Here's a breakdown:
* Word Order Languages: These languages use the order of words in a sentence to indicate grammatical relationships like subject, object, and verb.
* English: Subject-Verb-Object (SVO)
* Japanese: Subject-Object-Verb (SOV)
* German: Verb-Second (V2), meaning the verb usually comes in second position in main clauses.
* Inflectional Languages: These languages use changes to words (inflections) to show grammatical relationships. These changes can include:
* Case: Marking the function of a noun (e.g., subject, object, possessive).
* Tense: Showing the time of the verb.
* Number: Indicating whether a noun is singular or plural.
* Gender: Marking the gender of a noun.
Examples of Highly Inflectional Languages:
* Latin: Highly inflected, with minimal reliance on word order for meaning.
* Classical Greek: Similar to Latin.
* Finnish: Uses cases and other inflections to convey syntactic relationships.
Some Languages Use a Combination:
* Many languages use a combination of word order and inflections. For example, English uses word order for basic syntax, but also has some inflections (e.g., "walk" vs. "walked", "cat" vs. "cats").
Key Points:
* Word order is a primary means of conveying meaning in many languages, but not all.
* Inflectional languages often have more flexible word order.
* Even languages that rely heavily on word order will still have some level of inflection.
It's important to remember that language is incredibly diverse, and there are many complexities and nuances within each language family.