TOPIC ELIMINATION AND THE POSTULATE OF THE BASIC WORD ORDER IN RUSSIAN

The paper deals with the postulate of the basic word order in Russian introduced by Anton Zimmerling. According to it, within the basic word order the subject in a Russian sentence is always located to the left of the predicate. This postulate does not agree with the well-known facts of the Russian language. The interpretation of sentences like Цвела черемуха (Cvela čeremuxa) as derived from the initial neutral variant Черемуха цвела (Čeremuxa сvela) is rejected. An alternative interpretation is substantiated according to which sentences under consideration may be seen both as non-derived (incomplete realizations of the model В саду цвела черемуха [V sadu cvela čeremuxa]) and as derived from the same complete initial model. For the second version of interpretation a notion of the Theme (Topic) Elimination as one more LAT — Lineal-Accent Transformation (in addition to the existing calculus of LAT) — is proposed.