A Level Playing-Field
Perceptibility and Inflection in English Compounds
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 20259758 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Robert Kirchner (0000-0002-0138-200X, University of Alberta), Elena Nicoladis (0000-0002-5065-9159, University of Alberta) |
| Year | 2009 |
| Volume | 54 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 91-116 |
| Publication date | 2009-03-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The Canadian Journal of Linguistics / La revue canadienne de linguistique (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0008-4131 • E-ISSN: 1710-1115 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s0008413100001055 |
| OpenAlex | W4252777155 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 23 |
To explain why English compounds generally avoid internal inflectional suffixation (e.g., key-chain rather than keys-chain ), linguists have often invoked the Level Ordering Hypothesis, that is, that particular types of morphology, in this case inflectional suffixation, are derivationally ordered after compounding. However, a broad range of counter-examples and conceptual objections to Level Ordering have emerged. We propose an alternative account, based on the observation that certain English inflectional suffixes are more perceptible than others ( -ing > -s > -ed ), and that these suffixes are less crucial to lexical access and recovery of meaning than corresponding root-final segments. This proposal was tested in perception and production experiments. In the perception experiment, compounds with a nonsense word as modifier (e.g., dacks van, dacked van ) were auditorily presented to native English speakers, who were asked to spell what they heard. The participants omitted significantly more -ed than -s or -ing . In the production experiment, native English speakers read these compounds. The speakers dropped significantly more -ed than -s or -ing . Furthermore, they dropped more of these sounds when they were spelled as affixes than as part of the root (e.g., dacked van vs. dact van ). These results suggest that English speakers’ avoidance or inclusion of inflection in compounds is based not on Level Ordering but on perceptibility, as well as the status of the consonant as an affix. We further present a formal analysis capturing these factors in terms of Steriade’s Licensing-by-Cue proposal
Affix · Diminutive · Inflection · Linguistics · Meaning (existential) · Perception · Root (linguistics) · Linguistic Variation and Morphology · Philosophy · Phonetics and Phonology Research · Psychology · Syntax, Semantics, Linguistic Variation
Phonology and Language Use
The role of the sonority cycle in core syllabification
Deriving Variation from Grammar
Regular morphology and the lexicon
Large constituent families help children parse compounds
When level-ordering is not used in the formation of English compounds
Rules vs. analogy in English past tenses
L2 acquisition of English synthetic compounding is not constrained by level-ordering (and neither, probably, is L1 )
On the theory of Lexical Phonology
Some consequences of Lexical Phonology
English suffixation is constrained only by selectional restrictions
An Effort Based Approach to Consonant Lenition
Compounding and the Representation of L2 Inflectional Morphology
Empirical Tests of the Gradual Learning Algorithm
Quatrain Form in English Folk Verse
| Citations per year | 0.13 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2018 - 2018 (1) |
| Highly cited | No |