University of Kentucky UKnowledge Theses and Dissertations--Linguistics Linguistics 2014 Egyptian Arabic Plurals in Theory and Computation Lindley Winchester University of Kentucky, [email protected] Right click to open a feedback form in a new tab to let us know how this document benefits ou.y Recommended Citation Winchester, Lindley, "Egyptian Arabic Plurals in Theory and Computation" (2014). Theses and Dissertations--Linguistics. 4. https://uknowledge.uky.edu/ltt_etds/4 This Master's Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Linguistics at UKnowledge. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations--Linguistics by an authorized administrator of UKnowledge. For more information, please contact [email protected]. STUDENT AGREEMENT: I represent that my thesis or dissertation and abstract are my original work. Proper attribution has been given to all outside sources. I understand that I am solely responsible for obtaining any needed copyright permissions. 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Lindley Winchester, Student Dr. Andrew Hippisley, Major Professor Dr. Gregory Stump, Director of Graduate Studies EGYPTIAN ARABIC PLURALS IN THEORY AND COMPUTATION _____________________________________________________ THESIS ______________________________________________________ A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Linguistic Theory and Computation at the University of Kentucky By Lindley Ellen Winchester Lexington, Kentucky Director: Dr. Gregory Stump, Professor of Linguistics Lexington, Kentucky 2014 Copyright © Lindley Ellen Winchester ABSTRACT OF THESIS EGYPTIAN ARABIC PLURALS IN THEORY AND COMPUTATION This paper examines the plural inflectional processes present in Egyptian Arabic, with specific focus on the complex broken plural system. The data used in this examination is a set of 114 lexemes from a dictionary of the Egyptian Arabic variety by Badawi and Hinds (1984) collected through comparison of singular to plural template correspondences proposed by Gadalla (2004). The theoretical side of this analysis tests the proposed realizational approach in Kihm (2006) named the “Root-and-Site Hypothesis” against a variety of broken plural constructions in Egyptian Arabic. Categorizing concatenative and non-concatenative morphological processes as approachable in the same manner, this framework discusses inflection as not only represented by segments but also by “sites” where inflectional operations may take place. In order to organize the data through a computational lens, I emulate features of this approach in a DATR theorem that generates the grammatical forms for a set of both broken and sound plural nominals. The hierarchically-structured inheritance of the program’s language allows for default templates to be defined as well as overridden, permitting a wide scope of variation to be represented with little code content. KEYWORDS: Theoretical Linguistics, Computational Linguistics, Arabic Linguistics, Egyptian Arabic, Morphology EGYPTIAN ARABIC PLURALS IN THEORY AND COMPUTATION By Lindley Ellen Winchester Andrew Hippisley Director of Thesis Gregory Stump Director of Graduate Studies April 9th, 2014 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS While an individual work, the following thesis could not have taken the shape without the helpful insights and motivations from the University of Kentucky’s Linguistics department faculty. Special thanks should be given to my Thesis Chair, Andrew Hippisley, and the other members of my Thesis Committee: Andrew Byrd, Gregory Stump, and Raphael Finkel. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements…………………………………………………………………………..iii List of Tables………………………………………………………………………………….v List of Figures………………………………………………………………………………...vi Chapter 1: Introduction………………………………………………………………………..1 Chapter 2: A brief phonological overview…………………………………………………….2 Chapter 3: Nominal formation………………………………………………………………...3 Nominal inflection…………………………………………………………………….3 Chapter 4: Why broken plurals? ……………………………………………………………...6 Chapter 5: Methodology………………………………………………………………………9 Chapter 6: Broken plurals in theory………………………………………………………….10 The root and site hypothesis…………………………………………………………12 The basics…………………………………………………………………….12 Extensions and problems with the analysis………………………………… 16 Organization of data………………………………………………………………… 19 Chapter 7: Broken plurals in computation………………………………………………….. 21 DATR and a basic theorem…………………………………………………………. 21 A better theory……………………………………………………………………… 36 Chapter 8: Future research………………………………………………………………….. 53 Chapter 9: Conclusions……………………………………………………………………... 54 References……………………………………………………………………………………55 Vita…………………………………………………………………………………………...57 iv LIST OF TABLES Table 1, Examples of BP variation……………………………………………………………5 Table 2, Examples of inflectional variation between templates………………………………6 Table 3, Derived broken plurals.............................................................................................. 17 Table 4, Broken plurals with glide insertion........................................................................... 17 Table 5, Organization of inflection classes and examples………………………………….. 20 Table 6, Paths and Values……………………………………………………………………21 Table 7, Lexemes in the Basic DATR theory………………………………………………. 30 Table 8, Nouns covered by second DATR theory………………………………………….. 52 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1, Functional Site Realization Axiom…………………………………………... 14 Figure 2, Glide deletion rule............................................................................................. 16 Figure 3, Refinement of Kihm’s C2 hypothesis………………………………………….19 Figure 4, GABAL code lexical entry…………………………………………………….22 Figure 5, GABAL extended lexical entry………………………………………………. 23 Figure 6, GABAL inheritance visual representation…………………………………… 23 Figure 7, TAMAN lexical entry………………………………………………………… 24 Figure 8, Incorrect TAMAN inheritance……………………………………………….. 25 Figure 9, Correct GABAL and TAMAN inheritance network…………………………. 25 Figure 10, Partial GABAL inheritance network………………………………………... 26 Figure 11, Full GABAL inheritance network.………………………………………….. 27 Figure 12, Code comparison……………………………………………………………. 27 Figure 13, GABAL and TAMAN inheritance network………………………………… 29 Figure 14, Basic inheritance network…………………………………………………... 30 Figure 15, SHAGAAN lexical entry……………………………………………………. 36 Figure 16, Singular and post-C2 broken plural inflection coding………………………. 37 Figure 17, /a/ vowel node coding……………………………………………………….. 38 Figure 18, /u/ vowel node coding………………………………………………………. 38 vi 1. INTRODUCTION. Egyptian Arabic is, as the name states, a branch of the Arabic language that is the national language of Egypt, but is also intelligible in other Arabic-speaking countries, such as Libya, Syria, and Yemen. Classified under the Arabic macrolanguage, it is defined characteristically as part of the central and south branch of the Afroasiatic language family and Semitic genus (Lewis). The particular inflectional process in focus here occurs on the nominal forms of the language, which are inflected for the plural number through one of two separate processes, a suffixal inflection and infixational inflection, both of which will be elaborated upon further in 3.1.. The latter process will take the majority of the focus, analyzed through a pre-existing theoretical framework and formalized in the computational model, DATR. The purpose of this examination is to computationally model theory in the construction of broken plurals in Egyptian Arabic, seeking an analysis that encompasses a majority, if not all, of the complex forms in question. 1 2. A BRIEF PHONOLOGICAL OVERVIEW. Before beginning my formal discussion, I should first give a brief overview of Egyptian Arabic phonology as is relevant to this paper. To begin, Egyptian Arabic (EA from here) distinguishes the ordinary vowels of Modern Standard Arabic (MSA from here), /a1/, /i/, /u/ and corresponding long variants, in addition to the long vowels: /oo/ and /ee/ (Gadalla 2004: 5). Consonants are as in MSA with only minor alternations in pronunciation from MSA to EA. Through my own à (ج) /à EA /s, z/ ; MSA /ʒ(ث) /experience with the language, these include: MSA /θ (ق) /à EA /zˤ/, /ðˤ/, or /dˤ/; and MSA /q (ظ) /à EA /zˤ/; MSA /ðˤ (ض) /EA /g/; MSA /dˤ2 à /ʔ/