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In linguistic typology, subject–verb–object (SVO) is a sentence structure where the subject comes first, the verb second, and the object third. Languages may be classified according to the dominant sequence of these elements in unmarked sentences (i.e., sentences in which an unusual word order is not used for emphasis).
Punjabi, for instance, may be characterised as following a Subject—Object—Verb typology overall, but some flexibility is permitted, and this tendency does not follow in sentences involving personal pronouns. Examples are shown here in both Shahmukhi (top, right-to-left) and Gurmukhi (bottom, left-to-right). The word forms used reflect those ...
Notice how in the original Malagasy, John (the direct object) precedes Jeanne (the indirect object), whereas in the English equivalent, Jeanne precedes John. English, unlike Malagasy, has S–V–IO–DO order. Another example of this phenomenon, from Päri (DO–V–S–IO order):
pineapple nota I apa fetch anana nota apa pineapple I fetch I fetch a pineapple British Sign Language (BSL) normally uses topic–comment structure, but its default word order when topic–comment structure is not used is OSV. Marked word order This section does not cite any sources. Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged ...
In yes–no questions such as (C), English and German use subject-verb inversion. But, whereas English relies on do-support to form questions from verbs other than auxiliaries, German has no such restriction and uses inversion to form questions, even from lexical verbs. Despite this, English, as opposed to German, has very strict word order.
Structure (not linearized): [ H [S [V O]] ] (where H stands for a head) can be pronounced as H + V S O conventionally. [4] Under the FL approach however, that structure can be pronounced as H + V O S, [4] as the phrase is said to be linearized with the subject to the right of the verb-object constituent. Consequently, we see a VOS order.
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For example, the German sentence Ich esse oft Rinderbraten (I often eat roast beef) is in the standard SVO word order, with the adverb oft (often) immediately after the verb. However, if that adverb is moved to the beginning of the sentence for emphasis, the subject ich (I) is moved to the third position, which places the sentence in VSO order ...