Abstract
The order of personal pronouns in Formosan and Philippine languages is of great interest to linguists in that it exhibits great variations across languages. In some languages, such as Central Cagayan Agta, the order of personal pronouns is syntactically conditioned. In some languages, such as Tagalog, the order of personal pronouns is phonologically conditioned. In some other languages, such as some Manobo languages, the order of personal pronouns is conditioned by multiple factors (e.g. case, person, etc.). In this study, the relative order of personal pronouns in Atayal is reexamined. It is argued that, contrary to the claims that have been made in previous analyses, semantic factors (e.g. person, number, etc.) alone cannot adequately account for the pronominal order facts in Atayal. Instead, it is the interaction of semantic factors with syntactic and phonological factors that provides us with a fuller and more satisfactory account of the pronominal order facts.