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Language universals: Abstract but not mythological

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 October 2009

Mark C. Baker
Mark C. Baker
Affiliation:
Department of Linguistics, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ 08901. [email protected]://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~mabaker/
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Abstract

I present the so-called Verb-Object Constraint as a serious proposal for a true linguistic universal. It provides an example of the kind of abstraction in linguistic analysis that seems warranted, of how different languages can confirm such a universal in different ways, and why approaches that avoid all abstractness miss important linguistic generalizations.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 32 , Issue 5 , October 2009 , pp. 448 - 449
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

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