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| Linguistic typology |
|---|
| Morphological |
| Morphosyntactic |
| Word order |
| Lexicon |
| Word order |
English equivalent |
Proportion of languages |
Example languages | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SOV | "Cows grass eat." | 45% | Ancient Greek, Bengali, Burmese, Hindi/ Urdu, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Oromo, Persian, Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu, Turkish, etc | |
| SVO | "Cows eat grass." | 42% | Chinese, English, French, Hausa, Hebrew, Arabic, Italian, Malay, Portuguese, Spanish, Swahili, Thai, Vietnamese, etc | |
| VSO | "Eat cows grass." | 9% | Biblical Hebrew, Classical Arabic, Filipino, Ge式ez, Irish, M膩ori, Tuareg-Berber, Welsh | |
| VOS | "Eat grass cows." | 3% | Car, Fijian, Malagasy, Q始eqchi始, Ter锚na | |
| OVS | "Grass eat cows." | 1% | Hixkaryana, Urarina | |
| OSV | "Grass cows eat." | 0% | Tobati, Warao | |
| Frequency distribution of word order in languages surveyed by Russell S. Tomlin in the 1980s [1] [2] () | ||||
In linguistic typology, object鈥搒ubject鈥搗erb (OSV) or object鈥揳gent鈥搗erb (OAV) is a classification of languages, based on whether the structure predominates in pragmatically neutral expressions. An example of this would be "Oranges Sam ate."
Unmarked word order
Natural languages
OSV is rarely used in unmarked sentences, which use a normal word order without emphasis. Most languages that use OSV as their default word order come from the Amazon basin, such as Xavante, Jamamadi, Apurin茫, Warao, Kayab铆 and Nad毛b. [3] Here is an example from Apurin茫: [3]
anana
pineapple
nota
I
apa
fetch
I fetch a pineapple
British Sign Language (BSL) normally uses topic鈥揷omment structure, but its default word order when topic鈥揷omment structure is not used is OSV.
Marked word order
 |
Various languages allow OSV word order but only in marked sentences, which emphasise part or all of the sentence.
Arabic
Classical Arabic is generally VSO but allows OSV in marked sentences (ones using traditional Arabic declension). For example, Verse 5 of Al-Fatiha reads:
廿賽賷賻賾丕賰賻
Iyy膩ka
2MSG. ACC
賳賻毓賿亘購丿購
na士budu
1PL.worship. IPFV. IND
賵賻廿賽賷賻賾丕賰賻
wa=iyy膩ka
and= 2MSG. ACC
賳賻爻賿鬲賻毓賽賷賳購.
nasta士墨n.
1PL.ask.for.help. IPFV. IND
You alone we worship, and You alone we ask for help.
The construction is less used in Modern Standard Arabic, which tends not to use marked sentences, and is generally absent in the colloquial varieties of Arabic, which are generally not declined and tend to observe strict SVO order.
Chinese
Passive constructions in Chinese follow an OSV (OAV) pattern through the use of the particle 琚:
杩欎釜
Zh猫ge
this
姗樺瓙
j煤zi
orange
琚
b猫i
by
鎴
w菕
me
鍚
ch墨
eat
鎺
di脿o
浜
le
PFV
This orange was eaten by me.
 | This article may need to be rewritten to comply with Wikipedia's
quality standards. (September 2022) |
English
In English, object-subject-verb order is atypical but can be used for contrastive focus, as in: That car we bought at least five years ago. The other one we only bought last year. [4]
Finnish
Finnish has a remarkably lax word order [5] and so emphasis on the object is often marked simply by putting it first in the sentence. [6] The word by word translation in example (1) would be "you I love!" and expresses a contrast to maybe loving someone else.
Sinua
2SG. PTV
min盲
1SG. NOM
rakastan!
1SG.love. PRS. IND
"I love you!"
This word order is totally natural and quite often used for emphasis. Example (2) expresses the contrast of refusing to eat something else (like something more healthy).
Suklaata
chocolate. PTV
se
3. SG
kyll盲
INT
suostuu
3SG.consent. PRS. IND
sy枚m盲盲n
eat. ILL
"He instead consents to eating chocolate."
Hebrew
In Modern Hebrew, OSV is often used instead of the normal SVO to emphasise the object. 讗谞讬 讗讜讛讘 讗讜转讛 would mean "I love her", but "讗讜转讛 讗谞讬 讗讜讛讘" would mean "It is she whom I love". [7] Possibly an influence of Germanic (via Yiddish), as Jewish English uses a similar construction ("You, I like, kid") much more than many other varieties of English and often with the "it is" left implicit.
Hungarian
In Hungarian, OSV emphasises the subject:
A sz贸cikket 茅n szerkesztettem = The article/I/edited (It was I, not somebody else, who edited the article).
Korean and Japanese
Korean and Japanese have SOV by default, but since they are topic-prominent languages, they often seem to be OSV when the object is topicalized. Here is an example in Korean:
攴
geu
that
靷臣鈥撾姅
sagwa-neun
apple- TOP
Object
鞝溾撽皜
je-ga
I. POL- NOM
Subject
毹光撿棃鈥撿柎鈥撿殧
meog-eoss-eo-yo
eat- PST- DEC- POL
Verb
As for the apple, I ate it. (or) The apple, I ate.
An almost identical syntax is possible in Japanese:
銇濄伄
sono
that
銈娿倱銇斻偁銇
ringo-wa
apple- TOP
Object
绉併偁銇
watashi-ga
I. POL- NOM
Subject
As for the apple, I ate it. (or) The apple, I ate.
Malayalam
OSV is one of the permissible word orders in Malayalam, the other being SOV.
Portuguese
OSV is possible in Portuguese to emphasize the object.
De
of
ma莽茫
apple
Object
eu
I
Subject
n茫o
NEG
gosto
like- 1SG
Verb
I do not like apple
Turkish
OSV is used in Turkish to emphasize the subject:
yeme臒-i
meal- ACC
ben
I
pi艧ir-di-m
cook- PST- 1SG
It was I, not somebody else, who cooked the meal.
See also
- Subject鈥搊bject鈥搗erb
- Subject鈥搗erb鈥搊bject
- Object鈥搗erb鈥搒ubject
- Verb鈥搊bject鈥搒ubject
- Verb鈥搒ubject鈥搊bject
- Yoda, a popular Star Wars character who speaks in the object鈥搒ubject鈥搗erb word order
- Yoda conditions - a style of writing conditionals in computer programming languages
References
- ^ Meyer, Charles F. (2010). Introducing English Linguistics (Student ed.). Cambridge University Press.
- ^ Tomlin, Russell S. (1986). Basic Word Order: Functional Principles. London: Croom Helm. p. 22. ISBN 9780709924999. OCLC 13423631.
- ^ a b O'Grady, W. et al. Contemporary Linguistics (3rd edition, 1996) ISBN 0-582-24691-1
- ^ "Word order and focus". Retrieved 11 May 2023.
- ^ "Sanaj盲rjestys j盲sent盲盲 teksti盲 - Kielikello".
- ^ "Word order and basic noun cases 鈥 Hyv盲盲 P盲iv盲盲 Suomi documentation".
- ^ Friedmann, Naama; Shapiro, Lewis (April 2003). "Agrammatic comprehension of simple active sentence with moved constituents: Hebrew OSV and OVS structures". Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research. 46 (2): 288鈥97. doi: 10.1044/1092-4388(2003/023). PMC 3392331. PMID 14700372.
| This article has multiple issues. Please help
improve it or discuss these issues on the
talk page. (
Learn how and when to remove these template messages)
|
| Linguistic typology |
|---|
| Morphological |
| Morphosyntactic |
| Word order |
| Lexicon |
| Word order |
English equivalent |
Proportion of languages |
Example languages | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SOV | "Cows grass eat." | 45% | Ancient Greek, Bengali, Burmese, Hindi/ Urdu, Japanese, Korean, Latin, Oromo, Persian, Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu, Turkish, etc | |
| SVO | "Cows eat grass." | 42% | Chinese, English, French, Hausa, Hebrew, Arabic, Italian, Malay, Portuguese, Spanish, Swahili, Thai, Vietnamese, etc | |
| VSO | "Eat cows grass." | 9% | Biblical Hebrew, Classical Arabic, Filipino, Ge式ez, Irish, M膩ori, Tuareg-Berber, Welsh | |
| VOS | "Eat grass cows." | 3% | Car, Fijian, Malagasy, Q始eqchi始, Ter锚na | |
| OVS | "Grass eat cows." | 1% | Hixkaryana, Urarina | |
| OSV | "Grass cows eat." | 0% | Tobati, Warao | |
| Frequency distribution of word order in languages surveyed by Russell S. Tomlin in the 1980s [1] [2] () | ||||
In linguistic typology, object鈥搒ubject鈥搗erb (OSV) or object鈥揳gent鈥搗erb (OAV) is a classification of languages, based on whether the structure predominates in pragmatically neutral expressions. An example of this would be "Oranges Sam ate."
Unmarked word order
Natural languages
OSV is rarely used in unmarked sentences, which use a normal word order without emphasis. Most languages that use OSV as their default word order come from the Amazon basin, such as Xavante, Jamamadi, Apurin茫, Warao, Kayab铆 and Nad毛b. [3] Here is an example from Apurin茫: [3]
anana
pineapple
nota
I
apa
fetch
I fetch a pineapple
British Sign Language (BSL) normally uses topic鈥揷omment structure, but its default word order when topic鈥揷omment structure is not used is OSV.
Marked word order
|
Various languages allow OSV word order but only in marked sentences, which emphasise part or all of the sentence.
Arabic
Classical Arabic is generally VSO but allows OSV in marked sentences (ones using traditional Arabic declension). For example, Verse 5 of Al-Fatiha reads:
廿賽賷賻賾丕賰賻
Iyy膩ka
2MSG. ACC
賳賻毓賿亘購丿購
na士budu
1PL.worship. IPFV. IND
賵賻廿賽賷賻賾丕賰賻
wa=iyy膩ka
and= 2MSG. ACC
賳賻爻賿鬲賻毓賽賷賳購.
nasta士墨n.
1PL.ask.for.help. IPFV. IND
You alone we worship, and You alone we ask for help.
The construction is less used in Modern Standard Arabic, which tends not to use marked sentences, and is generally absent in the colloquial varieties of Arabic, which are generally not declined and tend to observe strict SVO order.
Chinese
Passive constructions in Chinese follow an OSV (OAV) pattern through the use of the particle 琚:
杩欎釜
Zh猫ge
this
姗樺瓙
j煤zi
orange
琚
b猫i
by
鎴
w菕
me
鍚
ch墨
eat
鎺
di脿o
浜
le
PFV
This orange was eaten by me.
| This article may need to be rewritten to comply with Wikipedia's
quality standards. (September 2022) |
English
In English, object-subject-verb order is atypical but can be used for contrastive focus, as in: That car we bought at least five years ago. The other one we only bought last year. [4]
Finnish
Finnish has a remarkably lax word order [5] and so emphasis on the object is often marked simply by putting it first in the sentence. [6] The word by word translation in example (1) would be "you I love!" and expresses a contrast to maybe loving someone else.
Sinua
2SG. PTV
min盲
1SG. NOM
rakastan!
1SG.love. PRS. IND
"I love you!"
This word order is totally natural and quite often used for emphasis. Example (2) expresses the contrast of refusing to eat something else (like something more healthy).
Suklaata
chocolate. PTV
se
3. SG
kyll盲
INT
suostuu
3SG.consent. PRS. IND
sy枚m盲盲n
eat. ILL
"He instead consents to eating chocolate."
Hebrew
In Modern Hebrew, OSV is often used instead of the normal SVO to emphasise the object. 讗谞讬 讗讜讛讘 讗讜转讛 would mean "I love her", but "讗讜转讛 讗谞讬 讗讜讛讘" would mean "It is she whom I love". [7] Possibly an influence of Germanic (via Yiddish), as Jewish English uses a similar construction ("You, I like, kid") much more than many other varieties of English and often with the "it is" left implicit.
Hungarian
In Hungarian, OSV emphasises the subject:
A sz贸cikket 茅n szerkesztettem = The article/I/edited (It was I, not somebody else, who edited the article).
Korean and Japanese
Korean and Japanese have SOV by default, but since they are topic-prominent languages, they often seem to be OSV when the object is topicalized. Here is an example in Korean:
攴
geu
that
靷臣鈥撾姅
sagwa-neun
apple- TOP
Object
鞝溾撽皜
je-ga
I. POL- NOM
Subject
毹光撿棃鈥撿柎鈥撿殧
meog-eoss-eo-yo
eat- PST- DEC- POL
Verb
As for the apple, I ate it. (or) The apple, I ate.
An almost identical syntax is possible in Japanese:
銇濄伄
sono
that
銈娿倱銇斻偁銇
ringo-wa
apple- TOP
Object
绉併偁銇
watashi-ga
I. POL- NOM
Subject
As for the apple, I ate it. (or) The apple, I ate.
Malayalam
OSV is one of the permissible word orders in Malayalam, the other being SOV.
Portuguese
OSV is possible in Portuguese to emphasize the object.
De
of
ma莽茫
apple
Object
eu
I
Subject
n茫o
NEG
gosto
like- 1SG
Verb
I do not like apple
Turkish
OSV is used in Turkish to emphasize the subject:
yeme臒-i
meal- ACC
ben
I
pi艧ir-di-m
cook- PST- 1SG
It was I, not somebody else, who cooked the meal.
See also
- Subject鈥搊bject鈥搗erb
- Subject鈥搗erb鈥搊bject
- Object鈥搗erb鈥搒ubject
- Verb鈥搊bject鈥搒ubject
- Verb鈥搒ubject鈥搊bject
- Yoda, a popular Star Wars character who speaks in the object鈥搒ubject鈥搗erb word order
- Yoda conditions - a style of writing conditionals in computer programming languages
References
- ^ Meyer, Charles F. (2010). Introducing English Linguistics (Student ed.). Cambridge University Press.
- ^ Tomlin, Russell S. (1986). Basic Word Order: Functional Principles. London: Croom Helm. p. 22. ISBN 9780709924999. OCLC 13423631.
- ^ a b O'Grady, W. et al. Contemporary Linguistics (3rd edition, 1996) ISBN 0-582-24691-1
- ^ "Word order and focus". Retrieved 11 May 2023.
- ^ "Sanaj盲rjestys j盲sent盲盲 teksti盲 - Kielikello".
- ^ "Word order and basic noun cases 鈥 Hyv盲盲 P盲iv盲盲 Suomi documentation".
- ^ Friedmann, Naama; Shapiro, Lewis (April 2003). "Agrammatic comprehension of simple active sentence with moved constituents: Hebrew OSV and OVS structures". Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research. 46 (2): 288鈥97. doi: 10.1044/1092-4388(2003/023). PMC 3392331. PMID 14700372.