Part of
Competition in Word-FormationEdited by Alexandra Bagasheva, Akiko Nagano and Vincent Renner
[Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 284] 2024
► pp. 104–138
Edited by Alexandra Bagasheva, Akiko Nagano and Vincent Renner
[Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 284] 2024
► pp. 104–138
Chapter 4Measuring affix rivalry as a gradient relationship
In many languages, affixes can be used to derive
words with the same semantic types and can therefore compete in word
formation. This paper discusses how to quantitatively assess the
competition between derivational affixes based on their semantic
similarity. Two possible measures of affix rivalry drawn from
studies in ecology are examined: the Sørensen index, which considers
the proportion of shared functions between rival affixes; and the
Percentage similarity coefficient, which is based on the realization
frequency of functions. Two complementary measures (Balanced
richness and Balanced abundance) are also proposed to further
analyze the semantic dissimilarity between rival affixes. Using the
semantic competition between six French deverbal suffixes as a case
study, we show how these four measures suit the quantification of
affix rivalry and help capture different aspects of the
phenomenon.
Keywords: affix rivalry, quantitative method, nominalization, deverbal suffix, French
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Rivalry and polyfunctionality
- 3.Measures of rivalry
- 3.1Quantifying competition
- 3.2Possible measures
- 3.2.1Similarity coefficients
- 3.2.2Complementary indices
- 4.Case study: Deverbal nominalizing suffixes in French
- 4.1Data collection
- 4.2Semantic analysis
- 4.3Results
- 4.3.1General information
- 4.3.2Incidence-based measures
- 4.3.3Abundance-based measures
- 4.3.4Comparison of the different measures
- 5.Conclusion
- Supplementary material
-
Acknowledgements -
Notes -
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