Cover not available
Part of
Morphological Metatheory
Edited by Daniel Siddiqi and Heidi Harley
[Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 229] 2016
► pp. 237–270

Emergent morphology

| University of Arizona
| University of British Columbia

This paper examines implications for morpho-phonology of a model that minimizes the role of an innate linguistic endowment in grammar formation. ‘Bottom-up’ learning results in mental representations that form sets from perceived morphs but do not involve abstract ‘underlying’ representations. For production, syntactic/semantic features (S-features) identify morphs to be compiled into words. When multiple morphs bear the same S-feature, the grammar must select among the possible contenders. Selection involves phonological regularities or sub-regularities and morpho-phonological as well as idiosyncratic choice; when all else fails the default morph is selected. The model unifies the formal characterization of suppletion, sub-regularities, allophonic patterns, as well as unifying suppletion and zero morphs. Examples come from English, Southern Min, Yoruba, and Kinande, and other languages.

Published online: 29 June 2016
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/la.229.09arc
References
Akinlabi, Akinbiyi
1985 Tonal Underspecification and Yorùbá Tone. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Ibadan.
Allen, Margaret
1978 The morphology of negative prefixes in English. In Papers from Annual Meeting, North Eastern Linguistics Society, 1–11. Amherst MA: GSLA.Google Scholar
Archangeli, Diana, Mielke, Jeff & Pulleyblank, Douglas
2012a From sequence frequencies to conditions in Bantu vowel harmony: Building a grammar from the ground up. McGill Working Papers in Linguistics 22(1).Google Scholar
2012b Greater than noise: Frequency effects in Bantu height harmony. In Phonological Explorations: Empirical, Theoretical and Diachronic Issues, Bert Botma & Roland Noske (eds), 191–222. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Archangeli, Diana & Pulleyblank, Douglas
2012 Emergent phonology: Evidence from English. In Issues in English Linguistics, Ik-Hwan Lee, Young-Se Kang, Kyoung-Ae Kim, Kee-Ho Kim, Il-Kon Kim, Seong-Ha Rhee, Jin-Hyuang Kim, Hyo-Young Kim, Ki-Jeang Lee, Hye-Kyung Kang, & Sung-Ho Ahn (eds), 1–26. Seoul: Hankookmunhwasa.Google Scholar
2013 Esimbi prefix selection. Ms, University of Arizona and University of British Columbia.Google Scholar
2015 Tonal allomorphy in Kinande. In Capturing Phonological Shades, Lian Hee Wee & Yuchau Hsiao (eds), 76–100. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars.Google Scholar
To appear. Phonology as an emergent system. In The Routledge Handbook of Phonological Theory, Anna Bosch & S.J. Hannahs (eds) London Routledge
Under review. Emergence and allomorphy: Kinande recent past tone patterns. In Challenges and New Prospects on Prosody in West Africa, Firmin Ahoua (ed.)
Awobuluyi, Oladele
1978 Essentials of Yoruba Grammar. Ibadan: OUP.Google Scholar
Bamgbose, Ayo
1966a The assimilated low tone in Yoruba. Lingua 16: 1–13. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1966b A Grammar of Yoruba. Cambridge: CUP.Google Scholar
Bonet, Eulàlia
2004 Morph insertion and allomorphy in Optimality Theory. International Journal of English Studies 4: 73–104.Google Scholar
Chen, Matthew Y
1987 The syntax of Xiamen tone sandhi. Phonology 4: 109–149. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chomsky, Noam & Halle, Morris
1965 Some controversial questions in phonological theory. Journal of Linguistics 1: 97–138. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1968 The Sound Pattern of English. New York NY: Harper & Row.Google Scholar
Deacon, Terrence
1997 The Symbolic Species: The Co-evolution of Language and the Brain. New York NY: W.W. Norton & Company.Google Scholar
Eimas, Peter, Siqueland, Einar, Jusczyk, Peter & Vigorito, James
1971 Speech perception in infants. Science 171: 303–306. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gambarage, Joash Johannes & Pulleyblank, Douglas
In press. Tongue root harmony in Nata: An allomorphy-based account. In Africa’s Endangered Languages: Documentary and Theoretical Approaches, Jason Kandybowicz & Harold Torrence (eds) Oxford OUP
Gerken, LouAnn & Bollt, Alex
2008 Three exemplars allow at least some linguistic generalizations: Implications for generalization mechanisms and constraints. Language Learning and Development 4: 228–248. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hall, Kathleen Currie, Allen, Blake, Fry, Michael, Mackie, Scott & McAuliffe, Michael
2015 Phonological CorpusTools. Version 1.1.1 [URL]Google Scholar
Halle, Morris
1997 Distributed Morphology: Impoverishment and fission. In MIT Working Papers in Linguistics 30: Papers at the Interface, B. Bruening, Y. Kang & M. McGinnis (eds), 425–449. Cambridge MA: MITWPL.Google Scholar
Halle, Morris & Marantz, Alec
1993 Distributed Morphology and the pieces of inflection. In The View from Building 20.Essays in Linguistics in Honor of Sylvain Bromberger, Ken Hale & Samuel Jay Keyser (eds), 111–176. Cambridge MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
1994. Some key features of Distributed Morphology. In Papers on Phonology and Morphology [MIT Working Papers in Linguistics 21], Andrew Carnie & Heidi Harley (eds), 275–288. Cambridge MA: MITWPL.Google Scholar
Harley, Heidi & Noyer, Rolf
1999 Distributed Morphology. Glot International 4: 3–9.Google Scholar
Harris, Zellig S
1942 Morpheme alternants in linguistic analysis. Language 18: 169–180. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Higgins, Holly Ann
2011 Ikoma Vowel Harmony: Phonetics and Phonology. Ph.D. dissertation, Trinity Western University.
Hockett, Charles F
1947 Problems of morphemic analysis. Language 23: 321–343. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1958 A Course in Modern Linguistics. New York NY: Macmillan Publishing.Google Scholar
1961 Linguistic elements and their relations. Language 37: 29–53. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hoijer, Harry
1933 Tonkawa: An Indian language of Texas. In Handbook of American Indian Languages, Vol. III. New York NY: Colombia University Press.Google Scholar
1949 An Analytical Dictionary of the Tonkawa Language [University of California Publications in Linguistics 5]. Berkeley CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Hyman, Larry M. & Valinande, Nzama
1985 Globality in the Kinande tone system. In African Linguistics: Essays in Memory of M.W.K. Semikenke, Didier Goyvaerts (ed.), 239–260. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Itô, Junko, Mester, R. Armin & Padgett, Jaye
1995 Licensing and underspecification in optimality theory. Linguistic Inquiry 26: 571–613.Google Scholar
Jusczyk, Peter & Luce, Paul
1994 Infants’ sensitivity to phonotactic patterns in the native language. Journal of Memory and Language 33: 630–645. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kager, René
1996 On affix allomorphy and syllable counting. In Interfaces in Phonology, Ursula Kleinhenz (ed.), 155–171. Berlin: Akademie Verlag.Google Scholar
Kuhl, Patricia, Williams, Karen & Lacerda, Francisco
1987 Linguistic experience alters phonetic perception in infants by 6 months of age. Cell 49: 606–608.Google Scholar
Mascaró, Joan
2007 External allomorphy and lexical representation. Linguistic Inquiry 38: 715–735. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Maye, Jessica, Werker, Janet & Gerken, LouAnn
2002 Infant sensitivity to distributional information can affect phonetic discrimination. Cognition 82: 101–111. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
McCarthy, John & Prince, Alan
1995 Faithfulness and reduplicative identity. In University of Massachusetts Occasional Papers in Linguistics [UMOP], 18: Papers in Optimality Theory, Jill Beckman, Laura Walsh Dickey & Suzanne Urbancyzk (eds), 249–384. Amherst MA: GLSA.Google Scholar
Mutaka, Ngessimo
1990 The Lexical Tonology of Kinande. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Southern California. Published by Lincom, Munich, 1994.
Myers, James & Tsay, Jane
2008 Neutralization in Taiwan Southern Min tone sandhi. In Interfaces in Chinese Phonology: Festschrift in Honor of Matthew Y. Chen on his 70th Birthday, Yuchau E. Hsiao, Hui-chuan Hsu, Lian-Hee Wee & Dah-an Ho (eds), 47–78. Taiwan: Academia Sinica.Google Scholar
Newport, Elissa & Aslin, Richard
2004 Learning at a distance I. Statistical learning of non-adjacent dependencies. Cognitive Psychology 48: 127–162. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Pfau, Roland
2000 Features and Categories in Language Production. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Frankfurt.
2009 Grammar as Processor: A Distributed Morphology Account of Spontaneous Speech Errors [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 137]. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Pitt, Mark A., Dilley, Laura, Johnson, Keith, Kiesling, Scott, Raymond, William D., Hume, Elizabeth & Fosler-Lussier, Eric
2007 Buckeye Corpus of Conversational Speech, 2nd release. Columbus OH: Department of Psychology, Ohio State University (Distributor). [URL]Google Scholar
Polka, Linda & Werker, Janet
1994 Developmental changes in perception of nonnative vowel contrasts. Journal of Experimental Psychology-Human Perception and Performance 20: 421–435. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Prince, Alan & Smolensky, Paul
1993 Optimality Theory: Constraint Interaction in Generative Grammar. Technical Report RuCCS-TR-2. New Brunswick NJ: Rutgers University Center for Cognitive Science.Google Scholar
Pulleyblank, Douglas
1986 Tone in Lexical Phonology. Dordrecht: Reidel. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Saffran, Jenny, Aslin, Richard & Newport, Elissa
1996 Statistical learning by 8-month-old infants. Science 274: 1926–1928. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sapir, Edward
1933[1944] The psychological reality of phonemes. In Selected Writings of Edward Sapir, 46–60. Berkeley CA: University of California.Google Scholar
Seidl, Amanda & Buckley, Eugene
2005 On the learning of arbitrary phonological rules. Language Learning and Development 1: 289–316. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Siegel, Dorothy
1974 Topics in English Morphology. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT. (Garland 1979).
Stonham, John
1999 Aspects of Tsishaath Nootka Phonetics & Phonology [Lincom Studies in Native American Linguistics]. Munich: Lincom.Google Scholar
Tranel, Bernard
1996 French liaison and elision revisited: A unified account within Optimality Theory. In Aspects of Romance Linguistics, Claudia Parodi, Carlos Quicoli, Mario Saltarelli & Maria Luisa Zubizarreta (eds), 433–455. Washington DC: Georgetown Universitiy Press.Google Scholar
Tsay, Jane & Myers, James
1996 Taiwanese tone sandhi as allomorph selection. In Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society 22, 394–405. Berkeley CA: BLS. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ward, Ida C
1952 An Introduction to the Yoruba Language. Cambridge:W. Heffer and Sons.Google Scholar
Werker, Janet & Lalonde, Chris
1988 Cross-language speech perception: Initial capabilities and developmental change. Developmental Psychology 24: 672–683. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Yip, Moira
1980 The Tonal Phonology of Chinese. Ph.D. dissertation, MIT.
Cited by

Cited by 4 other publications

Elias-Ulloa, Jose
2021. Lexical Category-Governed Neutralization to Coronal and Non-Coronal Place of Articulation in Latent Consonants: The Case of Shipibo-Konibo and Capanahua (Pano). Languages 6:4 ► pp. 158 ff. DOI logo
Rolle, Nicholas
2023. Inward and Outward Allomorph Selection. In The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Morphology, ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Sande, Hannah
2018. Cross-word morphologically conditioned scalar tone shift in Guébie. Morphology 28:3 ► pp. 253 ff. DOI logo
Sande, Hannah
2020. Morphologically conditioned phonology with two triggers. Phonology 37:3 ► pp. 453 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 21 april 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.