Weak Inflection Research Articles

Entwicklung und Durchsetzung der Monoflexion im 18. Jahrhundert

Abstract In this paper, it is argued that the principle of monoinflection governing the distribution of strong and weak adjective inflection in the New High German noun phrase (NP) definitively became established in the 18th century. Empirical evidence for this assumption is provided by the findings of three corpus studies based on the historical corpus ›Deutsches Textarchiv‹ (German Text Archive). Focusing on three different constructional types within the NP, the evolving distribution of strong and weak adjective inflection is studied for the period from 1600 to 1900. Based on the findings of the three corpus studies, further structural tendencies in the (re)organization of the New High German NP and their interaction with the principle of monoinflection are discussed.

Strength and Weakness of the Old English Adjective

AbstractAs regards Old English, the inflectional strength and weakness are characterised by a kind of inconsistency. In the case of Old English adjectives these two inflectional properties appear to be different from those associated with nouns and verbs. In the case of the latter the two properties seem to be lexically determined while in the case of adjectives they appear to be determined by syntactic conditions. The traditional accounts of the Old English grammar attribute two paradigms to one adjectival lexical item. The analysis presented in this article postulates that one can actually speak about one adjectival inflection and what is traditionally presented as strong and weak adjectival inflections is actually the result of two different syntactic derivations.

Parallel- vs. Wechselflexion im dat sg mask/neutr – Ein Erklärungsansatz zur Persistenz der Variation

AbstractThis paper deals with the variation of adjective inflection in nominal phrases with two consecutive adjectives in the dative singular masculine/neuter (e. g.mit größerem politischem[strong inflection]Einfluss vs. mit größerem politischen[weak inflection]Einfluss‚with greater political influence‘). Only the second adjective is affected by the variation; it can show strong or weak inflection (parallel inflection vs. alternating inflection). In Standard German, both uses coexist without any difference in meaning or function. This phenomenon is analyzed using corpus data. The focus is on the question why this variation persists almost exclusively in the dative singular masculine/neuter. After the discussion of different explanations available, a phonological approach to explain the persistence of the variation is presented. It is argued that the low phonological contrast between the strong inflection -mand its weak counterpart -nis the reason why the variation is still persistent in the dative singular masculine/neuter. The role of grammar reference works in the persistence of the concerning variation is also discussed.

An experimental approach to iconicity in Dutch strong and weak verb morphology

In Dutch, some verbs can vary in their preterite and past participle form. These verbs can either take the strong inflection (using ablaut, e.g. schuilen-school-gescholen ‘hide-hid-hidden’) or the weak inflection (adding a dental suffix, e.g. schuilen-schuilde-geschuild ‘hide-hid-hidden’). In a diachronic corpus study, De Smet and Van de Velde (2020) show that this variation can be exapted to express aspect in an iconic manner. Their results indicate that weak preterites are used more often in durative contexts, while the shorter strong variants are used more often in punctual contexts. For the past participles, this pattern is reversed: the longer strong variants are used more often in durative contexts, while the shorter weak variants are used more often in punctual contexts. In this paper, we seek experimental validation of these results. Furthermore, we also distinguish between preterite singulars and preterite plurals, as we expect the iconicity effect to be less obvious for the latter, given that the difference in length between the strong and weak preterite plural is negligible (e.g. schuilden vs. scholen). Participants were presented with a forced choice task where they had to choose between weak or strong preterites and past participles of nonce verbs in sentences suggesting either a durative or a punctual context. Though no general effect of aspect on verb inflection was found, results indicate a trend for a particular group of verbs that supports the corpus results from De Smet and Van de Velde (2020). Furthermore, the durative-punctual distinction was also found to be portrayed in yet another iconic manner: verb forms with vowels that are sound symbolically associated with slow long movements were used more often in durative contexts, while verb forms with vowels that are associated with quick, short movements were used more often in punctual contexts.

How to become an adjective when you're not strong (enough)?


 
 
 This article attempts to put a new spin on (the development of) weakly inflected adjectives, with a partic- ular focus on North Germanic, by recycling some traditional ideas. Point of departure is the observation that the Proto-Norse demonstrative hinn had ended up as a functional element in the extended adjectival projection in Old Norse – not as a definite article in the extended nominal projection (an otherwise well- known grammaticalization process). Following the old idea that weak inflection originally involved nominalization, it is argued that weak “adjectives” maintained their nominal status beyond Proto-Gemanic. Thus the weakening demonstrative originally occurs as a determiner in some nominal projection. At some stage prior to Old Norse, this constellation is reanalyzed at the phrasal level, from noun phrase to adjectival phrase, a process in which the demonstrative gets “trapped” inside the adjectival projection and is reanalyzed as adjectival article. This process termed phrasal reanalysis is operative at three levels, (i) lexical: N0 >> A0; (ii) phrasal: NP >> AP; (iii) functional: demonstrative >> adjectival article.
 
 

A corpus-based quantitative analysis of twelve centuries of preterite and past participle morphology in Dutch

AbstractGermanic preterite morphology has been the subject of a bewildering number of studies, looking especially at the competition between the so-called strong inflection (operating with ablaut), and the so-called weak inflection (operating with suffixation). In this study over 250,000 observations from twelve centuries of Dutch were analyzed in a generalized linear mixed-effect model gauging the effects of a multitude of language-internal factors, ranging from various frequency measures to various form-related factors and how they interact with each other. This study confirms the well-known effects of token and type frequency, finding that formal similarities can be both a driving and conservative force in language change and demonstrates that not all members (i.e., preterites and past participles) of a verb paradigm change at the same time, which is both an effect of their frequency and their formal coherence within the paradigm.

Semantic differences between strong and weak verb forms in Dutch

Abstract Dutch, like other Germanic languages, disposes of two strategies to express past tense: the strong inflection (e.g., rijden – reed ‘drive – drove’) and the weak inflection (spelen – speelde ‘play – played’). This distinction is for the most part lexically determined in that each verb occurs in one of the two inflections. Diachronically the system is in flux though, with the resilience of some verbs being mainly driven by frequency. Synchronically this might result in variable verbs (e.g., schuilen – schuilde/school ‘hide – hid’ or raden – raadde/ried ‘guess – guessed’). This diachronic (1300–2000) corpus study shows that this variation is not haphazard, but that semantic factors are at play. We see two such effects. First of all, synchronically, the variation is exapted in an iconic manner to express aspect: durative meanings tend to be expressed by longer verb forms and punctual meanings tend to be expressed by shorter verb forms. Secondly, we see that metaphorical meanings come to be associated within obsolescent inflectional forms, as predicted by Kuryłowicz’s “fourth law of analogy”.

Turbulent Heat and Momentum Exchange in Nocturnal Drainage Flow Through a Sloped Vineyard

High-frequency measurements are available at five heights within and above a row-gap trellised vineyard located on a 7$$^{\circ }$$ slope in the Southern Okanagan Valley, British Columbia, Canada. During a 3-week campaign in July 2016, approximately 17% of the nocturnal conditions exhibit drainage flow along the local slope. Drainage conditions are characterized by temperature inversions beginning around $$z/h_c = 0.39$$, where z is the height above ground level (a.g.l.) and $$h_c$$ is the canopy height (2.3 m a.g.l.), and near-surface lapses. Changes in the sign of the streamwise momentum flux suggest the presence of a jet maximum around $$z/h_c = 1.65$$, while a weak inflection point is observed near the canopy top, suggesting dynamical influences from both the drainage layer and canopy layer on the turbulent flow field. The largest observed fluxes in both the streamwise momentum flux and the turbulent sensible heat flux are near the top of the canopy, consistent with the location of the inflection point. Calculated two-point length scales from along-slope distributed temperature measurements reveal that turbulent structures are smallest near the canopy top. Conditional sampling of the three-dimensional velocity components and temperature indicate that a large fraction of canopy-layer transport is driven by canopy top turbulence, with sweeps dominating over ejections, particularly at $$z/h_c = 0.65$$.

Analogy, reanalysis and exaptation in Early Middle English: the emergence of a new inflectional system

From Old English to Middle English inflection is gradually lost. It is assumed that this is mainly due to phonological and syntactic changes. This article, however, argues that the loss of inflection is not a linear process but new systems can emerge, and that morphological changes play an important role. The nominal inflection of the Lambeth Homilies – an Early Middle English manuscript from the southwest Midlands and dated around 1200 – is investigated in detail. It will be shown that analogical changes within and across inflection classes do not simply lead towards a reduction of inflection. The increase in syncretism and decrease in allomorphy result in a new inflectional system. This new system distinguishes singular from plural, feminine from non-feminine (in the singular and plural), and possessive from non-possessive (in the singular and plural). Additionally, the original inflection classes related to different stems are almost lost, except the weak inflection classes. The inflection classes are instead related to gender; that is, gender is the information that best predicts how a noun is inflected.

This is not the same: the ambiguity of a Gothic adjective

AbstractIn line with the traditional pronouncement that the weak (definite) forms of adjectives in Germanic follow the definite determiner, the Gothic weak-only adjectivesama‘the same’ (no indefinite form *sams, with the strong inflection-s, occurs) is determined (sa sama‘the same’) in the majority of its attestations. However, contrary to the traditional description, occasionally it also occurs on its own, without a determiner. An examination of the syntactic distribution of the adjective and a comparison of the Gothic translation of the Bible with the Greek and Latin texts uncover a double semantic nature ofsama. Specifically, when determined,samaconveys a definite/particularising force of ‘the same’. In the absence of the determiner, however, it conveys the semantic value of ‘one; of one kind’. The results of this investigation contribute to our understanding of the conditions that govern the distribution of strong vs. weak adjective inflections in early Germanic. In particular, they confirm the contention that the occurrence of the weak form of the adjective is not simply a matter of whether or not a definite determiner precedes it. Instead, the definite value of the adjective inflection is realised cumulatively (periphrastically), via the co-occurrence of the definite determiner and the weak adjective inflection.

Hybrasurfs-A New Class of Hyperbranched Surfactants.

A hyperbranched (HB) polyester carrying peripheral allyl groups was prepared by melt-condensation of a suitably designed AB2 monomer bearing two allyl ester groups and one hydroxyl group. The periphery of the hyperbranched polymer was co-clicked with two different organic thiols, namely, hexadecane thiol and 3-mercaptopropionic acid, using the thiol-ene reaction. Three different samples with varying mole fractions of the hydrophilic carboxylic acid groups were prepared; the conformational adaptability of the hyperbranched polymer backbone permitted these amphiphilic systems to form Janus structures that exhibit surfactant-like properties and, therefore, we have termed them hybrasurfs. These polymers behave like clusters of surfactants that have been stitched at the waist by the HB polymer backbone; the Langmuir isotherms revealed the formation of a monolayer, and in two of the samples having higher mole fractions of hexadecyl segments a weak inflection in the isotherm is seen. This suggests a densification, typically implying the crystallization of the alkyl segment at the air-water interface. The monolayers were transferred onto a substrate, and their heights were estimated using atomic force microscopy; the values thus obtained were in reasonable agreement with the expected value. The water contact angles of the substrates bearing the transferred monolayers of the three different samples (transferred at two different points along the isotherm) were measured; it was seen that the sample carrying the highest mole fraction of hexadecyl chains exhibited a significantly larger contact angle when compared to that of the other two samples. Interestingly, these hybrasurfs also formed vesicles in water and were shown to encapsulate water-soluble dyes, such as Eosin Y. Thus, this class of readily accessible amphiphilic HB polymers that behave as a cluster of surfactants opens some interesting possibilities for further exploration.

Weak adjectives need not be definite

Abstract In Gothic and, more generally, early Germanic, adjectives can be declined for gender, number, case and determination. The latter category refers to a morphologically realised distinction (opposition) of indefiniteness and definiteness, traditionally presented in terms of the strong (indefinite) and weak (definite) types of inflection: cf. strong ubils‘evil’ vs. weak sa ubila‘the evil (one)’. The definite (weak) form of the adjective is conventionally said to be triggered by the definite determiner (pronoun) that precedes it. By examining the evidence of variation between determined and undetermined weak forms of adjectives in the Gothic Bible, I argue that the weak inflection performs a broader range of functions than conventionally assumed. In particular, I show that the weak form of the adjective is indefinite in the presence of a classifying or identifying feature. However, it accompanies a D-word projected from a noun (which may be null) bearing a definite feature. In other words, the weak inflection is not an autonomous carrier of definiteness and is definite only by association with the determiner. The evidence of variation between Lithuanian short (indefinite) and long (definite) forms of adjectives provides compelling support for this presentation of the Gothic facts.

Frisian strong and weak verbs in the face of Dutch influence: a synchronic and experimental approach

Like other Germanic languages, Frisian has both strong and weak verbal inflection. Despite a strong diachronic tendency for change towards weak inflection, strong inflection patterns are available synchronically to speakers to form the past tense and past participle of new or nonce verbs. Using a measure for ‘potential productivity’ developed by Knooihuizen and Strik (Folia Linguist Hist 35:173–200, 2014) for Dutch, we investigate the relative strength of available patterns in Frisian in an elicitation and an acceptability judgment experiment. Despite the multitude of different patterns in the strong verbal inflection system, strong inflection makes up 35% of the elicited nonce forms; these forms cannot all be explained by analogy. Analogically formed strong inflections of nonce verbs receive relatively high acceptability ratings at 4.2 on a 7-point scale. The elicitation experiment also produced many weak forms (12% of participles) that are not normatively possible with the -e infinitives in the elicitation prompt. These alternative weak forms were not included in the acceptability judgment experiment. We discuss the experimental results in the context of diachronically attested language change in Frisian and of intensive language contact with Dutch.

Adjectival inflection as diagnostic for structural position: inside and outside the Icelandic definiteness domain

This article attempts to account for the distribution of Icelandic adjectival inflection in a manner that also captures a problematic case that has not been satisfactorily analyzed in the literature. It is argued that weak inflection is triggered if the adjective is c-commanded by a feature [definite]. Strong inflection occurs precisely if weak inflection is not triggered. This implementation accounts for the occurrence of strong inflection on predicative adjectives and adnominal adjectives in indefinite noun phrases, but moreover allows us to account for an unexpected pattern in Icelandic where a strongly inflected adjective occurs in a definite noun phrase. It is argued that, in this case, the adjective is not c-commanded by the definite article, but, in fact, merged outside DP. This rather unorthodox assumption motivated on morpho-syntactic grounds makes a number of syntactic and semantic predictions. In particular, adjectives that are merged outside DP are expected to modify not simply an NP (of type $${ }$$ ), but actually a referential expression/an individual of type e. The discussion of four instances of that strongly inflected pattern—appositives, expressives, positional predicates and little partitives—provides various kinds of evidence and shows that these expectations are indeed borne out.

Sentiment analysis leveraging emotions and word embeddings

Sentiment analysis and opinion mining are valuable for extraction of useful subjective information out of text documents. These tasks have become of great importance, especially for business and marketing professionals, since online posted products and services reviews impact markets and consumers shifts. This work is motivated by the fact that automating retrieval and detection of sentiments expressed for certain products and services embeds complex processes and pose research challenges, due to the textual phenomena and the language specific expression variations. This paper proposes a fast, flexible, generic methodology for sentiment detection out of textual snippets which express people’s opinions in different languages. The proposed methodology adopts a machine learning approach with which textual documents are represented by vectors and are used for training a polarity classification model. Several documents’ vector representation approaches have been studied, including lexicon-based, word embedding-based and hybrid vectorizations. The competence of these feature representations for the sentiment classification task is assessed through experiments on four datasets containing online user reviews in both Greek and English languages, in order to represent high and weak inflection language groups. The proposed methodology requires minimal computational resources, thus, it might have impact in real world scenarios where limited resources is the case.

Inflections on pre-nominal adjectives in Germanic: Main types, subtypes, and subset relations

In order to contribute to the understanding of the nature of inflection, this paper investigates the endings on pre-nominal adjectives in four Germanic languages: Dutch, Norwegian, German, and Yiddish. Incorporating detailed observations about Yiddish in general and non-canonical nominals in particular, this study confirms Harbert’s (The Germanic languages, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2007) classification of the Mainland Scandinavian languages as semantically determining their inflections but of German as encoding case, number, and gender on its endings. The latter is shown to be regulated by lexical factors. Dutch is grouped with Norwegian and Yiddish with German. While all four languages differ in their details, the paper proposes that compared to Dutch, the Norwegian weak inflections require a subset of definiteness (sub-)components and that in comparison to German, the Yiddish weak inflections require a subset of lexical triggers. Whereas weak endings only surface inside DPs, which are necessarily definite in Dutch and Norwegian, strong endings are shown to appear in more diverse contexts. Given the language-specific conditions on the distribution of the weak inflections, the strong endings are interpreted as the elsewhere case in all languages.

On the nature of magnetic state in the spinel Co2SnO4

In the spinel Co2SnO4, coexistence of ferrimagnetic ordering below TN ≃ 41 K followed by a spin glass state below TSG ≃ 39 K was proposed recently based on the temperature dependence of magnetization M(T) data. Here new measurements of the temperature dependence of the specific heat CP(T), ac-susceptibilities χ′(T) and χ″(T) measured at frequencies between 0.51 and 1.2 kHz, and the hysteresis loop parameters (coercivity HC(T) and remanence MR(T)) in two differently prepared samples of Co2SnO4 are reported. The presence of the Co2+ and Sn4+ states is confirmed by x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) yielding the structure: Co2SnO4 = [Co2+][Co2+Sn4+]O4. The data of CP versus T shows only an inflection near 39 K characteristic of spin–glass ordering. The analysis of the frequency dependence of ac-magnetic susceptibility data near 39 K using the Vogel–Fulcher law and the power-law of the critical slowing-down suggests the presence of spin clusters in the system which is close to a spin–glass state. With a decrease in temperature below 39 K, the temperature dependence of the coercivity HC and remanence MR for the zero-field cooled samples show both HC and MR reaching their peak magnitudes near 25 K, then decreasing with decreasing T and becoming negligible below 15 K. The plot of CP/T versus T also yields a weak inflection near 15 K. This temperature dependence of HC and remanence MR is likely associated with the different magnitudes of the magnetic moments of Co2+ ions on the ‘A’ and ‘B’ sites and their different temperature dependence.

Relative productivity potentials of Dutch verbal inflection patterns

AbstractDiachronic change regarding the Germanic verb shows a tendency away from strong and towards weak inflection, although the change is not unidirectional. Three production and acceptability experiments on nonce and existing verbs in Dutch unveil a clear hierarchy in potential productivity of inflection patterns. Weak inflection has the highest potential productivity; within strong inflection, Classes I, II and III outrank the others. Speakers also regularly employ a productoriented schema based on the vowels /o/ and /ɔ/, as well as, although to a lesser extent, on /i/ and /ɪ/. We relate these findings to synchronic factors and to diachronic change.

Characterisation of two kaolin facies from Ediki, Southwest Cameroon

Sand-rich (ESR) and sand-poor kaolin (ESP) facies from Ediki, Southwest (SW) Cameroon, have been mineralogically and geochemically characterised in order to elucidate on their emplacement and degree of kaolinization. The mineralogical assemblage comprised quartz, kaolinite, muscovite, microcline, goethite and anatase. ESP registered a sharp peak at 3620 cm-1 and two weak inflections between the doublets at 3652 and 3670 cm-1, whereas only one clearly resolved peak at 3620 cm-1 was observed for ESR. Quartz interference at 1023, 791 and 682 occurred in both samples. Laths, irregular platelets and flakes with swirl texture and corroded edges characterized ESR whereas loose stacks and flakes displaying a seemingly preferred orientation was observed in ESP. Low alumina content, CIA and high Si2O3:Al2O3 ratio coupled with relative enrichment of K over the other alkali and alkali earth metals was observed in both samples. The results infer partial kaolinization processes, low to moderate degrees of crystallinity and significant quartz contamination in both kaolin facies. The difference in mineralogy and geochemistry between the two facies is ascribed to physical controls on weathering (inferred porosity, permeability and inclination of the lithologic units) rather than the degree of chemical alteration. Key words: Cameroon, kaolin facies, characterization, kaolinization.

Two Different Anisotropic SDW Gaps in Heavy-Fermion System Ce0.87La0.13(Ru1-xRhx)2Si2by Resistivity

We have measured the susceptibility χ and resistivity ρ on single-crystalline Ce 0.87 La 0.13 (Ru 1- x Rh x ) 2 Si 2 for 0 ≤ x ≤0.4 in directions parallel (∥) and perpendicular (⊥) to the c -axis. The χ∥ for 0 ≤ x ≤0.3 indicates a typical AF maximum at T N . The ρ⊥ for x = 0 and 0.05 shows a gap-type anomaly at T N . The ρ∥ indicates a weak inflection at around T N for x = 0 and a clear shoulder at T N for x = 0.05. For 0.1 ≤ x ≤0.3 the gap-type anomaly in ρ⊥ disappears and a gap-type jump has been detected in ρ∥ at T N . These behaviors suggest that the Fermi-surface nesting along the a -axis for x = 0 followed by a transverse SDW ordering changes into the nesting along the c -axis followed by a longitudinal SDW ordering for 0.1 ≤ x ≤0.3.