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A synthetic language, in linguistic typology, is a language with a high morpheme-per-word ratio. This linguistic classification is largely independent of morpheme-usage classifications (such as fusional, agglutinative, etc.) although there is a common tendency for agglutinative languages to exhibit synthetic properties. Linguistic typology is the typology that classifies languages by their features. ...
Morphological typology was developed by brothers Friedrich and August von Schlegel. ...
An isolating language is a language in which the vast majority of morphemes are free morphemes and are considered to be full-fledged words. By contrast, in a synthetic language, a word is composed of agglutinated or fused morphemes that denote its syntactic meanings. ...
A fusional language (also called inflecting language) is a type of synthetic language, distinguished from agglutinative languages by its tendency to squish together many morphemes in a way which can be difficult to segment. ...
It has been suggested that Agglutination be merged into this article or section. ...
Polysynthetic languages are highly synthetic languages, i. ...
Oligosynthetic (from the Greek ολίγοι, meaning few) is a hypothetical designation for a language using an extremely small array of morphemes, perhaps numbering only in the hundreds, which combine synthetically to form statements. ...
Morphology is a subdiscipline of linguistics that studies word structure. ...
In linguistics, morphosyntactic alignment is the system used to distinguish between the arguments of transitive verbs and intransitive verbs. ...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
An ergative-absolutive language (or simply ergative) is one that treats the agent of transitive verbs distinctly from the subject of intransitive verbs and the object of transitive verbs. ...
An active language is one where the only argument of an intransitive verb (that is, the subject) is marked sometimes in the same way as the subject of a transitive verb, and some other times in the same way as the direct object of a transitive verb. ...
A tripartite language is one that marks the agent, experiencer, and patient verb arguments each in different ways. ...
A direct-inverse language is a language where clauses with transitive verbs can be expressed either using a direct or an inverse construction. ...
The syntactic pivot is the verb argument around which sentences revolve, in a given language. ...
It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Thematic role. ...
Word order, in linguistic typology, refers to the order in which words appear in sentences across different languages. ...
In linguistics, a VO language is a language in which the verb typically comes before the object. ...
In linguistic typology, subject-verb-object (SVO) is the sequence subject verb object in neutral expressions: Sam ate oranges. ...
Verb Subject Object—commonly used in its abbreviated form VSO—is a term in linguistic typology. ...
Verb Object Subject - commonly used in its abbreviated form VOS - is a term in Linguistic typology. ...
In linguistics, an OV language is a language in which the object comes before the verb. ...
In linguistic typology, Subject Object Verb (SOV) is the type of languages in which the subject, object, and verb of a sentence appear (usually) in that order. ...
Object Subject Verb (OSV) is one of the permutations of expression used in Linguistic typology. ...
Object Verb Subject (OVS) is one of the permutations of expression used in linguistic typology. ...
Time Manner Place is a term used in linguistic typology to state the general order of adpositional phrases in a languages sentences: yesterday by car to the store. It is common among SOV languages. ...
Place Manner Time is a term used in linguistic typology to state the general order of adpositional phrases in a languages sentences: to the store by car yesterday. It would seem that it is common among SVO languages. ...
Linguistic typology is the typology that classifies languages by their features. ...
In morpheme-based morphology, a morpheme is the smallest lingual unit that carries a semantic interpretation. ...
A word is a unit of language that carries meaning and consists of one or more morphemes. ...
A fusional language (also called inflecting language) is a type of synthetic language, distinguished from agglutinative languages by its tendency to squish together many morphemes in a way which can be difficult to segment. ...
An agglutinative language is a language in which the words are formed by joining morphemes together. ...
Synthetic and isolating languages
Synthetic languages are frequently contrasted with isolating languages. It is more accurate to conceive of languages as existing on a continuum, with strictly isolating (consistently one morpheme per word) at one end and highly polysynthetic (in which a single word may contain as much information as an entire English sentence) at the other extreme. Synthetic languages tend to lie around the middle of this scale. An analytic language (or isolating language) is a language in which the vast majority of morphemes are free morphemes and considered to be full-fledged words. By contrast, in a synthetic language, a word is composed of agglutinated or fused morphemes that denote its syntactic meanings. ...
Polysynthetic languages are highly synthetic languages, i. ...
The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ...
Specimens Synthetic languages are numerous and well-attested, the most commonly cited being Indo-European languages such as German, Russian, Polish and Czech, as well as many languages of the Americas, including Navajo, Nahuatl, Mohawk and Quechua. It is likely that Interlingua can be considered a synthetic language. The Indo-European languages comprise a family of several hundred related languages and dialects [1], including most of the major languages of Europe, as well as many spoken in the Indian subcontinent (South Asia), the Iranian plateau (Southwest Asia), and Central Asia. ...
Reading Adahooniigii — The Navajo Language Monthly Navajo or Navaho (native name: Diné bizaad) is an Athabaskan language (of Na-Dené stock) spoken in the southwest United States by the Navajo people (Diné). It is geographically and linguistically one of the Southern Athabaskan languages (the majority of Athabaskan languages are spoken...
Nahuatl is a native language of central Mexico. ...
Mohawk is a Native American language spoken in the United States and Canada. ...
Quechua (Runa Simi in Quechua; Runa, human + Simi, speech, literally mouth; i. ...
Interlingua is an international auxiliary language (IAL) published in 1951 by the International Auxiliary Language Association (IALA). ...
Forms of synthesis There are several ways in which a language can exhibit synthetic characteristics:
Derivational synthesis In derivational synthesis, morphemes of different types (nouns, verbs, affixes, etc.) are joined to create new words. For example: In English, a noun or noun substantive is a lexical category which can co-occur with (in)definite articles and attributive adjectives, and function as the head of a noun phrase. ...
This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ...
Look up affix in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...
- German: Luftkissenfahrzeug "air-cushion-travel-device" = "hovercraft"
- Greek: yperkholisterolaimia "overmuch/high-cholesterol-blood+-ia(suffix)" = "hypercholesterolemia"
- Polish: przystanek "little-stand-beside" = "bus stop"
- English: unthinkably = "not-think-possible-(adverb)" or
antidisestablishmentarianism BHC SR-N4 The worlds largest car and passenger carrying hovercraft A hovercraft, or air-cushion vehicle (ACV), is a vehicle or craft that can be supported by a cushion of air ejected downwards against a surface close below it, and can in principle travel over any relatively smooth...
Hypercholesterolemia (literally: high blood cholesterol) is the presence of high levels of cholesterol in the blood [1]. It is not a disease but a metabolic derangement that can be secondary to many diseases and can contribute to many forms of disease, most notably cardiovascular disease. ...
The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ...
Look up Antidisestablish. ...
Relational synthesis In relational synthesis, root words are joined to bound morphemes to show grammatical function: The root is the primary lexical unit of a word, which carries the most significant aspects of semantic content and cannot be reduced into smaller constituents. ...
Bound morphemes can only occur when attached to root morphemes. ...
- Nahuatl: ocaltizquiya "already-(she)-him-bathe-would" = "she would have bathed him"
- Japanese: miseraregatai "see-causative-passive-difficult" = "it's difficult to be shown (this)"
- Finnish: juoksentelisinkohan "run-erratic motion-conditional-I-question-casual" = "I wonder if I should run around (aimlessly)"
- Finnish: hiutaleannos = "flake-ration"; hiuta+le has the components hiutua "to thin" and -le "a small thing produced by the action", and ann+os is derived from antaa "to give" and -os "a mass transferred or made by the action".
Nahuatl is a native language of central Mexico. ...
In grammar, a frequentative form of a word is one which indicates repeated action. ...
The conditional mood (or conditional tense) is the form of the verb used in conditional sentences to refer to a hypothetical state of affairs, or an uncertain event that is contingent on another set of circumstances. ...
Degrees of synthesis In order to demonstrate the "continuum" nature of the isolating-synthetic-polysynthetic classification, some examples are shown below:
Strictly isolating Tahitian: Avel via l'avà inis almanà means "The bird flew off into the distance." Virtually every word is a stand-alone morpheme. Tahitian, a Tahitic language, is one of the two official languages of French Polynesia (along with French). ...
Rather isolating English: "He travelled by hovercraft on the sea." Largely isolating, but travelled and hovercraft each have two morphemes per word, the former being an example of relational synthesis (inflection), and the latter of derivational synthesis (derivation). The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ...
Rather synthetic Japanese: Watashitachi ni totte, kono naku kodomo no shashin wa miseraregatai mono desu means strictly literally, "In our case, these pictures of children crying are things that are difficult to be shown," approximately We cannot bear being shown these pictures of children crying in more idiomatic English. In the example, virtually every word has more than one morpheme and some have up to five (the particles ni, no, wa are enclitic case markers, i.e., they are phonologically part of the previous word). In linguistics, a clitic is a morpheme that functions syntactically like a word, but does not appear as an independent phonological word; instead it is always attached to a following or preceding word. ...
Very synthetic Finnish: Käyttäytyessään tottelemattomasti oppilas saa jälki-istuntoa means "Should he/she behave in an insubordinate manner, the student will get detention." Structurally: behavior(present/future tense)(of his/hers) insubordinate(in the manner/style) studying(he/she who (should be)) gets detention(some). Practically every word is derived and/or inflected, and one word can be considered polysynthetic. This is, however, very formal language - almost like judicial text - and usually replaced by more analytic structure: Kun oppilas käyttäytyy tottelemattomasti, hän saa jälki-istuntoa.
Polysynthetic Mohawk: Washakotya'tawitsherahetkvhta'se means "He ruined her dress" (strictly, "He made the thing that one puts on one's body ugly for her"). One word expresses the idea that would be conveyed in an entire sentence in a non-polysynthetic language. Mohawk is a Native American language spoken in the United States and Canada. ...
Oligosynthesis Oligosynthetic languages are a theoretical notion created by Benjamin Whorf with no known examples existing in natural languages. Such languages would be functionally synthetic, but make use of a very limited array of morphemes (perhaps just a few hundred). Whorf proposed that Nahuatl was oligosynthetic, but this has since been discounted by most linguists. Oligosynthetic (from the Greek ολίγοι, meaning few) is a hypothetical designation for a language using an extremely small array of morphemes, perhaps numbering only in the hundreds, which combine synthetically to form statements. ...
Benjamin Lee Whorf (April 24, 1897 – July 26, 1941) was an American linguist. ...
Nahuatl ( [1] is a term applied to a group of related languages and dialects of the Aztecan [2] branch of the Uto-Aztecan language family, indigenous to central Mexico. ...
See also An analytic language (or isolating language) is a language in which the vast majority of morphemes are free morphemes and considered to be full-fledged words. By contrast, in a synthetic language, a word is composed of agglutinated or fused morphemes that denote its syntactic meanings. ...
In grammar, inflection or inflexion is the modification or marking of a word (or more precisely lexeme) to reflect grammatical (that is, relational) information, such as gender, tense, number or person. ...
For other uses, see Morphology. ...
Linguistic typology is the typology that classifies languages by their features. ...
Bound morphemes can only occur when attached to root morphemes. ...
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