Abstract
The first part of this review article summarises and evaluates the contents of the book, attempting to do justice to the wealth of perspectives it offers. The book considers phonological, morphological, syntactic and semantic features from the vantage points of approaches as diverse as typology, computational linguistics and formal theories like Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar (HPSG) and Minimalism. The second part of the article discusses several of the unifying threads that run through the volume, including the internal and cross-linguistic validity and correspondence of features, as well as the boundaries between morphology, syntax and semantics. I argue for a syntactic treatment of what has been referred to as periphrastic tense constructions in Bulgarian (including the future and the perfect), which I believe ensures greater language-internal and cross-linguistic consistency in proposing features and assigning their values. After briefly examining animacy in Bulgarian, I conclude that the operation and classification of features can make drawing boundaries between semantics and morphosyntax especially difficult. Finally, a case is made for treating tense as at least partly morphosyntactic in English, in contrast to prevalent current assumptions about the strictly morphosemantic nature of tense cross-linguistically.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.