Diagrammatic iconicity explains asymmetries in Paamese possessive constructions
Grammatical asymmetries in possessive constructions are overtly coded in about 18% of the world’s languages according to the World Atlas of Language Structures (Dryer & Haspelmath, 2013). What primarily motivates these grammatical asymmetries is controversial and has been at the crux of the “iconicity vs. frequency” debate (e.g. Croft, 2008; Haiman, 2008; Haspelmath, 2008). This paper contribu