Talk:Head-directionality parameter

AN

English adjectives precede nouns, which is head-final order. --JWB 19:40, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

i have traced who wrote it: by edition http://en.wiki.x.io/w/index.php?title=Head-directionality_parameter&diff=next&oldid=647391905&diffmode=source user:W. P. Uzer deleted "However, it is generally accepted that an adjective phrase that serves as an adjunct that occurs before a noun has a head-final structure.{{sfn|Sadler & Arnold|1994|pp=28–34}}" and added "is a strongly head-initial language". i would like just to edit it but i am lazy for now to search for an authoritative source. there is "{{sfn|Fukui|1994|p=4}}" reference that was already before this edition, it was for verb phrase example. now, it looks like also for the "strongly ...". maybe i will put there "where is source for this?" template, for the "strongly ...". --Qdinar (talk) 21:09, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

i made so, no source template: http://en.wiki.x.io/w/index.php?title=Head-directionality_parameter&diff=1061915239&oldid=1061597034 . Qdinar (talk) 21:27, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

This is all a long time ago so I don't remember exactly what my motivations were (except to tidy up after a massive bloating of the article by a class of students), and I don't have a strong opinion on the matter now, but two things that may be relevant: 1) the sentence you note that I deleted concerns adjective phrases, i.e. adjective and its own modifier (e.g. "very good" or "easy to draw"), it doesn't concern the adjective+noun situation; 2) this article defines the head-directionality parameter as dependent only on the order of heads and complements, so the order of heads and adjuncts (as in the adjective+noun case) is irrelevant. I don't know how standard that definition is or even if it can be claimed to be applied consistently within this article (as the difference between complements and adjuncts is not always clear). W. P. Uzer (talk) 21:39, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

i think the examle "extremely happy person" is both about adjective phrase and noun phrase. in the explanation there is "The entire adjective phrase acts acts as an adjunct to NP. However, it is generally accepted that an adjective phrase that serves as an adjunct that occurs before a noun has a head-final structure." . i do not understand "the adjective happy does not have a complement". see what it was before that edition: http://en.wiki.x.io/w/index.php?title=Head-directionality_parameter&oldid=647391905#English . i have looked at this with more attention now and now i see... in the image it is structured as [extremely [happy person]] , not [[extremely happy] person]], but i think really it is dubious. so, i think, they said that because of this. the image shows only 2 noun phrases, "happy person" and "extremely (... person)". i think, "the adjective happy does not have a complement" means that it is not structured as "[extremely happy]". and, i think, "an adjective phrase that serves as an adjunct that occurs before a noun has a head-final structure" means that if it was, it would also be a head-final phrase. (and i agree that it would be). --Qdinar (talk) 07:01, 26 December 2021 (UTC)

now, i think that image, , is wrong. i think "extremely" and "happy" should be joined together before their composition is joined with "person". is this image from an authoritative source? seems not. --Qdinar (talk) 18:46, 27 December 2021 (UTC)

Just wondering about example 16, the example is written 4x, but since it is an English example does it need to be written in that format?Cadicksh92 (talk) 18:07, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

Missing the point

I think the usage of the head notion in this stub misses the point of how syntax works. In syntactic terms, "clause" would translate to a Complementiser Phrase, but the head of such a phrase is (of course) the Complementiser node. Neither the subject nor the verb is even a candidate.

English is widely considered a head-initial language, because the syntax branches to the left. In layman's terms, the words on the right of the sentence form lesser units within larger units consisting of those words plus material to their left, and those larger units are embedded in yet larger units that include material further on the left, and so on.

A more sensible criticism of head directionality would be that in some languages, some phrases seem to branch to the left while others seem to branch to the right. For example, in Dutch, the CP branches to the right while the TP branches to the left (that is to say, in an embedded clause the complementiser is all the way on the left while the tensed verb is all the way on the right of the clause, while everything else is in between). Fyrius (talk) 14:09, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

By the way, I have the impression few syntacticians take the notion of a Head Directionality Parameter seriously any more anyway, nor the rest of the Principles and Parameters framework for that matter. Fyrius (talk) 14:12, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Japanese language

The honorific is missing in the Japanese language example. Names of people are always followed by an honorific unless an intended insult is implied. Also the conjugation iru for the verb denotes an infinitive or present perfect tense. The example reads: Jon is putting the book on the table. The example should read Jon-san wa taberu no ue ni hon o oiteimashita (ジョンさんはタベルの上に本を置いていました.） This assumes that the original English example is past perfect. The given example in Japanese assumes that Jon is still in the room and is going to use the book again. 202.166.21.151 (talk) 14:44, 1 September 2013 (UTC)

A problem with the examples in English and German and Japanese. The first two function from a time perspective equivalently. The Japanese example as it stands now is in simple past tense, not in present perfect (Japanese has present, present continuous, past and past continuous - there is no perfect construction in Japanese, the -teiru (-teimasu) or -teita (-teimashita) indicate the progressive construction ie is/am running, was/were running, also only present in German as the gerund, or in the presence of a different action ie Laufend, bin ich am schnellsten.). Therefore, a consistent example would have been to use simple past tense in both English and German. However, since the point is not to translate the tenses correctly but rather than Head Directionality, this is probably moot. However as a direct translation, it is incorrect. 14:44, 1 September 2013 (UTC)

UBC C2 Contributions

We're a group of undergraduates from the University of British Columbia taking a course in introductory syntax. Expanding this article is our main research project for the semester. If you have any constructive feedback, we would welcome that a lot! Please recommend any papers that you think would help us expand this article. All citations are in APA style. Xmizuro (talk) 04:50, 3 October 2014 (UTC) Tsadler00 (talk) 04:35, 3 October 2014 (UTC) Ziyasummer (talk) 04:58, 3 October 2014 (UTC) LingAnthNerd (talk) 05:02, 3 October 2014 (UTC) FulcoE (talk) 05:04, 3 October 2014 (UTC)

Annotated Bibliography

The following articles are listed as possible reference and expansion points to help enhance this stub.

Coates, J. (1971). Denominal adjectives: A study in syntactic relationships between modifier and head. Lingua, 27, 160-169. doi:10.1016/0024-3841(71)90084-2

The main focus of this article is on understanding the different types of adjectives and nouns, and comparing the location of the semantic stress in compound words in English to discover which part is the head. By using a few compound words in an evaluation matrix, the author examines larger linguistic patterns. This article extends the understand of the Wikipedia article beyond just larger syntactic trees and looks into phenomena that may have started out as lexical and functional words but have been combined into a single world in common orthography. This goes further to challenge people to think beyond the orthography to what headedness actually means syntactically and semantically. The author’s focus on English examples limits his perspective to attempting to establish rules without actually seeing if they are universal or otherwise. The article extends the breadth of the Wikipedia article despite its minor scope limitations.

Ernst, T. (1992). Phrase structure and directionality in Irish. Journal of Linguistics, 28(2), 415-443. doi:10.1017/S0022226700015279

Ernst argues that the head parameter not only specifies whether the entire language is head initial or head final, but rather languages may have multiple head parameters which exist for the complements, specifiers, and adjuncts. This article gives a detailed analysis of Irish to demonstrate the different head parameters. For our project, this demonstrates why not all languages are definite in their head parameter. It also suggests that head parameter can be free. The author writes using the perspective of Universal Grammar as a device to explain the differences in word order. The evidence to support the argument in the paper is mostly Irish. The detailed analysis is very strong, but the use of a single language weakens the generalization. Applying this theory to other languages would strengthen its argument that multiple head parameters exist within one language.

Flynn, S., & Espinal, I. (1985). Head-initial/head-final parameter in adult Chinese L2 acquisition of English. Second Language Research, 1(2), 93-117. doi:10.1177/026765838500100201

The authors investigate the relationship between head parameter and second language acquisition. They argue that head parameter is different from the parameter that governs word order. They also argue that speakers re-adjust their head parameter to suit the secondary language that they are learning. Regarding the Wikipedia article, this paper will demonstrate head parameter’s association with language acquisition, and a perspective that treats head parameter as separate from word order (This will be an opposing view from other articles that treat them as the same parameter) . This paper is written from the perspective of Universal Grammar, thus the head parameter is used to explain language acquisition. It also supports the parameter-setting model for second language acquisition created by Flynn. One weakness of this article is that the results are only interpreted through Universal Grammar. However, this article contains a well-designed experiment, logical arguments, and data from other languages that strengthen their arguments.

Fukui, N. (1993). Parameters and optionality. Linguistic Inquiry, 24(3), 399-420. Retrieved from: <http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/stable/4178821>

Fukui argues that in a head-initial language such as English, leftward movement of an object requires an obligatory driving force (topicalization/wh-movement) because it goes against the parameter value CPR = X0 > ymax, while rightward movement maintains the value and thus can be optional. However, in head-final Japanese, the opposite result is found (with CPR = Ymax > X0). Further, Japanese does not contain a movement which would force a clause rightward over a head, thus Japanese is very strictly head-final. This article will help to determine the importance of head directionality through the application of Fukui’s movement experiment. This is written fairly formal tone is used, and is very well thought-out and thorough. However, the language used is pretty technical, lending to a more intermediate-level read for a scholarly audience. Fukui applies the theory to another language outside the comparative Japanese and English; however, I would like to see other language families (with respectively varying head parameters) analyzed using this theory to see its results when Universally applied.

Hsieh, H. (1977). Noun-modifier order as a consequence of VSO order. Lingua, 42(2-3), 91-109. doi:10.1016/0024-3841(77)90021-3

This article investigates the correlation between head direction in NPs and cross-linguistic basic word orders. The author argues that the head-initial structure of NPs arises from verb-initial arrangement of basic word orders in sentences, instead of the verb-object order in VPs. To prove this claim, the author conducted a wide range of surveys in various language families and subfamilies. With comprehensive cross-linguistic evidences, this article invalidates the previous hypothesis of how verb-object sequence results in head-initial NPs. From a typological linguistics perspective, the author provides a compelling characterization of the correlation between head direction and the basic word order in a variety of languages across the world. His argument strengthens the foundation for comparative syntax. His findings expand the horizon for future head directional studies. Although this study was conducted in 1970s, to the readers, the rigorous logic, the large scale of investigation, and the straightforward approaches all make this article very impressive and convincing.

Ledgeway, A. (2012). From Latin to Romance: Configurationality, functional categories and Head‐Marking. Transactions of the Philological Society, 110(3), 422-442. doi:10.1111/j.1467-968X.2012.01310.x

Ledgeway explores some of the language shifts between Latin and Romance languages. Specifically, he argues against the idea that most of the structural differences resulted from a shift from a synthetic language to an analytic one. Rather, the change was a combination of shifting to a more analytic language and developing more internal structure. This article helps show how X-bar theory relates different languages to each other and how syntactic structure is tied to language change, which would help expand the scope of the Wikipedia article to include historical linguistics. It also explains how some languages can appears to be un-directional, when really the language just allows more than one location for the head. Written with a focus on historical linguistics, the article shows the flexibility of languages and how relatively new theories contribute understanding to “dead” languages as well as living ones. Overall, the well-written structure contributes to the understanding of the reader and the tree-diagrams are really helpful when trying to understand the linguistic significance of hierarchical vs. linear linguistic structure. It would be interesting to see how other synthetic languages do or do not require the head parameter.

Liu, H. (2010). Dependency direction as a means of word-order typology: A method based on dependency treebanks. Lingua, 120(6), 1567-1578. doi:10.1016/j.lingua.2009.10.001

The main goals of this article are to introduce a method for word-order typology based on dependency treebanks, and to demonstrate how this method could improve traditional language typology studies. Previous word-order typological studies usually classify languages into a limited number of discrete types based on the linear order and binary relation of grammatical elements. The author in this article, however, proposes a statistical and corpus-based approach that is proved can provide more complete and fine-grained typological analysis about head directional distribution. The results imply that languages can be typologized along a continuum with head-initial and head-final as the two ends. Several considerable factors might slightly influence the results (such as the annotation scheme and the genre variety in the selection of some samples), but overall, this study provides us a novel and advanced approach for modern language typology, as well as for characterizing head directional parameters cross-linguistically in this Wikipedia article.

O’Grady, W., Lee, M., & Choo, M. (2001). The acquisition of relative clauses by heritage and non-heritage learners of Korean as a second language: A comparative study. Journal of Korean Language Education, 12(2), 283-294. Retrieved from: <http://isites.harvard.edu/fs/docs/icb.topic723567.files/Korean%20RC_ogrady_lee_choo.pdf>

The goal of the paper is to investigate the ability of recognize heads and their relative clause structures in Korean and to compare this ability between heritage and non-heritage learners. Using data gathered through a comprehension experiment, the author guides the readers through syntactic heads, and the discerned meanings; it also shows how English head-initial relative clauses is easier to learn than Korean head-final relative clauses. This paper adds onto our topic by investigating the magnitude of importance head-parameters has on both form and function of language. Providing information on the importance of the head parameter in Korean syntax, this paper also shows how heritage learners do not have any apparent advantage over non-heritage learners (they usually do in areas of vocabulary, pronunciation, comprehension). The detailed analysis of data as well as a rich use of (referenced) previous research is contrasted by the limited use of examples (most likely due the narrow focus of this paper).

Rijkhoff, J. (1986), “Word order universals revisited: the principle of head proximity.” Belgian Journal of Linguistics, 1, 95-125. Retrieved from: <http://forskningsbasen.deff.dk/Share.external?sp=Sdffcf950-a4a8-11da-bee9-02004c4f4f50&sp=Sau>

Rijkhoff looks at Principle of Head-Proximity as the main drive behind the constituent ordering in syntax. This article supports how PHP and its Principles of Constituent Ordering can be applied to other phenomena that were previously treated separately, and further simplifies the theory because PHP approach reduces the number of Principles of Constituent Ordering. This reduction is a secondary effect that applies over the whole syntactic analysis. Rijkhoff, by analyzing the PHP, sheds new light on the head-parameter and the structures with which it is linked. Moreover, it also offers an insight into the evolution of syntactic analysis. The author uses peer-reviewed data and theories, and writes to an audience of scholars, hence his point of view is strictly academic. This article’s style is intuitive and it flows well because the reader is carried through the different steps and easily grasps concepts proposed, reaching the article’s purpose with minimal confusion.

Takano, Yuji. (2003). How antisymmetric is syntax? Linguistic Inquiry, 34(3), 516-526. doi:10.1162/ling.2003.34.3.516

This article argues for the validity of an Antisymmetric Syntax: what is structurally higher in formation must linearly precede what is lower in formation. Antisymmetry only subjects structures which are formed by Chomsky’s Set-Merge (complements and specifiers) to disallow rightward movement, while those formed through Pair-Merge (adjunction structures) can form in either direction. This article expands on Richard Kayne’s work through the order of syntactic structures and the movement allowed therein. This article provides insight into the part head directionality plays in determining in which direction movement may take place, without violating the parameter (unless there is a rule allowing it to do so). This is informally written, with data taken from other articles. It offers an objective point of view attempting to support antisymmetric syntax, but without dismissing results which may be contradictory. This work does not offer any original data or experimentation, and focuses exclusively on head-initial English sentences. A comparative argument with head-final examples would benefit further study.

Takita, K. (2009). If Chinese is head-initial, Japanese cannot be. Journal of East Asian Linguistics, 18(1), 41-61. doi:10.1007/s10831-009-9038-z

The author approaches the word order in Japanese relative to the one in Mandarin Chinese after many languages (including Mandarin Chinese) were found to be underlyingly head-initial. The author argues that Japanese is genuinely head-final and that the Universal Grammar is equipped with a directionality parameter admitting both head-final and head-initial languages. This is in turn relevant to our topic, helping us supplement information on Head Parameter universality. Moreover, the more cross-linguistic references and data present, the more reliable our project grows. Takita’s approach is very objective, taking into account previous research and contemporary views. However, it seems that this study was written for academic-use mostly, as it references previous approaches and theories built on syntax. She offers enough data to prove her claim, yet the glossing and translations can be overwhelming at times. Conclusively, her study straightforwardly approaches her prediction concluding that Head Parameter is present in the Universal Grammar; this is a great approach as it states both goals and thinking process.

References

• Coates, J. (1971). "Denominal adjectives: A study in syntactic relationships between modifier and head". Lingua. 27: 160–169. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Flynn, S.; Espinal, I. (1985). "Head-initial/head-final parameter in adult Chinese L2 acquisition of English". Second Language Research. 1 (2): 93–117. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help) [1]
• Fukui, N. (1993). "Parameters and optionality". Linguistic Inquiry. 24 (3): 399–420. JSTOR 4178821. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Hoeksema, J. (1992). "The head parameter in morphology and syntax". Language and cognition. 2: 119–132. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help) [2]
• Hsieh, H. (1977). "Noun-modifier order as a consequence of VSO order". Lingua. 42 (2–3): 91–109. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help) [3]
• Ledegeway, A. (2012). "From Latin to Romance: Configurationality, functional categories and Head Marking". Transactions of the Philological Society. 110 (3): 422–442. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Liu, H. (2010). "Dependency direction as a means of word-order typology: A method based on dependency treebanks". Lingua. 120 (6): 1567–1578. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help) [4]
• O'Grady, W.; Lee, M.; Choo, M. (2001). "The acquisition of relative clauses by heritage and non-heritage learners of Korean as a second language: A comparative study". Journal of Korean Language Education. 12: 283–294. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help) [5]
• Rijkhoff, J. (1986). "Word order universals revisited: the principle of Head Proximity". Belgian Journal of Linguistics. 1: 95–125. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help) [6]
• Takita, K. (2009). "If Chinese is head-initial, Japanese cannot be". Journal of East Asian Linguistics. 18 (1): 41–61. JSTOR 40345242. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)

Some more references

I checked the Handbook of Contemporary Syntactic Theory and there's only one paper on phrase structure but you have cited the author (Fukui)'s work. He has incorporated it in his 2005 book "Theoretical Comparative Syntax Studies in Macroparameters" http://www.tandfebooks.com.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/isbn/9780203479179. I added other references which are contra (directionality) parameter fyi.

• Kayne, Richard (1994). The Antisymmetry of Syntax Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
• Kayne, Richard S. 2013. Why are there no directionality parameters? Studies in Chinese Linguistics 34(1): 3-37.
• Newmeyer, F. 2004. Against a parameter setting approach to typological variation. http://people.ds.cam.ac.uk/mtb23/nsp/Newmeyer%20LVYB%20final.pdf

The below book seems to cover detailed background on different approaches to word order including head directionality, but it's on loan.

• Song, Jae Jung. 2012. Word order. http://webcat2.library.ubc.ca/vwebv/holdingsInfo?bibId=5852545

Also, note to cite the source of the parameter, e.g.,

• Chomsky, Noam, and Lasnik, Howard. 1993. "The theory of principles and parameters." In: Jacobs, Joachim et al. (eds.), Syntax, vol. 1, 506-569. Berlin: de Gruyter.

--Lingfan (talk) 02:37, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Possible Article Outline

1. Brief introduction to headedness, what is it? where does the idea come from? Why is this important linguistically?
2. Directionality - What is this? Why is this important? What does does it say about a language? what does it say about languages?
3. Levels of headedness

• Within compound words
• Word Order
• Phrases
• Movement
• Asymmetric Syntax

1. Headedness and language acquisition?
2. Language Typology

• Comparing different languages (like the Chinese vs. Japanese one)?
• Latin to Romance languages

1. Significance in Syntax

• Head proximity?

Thoughts or suggestions of things to include or ordering suggestions? LingAnthNerd (talk) 15:20, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

Such a version of the article would include too much information. The notion of a head is established in the article on the head; the notion of heads in phrases is established in the article on phrases; the notion of movement is established in the article on movement; etc. This article can and should be brief, but it should contain links to these other articles. --Tjo3ya (talk) 23:57, 10 October 2014 (UTC)

I think the idea would be to have a brief outline of those things, nothing terribly lengthy (really only a few sentences). Plus, while those topics are covered in other articles, a brief summary for why they support the idea of headedness would still be relevant to the article. The idea would still be to link to the other articles for a more in-depth discussion. LingAnthNerd (talk) 22:52, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

I can describe a mistake that beginning linguists make when they try to produce such an article. They inevitably end up trying to describe and explain concepts that established linguists have no difficulty at all with. A beginning linguist will thus attempt to explain what the head of a phrase is in such an article because he/she is learning the concept for the first time. That is unnecessary, since if one does not understand what a head is, one should go to the article on heads. Same comment is valid for movement. Established linguists know what movement is supposed to be; there is no need to explain it in an article like this. If the reader does not understand what movement is, he or she should go to the article on movement.

In contrast, a section on language typology is indeed appropriate for this article. In this regard however, the sources listed above omit perhaps the most important one when it comes to head-directionality. Lucien Tesniere may have been the first linguist to systematically classify languages into head-initial, head-final, and mitigated types. He classified approximately 200 languages into these categories in the 1930s. The Chomskyan tradition does its best to ignore Tesniere's contribution, since the theory of syntax Tesniere developed is antithetical to key aspects of the phrase structure approach associated with the Chomskyans. Chapters 12-14 in Tesniere's book (1959) are the relevant ones. Tesniere wrote in French, but an English translation of his book will be available from John Benjamins very soon. I would happily provide the necessary chapters of Tesniere's book in English to anyone working on this article who is brave enough to contact me via email. My email address is on my user page. --Tjo3ya (talk) 03:06, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the help, I really appreciate it. Do you think it would be better if we started the article just with a definition of head directionality with a link to the article on heads? Also, you have not really commented on the use of sources exploring how heads affect language acquisition. A brief summary of such an argument with a link to another page might be more appropriate. I guess part of my idea is that I feel like an encyclopedia entry should explain not only what a term means but also contain a brief summary of why such an idea is relevant and/or how it connects to other linked articles. LingAnthNerd (talk) 18:02, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

Yes, thank you very much! The suggestions that you've given us have been very helpful in formatting and planning out our project! -Tsadler00 (talk) 04:19, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

While other Wikipedia entries deal with the notion of "head", they don't provide a full paradigm of how one assesses whether a language is "head-initial" and "head-final". For this reason, provide a complete set of examples that show that English is consistently head-initial for all values of X (X = {V, N, A, P, D, T, C, Asp}. And provide the corresponding sub-trees. And similarly for Japanese. Also provide a complete set of examines from two "mixed" languages. I would suggest the Gbe languages (discussed in work by Enoch Aboh), as well as Dutch/German. Also missing is a discussion of the theoretical debate about the status of a "parameter" for head-directionality; this is where the work by Kayne and Baker are relevant. I agree with Tjo3ya (talk) that presenting Tesnière's contributions is important. Also relevant is the typological work by Greenberg, which is the basis for the online WALS (World Atlas of Linguistic Structures; http://wals.info). --RM Dechaine (talk) 13:08, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

Revised Article Outline

I. INTRO (2-3 sentences) define & exemplify the phenomenon that your entry is examining Definition: “Head parameter is this______________” (link to “head“ page) (Quick summary of what is to come)

We may be able to use some of what is already written on the page, and just add on what we expand on in the data and theory sections -Tsadler00 (talk) 04:31, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

II. DATA/Examples where you present examples that illustrate the distribution of the phenomenon that your entry is examining. (Depending on the kind of problem you're looking at this could involve (i) one set of examples from English, along with examples from a representative set of languages.

(Head - “Initial”) brief description with general tree

examples from articles:

adjectives: English (+Irish)

verbs: Chinese

(Head - “final”) brief description with general tree

examples from articles:

adjectives: French

verbs: Japanese

“The results imply that languages can be typologized along a continuum with head-initial and head-final as the two ends.”

Language Typology and different types of Head Parameters with examples from different languages.

- Within compound words

- Word Order

- Phrases

- Movement

- Asymmetric Syntax

These areas are still under discussion as to whether and how much to include -Tsadler00 (talk) 04:31, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

III. THEORY where you present (at least two) competing analyses within generative grammar. (keep neutral voice!!)

History (?): --relatively short section-- Where the term/idea first emerged, who’s the ‘inventor’?

Analysis #1: Lucien Tesniere (?)

Summarization of argument

Pros/Cons

Application (?)

Examples/Sources

Analysis #2: Chomsky (?)

Summarization of argument

Pros/Cons

Application (?)

Examples/Sources

Edits will continue to be made to this (very rough) outline until posting of the final outline on Oct. 30, 2014. Any comments or suggestions are incredibly welcome! -Tsadler00 (talk) 04:31, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

General Tech questions

• Inserting images and annotating them
• Linking the in-text citations to the citation section at the bottom. (Internal referencing--where do we use the < ref > etc. code?)

LingAnthNerd (talk) 02:59, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

• How do you keep the data format (when it's in the box) from spreading too far across the page and overlapping with side modules? (or does this only happen on my computer?)

Tsadler00 (talk) 03:49, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

Relative to formatting examples, align the English gloss with the target morphemes.--RM Dechaine (talk) 13:58, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

Relative to structures, give bracketed representations and the corresponding tree diagrams. As most of the data will focus on Head-Complement ordering, you can use a neutral version of X-bar theory, e.g. [[X] [YP]].--RM Dechaine (talk) 13:58, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

Question for second tech meeting: How to align the morphemes? I've tried using blockquote and poem in a table but that didn't work. Xmizuro (talk) 02:28, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Data Section

I've added a lot of examples in the data section for German, Japanese, English and Dutch. This is just to demonstrate that some languages are head initial/final or a mix of both. More of it will be discussed in the theory section of the page. Let me know if there are any other relevant examples. Please let me know how I can improve the data section. Xmizuro (talk) 20:59, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Tree for (17) doesn't match textual example (17): 'any body' in tree; 'any book' in text Tsadler00 (talk) 23:37, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Can someone take another look at (11)? I believe the textual explanation should say preceded (comes before) rather than proceeded (follows after). Tsadler00 (talk) 00:08, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

I agree. I will go in a quickly change the grammar. Xmizuro (talk) 01:44, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

Revised Theoretical Framework

Three main approaches to Head-directionality Parameters in literature

Surface True Language Typology

• Greenburge’s
• Dryer’s

Gradient Approach

• Tesniere
  • dependency grammar

Ziyasummer (talk) 03:08, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Miscellaneous Notes

Prior examples removed from Framework because they held no citation, and no dire relevance to the section in part (what they argue for is shown in later examples with citations).

(2) German: head-initial and head-final Kim hat das Buch auf den Tisch gelegt. Kim has the book on the table put 'Kim has put the book on the table.'

(3) Japanese: head-final キムはテーブルの上に本を置いた Kimu-wa tēburu-no ue-ni hon-o oi-ta. Kim-TOP table-GEN top-onto book-ACC put-?? 'Kim has put the book on the table.'

Peer Review

Hi, C2! First off, I just want to say great job on your article so far. The level of comprehensiveness and the quality of the research you have all done so far is commendable. Your Framework section is very concise and enlightening, and the Theory in Practice section is very well laid-out and informative, especially with the specific examples from different languages you have chosen to illustrate your points and the useful tree diagrams that accompany every one of them. I made some minor edits to these sections, but they were mainly superficial edits to punctuation and links. One formatting suggestion I have is that the headings/subheadings should be edited to reflect Wikipedia guidelines, meaning that only the first word should be capitalized with the subsequent words all lowercase (for example, 'Theory in practice' and 'Head order vs. word order' rather than 'Theory in Practice' and 'Head Order vs. Word Order'). As for citations, I noticed that there seem to be two different types of citation styles going on--one of which corresponds to the Wikipedia numbered list under 'References,' and one that corresponds to the list under 'Works Cited' that follows an APA citation style rather than Wikipedia's suggested reference style. I would suggest that these two lists should be combined under Wikipedia's cohesive style of citation. Stephmau (talk) 07:23, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Milestone #3 Peer Review, Ling 300

Nice work, C2! The article is very thorough and comprehensive. My suggestions are mostly tied to referencing issues and small citation errors. In the intro, I would re-word the sentence A controversial claim, advocated by Richard Kayne, is that human languages are universally head-initial, and that any departure from this on the surface is attributable to independently motivated movement operations, since this is the instructor's wording from the syllabus and there's a chance that your group might run into referencing issues when being graded. Furthermore, some of references under Theories in language typology are in APA style instead of abiding by the Wikipedia citation style. Some of the references within your examples are also inconsistent with the Wikipedia style of citation. Lastly, I would recommend providing a link to the section under your summary of results table where you mention adjective phrases being "more free" in terms of head-directionality than complementizer phrases. By bringing this point of discussion forward, you could make the article more "user-friendly" by giving the reader the link to where they might be able to find out more information on this particular theory. Additionally, I think that this particular statement, Adjuncts, like the ones in English adjectives, seem more "free" in terms of head-directionality than most complements in a language, needs to be verifiable, i.e., include a reference. Cnorton1 (talk) 06:30, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Edits for 'Theories in language typology'

Great job so far! Your 'Theory in practice' section is very thorough in terms of examples and diagrams. I have some edits for your ‘Theories in language typology’ section, which has inconsistent citations and references. As another reviewer mentioned, page numbers are cited in parenthesis which is incorrect. These should be removed and cited with the Wikipedia citation format.

The section also makes reference to information that is not included. Specifically, the ‘Applications’ sub-section begins “this study...” but no study is mentioned previously. This should be re-written as “In a study by XXX which looked at XXX it was found that XXX”.

Similarly in the ‘OV order and symmetry’ sub-section it is begun with “With this section...”. This does not read well in the Wikipedia format. This introductory phrase can be deleted.

Overall, the ‘theories in language typology’ section was difficult to follow. Within the first three sub-sections, multiple scholars and theories are introduced but it is unclear how they are related. Having sub-headings named for each theory in chronological order of them being proposed, with mention of their application, validity and who the related scholar is included underneath the sub-heading, would be much clearer. Vvanzee (talk) 23:56, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Has it been established that the theory is not valid? I did not follow thatWikitrishslp (talk) 05:16, 4 November 2014 (UTC) and is the word "debunking" a bit extreme?Wikitrishslp (talk) 05:28, 4 November 2014 (UTC)
Update: I have removed the two introductory phrases that I mentioned earlier. These were the 'with this section.." and "in this study...". If mentioning the study is important, I would still recommend using the format I suggested earlier. Vvanzee (talk) 00:16, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Constructive feedback

C2, great work on this article so far! The layout as well as your chosen headings within the article makes it fairly easy to follow through. The examples (and trees) you have provided are also very concise and relevant to the information you have included which offers a high level of comprehension.

I have made some very minor edits to enhance the writing style. For example, I noticed that in certain parts/ sections of the article, the repeated use of the phrase “things like…” appears often. This is a sentence that is under your ‘Framework’ section: “Dependents being things like adjuncts, specifiers, and complements.” To improve the brevity of the article, cutting out the words “things like” in some sentences can make the article sound more fluid.

Additionally, I noticed that under the subheading ‘Some examples’ (under Framework) the first sentence starts off by saying “This assumes the language has a fixed phrase order in that part of its grammar to begin with”. Due to the fact that this is the first sentence under a new introduced subheading, it should not be introduced with “This assumes...” Instead, “This” should be replaced with what it is intended to represent.

I also noticed that the sources in works cited section is not consistent with how the sources are cited in the references section. Perhaps they should all use the same format of citation.

Overall, an informative article with good structure and plenty of helpful examples. I found it both easy to follow and enjoyable to read. Veegu (talk) 03:46, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

A little on language

On the German examples. There is some confusion as to the examples given in German. Example (2)in English "eat an apple", [VP [V eat][DP an apple]] is used in Fukui's article to contrast with Japanese as an example of head initial vs. head final languages. It is actually the same in English as in German in this simple VP phrase with one verb part: [ VP [esse][DP einen Apfel]] so that it does not show by itself that German is a head final language. In this way, the underlying structure is likely the same as English. In German, a verb occurs in final position in certain places such as in a CP phrase after "that" (dass), or within a relative clause or as the second verb after an auxiliary verb such as "will" or "have". It is possible that the first verb under T forces some sort of movement, such as raising of DP or of the second verb. This means that in example (3) the second verb is in final position, "ich werde es finden", but only, I suspect, after some sort of movement is triggered by the auxiliary "werde". The underlying German structure with one verb is the same as in English, so that the underlying structure in (2) would be: [VP [V finde][DP es]. The example in (8), taken from Berthold's "Relative Clause, Extrapositon in German", shows the verb in final position within a relative clause, so that the example does not show head initial. Wikitrishslp (talk) 05:20, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the detailed information on German! We'll only be looking at the surface structure in the typology because since it's our data section and it should be relatively theory-free. Going into the underlying structure and positing movement would require theory. However, since it sounds like there's two different verb orders in German on the surface level, we would love to add your example into our typology. Do you have a cited example that shows German is head-initial in the verb phrase? Thanks! Xmizuro (talk) 23:02, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

A little more on language

After explaining above how German verb phrases seem to be both head initial and head final, should the table be altered after gathering new evidence? It does not seem that German is uniquely head final. Or is this table cited from a source? The table is an interesting idea. A few sentences would need to be looked at again in making the claim that German verbs are head final.

I think the table at the end is just a visual summary of the data section since it is quite lengthy. I'd also added a comment above regarding the German verbs. Xmizuro (talk) 23:04, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

French adjectives would supply a good contrast to position of English adjectives. The examples of adjectives are not really comparisons of one language to the other which could be interesting if the comparisons were closer. (17) does not really contradict (18) as they seem to be examples of different cases, such as accusative and dative.

I do not see cited sources for the Italian and cannot understand the conclusion that verbs agree with the following subject or this is confusing. I think you mean that the subject can be placed either before or after the verb, so that "ho hanno mangiato i gatti" means "I ate cats" but so does "i gatti ho hanno mangiato", (I believe) by virtue of scrambling. It is unclear what point the Italian examples are making. "Li ho visti" or "I saw them" does not seem to compare with "ho visti loro", "I saw their". It is hard to bring in examples from other languages!Wikitrishslp (talk) 05:13, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Some examples

Ideas for clarity: (I did this already) Insert the Table (1)and explanation to show how English is an example of a head-initial language to follow logically from the end of the Head order vs. word order section, either at the end of the section or the beginning of Some examples. After that, it would be helpful to understand the direction you are taking to show opposition to this view, in that languages do not fall so neatly into one or the other category (dichotomy) before you give examples. It is confusing because you state some exceptions before you give the English example. This sentence does not contribute at this stage of the argument: "For example, English, German, and Japanese each construct verb phrases in different ways" and is followed by 'consider the example', which is confusing so could be removed. Say what the whole thing means after alluding to French. As the heading is "some examples", it would be good to have at least one more example in this section other than the English.Wikitrishslp (talk) 03:39, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Constructive feedback/Peer review

Overall, it's quite comprehensive with all the examples shown in other languages and the tree diagrams are conducive to learning the information. I would suggest only putting language/structure examples in the formatted boxes rather than formatting the rules of Kayne's Antisymmetry Theory in boxes. A lot of the sources and headings need to be cited under Wikipedia style formatting, and there are some instances where a fact or claim is made without giving a reference (i.e. when talking about Greenberg's Universal 33, there's no reference back to the literature; there's also no explanation as to what the "Universal 33" is). I think it would be helpful to have translations or glosses for the Italian and German examples used under the typology section (like the examples used for Japanese and Gbe in the "Theory in Practice" section).

Under the "Origins" subsection of "Theories in language typology," it's mentioned that "parametrical approach began with Lucian Tesnière and his hypothesis that language structures can be either Centrifugal or Centripedal..." but these two terms are glossed over without any explanation and not mentioned in the rest of the section, so either a brief explanation of the terms can be added, or the two terms could be removed entirely. This section on theories in language typology felt, to me, at least, like it read a bit like a detailed summary of (what I assume to be) Kayne's paper.

On the subject of the tone of the article, there were a couple of other instances where it seemed the article lost its neutrality (i.e. "based on the data, it is evident that there are head-initial and head-final structures"; "This, in Antisymmetry, proves the absence of directionality parameters..."), like with the use of "one" to refer to an individual. Rather than saying "one cannot classify a language as entirely head-initial...", I think simply stating it as a fact ("it is not possible to classify...") would neutralize the tone a bit. Cjowyoung (talk) 05:58, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Antisymmetry approach

Under the "applications" head of your antisymmetry section, we're confused about why Kayne's points are organized in an 'example' style, and specifically why 1) isn't a title. Furthermore, 4) appears to be separated unnecessarily from the rest of the points, making it somewhat alienated from the topic. Cnorton1 (talk) 17:59, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

In-class review

When first speaking about examples, consider stating where they are in the page (i.e., below, above, etc.)ChristianEpp (talk) 18:02, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

Comments on revisions after peer review

In order to address the concerns mentioned by the reviewers, we have compiled them into a list for easy viewing and to make sure that we have addressed them all.

• Heading formatting - Decapitalized all but initial words. Additionally, we have changed the names of the header so that it describes each section more accurately.
• Cohesive citations - We are using the Harvard method of citation. We have changed most of our citations. There are a couple citations that need to be converted to Harvard but that will be done shortly.
• Link regarding adjectives being “more free” - We rephrased the example in question and cited many more of our statements to adhere to the verifiable policy of Wikipedia.
• Notations about adjuncts needing citations -As aforementioned, we have added a lot of citations and have tried to re-word unverifiable statements.
• Page number citation formatting - This has been changed to be internally consistent and adhere to the chosen style.
• Applications subsection beginning - This is part of the Antisymmetry bit, and I agree that some of the ‘examples’ are confusedly configured. I know that the information I’ve been finding has slowly been percolating into other areas of the Theory section, so I keep trying to tie what is being said back together, but may miss a sentence or two. Application subsection has been changed to Evidence, and explores a few examples to show Kayne’s theory in natural languages.
• Introductory phrase for “OV order and symmetry” delete “With this section” - Already deleted by the commenter.
• Need to explain how theories are related to each other - Have begun explaining the differences between Surface True and Antisymmetry. Also, connected the sample languages with the gradient approach. Connected Antisymmetry with Chomsky’s X-Bar Theory.
• Name the theories in chronological order, validity, who proposed etc. - Only one we know for sure is Antisymmetry (Kayne, 1994), as the Surface True is more adapting head parameter into only the surface derivation, rather than the deep structure (which is what Kayne looks at). We have also added a new statistical study in Gradient approach and have made connections with the sample languages we presented. Gradient approach is a relatively new and non-mainstream sub-area of head-directionality parameters. It has a shared background with other approaches.
• Theory not valid? (confusing critique remark) + • Formatting of theory section - It is true that different theories have shared origins but distinct approaches, which make them look obscure and messy. Most importantly, as far as what we have been researched, there is no concrete and comprehensive theory in the literature that focuses only on Head-directionality Parameter. All the theories we have presented are pretty much to give a sense about how to look at dead-directionality parameters instead of how to define them. Maybe that is one of the reasons we confused our reader about the validity. We have been trying to fix this obscurity by making connections with our data sections.
• “This” of Framework section replaced with what “this” is referring to. - We have made it an effort to double-check our writings to ensure that any references arbitrarily using ‘this’ or ‘that’ are replaced with the clear reference.
• How to deal with German question - We are currently researching this based on a source suggested by Martina Wiltshanko. This is a very valid point that we had not realized but are trying to figure out how to address. Some of this seems to be based on case of the sentence. We will look into the case but are currently focusing on looking for head-initial structures first since this is more relevant to the article. We’ve found a book on German syntax but have been unable to borrow it from the library. Once we’ve borrowed it, we can possibly add a head-initial structure for the VP. Additionally, the purpose of our data section is to explain the surface syntax and to stay away from theory. If we proposed movement as you suggested theory would be involved. However, we can still incorporate your comment by adding an application section in our theory section. We’ve decided to add this section to explain how each theory approaches the data that was presented in the article.
• French Adjectives - French adjectives would be a great comparison to English, however, we’ve added new examples from Gbe and German that show different parameters. In total, we have head-final, head-initial, and mixed structures. So even without adding French, we’ve covered the different possibilities that the head-parameter can have. As mentioned before, we are not looking to explain all languages, just to give enough examples to help people understand the ideas and the major aspects of the theories.
• Italian examples not cited - Antisymmetry’s examples cited and/or linked when appropriate.
• Uncertain about what “some examples” comment is actually trying to say. - As is stated above in reference to replacing floating ‘this’ and ‘that,’ we have made an effort to do away with any pragmatic ambiguity.
• Explain Tesniere’s centrifugal and centripedal ideas - We’ve moved this section into the beginning. This idea is presented first since this is where the head-directionality parameter was first proposed. We’ve also added explanations of both the terms and linked it to the modern terms.
• Antisymmetry approach: Most of Kayne’s points have been taken or replaced within text rather than example boxes, and those who are still within singular boxes are those described by Kayne as “existential” (for which I’m yet unsure how they behave)
• Universal 33 (Antisymmetry) - Text with their concepts rephrased to better fit the fluidity
• Translations and glosses (Antisymmetry) - Added for all examples
• Tone (Antisymmetry) - Made changes according to the suggestions left on the Talk page Xmizuro (talk) 07:22, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

German

Feedback:

• The "German" example (4) is not German. The source gives it as West Flemish. A better example could be chosen, since that example is given only to make a special point that is not made in this article.
• Some of the statements about German verb phrases being head final may be a bit misleading since the verb is final only in certain circumstances, e.g. in subordinate and non-finite clauses and when used with an auxiliary. If such examples are given, it might be appropriate to find sources with "canonical" examples of German affirmative statements or imperatives. --Boson (talk) 21:30, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

I sort of corrected this (I removed the West Flemish example and added more explanation). W. P. Uzer (talk) 08:58, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

One-sided article

This article is now one-sided. It goes on for ages about head-directionality as understood from one particular approach to syntax, i.e. Chomskyan syntax. There is one very brief mention of an alternative understanding (Tesniere at the beginning), but that appears to be all we get. We again have a situation where one particular linguist (RM Dechaine) has engaged squads of undergraduates to promote one particular approach to syntax. This is not good. It's not good for science, and it is not good for the promotion of free knowledge. I may work on this article myself (or I may not). I may add an alternative take on head-directionality. I may produce dependency-trees to appear together with the constituency-based trees. The reader could decide for him- or herself which understanding of head-directionality is the better way to understand the notion. --Tjo3ya (talk) 21:03, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Mistakes in the section on German

• The analysis of the verb second main clause "Ich werde es finden" is doubtful, since the consensus in German syntax is that a V2-clause is a CP, and that the finite verb moves to the C position. Whether or not this particular C position can additionally be identified with a "finiteness" category, the movement analysis is standard (and movement is so badly needed that it has even been used in some HPSG models of German syntax, cf. work by Stefan Müller). The base position of the verb is then always at the right periphery of VP, whether finite or nonfinite. -- Also note the contradiction that the last example of the section ("dass [Lisa eine Blume gepflanzt hat]") uses a head-final TP!
• Noun phrases: it is highly doubtful that a relative clause can be a complement of N. The last major textbook that discusses this question, Sternefeld 2006, experiments with the DP-level, but on the whole is sceptical that a satisfying analysis is known to date.
• Postpositions: it strikes me as an unorthodox analysis that the form "hinauf" should be a postposition, although it is hard to know what is going on here. The text cites Riemsdijk (2007), but his analysis, as I understand it, does not have a leftward complement position, the accusative is rather a specifier, which makes a lot of sense, because it has the semantics of a measure phrase. See esp. Riemsdijk 2007, pp.7ff. & p. 17.

--Alazon (talk) 15:41, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

Editing for a university project

Hello everyone, from now until the middle of December, I will be providing structural edits and adding new content to this page focusing on the syntactic structure of head-final order languages. I intend to add language data from a different language (most likely Turkish) to the section under "Examples of head-final languages", as currently there are only examples from Japanese. The purpose of this will be to expand on the data available so that users on this page will have access to examples in other languages and how head-final order is analyzed in alternate ways. This is part of a course-based activity of a 3rd year syntax course, and I anticipate having completed my edits by late-middle December. I would appreciate any and all constructive comments and suggestions about how to improve the overall quality of this article, as well as any guidance or advice you may have. Thank you for allowing me to edit in this space. LKuoch (talk) 00:57, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

Over the next few days, I intend to have a clear outline of what exactly I am changing structurally or adding in terms of content to the page, so that it is clear what changes are occurring and where they will appear. This outline will appear under this subsection (along with any other discourse pertaining to this project). Any and all feedback would be greatly appreciated. LKuoch (talk) 01:17, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

So far, I have made only minor edits to clean up some errors I found on the page. They are as follows: i) I added language families to the languages in the example data so that future language data can be organized by language family ii) I deleted some leftover text on the page that appeared to be attempting to add a subsection "== Examples of mixed word-order languages", which had already been created and developed. iii) I also added a subsection under "Examples of head-final languages" for Turkish, as a placeholder for where I will be developing content and adding Turkish examples of head-final order LKuoch (talk) 05:21, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

I have recently added content underneath the subsection for Turkish introducing some basic syntactic observations of head-final order. I have referenced two academic and peer-reviewed articles to create my summary of Turkish word order, which I may expand upon in the near future if I find any other relevant information to add. If not, this summary will serve as a basis for introducing example sentences and diagrams for how Turkish might analyze word order. LKuoch (talk) 08:20, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

I've examples of word order scrambling in Turkish matrix clauses. For my next steps, I may add phrase structure diagrams (e.g., trees) to provide a visual representation of the examples. Additionally, I plan to include examples of basic NP, DP, VP, and PP phrases in Turkish.LKuoch (talk) 03:09, 17 December 2021 (UTC)

Hi everyone, I just wanted to add some closing statements now that I believe that the edits and content development for my assignment have been completed. I may continue to tweak small things here and there (e.g., phrasing of certain sentences) over the next few days, but as of now I have no plans to add anything else major to the page. The last thing I did was include samples of TP, VP, DP, and PP phrases in Turkish to demonstrate how head-final structure is analyzed through generative grammar. I added images of phrase structure trees to exemplify this as well. Thank you again for the time and it really has been a pleasure contributing to this page over the last few weeks! LKuoch (talk) 01:41, 19 December 2021 (UTC)

Linguistics University Project 2021

Hello everyone, over the next few days we will be making some minimal and some larger structural edits as well as adding new content to this page focused on head-initial word order, more specifically in Indonesian. This is part of a course-based activity of a 3rd-year syntax course, and we anticipate having completed our edits by the end of December. We would appreciate any and all constructive comments and suggestions about how to improve the overall quality of this article. Mbishop01 (talk) 19:18, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

We have developed a subsection of examples of head-initial languages where we will compose a new entry on Indonesian as well as edit the subsection on types of phrase, where we have added basic syntactic trees to represent each type of phrase discussed. Mbishop01 (talk) 20:52, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

We have finished up our edits and contributions to this page. The extent of our research can be found in the Indonesian subsection where we took two different approaches to analyze head-initial directionality in the language. Neither myself nor my research partner is a speaker of Indonesian, therefore, all translations and glosses came from one grammar. If this subsection were to be expanded, I would suggest more research into determiner phrases and adjective phrases as this was something we had a hard time researching. We may make a few minor edits over the next few days as a response to peer critiques but until then any and all edits are welcome to this section, thank you for having us on this page and allowing our contributions. Mbishop01 (talk) 21:48, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

Head initial references ad.'s not objects

A misconception has arose that head initial means that the head (verb or noun) goes before an object in the sentence. This is not true head initial means that's the head (verb or noun) goes before it's compliments (adverbs or adjectives) as in "big goat". Big difference. Chrythanus (talk) 13:24, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

I believe that in this context, "complement" does indeed mean (for example) the object of a verb, or the "object" of a pre(/post)position. Optional modifiers like adverbs and adjectives are called adjuncts, and linguists have apparently decided that the position of these is of less significance for the determination of what they call head directionality. W. P. Uzer (talk) 18:51, 15 December 2022 (UTC)