Lexical Derivation Research Articles

Passive and Causative Constructions in Korean: Lexical Derivation

Passive and Causative Constructions in Korean: Lexical Derivation

상고 중국어에 보이는 母音 交替(ablaut)를 통한 어휘 파생 현상에 대한 小考

상고 중국어에 보이는 母音 交替(ablaut)를 통한 어휘 파생 현상에 대한 小考

The early semantics of the neologism BREXIT: a lexicogrammatical approach

The aim of this paper is to examine the nominality of the neologism BREXIT using a corpus-informed lexicogrammatical approach. The term BREXIT, coined in 2012, used initially in print and social media in the UK is now internationally wide-spread. BREXIT is a blend of British + exit, which expresses the meaning of’Britain exiting from the EU’. Although ‘Brexit’ clearly expresses an event (motion) meaning, as a nominalization, it also expresses nominal meaning. In systemic functional linguistics (SFL), nominalization is much broader than lexical derivation and is treated as a means of conceptualising and encoding experience. In this paper the development of BREXIT is explored using a corpus of 1,641,903 words including 2,435 instances of BREXIT from its first use in May 2012 to the UK general election in 2015. Capturing the development of this term from its initial use allows some insight into the intended meanings of the speaker due to the glosses provided. These appositional expressions are combined with the collocations found in the corpus. The results show that while the meanings identifiable in the corpus are entirely nominal in use, the term encodes complex meanings of event-oriented meanings and of hypotheticality. In examining the nominal status of BREXIT, I show that not all nominalizations are instances of grammatical metaphor.

ON THE SO-CALLED “VINOKUR CRITERION”

The paper is devoted to the problem of direction of lexical derivation. The system methodology was used to describe the “Vinokur criterion”; it turned out that the criterion can not be used to identify the derivation direction. Also the existence of morphemes apocope technique in Russian derivation is refuted and the term interfix is replaced by epenthesis. It is suggested to use the quantity of morphemes instead of the “Vinokur criterion”: the derived stem is different from the stem of the same root in one additional terminal affix. As a result the morphemic analysis is defined as the first stage and the obligatory condition of the derivative analysis. If the “Vinokur criterion” is interpreted correctly, it can be used in lexicography to describe the semantics of derived words. It may also be the indicator of derived word de-etymologization. The problem of the direction of lexical derivation is also connected with the problem of words existence-inexistence in language and speech, with the problem of synchrony and diachrony of word-formation system and also with the necessity for differentiation of the systems of onims and appellatives and for consideration of each derivative as an element of the whole language system.

Noun Layers in Old English: Mismatches and Asymmetry in Lexical Derivation

The aim of the article is to explain the form-function mismatches that occur in the formation of Old English nouns. The analysis identifies pairs of derived nouns that share a lexemic root and represent instances of near-synonymy. Two types of mismatch are found in the formation of nouns, namely convergent derivation due to the competition of suffixes and convergent derivation resulting from the competition of bases. Four types of asymmetry can be distinguished: on the grounds of process, category, productivity and recursivity. The existence of mismatches and the associated asymmetry indicate two waves of word-formation that configure two layers in the lexicon of Old English.

Word formation is syntactic: adjectival passives in English

Since Wasow (1977), the differences between adjectival and verbal passives in English have been taken to motivate a division between lexical and syntactic word-formation processes. This paper shows with data from corpora that many accepted facts about adjectival passives are incorrect: adjectival passives can be formed from ECM/raising verbs, and they can also involve a subset of indirect or applied objects. On the other hand, adjectival passives do differ from verbal passives in special meanings and missing inputs. This means that the phenomena that are supposed to characterize syntactic versus lexical processes do not all pattern together: ECM/raising points to a syntactic derivation of adjectival passives, but special interpretations and missing inputs point to a lexical derivation. This paper instead proposes a purely syntactic account of adjectival passives that explains all of the facts, both the similarities and the differences between adjectival and verbal passives. This syntactic analysis also permits a simple account of the alleged class of non-intersective adjectives, and the predictions it makes provides support for the theory of applied arguments advanced by Bruening (2010).

The derivational map of Old English and the limits of gradual derivation

This journal article deals with Old English word-formation as represented by a derivational map. In a derivational map, lexical derivation applies gradually, so that a process only occurs at a time and affixes are attached one by one. This theoretical and methodological stance holds good for most derivations but there is also evidence of non-gradual formations with the prefixes ǣ-, ge-, or-, twi-, ðri-, and un-. After discussing the relevant derivatives with each of the aforementioned affixes, the conclusions are reached that non-gradual formations arise in frequent word-formation patterns; they constitute, with few exceptions, an adjectival phenomenon; and they are mainly associated with secondary derivational functions. Regarding the derivational map of Old English, the conclusion is drawn that non-gradual formations have to be represented by means of reconstructed forms so that each node represents one lexeme and each edge marks one morphological process.

Recursivity, Derivational Depth and the Search for Old English Lexical Primes

The aims of this article are to coin the term of derivational depth and to assess the role of zero derivation in the search for the lexical primes of Old English. Derivational depth is characterized diachronically as making reference to the (un)productive derivational processes that function as input to productive derivational processes. As regards the related concept of lexical recursivity, it is defined as the derivation of derived bases, which, in Old English, can be the case with the output of processes of zero derivation, affixation and compounding. In the search for the lexical primes of Old English, evidence has been found for three types of zero derivation, including zero derivation with zero inflection, with full inflection and with formative. The main conclusions of the article are that lexical recursivity is a linguistic property, whereas derivational depth represents a property of lexical representations; that zero derivation constitutes a principled formal criterion for defining lexical primes; and that nominal zero derivatives of strong verbs play a role central to lexical derivation in Old English.

Lexico-Grammatical Features of Nigerian English

English is a second language which serves a number of purposes in Nigeria and certain socio-cultural variables influence its use in the Nigerian context. There is rapid expansion in the vocabulary used by Nigerians to translate their thought into language. This has brought about different coinages to suit the situation and context of usage. The English language lacks the ability to perfectly capture all aspects of Nigerian culture, hence it is frequently augmented by fresh coinages and importations derived from Nigerian English lexis as different from native speakers’ lexis. There is the introduction of culture-specific vocabulary items into the English language by Nigerian speakers of the language. This has led to creativity which manifests in coinages to reflect the Nigerian experience. Examples of Nigerian English are drawn and examined in this paper to reveal the influx of new words into the English language as occasioned by lexical derivations and innovations in the Nigerian usage of the language.

LEXICAL OPERATIONS AND HIGH -LEVEL SYNTACTIC OPERATIONS WITH OLD ENGLISH -A, -E, -O, AND -U

The aim of this article is to explain the lexical and high-level syntactic operations comprising the Old English suffixes -a, -e, -o and -u. Previous research has dealt with these suffixes, which constitute an area of overlapping between inflection and derivation, in terms of inflection, zero derivation or continuity between inflection and derivation. The position adopted in this article is that these affixes are fully derivational, although interesting points of convergence with inflection arise that deserve discussion. In this respect, a fundamental difference is made between explicit and implicit morphological relations. Such relations are considered in the derivational and the inflectional dimensions. Regarding lexical operations, the analysis concentrates on the subjective and objective functions realized by these suffixes, while, as far as high-level syntactic operations are concerned, a distinction is drawn between motivated and unmotivated inflective relations. The fact that most of the suffixes under scrutiny perform the subjective and the objective function is in keeping with the Separation Hypothesis, in terms of which grammatical morphemes are the output of phonological operations independent of the semantic operations that they realize. The results are also in accordance with the Universal Grammatical Function Theory, which predicts that the functions of inflectional and lexical derivation are the same.

Phonological and Morphological Functions of Palatalisation in Irish and Polish

The paper attempts to compare the status of palatalization of consonants in Modern Irish and Polish within the phonological and morphological systems of the two languages. Irish and Polish have been selected from the Celtic and Slavic groups due to the fact that both have palatalized consonants. One function, which is connected with the palatalized / non-palatalized distinction is expressing lexical contrast, e.g. Irish cúis [ku:ʃ] ‘reason’ vs. ciumhais [kʲu:ʃ] ‘edge’ and Polish beli [beli] ‘roll, Gen.sg.’ vs. bieli [bʲeli] ‘whiteness, Gen.sg.’. Phonologically speaking, the term ‘palatalization’ is rather broad and ambiguous, as it subsumes two quite disparate linguistic situations. Namely, it may be understood as a dynamic phonetic or phonological process of fronting or softening a consonant in the context of the following front vowel [i/e] or glide [j]. In this sense, palatalization is allophonic, that is, a context dependent assimilatory process, as may be the case with Irish bith [bʲi] ‘existence’, or Polish bił [bʲiw] ‘he beat’. On the other hand, both Irish and Polish seem to show that palatalization of consonants may also be independent of the context, in which case we are not dealing with a process, but with a genuine lexical property of given consonants, that is, a phonemic distinction. This point can be illustrated by such forms as Irish beo [bʲo:] ‘alive’ and Polish biodro [bʲodro] ‘hip’. Here the palatalized consonant is followed by a back vowel and could not have been derived by assimilation. Another argument for the phonemic status of palatalization in the two languages comes from the forms in which the presence of a front vowel does not guarantee that a consonant will be palatalized, e.g. Irish tuí [ti:] ‘straw’ (cf. tí [tʲi:] ‘house, Gen.sg.’) and Polish beli [beli] ‘roll, Gen.sg.’. It may appear that the phonological similarities between Irish and Polish palatalization are considerable. However, the appealing picture becomes more complicated when the two systems are looked at in detail. Once present in the phonological representation of words, the property of palatalization in Irish behaves quite disparately from what is observed in Polish. In Irish, palatalization behaves as an independent property (autosegment) and has a tendency to spread leftwards, affecting the preceding short vowels, e.g. sop / soip [sop / sipʲ] ‘wisp / Gen.sg’, consonants and vowels, e.g. olc / oilc [olk / ilʲkʲ] ‘evil / Gen.sg.’, or even entire syllables, e.g. dorn / doirn [dorən / dirʲinʲ] ‘fist / Gen.sg.’. Thus, palatalization as an assimilatory process is not entirely inactive. On the other hand, in Polish, there is some vestigial consonant-vowel interaction, practically limited to velar consonants, as well as some cluster assimilation. The paper aims to define the conditions on the phonological scope of palatalization in Irish and Polish from the point of view of the historical origin of the phenomenon, distributional restrictions, and participation in processes. Both languages successfully utilize the palatalized / non-palatalized distinction also in the respective morphological systems. This general similarity has a historical origin in the loss of final syllables. The paper surveys various lexical derivations and inflectional paradigms involving palatalization in Irish and Polish. From the formal point of view, there seem to be two main ways in which the palatalized / non-palatalized distinction is utilized morphologically, each of which has two subcategories: 1. Palatalization a. as a sole formative: C > Cʲ, e.g. Irish bád / báid [bɑ:d / bɑ:dʲ] ‘boat, Nom.sg. / Nom.pl.’, and Polish ryb-a / rybi-a [rɨba / rybʲa] ‘fish, Nom.sg. / adj.Nom.sg.fem.’. b. as a co-formative: C > Cʲ+vowel, e.g. Irish deas / deise [dʲas / dʲeʃə] ‘nice / Gen.sg.’, and Polish student / studenc-i [student / studeɲtɕi] ‘student, Nom.sg. / Nom.pl.’. 2. De-palatalization a. as a sole formative: Cʲ > C, e.g. Irish athair / athar [ahir / ahər] ‘father, Nom.sg. / Gen.sg.’. b. as a co-formative: e.g. Polish liść / list-ek [liɕtɕ / listek] ‘leaf / dim.’ From the functional viewpoint, these effects are seen, in Polish, in some paradigms of nominal inflection, the derivation of abstract nouns from adjectives and of possessive denominal adjectives, as well as in large areas of expressive word-formation, etc. In Irish, the morphological impact of palatalization is best observed in the nominal inflection, but it also present in verbal inflection and some derivations, e.g. Verbal Nouns. Further cross-linguistic comparison and typological research is called for in order to fully appreciate the status of palatalization as a link between phonology and morphology. This paper attempts to lay the foundations for such research.

Old Irish and Slavic Prefixed Verbs and the Function of Prefixes

The long chain of verbal prefixes which is common in the Old Irish glosses is a phenomenon which has parallels in Slavic. The normal order of Old Irish prefixes is known. Violations of that order can be observed. The prefixes are homonymous with prepositions and thus have a local meaning. The exact function of the prefixes in the chain is, however, not always obvious. Some prefixes are telic and have a weakened local meaning. The reason for the order in which the prefixes occur has not been well explained. It is often difficult to determine where a certain prefix was placed when it was added to a preexisting shorter group of prefixes. Ro, con and ad can be infixed (in some cases prefixed) to indicate that an act or a state is seen as completed (perfective or perfect) or where ro and con indicate possibility or ability. The question can arise whether a certain prefix is of local or ‘aspectual’ nature. Doubling of prefixes occurs as in comtherchomracc ‘assembly’. In do·é-com-nacht ‘has bestowed’ ‘perfectivizing’ con- has been infixed into a pre-existing do·ind-naig. In·r-úa-lad ‘I have entered’ shows a similar process but with the ‘perfectivizing’ ro- in a different position. -r-ind·úa-lad (Ml 93cl4) ‘thou hast entered’ shows that this is not the only possible order. Multiple prefixes in Slavic were recently discussed by Filip (2003) who drew attention to the problematic nature of the function of prefixes as grammatical (inflexional) markers of perfective aspect. She also discussed their behaviour as directional prefixes. Most of her examples are from Czech and contain two (or three) prefixes. We shall draw attention to the prefixed verbs of Bulgarian which has longer chains of prefixes. It will therefore be interesting to compare Bulgarian with Old Irish. Many questions concerning these chains are similar to those that arise in the analysis of the OI chains of prefixes both in regard to function and position in the chain. The different position of 'aspectual' prefixes in Slavic and Irish should be observed. In this paper I shall mainly treat the functional properties of the prefixes. Bulgarian pridobivam is not too difficult to analyze. Izpoprebivam is more complicated as it shows actional iz- and the likewise actional po- in the initial position which is natural for such prefixes in Slavic languages. Izponaprikàzvam shows four prefixes though the very common combined prefix izpo- has been analyzed as being one entity. Nevertheless, po- seems to have kept its distributive meaning. Doubling of prefixes is found in Bulgarian. Filip (2003) considers the prefixes to be derivational morphemes, but does not see them as formal markers of perfectivity. The action of a prefixed verb may be quantized, telic or bounded. Böttger (2004) discusses grammatical and lexical derivation, grammaticalization and the Russian prefixes po-, zu- and ot- in a diachronical perspective. We shall discuss these theories and their applicability to OI and Bulgarian. The “directional and measurement usages” of Slavic and Irish prefixes will finally be compared with the functions of the Hittite enclitic directional particles.

Middle Voice in Otomi

In this article, I claim that Otomi has a nasal morpheme that serves as an exponent of middle voice. My data come from the dialect of San Ildefonso Tultepec, but a similar phenomenon can be observed in other dialects, so that the claims made here could be extended to Otomi as a diasystem. The study is based on a sample of 72 verbs that display the middle morpheme, a sample intended as a quantitative reference for the qualitative patterns found in the language. About two‐thirds of the verbs in this sample still show traces of lexical derivation. However, the derivative process has become unproductive and most middle verbs in Otomi function as independent units in the lexicon, showing just a morphological connection to their source verbs. My sample also contains cases where the source of the derivation was difficult, if not impossible, to reconstruct.

On the structure of names

This paper is concerned with the relationship between (proper) names and word structure, and specifically with the classification of names and with the role of (classes of) names in lexical derivation. The major source of exemplification is English. 1 outlines the categorisation of names proposed in a sister study devoted to the syntax of names (Anderson in preparation), as well as other relevant parts of the syntactic description given there. In 2.1 different kinds of personal and place names are differentiated and their more salient morphosyntactic characteristics commented upon. This is followed in 2.2 by a consideration both of the historic sources of names and of some of the properties and functions of systems of naming; and here is noted the typical de-semanticisation of names compared with the common words that are their typical historical source, such that the synchronic role of common (descriptive) elements in name systems tends to be restricted. These discussions are relatively informal, but 2.3 offers a more explicitly articulated account of the system of names. 3 is concerned with the major kinds of (lexical) derivational processes that can form names and with the role of names in derivational processes forming other names or items of other categories, and the light these throw on the semantics of (classes of) names and naming.

Thematic Roles and the Quest for Semantic Invariante of Lexical Derivations

En se situant dans le cadre d'un projet appele Semantic dictionary viewed as a lexical database dont l'objectif est d'identifier et de denombrer les informations linguistiquement pertinentes pouvant etre derivees des definitions du sens, l'A. examine ici les processus productifs de derivation semantique des verbes en russe, et en particulier les processus associes a un changement metonymique qui se refletent dans le cadre du cas profond d'un verbe. Il tente ainsi de montrer que les roles semantiques permettent de decouvrir l'invariant semantique d'une grande partie des derivations productives

L2 acquisition of English synthetic compounding is not constrained by level-ordering (and neither, probably, is L1 )

This article investigates the acquisition of English synthetic compounding by native Spanish and native Chinese speakers. Data are presented which con tradict the claim by Gordon (1985), Clahsen (1991) and Clahsen et al. (1992) that morphological level-ordering is universally, innately available to lan guage learners to guide their acquisition of compounding constraints. Empirical arguments are given which show that compounding, at least, can not be universally subject to the particular inflectional constraints - namely, a restriction on plurals in compounds - imposed by the level-ordering mod els cited in the above acquisition studies. I also present additional experi mental results which demonstrate that L2 learners of English freely violate this restriction, and that such violations reflect particular L1 influence. I suggest an alternative approach to analysing the role of Universal Grammar in the acquisition of compounding which better accounts for both the L1 and L2 English data, by considering 1) the interaction of syntactic principles with lexical derivation; 2) the parametric differences between the L1 and L2; and 3) the language-specific nature of morphological affixation.

The Limit of Structure Preservation in Dakota Lexical Phonology

Some of the earliest papers on Lexical Phonology claim that structure preservation applies throughout a Lexical derivation and may only he shut off by exiting the Lexicon. Work by Kellogg (1991) in Lakota attempts to uphold this relationship between Lexical Phonology and Structure Preservation but recent work in Lexical Phonology and some older work in Dakota refute this claim. After a minimal discussion of Dakota phonology, morphology and how they relate to each other in Lexical Phonology, I will take up the problem of syllable structure within the Lexicon and show that Structure Preservation seems to he shut off early in the Lexical derivation.

Affix raising and the level ordering hypothesis

The compositional structure of derived words like ungrammaticality constitutes a serious problem for level ordering theories of morphology that play a prominent role in Lexical Phonology. Pesetsky (1985) proposed an elegant solution to these apparent level ordering paradoxes which invoked a mechanism of Affix Raising to preserve level order. However, it is argued here that the Affix Raising account of level ordering paradoxes cannot be maintained: it is both too weak in its original form, and too strong when modified to accommodate clear cases of acceptability. Furthermore, it is argued that this attempt to maintain strict morphological level ordering is misguided, ant that, instead, lexical derivations can shift freely between morphological strata. Despite the rejection of strict morphological ordering, there remains strong motivation for the interleaving of morphological and phonological strata: Lexical Phonology does not fall with the fall of the rigid level ordering of word formation rules.

Recherches sur la morphologie lexicale : les flexions de genre et de nombre

Summary : Processing of gender and number categories in the french language. In French, gender and, less obviously, number are indicated by two processes : 1/ A so called morphological process by affixation of a morpheme (for example, -e in the feminine, -s in the plural), 2/ A so called lexical process by changing a word (ex. masculine garcon and feminine fille, singular cheval and plural chevaux). In gender and number processing, are these two processes equivalent ? Rather recent models of lexical derivation can be applied to the morphological process. These models assume an analysis in levels of the different components of a word, root, radical and affixes and suggest that number can be inserted at a deeper level than gender ; This idea leads to the experimental hypothesis in which gender processing promutes recognition in comparison with recall and number processing yields no difference between these two forms of retrieval. Four experiments using a particular method of transformation (from masculine to feminine, from plural to singular, etc.) of recall and recognition are applied to these issues. They show : A/ for gender : 1) The equivalence of masculine and feminine ; 2) An easier processing of lexical gender than of morphological gender, which implies two lexical entries in the case of lexical gender, and only one, not lexical, in the case of morphological gender. B/ for number : 1) The equivalence of singular and plural ; 2) Better recall of lexical plural than morphological plural, which leads to think that words such as cheval--chevaux, mal-maux are linked to derivation rules. C/ The comparison between recognition and recall shows that gender recognition is better than gender recall whereas both retrieval forms are equivalent for the number. This is in line with the idea of a deeper insertion level for number than for gender. Key words : morphological and lexical processive, gender, number.

Non-structure-preserving rules in lexical phonology: Southeastern Bantu harmony

One of the principles which supposedly governs the application of phonological rules in the lexicon is that of Structure Preservation, according to which conditions on the marking of feature values in underlying representation remain in force during lexical derivation. Evidence examined in this article indicates that the principle not only is too restrictive as a constraint on synchronic grammars but also makes wrong predictions about the direction of phonological change. The data involve an assimilatory process which affects mid vowels in southeastern Bantu languages.