedly exhibit strong and weak common word order trends.
If this ...
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Why do dominant VSO languages all have SVO as an alternative word order?
According to Greenberg’s 6th universal, "All languages with dominant VSO order have SVO as an alternative or as the only alternative basic order."
Why are dominant VSO languages predisposed ...
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What is the position of the subject in a Greek sentence, whose word order is VSO?
The following is a Greek sentence
Σε ποιόν φίλο νομίζεις ότι μιλάει ο άντρας;
To which friend think.2SG that speak.3SG the man
Its counterpart in ...
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Why is less consistent SVO more common than VSO or VOS?
"Language Change as a Source of Word Order Correlations", by Brady Clark, Matthew Goldrick, and Kenneth Konopka, is among the many sources dating back to Greenberg (1966) stating that language ...
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What morphosyntactic features are associated with VSO?
In an answer to another question, librik cited Orin Gensler's observation that Insular Celtic and Semitic share a surprisingly large feature complex. This makes it hard for a layman with ready access ...
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How do isolating VSO languages differentiate the subject and object?
In some Austronesian languages, which typically lack inflection, subjects appear structurally identical to their objects. What constructs do Verb-Subject-Object languages use to distinguish the two?
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