Los prefijos verbales en húngaro: a propósito de algunos estudios recientes

Abstract

The Hungarian language has traditionally been analyzed by scholars as having a free sentence order. Recent studies maintain that the free order pertains only to surface elements such as subject, verb, object; on a deeper level there are two fundamental positions to the left of the verb: those of Topic and Focus. It is possible to explain variations in word order as well as verbal prefix movement on the basis of these underlying positions.