Sino-Tibetan again

[Sam Martin]

----------------------------Original message----------------------------
 
In considering the syntactic similarities between Chinese and SE Asian
languages, don't overlook the probably important fact that all
noun modifications in Chinese, such as relativized structures and other
adnominal elements, *precede* the modified. But Thai (and I believe
Vietnamese) are like French and English in postposing most noun
modification. I think that fact, together with the hints of earlier SOV
structure in Chinese and the thoroughly Altaic-type syntax of Burmese, is
what has led some scholars (such as the late Hashimoto Mantaro) to
hypothesize for earlier Chinese a neater syntax more like what we see in
Japanese and Korean.