This parameter is restricted by benefactives but not other applicatives in Chichewa, which may reflect linearization along the Bantu animacy hierarchy. This parameter tracks weight and importance in Behaghel’s laws. The dominant form of this parameter is “scrambled” by cleft constructions. This parameter is often “disharmonic” in languages like Uyghur (“WEE-gur”), contra Joseph Greenberg. Three forms of this parameter are found in under five percent of natural languages, including Warao and the Cariban language Hixkaryana (“hish-car-YAH-nah”). Grammaticalization may make this parameter more “fixed,” as in the Germanic V2 principle. Analytic languages typically use this parameter and not inflection to convey syntactic roles. English alters this parameter via wh-movement and inversion in questions. For 10 points, what parameter most commonly takes the form “SOV,” or “subject-object-verb”? ■END■
ANSWER: word order [or word forms of ordering or word position; or Wortstellung; accept clausal order or NP order; prompt on symmetry, asymmetry, antisymmetry, language structure, or sentence structure; prompt on syntax or syntactical until “syntactical” is read; prompt on topicality, focus, prominence, or topic-prominent by asking “encoded by what parameter?”]
<Social Science>
= Average correct buzz position