Indonesian clause structure from an Austronesian perspective

Abstract

Although the neutral clauses of standard Indonesian are SVO, the language also permits verb-initial word order, and belongs to a branch of the Austronesian language family that was probably originally verb-initial. An analysis of Indonesian clause structure is investigated which exploits these connections, inspired by Cole and Hermon's analysis of the closely related language Toba Batak. In this analysis, VP must raise to the specifier of T and the subject can then raise to a specifier outside the clause proper. Such an analysis is shown to be inferior to an analysis of standard Indonesian in which SVO clauses are derived by simply raising the subject to the specifier of T. Evidence is presented that in some varieties of standard Indonesian, but not others, verb-initial clauses are derived by raising VP to an even higher specifier. Overall, the investigation serves to highlight some of the empirical considerations that can be brought to bear on ‘abstract’ analyses of clause structure.