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Catenae in Morphology

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Catenae in Morphology Catenae in Morphology Thomas Groß Aichi University, Nagoya, Japan [email protected] takes the backseat with just 8 pages. Valency Abstract theory is characterized by putting valency- bearing lexical items at center stage. Assuming This paper argues for a renewed attempt at morpholo- that non-lexical material is somehow subsumed gy in dependency grammar. The proposal made here by lexical material seems on a logical trajectory. is based on the concept of the “catena” proposed by But research in typology, foremost Bybee (1985), Authors (in press). The predecessor to this notion was has confirmed that affixes as expressions of va- the “chain” introduced by O‟Grady (1998), and em- lency, voice, aspect, modality, tense, mood, and ployed by Osborne (2005) and Groß and Osborne (2009). In morphology and morphosyntax, a morph person obtain in a specific linear order (or hie- catena is A MORPH OR A COMBINATION OF MORPHS rarchy), and developments in generative gram- THAT IS CONTINUOUS WITH RESPECT TO DOMINANCE. mar during the 1980‟s emphasized the domin- This concept allows for a parsimonious treatment of ance structure of the IP/TP, where such affixes morphology on the surface. The fact that no additional are thought to be located. Similar statements also terms and concepts are necessary for the analysis of concern NP structure: if case or plural is ex- morphological data is highly desirable because it pressed by morphs, then these morphs appear in makes a fluid transition from syntax to morphology peripheral position, an indication that they domi- possible. This paper introduces the relevant depen- nate their nouns. In general, it is safe to say that dency relationships seen operating in morphology, dependency grammar has missed out on impor- and shows how they can be used to explain compound structure, bracketing paradoxes, and multiple periph- tant trends and insights, and this has severely rasis. hampered any formulation of a dependency- based morphology. The fact that Anderson went 1 Introduction on to establish “dependency phonology” (Ander- son & Ewen 1987) instead of pursuing his initial Hays (1964: 517f; see in particular the second program of dependency morphology, is a case in example on page 518) may have been the first to point. Among the widely known dependency recognize the merit of extending the notion of grammars, only Mel‟čuk‟s Meaning-Text-Theory dependency into morphology. The motivation for (1988) and Hudson‟s Word Grammar (1984, doing so is clear: the complexity of word struc- 1990, 2007) explicitly address morphology. ture in languages differs, and if dependency While the notion of dependency can be consi- grammar desires to say something enlightening dered as established in syntax and phonology, about languages with different word structure, morphology is still underdeveloped. In recent then it must have the means to do so. Heringer times, Harnisch (2003) and Maxwell (2003) have (1970: 96f) provided perhaps the first dependen- argued again that dependency grammar must cy trees that included separate nodes for morphs. achieve a better understanding of the morpholog- Anderson (1980) was the first to use the label ical component. “dependency morphology”, in his analysis of This paper outlines a proposal for a dependen- Basque verbs. Both Heringer‟s and Anderson‟s cy morphology based on the notion of “chain”, analyses are characterized by the assumption that which was introduced by O‟Grady (1998). derivational and inflectional morphs depend on O‟Grady shows that many idioms do not qualify the lexical morphs with which they form words. as constituents, rather they form incomplete de- This assumption has carried on to the present pendency trees, which he called “chains”. Os- (e.g. Eroms 2010: 38f). Speculating on the rea- borne (2005) recognized the versatility of this sons for this assumption, the European tradition notion for dependency grammar. Groß and Os- sees dependency grammar as the theoretical borne (2009) use the chain concept to address background for valency theory. A brief look at discontinuous structure in syntax, and Groß Ágel and Fischer (2010) confirms this evalua- (2010) endeavors, in a first attempt, to apply the tion; valency theory is treated prominently and chain to word structure, arguing that bracketing initially on 14 pages, while dependency grammar paradoxes and multiple auxiliary constructions 47 can be quite easily resolved. Below, however, the words. A dependency relationship between term catena will be used instead of “chain” be- morphs inside the same word is called an intra- cause “chain” is understood in an entirely differ- word dependency. Intra-word dependencies are ent way in derivational theories of syntax. This determined by distribution: decision is also motivated by the work of Os- If the combination of two morphs M borne et al (in press), who show that the catena, 1 and M distributes more like M than rather than the constituent, is implicated in idiom 2 2 like M , then M is a dependent of M . formation, ellipsis, and predicate formation. 1 1 2 They define a catena (in syntax) as A WORD OR A This definition is similar to Mel‟čuk‟s definition COMBINATION OF WORDS THAT IS CONTINUOUS of “surface syntactic dominance” (2003: 200f). WITH RESPECT TO DOMINANCE. This definition The next example from Japanese illustrates intra- identifies any dependency tree or subtree of a word dependencies: tree as a catena. By replacing “word” with (1) -na “morph”, the catena is also available for mor- phology. mu- This paper proceeds as follows: Section 2 in- kankei forms on the central notions and shows how they are used to explain morphological dependencies mu- kankei -na (Japanese) within and across words and with clitics. It also NEG relation -ADN illustrates briefly that non-concatenative mor- „unrelated‟ phology can be dealt with. Section 3 concerns The intra-word dependencies are represented by compounds: gradient compound structure as well the dotted edges (as opposed to solid edges). The as exocentric compounds are explained. Section lexical morph kankei receives a (vertical) projec- 4 addresses bracketing paradoxes. Section 5 de- tion edge. The hyphens represent phonological monstrates that a catena-based approach can par- attachment (in the horizontal dimension). The simoniously account for multiple periphrasis. A negation prefix mu- phonologically attaches to final section concludes the paper. the next morph to its right, and the attributive 2 Catena-based morphology suffix phonologically -na attaches to the next morph to its left; in (1) this morph is kankei. The Building on Osborne et.al. (in press), a morph prefix mu- must depend on the suffix -na because catena is a MORPH OR A COMBINATION OF the morph combination mu-kankei distributes MORPHS THAT IS CONTINUOUS WITH RESPECT TO like a member of the lexical class of nominal DOMINANCE. The choice of “morph” instead of adjectives “keiyō meishi”. The morph catena “morpheme” is motivated by the need to main- kankei-na is not possible because kankei is a tain a surface-oriented level of analysis. A morph noun rather than a nominal adjective. Intra-word is loosely defined as any meaning bearing unit dependencies are thus motivated on the basis of that cannot be reduced any further, but that can distribution. be separated from other meaning bearing units in 1 2.2 Across words the horizontal AND/OR vertical dimension. The inclusion of the notion “vertical dimension” al- An inter-word dependency is a morphosyntactic lows for the treatment of phenomena subsumed relationship between a morph and a word. If the under non-concatenative morphology (trans- and morph licenses the appearance of the word, then suprafixation, reduplication, etc.), as briefly the morph governs the word. The next example demonstrated below. This section addresses illustrates that with an example from German: morph dependencies within and across words, (2) mit clitics, and non-concatenative morphology. -n 2.1 Within words -er Morph catenae obtain in morphology proper, i.e. inside words, and in morphosyntax, i.e. across Kind mit Kind -er -n (German) with child -PL -DAT 1 While there are certainly difficulties with the notions „with children‟ “morph” and “morpheme” (cf. Mel‟čuk 2006: 384ff), the proposal here is sufficient in the present context. 48 Example (2) shows the two units mit and Kind- dent on a morph capable of constituting a pro- er-n. The former qualifies as a word and a morph, sodic word, or it must depend on a morph that while the latter only qualifies as a word. Again, depends on such a morph, and so on, recursively. the dotted edges represent the intra-word depen- “Wackernagel” or “second position” clitics chal- dencies inside the noun: the plural suffix -er is lenge many theories. In the approach here, these seen as dominating the noun Kind because Kind- clitics can appear as quasi-words but must be er distributes like a plural noun, rather than like prosodically dependent on – most often – the the singular noun Kind. The dative case suffix is final morph of the first minimal prosodic unit. seen as dominating the plural noun because the This is illustrated with a Serbo-Croat example dative case should encompass the entire plural taken from Corbett (1987: 406). There the clitics noun Kind-er rather than just singular Kind. The -mu and -ih depend on dati, but they are part of noun Kind-er-n is dominated by the preposition the prosodic word formed by Želim. -ih prosodi- mit. Since mit can be seen as a morph, Kind-er-n cally depends on -mu, which depends on Želim. is a dependent of mit, mit licensing the appear- (4) Želim ance of the entire word Kind-er-n. Note that the morphs in examples (1) and (2) dati qualify as morph catenae.
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