Cognition, quantitative linguistics, and systemic typology GERTRAUD FENK-OCZLON and AUGUST FENK Abstract This paper argues for the relevance of quantitative and cognitive linguistics for typology. Crosslinguistic correlations between the size ofsyllables, words, and sentences, äs suggested earlier (Fenk & FenkOczlon 1993), have been r [ confirmed in a wider sample of!8 Indo-European and 16 non-Indo-European \ languages from all continents except Australia. Further correlations with word ; order turned out to be statistically significant: in predominantly agglutinative (S)OV languages the number ofsyllables per clause and per word is higher and the number ofphonemes per syllable lower than in (S)VO languages. Essen- tially, the patterns found seem to reflect a universal tendency to keep clauses relatively small and invariant, which in turn can be explained by time-related constraints ofour cognitive System. Keywords: agglutination, basic word order, clause length, complexity, mem- ory span, Menzerath's Law, morphological typology, syllable structure, Systems theory, word length 1. The systemic view, quantitatively grounded In bis editorial to the first issue of the Journal of Quantitative Linguistics Köh- ler Claims: "One of the most promising strategies for finding and integrating linguistic laws seems to be the functional one in combination with a Systems theoretical approach" (Köhler 1994). Within typology such an approach cor- responds to what is in another editorial (Plank 1986) referred to äs systemic, holistic, or organismic typology. Nowadays the metaphor of language äs an organism is used mainly by func- tional-typologically oriented authors, for whom linguistics is a branch of evo- lutionary biology (according to Croft 1990: 255). But the organismic view dates back into the past Century and can be associated with names such äs Linguistic Typology 3 (1999), 151-177 1430-0532/1999/003-0151 ©Walter de Gruyter Angemeldet | gertraud.fenk@aau.at Heruntergeladen am | 05.02.18 09:43