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- Title
Word-order and Constituent Structure in Naxi.
- Authors
Law, Paul
- Abstract
The superficial relatively free word-order in Naxi may give the impression that the language does not have much hierarchical structure the way English does. It is argued here that in fact Naxi has the same phrase structure as English, despite some differences in word-order. Evidence for constituency structure comes from certain diagnostics including coordination, ellipsis and movement. Binding and coreference facts, too, show that the subject indeed occurs in a structurally higher position than the object. A comparison with Japanese, a language that has the same basic SOV word-order further confirms the constituent structure and the structural positions of subject and object in Naxi, despite their other differences. The word-order in Naxi is not completely free, however. It is constrained by the presence of markers indicating the grammatical relations of the arguments, much like German.
- Subjects
NAXI language; ENGLISH language; GRAMMAR; LANGUAGES in China; LOLOISH languages
- Publication
Studies in Chinese Linguistics, 2013, Vol 34, Issue 3, p199
- ISSN
1017-1274
- Publication type
Article