<OT> New Posting: ROA-949

[roa at ruccs.rutgers.edu]

ROA 949-0108

Inflectional Morphology in Optimality Theory

Zheng Xu <xuz1014 at yahoo.com>

Direct link: http://roa.rutgers.edu/view.php3?roa=949


Abstract:
This dissertation proposes an inferential-realizational
model of inflectional morphology (Matthews 1972, Zwicky
1985, Anderson 1992, Aronoff 1994, Stump 2001) within the
framework of Optimality Theory (Prince and Smolensky 1993).
Following Russell 1995, Yip 1998, Hyman 2003, MacBride 2004,
I assume that the phonological information of inflectional
affixes is introduced through realization constraints (RC)
which associate abstract morphosyntactic or semantic feature
values with phonological forms. I propose that rankings
of realization constraints conform to the specificity condition,
i.e. a constraint realizing a more specific morphosyntactic
feature value set outranks a less specific realization constraint
. I also propose that the unmarked situation in which one
feature value is realized by one form (Wurzel 1989) is encoded
in two universal and violable markedness constraints, *FEATURE
SPLIT which bans the realization of a feature value by more
than one form and *FEATURE FUSION which bans a form realizing
more than one feature value.


Based on this model, I examine language phenomena such as
OCP-triggered selection of phonologically unrelated (allo)morphs
in Greek, Hungarian, Tswana, and Spanish, ordering of inflectiona
l affixes in Lezgian, blocking of inflectional affixes and
extended morphological exponence in languages like Tamazight
Berber, and directional syncretism in languages like Latin.


I show that this model has advantages over other morphological
models in several ways. (1) It readily captures cases in
which a default marker emerges to replace a morphosyntactically
more specific marker which is expected to be adjacent to
a phonologically similar form (OCP >> RCspecific >> RCless
specific). By contrast, the relation between a more specific
marker and a less specific one needs to be stipulated in
the input in a model which introduces phonological information
through inputs (e.g. Bonet 2004). (2) It readily captures
universal generalizations on affix order (Greenberg 1963,
Bybee 1985), e.g. a number exponent cannot be farther away
from a nominal stem than a case exponent because case scopes
over number. Such generalizations are missed in Paradigm
Function Morphology (Stump 2001) without extraordinary machinery.
(3) Based on rankings of *FEATURE SPLIT and constraints
realizing the same morphosyntactic feature value(s), it
provides a unified account of both blocking and extended
exponence without recourse to either a distinction between
primary and secondary exponents (Noyer 1992) or multiple
rule blocks (Stump 2001). (4) Based on output-to-output
correspondence constraints (Benua 1995, McCarthy and Prince
1995), it readily captures cases of divergent bidirectional
syncretism (Baerman 2004) in which syncretism brings about
both marked and unmarked forms, a problem for Noyer 1998,
which claims that syncretism always moves from a more marked
to a less marked state.

Comments: 
Keywords: inflectional morphology, realization, OCP, paradigm, blocking, exponence, affix ordering, syncretism
Areas: Morphology
Type: PhD Dissertation

Direct link: http://roa.rutgers.edu/view.php3?roa=949