Inflectional Defectiveness

An accessible exploration of how defectiveness emerges from the implicative organization of paradigms and the structure of the lexicon.

Andrea D. Sims (Author)

9781107623712, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 9 May 2019

331 pages, 18 b/w illus. 64 tables
23 x 15.3 x 2 cm, 0.56 kg

'In Inflection Defectiveness, Andrea D. Sims shines a light on a specific, controversial, problematic, and therefore often ignored aspect of many of the world's languages. In doing so, the author describes a number of paradigmatic gaps in multiple languages.' Daniel Walter, The Linguist List

Paradigmatic gaps ('missing' inflected forms) have traditionally been considered to be the random detritus of a language's history and marginal exceptions to the normal functioning of its inflectional system. Arguing that this is a misperception, Inflectional Defectiveness demonstrates that paradigmatic gaps are in fact normal and expected products of inflectional structure. Sims offers an accessible exploration of how and why inflectional defectiveness arises, why it persists, and how it is learned. The book presents a theory of morphology which is rooted in the implicative structure of the paradigm. This systematic exploration of the topic also addresses questions of inflection class organization, the morphology-syntax interface, the structure of the lexicon, and the nature of productivity. Presenting a novel synthesis of established research and new empirical data, this work is significant for researchers and graduate students in all fields of linguistics.

List of tables
List of figures
List of abbreviations
Preface
1. Introduction
2. Defining inflectional defectiveness
3. On the causes of inflectional defectiveness
4. Productivity, defectiveness, and syncretism
5. Principal parts, predictability, and paradigmatic gaps
6. Irreducible gaps and the morphologization of defectiveness
7. On learnability and the dynamic organization of the lexicon
8. The implicative structure of the paradigm and other concluding thoughts
Appendix. Information-theoretic and other probability-based measures of inflectional structure.

Subject Areas: Grammar, syntax & morphology [CFK], Linguistics [CF], Language: history & general works [CBX]