Discourse-related word order variation in Latvian
Discourse-related word order variation in Latvian
Author(s): Toms VoitsSubject(s): Language and Literature Studies, Theoretical Linguistics, Applied Linguistics, Syntax, Lexis, Baltic Languages
Published by: Latvijas Universitātes Akadēmiskais apgāds
Keywords: information structure; word order; Latvian; discourse;
Summary/Abstract: Latvian language is known to exhibit a fairly free word order. Although the base-generated word order of Latvian seems to be Subject-Verb-Object (SVO), due to the overt morphological marking it is possible to generate transitive sentences containing all possible word order vartiations (SVO, SOV, OVS, OSV, VSO and VOS). The present study aimed to confirm the hypothesis that the base-generated word order in Latvian is indeed SVO and test what discourse characteristics might drive the word order variation in this language. An experimental study was conducted surveying native Latvian speakers on their grammaticality judgements of different word orders across a variety of discourse contexts. Upon inspecting the data I propose a set of assumptions that regulate the word order of Latvian.
Journal: Valoda: nozīme un forma
- Issue Year: 2014
- Issue No: 5
- Page Range: 144-156
- Page Count: 13
- Language: Latvian