356 John Hajeknouns, as already indicated by Dixon in Chapter i. The phenomenon of adjectival
NP head is restricted to three languages (Mam, Russian, Tariana) described in this
volume. In Russian only the noun-like long form can be an NP head, in contrast to
the verb-like short form. Restrictions also apply in Mam where an adjectival head
is always anaphoric (see examples 62-3 in Chapter 5).
In Russian and Mam the adjectives in question are clearly non-verb-like, and
can never function as a verbal predicate. In Tariana most adjectives are option-
ally verb-like (predicative) or noun-like (post-copular). However, in no case where
adjectives are reported to be strongly verb-like, appearing only in verbal predi-
cates, do they also have the noun-like ability to function directly as NP heads.10 Noun phrase modification
All languages allow adjectival modification of nouns in noun phrases, but there are
very substantial cross-linguistic differences in observed patterns of behaviour. In
languages where adjectives are verb-like in the predicate, the behaviour of attribu-
tive adjectives in the noun phrase also tends to be strongly verb-like. This is most
evident with respect to relativization in the noun phrase. In Korean and Wolof, ad-
jectives, like verbs, are always relativized when modifying a noun. However, adjec-
tives and verbs can be distinguished in Wolof by subtle word order differences that
occur in simple, so-called unaugmented relative clauses. Where augmentation oc-
curs through the addition of such things as tense and aspect marking, all differences
then disappear, and word order becomes the same (see Chapter 10 for discussion).
In Lao relativization is optional with verbs and adjectives, both of which can
otherwise directly modify the noun. However, nouns functioning attributively
are obligatorily relativized. In Japanese, the reverse is true: whilst verbs and verb-
like inflected adjectives are able directly to modify the noun, nouns and noun-like
uninflected adjectives appear in a special adnominal construction. In Qiang, com-
plex adjectives typically appear in verb-like relative clauses before the noun, but
simple adjectives typically appear in one of two constructions: they are most clear-
ly adjectival and non-verbal when placed directly after a noun without any kind of
marking. But in the same position, they are also optionally noun-like when they
appear, for emphatic or contrastive effect, with a nominalizing suffix. LaPolla and
Huang (Chapter 13) argue that this nominalized form behaves as an independent
noun phrase, given that the order of modified noun and the nominalized adjective
can be reversed without any apparent effect.
In most other languages, verbs and adjectives can be distinguished by the
absence of relativization on adjectives, e.g. Mam, Papantla Totonac, North-East
Ambae, Tariana, Jarawara. Adjectives, unlike verbs, are able directly to modify a
noun. In Russian, the verb-like short adjective form no longer appears in the noun
phrase, except in set phrases, and only the noun-like long form is today produc-
tively attributive. In Manange, verbs are obligatorily relativized by a nominalizing
suffix in pre-head position, whilst so-called simple adjectives directly modify the