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Article published In:
Issues in Diachronic Construction Morphology
Edited by Muriel Norde and Graeme Trousdale
[Constructions and Frames 15:2] 2023
► pp. 234–256

English and German derivation revisited

A Diachronic Construction Morphology approach to the growing complexity of bases

ORCID logo | University of Bonn

Today, a number of etymologically related native and non-native English and German suffixes derive nouns and adjectives from entire phrases, suggesting that these suffixes have evolved clitic-like properties. By providing a diachronic analysis of dictionary entries that is underpinned by corpus searches, this paper traces how this property of the schemas of German ‑ig, ‑er and ‑ismus and of English ‑y, ‑er and ‑ism has evolved in the respective languages. The present analysis reveals that some developments appear to have taken place in parallel, while others are language-specific, which offers novel insights to our understanding of diachronic change affecting morphological schemas.

Keywords: derivation, morphological schemas, paradigms, schema growth, densification
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Common ancestry
  • 3.Case study 1: German ‑ig and English ‑y
  • 4.Case study 2: German ‑er and English ‑er
  • 5.Case study 3: German ‑ism and English ‑ism
  • 6.Theoretical implications
  • 7.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 8 January 2024
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/cf.00074.len
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