Word Order Typology in Baboli Dialect

Abstract

In word order typology, different languages are studied with respect to the order and sequence of their constituents and the classification and comparison of languages is carried out based on these orders. The present study describes word order in Baboli dialect in the framework of Dryer (1992). Data collection was done by both recording the answers provided by 10 local informants, 5 city dwellers, and 5 villagers to the questionnaire prepared for the present study and interviewing the aforementioned informants. The results indicated that compared with languages in its own geographical area (i.e. Eurasia), Baboli keeps a balance between the number of verb-medial (VO) and verb-final (OV) criteria, having 17 of each. In comparison with the languages of the world, though, Baboli has 16 criteria relevant to verb-final languages and 15 criteria relevant to verb-medial languages, showing a slight tendency towards verb-final languages. These results differ from those of contemporary Persian whose dominant tendency is towards verb-medial (VO) languages in comparison with both Eurasia languages- 12 criteria relevant to verb-final languages and 17 criteria relevant to verb-medial languages- and world languages- 15 criteria relevant to verb-final languages and 19 criteria relevant to verb-medial languages.

Keywords

• language typology
• word order
• baboli dialect