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Linguistic Typology: a short history and some
current issues
JAN RIJKHOFF
Department of Linguistics, University of Aarhus, Denmark
1. INTRODUCTION1
This issue of Tidsskrift for Sprogforskning contains written versions of the four
invited presentations for the 7th Research Colloquium ‘Sprog på Statsbiblioteket’
(30 November 2006), which was devoted to Linguistic Typology. Typology is
concerned with cross-linguistic variation; more specifically, it investigates the
range of possible grammatical phenomena that are attested in human language
and informs us about the way these phenomena hang together (tendencies,
correlations). Typology also attempts to account for the attested frequency and
distribution of grammatical phenomena, and to explain where the variation
stops, i.e. why certain logically possible grammatical phenomena do not occur
(for example, why there are no languages with basic order numeral-adjective-
demonstrative-noun in the noun phrase, as in three big these dogs). By way of an
introduction to this issue, I will give a brief outline of the history of linguistic
typology in the last 50 years (mainly concentrating on syntactic typology) and
mention some recent developments and current issues in the field, such as the
problem of cross-linguistic identification.
2. A SHORT HISTORY OF (SYNTACTIC) TYPOLOGY
Since Greenberg’s (1966) seminal work on language universals, linguistic
typology has played an important role in the field of linguistics and especially in
the last few decades it has developed into a major area of research with its own
• Professional organizations – e.g. the ‘Association for Linguistic Typology’
(ALT).
• Journals – e.g. Linguistic Typology, Studies in Language, Sprachtypologie und
Universalienforschung (STUF).
Rijkhoff, Jan (ed.), Linguistic Typology, Århus: Statsbiblioteket
Tidsskrift for Sprogforskning, årgang 5, 2007
Artikel nr. 1, Rijkhoff, Jan, 18 pp.
http://ojs.statsbiblioteket.dk/index.php/tfs/index
JAN RIJKHOFF
2
• Text books – e.g. Comrie (1981), Mallinson/Blake (1981), Whaley (1997),
Song (2001), Croft (2003).
• Handbooks – e.g. Haspelmath et al. (2001) (see also Haspelmath et al.
2005), Song forthcoming.
• Book series – e.g. Typological Studies in Language [Amsterdam: Benjamins],
Empirical Approaches to Language Typology [Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter],
Oxford Studies in Typology and Linguistic Theory [Oxford: OUP].2
As was mentioned above, linguistic typology is simultaneously about the
diversity and uniformity of languages, as it investigates the range of variation in
human languages and attempts to establish constraints and order in the
diversity (Comrie 1981: 30-31; Plank 2007b). Research in this field is
characterized by the essential stages in scientific analysis (Croft 1995: 87;
Moravcsik 2007): classification, generalization, and explanation. Initially,
linguistic data are collected in a more or less systematic manner and then
categorized on the basis of certain shared properties (e.g. regarding position,
form, meaning, or function). In the second stage one formulates generalizations
over the data. For example, Greenberg (1966) classified languages on the basis of
the unmarked order of nominal subject (S), verb (V) and nominal object (O),
which resulted in three classes: languages with basic order VSO, SVO or SOV
(Stage 1). This is shown in Table 1, which is based on Hawkins’ (1983) expanded
sample (notice that he used ‘V-1’ or ‘V-initial’ instead of VSO):
1. V-1 & N-- 38 5. SVO & N-- 56 9. SOV & N-- 21
2. V-1 & ANG 13 6. SVO & ANG 17 10. SOV & ANG 0
3. V-1 & --N 2 7. SVO & --N 19 11. SOV & --N 98
4. V-1 & GNA 0 8. SVO & GNA 17 12. SOV & GNA 55
53 lgs. 109 lgs. 174 lgs.
Table 1. Classification of languages (based on Hawkins 1983; ‘--’ = both A and G
precede or follow the noun).
The data in Table 1 show among other things that most SOV languages have
both the adjective and the genitive preceding the noun, whereas most VO (i.e.
V-1 and SVO) languages have these modifiers following the noun. Greenberg
then formulated 45 “universals of grammar with particular reference to the order
of meaningful elements” (Stage 2); for example (Greenberg 1966: 85-86):
LINGUISTIC TYPOLOGY: A SHORT HISTORY AND SOME CURRENT ISSUES
3
Universal 16
In languages with dominant order VSO, an inflected auxiliary always
precedes the main verb. In languages with dominant order SOV, an
inflected auxiliary always follows the main verb.
Universal 17
With overwhelmingly more than chance frequency, languages with
dominant order VSO have the adjective after the noun.
Universal 18
When the descriptive adjective precedes the noun, the demonstrative and
the numeral, with overwhelmingly more than chance frequency, do
likewise.
In the third stage one tries to explain these generalizations. Thus, Greenberg also
offered some tentative theoretical observations, suggesting that certain ordering
patterns could be explained in terms of the two competing motivations
‘dominance’ and ‘harmony’ (for example, he called the pairs VS – VO – NA – NG
and SV – OV – AN – GN ‘harmonic’), but he added that his theory was far from
complete and emphasized that disharmonic patterns and other counterexamples
should not be ignored (Greenberg 1966: 96-104).3
Subsequently Lehmann (1973, 1978) and Vennemann (1973, 1976) offered more
radical accounts for Greenberg’s findings, essentially reducing his three-way
typology (VSO, SVO, SOV) to two ‘word order types’:
(a) Lehmann: OV (SOV) and VO (V-1/VSO and SVO) languages. According to
Lehmann’s Fundamental Principle of Placement it is possible to predict
certain ordering pairs (such as the order of adjective and noun), if one
knows that the language has OV or VO order.
(b) Vennemann: OPERATOR-OPERAND and OPERAND-OPERATOR
languages. According to Vennemann’s Principle of Natural Serialization
categories are either operators or operands, which tend to be serialized
either with operator before operand, or vice versa. Examples of operators
are ‘object’ and ‘adverbial’, both of which have ‘verb’ as their operand).
Obviously there are many languages with constituent ordering patterns that
deviate from these ideal types, but such languages were largely ignored as they
were deemed to be in the process of changing from one type to another due to
internal development or contact.
JAN RIJKHOFF
4
Greenberg’s original, tripartite typology (VSO, SVO, SOV) was restored by
Hawkins (1983). Using a sample containing over 300 languages, Hawkins
formulated some new, often exceptionless universals, such as (Hawkins 1983: 64,
83).4
(1) If a language has OV order, then if the adjective precedes the noun, the
genitive precedes the noun; i.e. OV ⊃ (AN ⊃ GN).
(2) If a language has noun before genitive, then it has noun before relative
clause; i.e., NG ⊃ NRel (equivalently: RelN ⊃ GN).
Hawkins (1983: 75, 83) showed that various implications could be collapsed into
statistical implications with an adposition (preposition, postposition) as ultimate
antecedent; for example:
(3) Prepositional Noun Modifier Hierarchy (PrNMH):
Prep ⊃ ((NDem ∪ NNum ⊃ NA) & (NA ⊃ NG) & (NG ⊃ NRel))
(4) Postpositional Noun Modifier Hierarchy (PoNMH):
Postp ⊃ ((AN ∪ RelN ⊃ DemN & NumN) & (DemN ∪ NumN ⊃ GN))
He also attempted to account in a more principled way for the many languages
with ordering patterns that do not quite fit some ‘ideal’ two-way classification
(head-initial/head-final, VO/OV, operand-operator/operator-operand), which
had been the focus of Lehmann’s and Vennemann’s proposals.5 For example,
Hawkins’ Heaviness Serialization Principle is concerned with the fact that in
many (if not most) languages noun modifiers occur on both sides of the head
noun (≥R means (Hawkins 1983: 90-91): “‘exhibits more or equal rightward
positioning relative to the head noun across languages’. That is heavier noun
modifiers occur to the right”):6
(5) Heaviness Serialization Principle (HSP)
Rel ≥R Gen ≥R A ≥R Dem/Num
Dryer (1992) used an even bigger sample than Hawkins (containing some 600
languages) in an attempt to test which word order pairs actually correlate with
the order of object NP and verb (VO/OV). In spite of the proposals by Lehmann
LINGUISTIC TYPOLOGY: A SHORT HISTORY AND SOME CURRENT ISSUES
5
and Vennemann, claims about such correlations had never been substantiated
by systematic research.7 According to Dryer, there are indeed several word order
pairs that more or less correlate with the VO/OV distinction, among them the
pair HEAD NOUN – POSSESSOR NP (NG/GN) and the pair HEAD NOUN –
RELATIVE CLAUSE (NRel/RelN). However, he did not find evidence for a
correlation between VO/OV order and, for instance, the order of noun and
adjective (NA/AN) or the order of noun and demonstrative (NDem/DemN).
VERB PATTERNERS OBJECT PATTERNERS EXAMPLE
verb [V] subject [S] (there) entered + a tall man
adposition NP on + the table
copula verb predicate is + a teacher
‘want’ VP wants + to see Mary
tense/aspect auxiliary verb VP has + eaten dinner
complementizer sentence that + John is sick
noun [N] genitive [G] father + of John
noun [N] relative clause [Rel] movies + that we saw
verb manner adverb ran + slowly
Table 2. Some of Dryer’s correlation pairs (Dryer 1992: 108)
Thus, we tend to find the pairs VS, NG and NRel in VO languages and the pairs
SV, GN and RelN in OV languages. To account for the correlation pairs, Dryer
proposed the Branching Direction Theory (BDT), according to which there is
tendency for phrasal categories to precede non-phrasal categories in OV
languages and vice versa in VO languages. The basic version of the BDT reads as
follows (Dryer 1992: 87, 109):
(6) Branching Direction Theory
Verb patterners are non-phrasal (non-branching, lexical) categories and
object patterners phrasal (branching) categories. That is, a pair of
elements X and Y will employ the order XY significantly more often
among VO languages than among OV languages if and only if X is a non-
phrasal category and Y is a phrasal category.
However, the theory fails to account for at least three correlation pairs: the order
of verb and manner adverb (both of which are non-phrasal), the order of verb
and subject (if one believes that the subject NP actually combines with the VP,
JAN RIJKHOFF
6
there would be two phrasal categories), and the order of affix and stem (see
Dryer 1992: 125-128 for discussion). Because of these and other difficulties (for
instance, the status of adjectives as a non-branching category and the
constituent structure of NPs), Dryer then proposed a revised version and
ultimately a more elegant ‘alternate version’ of the BDT. Apart from the fact that
all versions of the BDT are based on some version of Chomsky’s syntactic theory
(which means that BDT works best for those who also accept certain features
that are peculiar to Chomsky’s theory), there is a more fundamental problem,
which concerns the way categories are defined and, more generally, how we can
be sure we are comparing the same category or grammatical phenomenon in
different languages. The problem is discussed in the next section, which also
briefly mentions some recent developments in linguistic typology.
3. SOME CURRENT ISSUES AND RECENT DEVELOPMENTS
3.1. Cross-linguistic identification
The problem of cross-linguistic identification is a rather persistent issue in
linguistic typology (Stassen 1985) and basically revolves around the question
‘How does one identify the same grammatical phenomenon across languages?’
or more concretely ‘Should categories be defined in terms of formal (‘structural’)
or semantic properties?’ (Croft 1995: 88-89; Song 2001: 10-15). Since formal
categories are often deemed to be too language dependent to be useful (i.e.
formal criteria cannot be applied to all languages as the structural variation
across languages is considered too varied), many typologists prefer semantic
categories, which are believed to be ‘universal’ (Haspelmath 2007: 119). It is true
that when Greenberg, Hawkins and Dryer employ category labels such as
NOUN, SUBJECT and GENITIVE, they generally use semantic criteria to define
category membership. This means, for example, that in practice the category
‘adjective’ may include more than just members of the word class ‘adjective’.
Since ‘adjectives’ are characterized as elements ‘designating qualities’ (Greenberg
1966: 77), Greenberg’s adjectival category also includes other forms or
constructions that can be used to designate qualities, such as verbs or relative
clauses (Greenberg 1966: 100): “In many languages all adjectival notions are
treated as intransitive verbs. The qualifying adjective is then a relative or
participle of the verb.” In a similar vein Dryer (1992: 96 fn. 12) writes: “As
discussed in Dryer (1988), there are many languages in which what I call
LINGUISTIC TYPOLOGY: A SHORT HISTORY AND SOME CURRENT ISSUES
7
adjectives are really verbs, and ‘adjectives’ modifying nouns are really just a kind
of relative clause.”
The problem is not so much that semantic criteria are used to define category
membership, but rather that it is not always possible to say whether this has
been done consistently. Notice, for example, that Dryer’s categories are
ultimately reclassified as what can only be regarded as formal categories when he
divides them into branching vs. non-branching categories in his BDT (see (6)).
Since such a division can only be made on the basis of formal, structure internal
properties, one might suspect that members of the original (‘semantic’)
categories were at least partly defined in formal terms.
To give another example, we just saw that the semantic category of adjectives
also includes what are formally speaking relative clauses. However, relative
clauses also occur as a separate category in the major typological studies of
Greenberg, Hawkins and Dryer mentioned earlier and in the well-known cross-
linguistic investigation of relative clauses by Keenan and Comrie (1977). Here
members of the category of Relative Clause [RC] appear to be limited to clausal
structures (i.e. formal entities):
We consider any syntactic object to be an RC if it specifies a
set of objects (perhaps a one-member set) in two steps: a
larger set is specified, called the domain of relativization, and
then restricted to some subset of which a certain sentence,
the restricting sentence, is true. The domain of relativization
is expressed in the surface structure by the head NP, and the
restricting sentence by the restricting clause, which may look
more or less like a surface sentence depending on the
language. (Keenan and Comrie 1977: 63)
Matters become particularly confusing when the two categories Adjective and
Relative Clause are combined in the same proposition, as in the case of
Hawkins’s Heaviness Serialization Principle or Dryer’s Branching Direction
Theory.9 In either case, we have of a semantically defined category Adjective (A),
which includes members of the word class ‘adjective’ but also relative clauses,
and a separate (presumably not entirely semantically defined) category Relative
Clause (Rel). If A is a semantic (or in Haspelmath’s words ‘substance based’)
category and Rel is a category that is at least partly defined in terms of formal
JAN RIJKHOFF
8
characteristics, this would be rather problematic from a methodological
perspective.10
Whereas some have argued against the usefulness of formal categories in
linguistic typology (e.g. Haspelmath 2007), others have claimed that typology
also requires formal categories (Newmeyer 2007). Indeed, it seems hard to deny
that certain grammatical phenomena can only be adequately described or
explained by referring to some formal property, such as structural complexity
(e.g. branching, structural depth, nesting, self-embedding). To some degree
‘structural complexity’ is a theory-internal notion, but it can nevertheless be
defined in language-independent terms: one can convert the degree of
morphological or syntactic complexity (e.g. utterance length or the number of
branches under a certain node) into a value that can be used to compare
morpho-syntactic entities across languages (Kirby 1997). In fact, the notion of
formal or structural complexity has often been used to explain grammatical
phenomena across languages. We have already mentioned Dryer’s Branching
Direction Theory, which distinguishes between branching and non-branching
categories, and Hawkins’ Heaviness Serialization Principle, according to which a
heavy (i.e. more complex) noun modifier such as a relative clause “exhibits more
or equal rightward positioning relative to the head noun across languages” than
a demonstrative or a numeral (Hawkins 1983: 90-91; see also Mallinson and
Blake 1981: 157). Another case in point is Dryer’s (1980) cross-linguistic study
that is concerned with differences between the position of simple NPs and the
position of sentential (i.e. complex) NPs. Simple and sentential NPs are formal
categories, as the distinction between simple and complex is made on the basis
of differences regarding the internal syntactic structure (Dryer 1980: 174). As a
final example of an explanation for a cross-linguistic phenomenon that crucially
refers to formal complexity, take Dik’s Principle of Increasing Complexity or a
more specific variant, the LIPOC principle:
(7) The Principle of Increasing Complexity (Dik 1997: 404):
There is preference for ordering constituents in an order of increasing
complexity.
LINGUISTIC TYPOLOGY: A SHORT HISTORY AND SOME CURRENT ISSUES
9
(8) Language-independent preferred order of constituents (LIPOC) (Dik 1997:
411):
Other things being equal, constituents prefer to be placed in an order of
increasing complexity, where complexity of constituents is defined as
follows:
(i) clitic < pronoun < NP < adp. phrase < subordinate clause;
(ii) for any category X: X < X coordinator X;
(iii) for any categories X and Y: X < X subordinator Y.
Since linguistic signs have a form and a meaning component (Saussure 1916), it
is perhaps only to be expected that both formal and meaning or ‘content’-based
criteria are needed for cross-linguistic research. Furthermore, it seems that both
form and content-based categories suffer from the same problem: at a superficial
level of analysis there will always be differences between individual languages,
both with regard to matters of form and meaning, where ‘meaning’ covers both
coded meaning (semantics) and inferred or contextualized meaning
(pragmatics).11 But since it is possible to abstract away from more or less
superficial differences in form or meaning (what counts as ‘superficial’ largely
depends on one’s theoretical perspective), one can find always similarities
(‘universals’ if you want) as well at some level of analysis.
We saw that the problem of cross-linguistic identifiability is often attributed to
the observation that it is difficult to know that one is dealing with the same or
comparable forms or structures across languages. For that reason some have
questioned the usefulness of formal categories (e.g. Haspelmath 2007), but
others have pointed out that concept or meaning-based categories are not
‘universal’ either (Song 2001: 11; Newmeyer 2007).12 Rather than argue for or
against the usefulness of formal or semantic categories in typology, I would like
to propose that linguistic typology also requires functional categories to describe
and explain grammatical phenomena within and across languages. This seems
particularly true for syntactic typology, where the functional category label
would specify the relation of an element to the construction in which it occurs
(Dik 1997: 126-127).13 For example, certain modifiers in the noun phrase can be
given the functional label ‘classifying modifier’ in that these modifiers serve to
(further) specify what kind of entity is denoted by the head noun, such as annual
in annual report, presidential in presidential election, electric in electric train, or social
JAN RIJKHOFF
10
in social security.14 These examples all involve members of the word class
‘adjective’, but notice that classifying adjectives differ from qualifying adjectives
(like nice in nice clothes) in a number of ways (Rijkhoff 2008; Rijkhoff
forthcoming). For instance, classifying adjectives do not admit intensifiers,
comparison, or predicative position (Quirk et al. 1985: 1339):
(9) an electric train vs. *a very electric train
(cf. very nice clothes)
(10) a medical examination vs. *a more medical examination
(cf. nicer clothes)
(11) the corporate lawyer vs. *the lawyer is corporate
(cf. these clothes are nice)
The following examples show that members of other formal categories, such as
prepositional phrases (PPs) or genitives (examples 12-14), can also serve as
CLASSIFYING MODIFIERS in English and other languages (Rijkhoff 2008: 84-85):
English
(12) a. a dog’s tail
b. a house of sin15
Swedish (Koptjevskaja-Tamm 2003: 539-40)
(13) a. En folk-et-s teater
a:C people-DEF.C-GEN theatre
‘a theatre for the people’
Lithuanian (Koptjevskaja-Tamm 2002: 155)
(14) a. duon-os peilis
bread-GEN knife
‘a bread knife’
Even though members of the functional category CLASSIFYING MODIFIER may
belong to different form classes (adjective, prepositional phrase, case-marked
noun), they share certain grammatical properties (Rijkhoff 2008: 84-88). Thus,
classifying genitives such as woman’s in the English examples below (but notice
LINGUISTIC TYPOLOGY: A SHORT HISTORY AND SOME CURRENT ISSUES
11
that the same goes for e.g. Dutch) cannot be modified or used as a predicate
either, just like classifying adjectives:
CLASSIFYING POSSESSIVE modification:
(15) a. the pretty [woman’s hat] b. the [pretty woman’s] hat
(‘the kind of hat worn by women’) (non-classifying possessive)
CLASSIFYING POSSESSIVE predicative position:
(16) a. a woman’s hat b. *that hat is a woman’s
These examples show that functional categories like CLASSIFYING MODIFIER
allow us to capture grammatical differences between members of the same form
class (e.g. adjectives, as in examples 9-11) and grammatical similarities between
members of different form classes (e.g. adjectives, prepositional phrases and
genitives, as in examples 9-16), both within and across languages. It has recently
been demonstrated that classifying modifiers and members of other functional
modifier categories (qualifying modifiers, localizing modifiers) can be
successfully characterized by positive or negative values for three grammatical
features: MODIFICATION, REFERENCE and PREDICATION (Rijkhoff
forthcoming). In sum, typology (and linguistics in general) also requires
functional categories to account for grammatical phenomena.
3.2. Some recent developments
This section mentions two recent developments in typology: (1) increased
awareness of the importance of language sampling procedures and (2) the use of
semantic maps.16
In the last few decades, we have seen an increased interest in sampling methods
for typological research (Song 2001: 17-41; Croft 2007: 80-82). Bell (1978) is
probably the first major systematic discussion of language sampling, followed by
Dryer (1989) and Bybee and her associates (Bybee 1985, Bybee et al. 1994), in
particular Perkins (1989, 2001). Rijkhoff et al. (1992) and Rijkhoff and Bakker
(1998) discuss different kinds of language samples and propose a sampling
design procedure for what they call ‘variety samples’ (as opposed to e.g.
‘probability samples’ or ‘random samples’). Variety samples are particularly
useful for explorative research: when little is known about the grammatical
JAN RIJKHOFF
12
phenomenon under investigation, it is important that the sample offers a
maximum degree of linguistic variation. Probability samples, which are used to
find correlation pairs or to establish the probability of occurrence of some
linguistic phenomenon, pose special problems because they must be free of
genetic, areal, cultural and typological bias (Rijkhoff and Bakker 1998: 265):17
[…], even in a relatively small sample it is practically
impossible to avoid the inclusion of languages that are not
somehow genetically related or spoken in the same region
[note omitted]. Several attempts have been made to deal
with this problem (Perkins 1980, Dryer 1989, Nichols 1992),
but basically there are only two ways out. Either a small
sample is used which, however, is not quite representative
with respect to the genetic, areal, and/or cultural diversity
(cf. Perkins 1980). Or a large sample is used and genetic,
areal, and/or cultural relationships are manipulated so as to
meet the requirements on statistical tests (e.g. Dryer 1992:
83). Essentially, however, there does not seem to be a real
solution.
A more recent development in typology is the employment of semantic maps,
which builds on ideas already developed in the context of research on semantic
fields and networks (van der Auwera and Temürcü 2006: 131-132). A semantic
map model represents all the meanings of some form (often called ‘marker’), the
essential idea being that “multiple uses of a marker are related in a systematic
and universal way” (van der Auwera and Temürcü 2006: 131). Since the various
meanings of some formal element are deemed to cover the same (‘universal’)
semantic space in all languages, semantic maps are believed to be powerful tools
in the analysis of cross-linguistic variation (van der Auwera and Plungian 1998:
79; see also Haspelmath 2003, 2007).
Since a short introduction is not the place for a detailed presentation of the
broad field of linguistic typology, I have only given a few examples of current
issues and recent developments in typology.18 Many more examples could have
been given, such as the use of scales or hierarchies (e.g. Greenberg 1966: 102;
Silverstein 1976; Dik 1997: 27-41; Harley and Ritter 2002; Filimonova 2005) or
the increased interest in other (i.e. non-syntactic) typologies such as areal,
lexical, semantic, or prosodic typology.19
The four articles of this issue nicely illustrate the wide range of problems that are
being addressed in linguistic typology (it must be emphasized, however, that
LINGUISTIC TYPOLOGY: A SHORT HISTORY AND SOME CURRENT ISSUES
13
there is often considerable overlap between the various subareas of linguistic
typology). Fortescue’s contribution is centrally concerned with polysynthesis
and more generally with morphological typology, which has a long tradition
that directly goes back to Schlegel, Humboldt and other great linguists of the 18th
and 19th century (Evans/Sasse 2002). Mosel investigates the typologically
remarkable properties of ditransitive and applicative constructions in Teop, an
Oceanic language of Bougainville (Papua New Guinea). Both construction types
fall under the notion ‘alignment’ (the comparison of the properties of arguments
across constructions), a phenomenon that typically belongs to lexical typology
(Malchukov et al. 2007; Donohue/Wichmann eds. 2008; Haig 2008). The title of
Herslund’s article about verbs and nouns in Danish and French indicates that his
contribution is also a lexical typological investigation. Since his research is
firmly based on insights from cognitive approaches to grammar, one could,
however, also argue that it is a study in cognitive typology (the first International
Conference on Cognitive Typology was held in 2000 in Antwerp, Belgium). Canger’s
article can be regarded as in an instance of semantic typology, as it discusses the
meaning and use of certain morphemes in Tacuapan Nawatl (a Mayan language)
and investigates to what extent one can identify a ‘shared function’ for each
form.
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Bell, Alan (1978), “Language Samples”, in: Greenberg, Joseph H. et al. (eds.)
(1978), Universals of Human Languages, Vol. 1: Method – Theory, Stanford:
Stanford University Press, pp. 123-156.
Bybee, Joan L. (1985), Morphology: a Study of the Relation between Meaning and
Form, Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Bybee, Joan L., Revere D. Perkins, William Pagliuca (1994), The Evolution of
Grammar: Tense, Aspect, and Modality in the Languages of the World, Chicago:
The University of Chicago Press.
Comrie, Bernard (1981), Language Universals and Linguistic Typology, Oxford:
Blackwell.
Croft, William (1990), Typology and Universals, Cambridge: Cambridge University
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Croft, William (1995), “Modern Syntactic Typology”, in: Shibatani, Masayoshi,
Theodora Bynon (eds.) (1995), Approaches to Language Typology, Oxford:
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Croft, William (2003), Typology and Universals, 2nd ed., Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
JAN RIJKHOFF
14
Croft, William (2007), “Typology and Linguistic Theory in the Past Decade: A
Personal View”, Linguistic Typology 11/1 (2007), pp. 79-91.
Dahl, Östen (2001), “Principles of Areal Typology”, in: Haspelmath, Martin,
Ekkehard König, Wulf Oesterreicher, Wolfgang Raible (eds.) (2001), Language
Typology and Linguistic Universals – an International Handbook, Vol. 1,
Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter, pp. 1456-1470.
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edited by Kees Hengeveld), Part 1, The Structure of the Clause, Berlin/New
York: Mouton de Gruyter.
Donohue, Mark, Søren Wichmann (eds.) (2008), The Typology of Semantic
Alignment, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Dryer, Matthew S. (1980), “The Positional Tendencies of Sentential Noun
Phrases in Universal Grammar”, The Canadian Journal of Linguistics 5/2
(1980), pp. 124-195.
Dryer, Matthew S. (1989), “Large Linguistic Areas and Language Sampling”,
Studies in Language 13/2 (1989), pp. 257-292.
Dryer, Matthew S. (1992), “The Greenbergian Word Order Correlations”,
Language 68/1 (1992), pp. 81-138.
Evans, Nicholas, Hans-Jürgen Sasse (eds.) (2002), Problems of Polysynthesis, Berlin:
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NOTES
1 I am grateful to Bill McGregor for helpful comments on an earlier draft. Abbreviations
used in this article: A = adjective, adp. phrase = adpositional phrase, BDT = Branching
Direction Theory, C = common gender, Def = Definite, Dem = demonstrative, G/Gen =
genitive, N = noun, NP = noun phrase, Num = numeral, O = object, Postp =
postposition, PP = prepositional phrase, Prep = preposition, Rel/RC = relative clause, S =
subject, V = verb, VP = verb phrase.
2 Notice furthermore that Blackwell’s Language and Linguistics Compass has a special
section on typology and that there are grammar series such as the Mouton Grammar
Library, which provide essential data for the cross-linguistic research.
3 See Croft (1990: 53-63; 2003: 344-346) for a detailed discussion of notions ‘dominance’
and ‘harmony’. As noted in Plank (2007a: 45), Greenberg (1966) was not the first to
observe word order correlations (see e.g. Schmidt 1919, 1926).
4 See Dryer (1992) and Rijkhoff (2004: 227) for counter-examples to some of Hawkins’
implications.
5 See Hawkins’ Principle of Cross-Category Harmony (Hawkins 1983: Chapter 4).
6 Additionally Hawkins (1983: 93) proposed the Mobility Principle according to which
demonstratives, numerals, and adjectives can move around the head noun more easily
than relative clauses (Rel) and possessor NPs (Gen).
7 See Perkins (2001: 432) for a critical assessment of the statistical aspects of Dryer’s
sampling technique.
8 The possibility that structural complexity is an iconic reflection of semantic or
conceptual complexity is irrelevant here.
9 For a more detailed discussion of categories in the context of Branching Direction
Theory, see Rijkhoff (2004: 278-290).
JAN RIJKHOFF
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10 See also Song (2001: 12-15) on Keenan and Comrie’s (1977) definition of relative
clauses.
11 The claim that semantic categories (i.e. what Haspelmath 2007: 119, 126 would call
‘substance-based categories’) are ‘universal’ is probably too strong. It may be true for
highly abstract grammatical categories like Tense or Mood, but there are considerable
problems with the substance approach to categorization in the case of e.g. semantic
roles, word classes or, more concretely, ‘simple’ word meanings.
12 Haspelmath (2003: 212) and others use ‘function’ to cover both the coded and the
contextual meaning. Furthermore, it seems that the terms ‘meaning’ and ‘concept’ are
often used interchangeably (e.g. Haspelmath 2007: 128). I believe it is important to
distinguish between ‘meaning’ and ‘function’, and between linguistic and conceptual
(i.e. non-linguistic) meanings.
13 Notice that members of formal or semantic categories are NON-RELATIONAL entities
like ‘NP’ (“structure headed by a noun”) or ‘Recipient’ (“the entity into whose
possession something is transferred” – Dik 1997: 121).
14 This use of the notion ‘functional’ is rather similar to the way it was used by linguists
of the Prague School, who were “seeking to understand what jobs the various
components were doing […]” (Sampson 1980: 104).
15 In fact, a dog’s tail is ambiguous, meaning either ‘a particular kind of tail’ (classifying)
or ‘the tail of an unidentified canine’.
16 Widmann/Bakker (2006) compare several language samples, but the standard that they
used to evaluate the samples (or rather: sampling methods) is based on a large number
of languages that is not very representative of the world’s languages (the complete list
can be found at http://www.zompist.com/numbers.shtml). Apparently no selection
procedure was used to construct this sample, as the goal was simply to include as many
languages as possible.
17 Problems of probability sampling are discussed in Maslova (2000).
18 A recent issue of Linguistic Typology (2007, Vol. 11/1) is devoted to the question “where
typology stands and where it is, or ought to be, going” (Plank 2007a: 1).
19 See e.g. Dahl (2001), Gil (1986), Hengeveld et al. (2004: 528), Lehmann (1990),
Levinson et al. (2003), Majid et al. (2006).
