This article deals with compounding in Greek, a language with an attested history of about 3,500 years. It shows that, through the centuries, Greek compounding has preserved its considerable productivity and most of its structural patterns, while it has also been enriched with the emergence of a new pattern of verbal compounds filling an existing gap. It is argued that changes have occurred in accordance with the dominant properties of Greek morphology, particularly compounding, which is largely stem-based and right-headed. As a result, the grammar of Greek compounding has become more optimal, in the sense that structures deviating from these properties have been restricted or nearly eliminated, and regularity has increased through the reduction of unnecessary variation. Moreover, the emergence of a compound marker rendered Modern Greek compounds particularly distinct from other word formations and their structure turned more systematic. The article also provides an explanation for the existence of an apparent counterexample of left-headed compounds in a number of Modern Greek varieties, which has been interpreted as the result of contact with Romance. Evidence for claims and proposals is drawn from all stages of the Greek language, ranging from Mycenaean to Modern Greek.
In a situation when two or more grammaticalization targets in one language are phonologically identical but functionally distinct, neither polygrammaticalization nor accidental syncretism can be ruled out, especially if we are dealing with a language without historical attestations. In the present paper, I present a detailed account of the coexistence of two homophonous grammatical markers in Rutul (< Lezgic < Nakh-Daghestanian), an underdescribed language of the Caucasus with a poorly known history. By taking into account the language-internal behavior of the markers, dialectal variation, similar developments in closely related languages and wider cross-linguistic parallels, I argue that the two ga-morphemes go back to constructions involving different lexical items and present the two different scenarios underlying their development. In particular, I suggest that the temporal ga and its variants originate from the noun ga(h) ‘time’, a Persian loan which also became the source of temporal markers in some other Lezgic languages. I also put forward a hypothesis that the indefiniteness marker ga comes from the verb ‘want’, a cross-linguistically common source for free-choice indefinite pronouns.
According to the principle of invariance of linguistic complexity, every language shows a similar degree of complexity, although it may be distributed across different levels and structures. However, it is difficult to give empirical substance to this principle because it is not easy to say what complexity is and how it should be measured. In addition, a diachronic trade-off has been suggested, for instance between morphology and syntax, whereby previous morphological complexity may be discharged in favor of greater syntactic complexification. Furthermore, language contact has been observed to start simplification processes leading to allegedly less complex languages, such as pidgins and creoles. In this paper, it will be suggested that morphologization should be considered as the response in terms of complexity reduction to changes that render morphonological alternations opaque. A case study will be discussed in support, drawn from Titsch, a variety of Walser German spoken in the highly multilingual context of the linguistic island of Gressoney.
There are now a variety of models available for describing morphology. Some are more static, simply laying out structure, while others are more dynamic, proposing sequences of operations by which structures might be derived. Different models might be useful for different purposes, different constructions, and different languages. But we can go beyond description toward explanation of the structures that exist by incorporating the diachronic dimension, examining the kinds of processes by which morphological structures develop over time in individual languages, then extracting general principles. Much of what we find synchronically might seem unmotivated until it is recognized that morphology reflects the crystallization of sequences of individual developments, each motivated at an earlier point in time. Such an approach is illustrated here with the development of tense morphology in languages of the Iroquoian family, indigenous to eastern North America.
A number of inflectional forms both in standard and dialectal Basque are characterized by multiple exponence or pleonastic morphology. Doubly or multiply marked morphological constructions compete at times with their singleton counterparts. Multiple exponence, which has had a significant presence throughout the history of Basque, develops out of various diachronic sources and through different processes, and these are the main concern of this paper. Some inflectional pleonasms appear to emerge simply as a side effect of changes like analogical extension and externalization of inflection. In other cases, however, it can be argued that multiple exponence, especially when it relies on reinforcement, is itself the target of change. The different innovations that give rise to multiple exponence in Basque are classified and discussed here, as a prior step to accounting for the deeper factors that may motivate the relative commonness of pleonastic morphology in the Basque grammar. In this part of the study, I lean on notions like morphological awareness and fluidity of inflection, which may arguably explain at least some of the peculiarities of multiple exponence as it is found in Basque, although they can at the same time be of wider relevance. Finally, I focus on sporadic cases of declining pleonastic morphology, paying special heed again to the diachronic processes that underlie them.
This article examines the diachrony of Germanic iterative “ (V)r-verbs” (e.g., German flattern, English flutter) and related deverbal suffixes (as in, e.g., German folgern ‘to infer’). While these verbs form a distinct class in North-West Germanic—evidenced by cognates like Old High German flogarōn and Old Norse flǫgra—their origin and the development of their iterative semantics remain poorly understood. To clarify the origin of this class, we present a systematic corpus study of four early Germanic languages: Gothic, Old High German, Old English, and Old Norse. We analyze the derivational bases, Aktionsart, and argument structures of early Germanic (V)r-verbs, identifying distinct denominal, deadjectival, and deverbative subclasses. Building on the insight that verbalizers diachronically often emerge from nominal or adjectival material through reanalysis in cross-categorial derivation ( Grestenberger 2023 ), we argue that iterative meaning originated in deadjectival verbs derived from eventive roots. In these cases, the (V)r-suffix was reanalyzed first as a root modifier and subsequently as a verbalizer expressing event-internal pluractionality. We contrast this class with deadjectival verbs derived from Property Concept roots, which typically yield degree achievement/fientive-factitive alternation verbs expressing a change of state. Our findings underscore the necessity of integrating morphological theory with empirical, corpus-based analysis to decode morphosemantic change in the diachrony of verbal morphology.
While the loss of subject agreement is often related to general processes of phonological attrition, the processes by which subject agreement emerges remain disputed. This paper tests one of the most influential approaches, the "topic shift" account of Giv & oacute;n (1976, 2017), which identifies a pragmatically-marked construction signaling topic discontinuity as the point from which subject agreement initially spreads. We investigate subject indexing in Hewram & icirc;, a West Iranian language, which exhibits differential subject indexing in past transitive constructions. Historically, West Iranian languages lost subject agreement in these constructions, but retained it elsewhere. Most contemporary languages have since restored subject agreement in past transitives, but in Hewram & icirc; such innovated subject indexing is not fully grammaticalized. We combine quantitative and qualitative methodologies on a sample of 2005 past transitive clauses from spoken Hewram & icirc; in order to identify the factors that influence the presence of an index. The quantitative analysis reveals that subject indexing is overall favoured in clauses that exhibit topic continuity, in particular those otherwise lacking an overt subject NP. In clauses with an overt subject NP, it is features associated with focus, rather than topic continuity, that inhibit indexing. We also find effects of person and animacy, with indexing most frequent with first and second person, and other human subjects. We find no evidence for the claim that a pragmatically marked construction for marking "topic shift" provided a model construction for these developments. Our findings constitute a novel and empirically well-grounded contribution to one of the most widely-researched domains of diachronic morphology.
Personal name (PN) blends (e.g., Merkozy from (Angela) Merkel and (Nicolas) Sarkozy) are often defined as creative (Beliaeva 2022), yet the factors shaping their perceived creativity remain underexplored. This especially holds for aspects beyond the formal properties of PN blends and their name constituents. Adopting a usage-based approach (Kemmer 2010), this study investigates how positive and negative connotative meanings and linguistic experience influence the perceived creativity of German PN blends. Connotative meanings were modeled using the name connotation profile (Mehrabian 1997), modified with sentiment analysis and word embeddings. Perceived creativity was operationalized along two dimensions: originality and communicative success, i.e., the recoverability of name constituents and the understanding of connotative meanings. In a rating experiment, we tested two hypotheses: (H1) stronger connotative meanings increase perceived originality but decrease recoverability of blend constituents; (H2) greater linguistic experience decreases perceived originality but increases recoverability. Statistical analysis confirmed H1 only for originality, while no effect for H2 could be detected in our dataset. The study contributes to understanding of semantic creativity in name-based word-formation, highlights the role of connotative meanings in perceived creativity, and demonstrates how natural language processing methods can model the semantic properties of experimentally elicited PN blends.
Two discontinuous areas of Slavic-viz. Slovak and Ukrainian dialects-display etymologically unexpected and synchronically isolated alternations in the root-final consonant preceding the comparative marker-s-: Slk dial. vys-ok-'tall'- vyk-s- 'taller'; Ukr dial. blyz'-k-'close'- blyk-s- 'closer'. We investigate such alternations in both languages, taking into account previously unconsidered dialectal and historical data, and propose a novel analysis. We explain the phenomenon as due to analogical change, specifically a type we call VARIANT-BASED ANALOGY (VBA), which consists in the replication of overabundance. In the situation a : alpha : alpha ' :: b : beta, where alpha and alpha ' are isofunctional free variants paradigmatically related to a, an innovative form beta ' may arise, copying the formal relationship between alpha and alpha ' (irrespective of the structure of a and b). Thus we explain Slk dial. vyk-s-& iacute; as an innovative variant of inherited vy-s-& iacute;, copying overabundance in cases such as dra-s-& iacute; drak-s-& iacute; 'dearer' (where both variants are motivated by their corresponding positive drab-& yacute; 'dear'). The mechanism differs from classical four-part analogy in that there is no structural parallelism between the relations a : alpha/alpha ' and b : beta/beta ': rather, beta ' emerges as a free variant of an existing form and the preexistence of overabundance in the model is required. Due to the blindness to the "bases" a and b, the explanatory potential of VBA resembles PRODUCT-ORIENTED INNOVATION (POI) postulated in earlier literature, but it is more principled and constrained.
This article accounts for levelling of a once frequent and productive paradigmatic alternation between Insular Nordic (i.e. Faroese and Icelandic) noun plurals, as in nominative plural hestar accusative plural hesta 'horses' and nominative plural gestir accusative plural gesti 'guests'. Both alternations survive in Icelandic but were levelled to nominative/accusative plural hestar, gestir in Faroese by around 1900. While almost all masculines engaged in the older alternations, roughly 63% of nouns showed syncretism of nominative/accusative plural, many in final-r. Here, I adopt a usage-based cognitive approach, emphasising the probabilistic impact of usage factors such as frequency on domain-general cognitive processes as the mechanism of language change. I argue that several related Faroese changes conspired to provide a proportional basis for levelling to syncretism in that language only. In this spirit, the current article serves as a language-specific case study of cross-linguistically common nominative-accusative syncretism and assesses how the direction of levelling reflects the emergent structure of grammar.
The role played by back-formation processes in the creation of new Basque words is understudied. This paper confirms that back-formation has been a productive means of word-formation in Basque, by gathering examples from both older scholarship and recent studies. Basque has a productive morphological rule for deriving verbs from nouns and adjectives, as in handi 'big'/handi (tu) 'become big'. In some cases, however, a noun or adjective has arguably been created from a verb by back-formation instead. In this paper, we provide several criteria for identifying instances of back-formation. We start with loanwords, where the facts are clearer than in the native vocabulary. We also discuss instances where both a verb and a related noun were borrowed (e.g., bainu 'bath'/baina(tu) 'bathe') and the existence of such pairs has served as an analogical model for new deverbal nouns.
Back-formation is defined as a type of morphological change in which a base word is created ex novo paralleling an extant morphological alternation that serves as a model as in the verb to televise from the noun television. This analogical procedure is generally held to aim at increasing paradigm regularity. In this survey, several questions will be discussed with respect to the nature, the extension and the inner motivation of back-formation as well as its generalizability as a mechanism for language modeling and change.
Some of the major questions about back-formation are considered, using data mainly from English, with many examples taken from the Oxford English Dictionary, though some are new. The discussion, therefore, is not necessarily generalizable to other languages. The evidence is not always unequivocal, and one of the most fundamental questions remains unanswered: How is normal formation possible in cases where the base has no independent existence?
The notion of back-formation was brought up in German linguistics in the first half of the nineteenth century and has never since ceased to be discussed controversially. One early account equated back-formation with the resolution of a proportional formula, with the only difference that the unknown (x) was a ' (a : b = x : b ') and not b ' (a : b = a ': x), as in ordinary derivation. This account has been criticized because in some cases at least no exact analogue can be found for such proportional formulae, but it could well be that approximate analogues are sufficient for speakers. From early on, reanalysis has also been said to be a necessary ingredient of back-formation, but it turns out that, although this is often the case, it is not a necessary condition. In the present paper, the position is endorsed which sees back-formation as a two-step process consisting of two elementary cognitive processes, namely similarity-based categorization and abduction.
This paper discusses back-formation from the perspective of a view of morphology in which there are productive and unproductive declarative schemas, but no abstract processes, so that the issue of the direction of derivation does not arise. This paradigmatic perspective does not make a strict distinction between rules and listed expressions either, and everything that speakers must remember is said to be in the inventorium (a new term with a meaning similar to Jackendoff's extended lexicon). Moreover, no distinction is made between "potential words" and "existing words": Just like sentences, regular complex words are potential, and complex words are inventorized if they are in some way idiosyncratic. On this view, back-formation is just as normal as forward-formation, though when it comes to word coinage, it is clear that back-coinage is much less common.
Back-formation is the process that leads to the coinage of a lexeme by deleting a sequence present in the base, such as the verb babysit from the noun babysitter. Back-formed words exhibit a distortion between a meaning that is more complex than that of their base and a form that is simpler. The very nature of this process remains to be established. Our study suggests that back-formation (i) encompasses multiple realities, (ii) performs a formal regularization within paradigms, and (iii) most of the time involves meaning-form discrepancies. Based on five case studies of French verbs that are either back-formed from nouns or adjectives, or have the structure of neoclassical compounds, we propose that these verbs fall into three main groups, depending on the structures they involve. Our analysis highlights the importance of a paradigmatic description where formal and semantic dimensions are distinguished. We also show how a paradigmatic framework such as ParaDis sheds new light on the nature of back-formation. Conversely, back-formation helps us better characterize the structure of paradigmatic families and the relations between newly-created families and existing ones.
Previous research has strongly indicated that morphologically productive forms/processes have multiple senses. However, this phenomenon has only been examined qualitatively and somewhat cursorily, although such research suggests that semantic processes may affect the productivity of a form/process (e.g., Bauer 2001 ; Charvátová 2013 ). The present study aims to address this gap by conducting a diachronic analysis of polysemous English PHOB to explore how its multiple senses may impact its productivity over time. PHOB is a particularly interesting case because it appears to be productive and has multiple distinct meanings: a fear of something (e.g., arachnophobia), a strong bias against some group of people (e.g., homophobia), or a repulsive property of physical materials (e.g., oleophobic). A diachronic corpus of American English was used to identify instances of PHOB, and each was coded for its sense. Two productivity measures were calculated (category-conditioned productivity and hapax-conditioned productivity) for the form overall as well as for each sense across six decades. The results indicate that multiple processes are involved in shifts in the meaning and productivity of PHOB. They also indicate that senses of PHOB appear to affect each other as well as affecting its overall productivity. For instance, the rise in the productivity of the ‘intolerance’ sense of PHOB starting in the 1970s appears to directly increase the level of ambiguity between ‘intolerance’ and ‘fear’ meanings as well as (temporarily) decreasing the productivity of ‘fear’ in the next decade. These results demonstrate the importance of semantic processes in explaining morphological productivity and provide evidence that future productivity research should consider polysemy more closely as an explanatory variable.
The objective of this study is to examine the morphosemantic features of English - head constructions (as in spearhead and crackhead) through the properties of constructional productivity (CxPr) and inheritance (CxIn), with the particular aim of exploring the transitional nature of the suffixoid - head hum conveying the meaning [+human] (as in crackhead). We argue that, because of the heterogeneity of CxPr, CxIn, and the meaning of nominal bases, constructional schemas formed with - head hum are characterized by dissimilar degrees of semantic secretion, which means that some schemas, such as those conveying addiction (e.g. baghead) and lack of intellect (e.g. airhead), are unambiguously perceived as pejorative units. Based on a constructionist approach, a total of 342 - head units, out of 1,261 matching strings, are employed to elaborate a network of constructions, where the schemas and their subschemas are hierarchically taxonomized. The results of this study show that the - head hum constructions are the most frequent type, with addiction-expressing subschema being the most productive and the most recent one, and where origin-expressing units (as in raghead) are always pejorative. Finally, this study proves that - head hum stands closer to the status of suffixoid, as opposed to other - head forms that do not convey the meaning [+human]. However, the heterogeneity of - head hum forms, and of course their schemas, point to dissimilar degrees of suffixoid-ness, which depend, to a certain extent, on their productivity indexes and their semantic secretion.
Compound words have been shown to exhibit variability in prominence patterns, with some similar to syntactic phrases and others, monomorphemic words. This study examines the relationship between prosodic structure and degree of lexicalization and suggests that the variability of compound words results from prosodic changes during the diachronic process of lexicalization. The duration ratio and three quantitative lexicalization indicators–i.e., semantic compositionality rated by speakers, corpus frequency, and reaction time collected in a lexical decision task–were analyzed. Results showed significant correlation between degree of lexicalization and prominence of Thai compounds, both in acoustic characteristics and prosodic structure, supporting the hypothesis that the variability of compound word prominence can be accounted for by prosodic structure and lexicalization.
Scottish Gaelic has been traditionally analysed as having a set of adpositions which inflect for person and number. For example, from do [t̪ə] ‘to’ we find forms such as dhomh [ɣɔ˜ː] ‘to me’, dhut [ɣuʰt̪] ‘to you’ and dha [ɣa] ‘to him’. Additionally, most of these prepositions also show morphological fusion with the definite article (e.g. dhan taigh [ɣənˈtʰɤj] ‘to the house’) and may optionally undergo univerbation with a possessive pronoun ( dom thaigh [t̪əmˈhɤj] ‘to my house’). Stewart & Joseph (2009) analysed the pronominal forms in isolation as a large set of oblique cases marked only in pronouns, rather than as inflected prepositions. In this article, I show how taking into account the morphological alternations in combination with the definite article and possessive pronouns, as well as highlighting functional parallels with the distribution of these forms to case inflections in other languages, suggests an extension of this descriptive analysis to nouns, with a paradigmatic-realisational approach being best-placed to account for the data. A key result of this analysis is that case markers and adpositions are placed on different tiers of description, with Scottish Gaelic using prepositions in the realisation of a large paradigm of local cases. The effects of this large expansion of the local case system upon the historical development of Scottish Gaelic are discussed, including the implications this has for discussions around grammaticalization.
