polysynthesis as a typological feature

8/19/2019 Polysynthesis as a Typological Feature

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Polysynthesis as a typological featureAn attempt at a characterization rom Eskimoand Athabaskan perspectives

Willem J. de Reuse

University o North exas, Denton

Polysynthesis is characterized as a type o morphology, qualitatively different rominflectional morphology and rom derivational morphology and redefined as

productive noninflectional concatenation (PNC). Like syntax and unlike derivational

morphology, PNC is ully productive, potentially recursive, necessarily concatenative,

allows or ordering variability o some elements, and interacts with syntax. Unlike

inflectional morphology and like syntax and derivational morphology, PNC can

be category-changing. Tis postulated morphological eature is very prevalent in

polysynthetic language amilies such as Eskimo (illustrated by Siberian Yupik), but

not very prevalent in other language amilies ofen designated as polysynthetic,

such as Athabascan (illustrated by Western Apache). Tis new characterization

o polysynthesis has as an interesting consequence its existence, to a small degree,

in Indo-European languages.

Keywords: polysynthesis, morphological typology, Athabascan, Eskimo, SiberianYupik, Western Apache

. Definitional problems

Characterising and defining polysynthesis has been a problem or some time.1

Te concept o polysynthesis was first ormulated by Duponceau (1819) or lan-

guages that can express a great variety o ideas in one single word. A modern at-

tempt at a characterization is Fortescue’s statement that polysynthetic languages

are “languages with complex morphologies capable o packing into a single word

many morphemes that in more analytic languages would be independent words”

(1994: 2600). He goes on to say that that is a very loose statement and wonders

whether it is possible to define polysynthesis more tightly. He comes to the con-

. Earlier versions o this paper were presented at a seminar at the Research Center or Linguis-

tic ypology, La robe University, Bundoora, Australia, 2003, and at the 15th Inuit Studies Con-

erence, Musée du Quai Branly, Paris, 2006. Some o the ideas in this paper are also in de Reuse

(2006a). I thank the participants in this seminar and conerence or their input and comments.


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Willem J. de Reuse

clusion that there is no “unified phenomenon ‘polysynthetic morphology’ that can

be defined exclusively” (1994:

2601).

Evans and Sasse (2002:

3) in the introduction to their collection o edited art-icles Problems of Polysynthesis come to rather similar conclusions:

(…) a prototypical polysynthetic language is one in which it is possible, in a single

word, to use processes o morphological composition to encode inormation about

both the predicate and its arguments, or all major clause types (i.e. one-, two- and

three-place predicates, basic and derived), to a level o specificity allowing this word

to serve alone as a ree-standing utterance without reliance on context.

Like Fortescue, they want to leave the definition intentionally vague.2

On the other hand, rom a more ormalist angle, an ambitious attempt has

been made by Baker (1996) in Te Polysynthesis Parameter to come up with a very

restrictive definition o polysynthesis. According to Baker, polysynthesis is a mac-

roparameter called the “Morphological Visibility Condition”, inormally, the re-

quirement that every argument o a head element must be related to a morpheme

in the word containing that head. Tat requirement can be satisfied through syn-

tactic agreement or through noun incorporation (1996: 14–15). It is interesting

to see how Baker has reached the term “polysynthesis” here. He first postulated a

ormal characteristic o certain polysynthetic languages, called it a parameter, and

then applied the term “polysynthesis” to that parameter. I will not take issue withBaker about whether such a parameter exists, but I object to the term “polysynthe-

sis” being applied to the parameter. Te term “polysynthesis” is already in use as an

(admittedly vague) typological term. A newly discovered parameter does need to

be given a name, preerably a catchy one, but it is conusing to appropriate a term

already in use and decide that that is the real meaning o the term.

Te resulting situation is that Baker’s too restrictive definition leaves most tra-

ditionally polysynthetic languages unaccounted or, as Evans and Sasse (2002:

4)

also point out.

Nevertheless, one can sympathize with Baker’s program to define polysynthe-

sis more tightly. But I must agree with Fortescue (1994: 2600–2601) that it is not

possible to give a very precise definition without doing violence to the way the

term has been used traditionally.

In this paper, I will try to circumscribe the concept o “productive nonin-

flectional concatenation”, or PNC, in the belie that “productive noninflectional

concatenation” is a more precisely definable concept than “polysynthesis”. I will

not claim that the two terms are equivalent and I will not be advocating that we

. Another interesting approach to the problem, adopted by Mattissen (2004), is to accept the

heterogeneity o morphological structure in polysynthetic languages and to engage in a detailed

classification, with several parameters, o all languages generally labelled polysynthetic.


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Chapter . Polysynthesis as a typological eature

replace the term “polysynthesis” by PNC.3 Rather, I will argue that the existence o

noticeable amounts o PNC is what characterizes most prototypical polysynthet-

ic languages. I will then illustrate the concept o PNC with two languages traditionally con-

sidered polysynthetic, Central Siberian Yupik Eskimo (CSY), an Eskimo–Aleut

language (de Reuse 1994, Nagai 2004), and Western Apache (WA), a Southern

Athabascan language (de Reuse 2006b). Tese two languages were chosen because

they are both representative o language amilies considered to be extremely poly-

synthetic, although, as we will see, in different ways. Tey were also chosen be-

cause I have extensive field experience with both.

. Productive noninflectional concatenation (PNC): neither derivation

nor inflection?

In the search or prototypical polysynthesis, many potential typological charac-

teristics o polysynthetic languages are listed by Fortescue (1994: 2601) and Evans

and Sasse (2002:

3–4), but not, apparently, the set o characteristics that I will de-

fine as PNC.

In this paper, I will propose that this set is striking in the most heavily

polysynthetic languages, and thereore the set is a good candidate or a prototyp-ical property o polysynthesis. We need to keep in mind, though, that all polysyn-

thetic languages have characteristics that have nothing to do with PNC, and as we

will see, some polysynthetic languages have rather little PNC.

able 1 is a chart o eatures distinguishing inflection, derivation, PNC, and

syntax: As seen in able 1, PNC, even though morphologically bound, has all

six eature values in common with the syntax; it also has [6] in common with

derivation,4 and [1] and [5] in common with inflection. It is not claimed that the

eatures in able 1 are independent o each other. Te main definitional eature is

. In de Reuse (1992), I used the term “internal syntax” or what I now preer to call PNC. I had

chosen the term “internal syntax” (first used by Swadesh 1939 to describe the word ormation

processes o Nootka, a polysynthetic Wakashan language), because PNC has many characteris-

tics o “external” (or real or phrasal or sentential) syntax, but it is word-internal. It then occurred

to me that what Swadesh meant with the term “internal syntax” is not exactly what I mean by

PNC, and thereore I replaced “internal syntax” by the more descriptive but less catchy PNC,

first used in de Reuse (2006a). Afer completing this paper, I became aware o the concept o

“quasi-inflectional morphology”, as defined by Mel’chuk (2006), and urther discussed by Beck

(2008). What Mel’chuk and Beck describe as “quasi-inflectional” morphemes appears to be quite

similar to what I call elements o PNC, but urther study is needed to ascertain whether the con-

cepts are the same.

. At this point in the paper, derivation is assumed to mean nonproductive derivation, i.e., the

traditional concept o derivation minus what I call PNC.


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Willem J. de Reuse

probably [1], i.e., productivity. More research needs to be carried out on how to

derive eatures [2–6] rom eature [1].

I will first explain eatures [1] through [6]. In my explanation, I will not talk

about morphemes or affixes or words, but o elements, in order to have a term cov-

ering both morphological and syntactic units.

Feature [1] means absolute productivity, i.e., there are no idiosyncratic restric-

tions on the use o the element. Tus, its presence is conditioned by semantic plau-

sibility only, and not by selectional restrictions. For many polysynthetic languages,

the elements o PNC are so numerous that it is very unlikely that native speakerswould have the ability to memorize the existing sequences and store them in the

lexicon (Smith 1978, Fortescue 1980, de Reuse 1994). Inflection, o course, is also

absolutely productive, but only within its paradigm. Note that I am claiming that

derivational morphology is never absolutely productive. Since some o what is tra-

ditionally called derivational is productive, I am in effect changing the definition

o derivational morphology, so that the productive parts o derivational morph-

ology will actually be reassigned to PNC.

Note also that in syntax, productivity

does not appear to be absolute, since we have lexicalized idioms such as ‘kick the

bucket’. However, in such cases, the Amelia Bedelia style or nonidiomatic reading

o idioms is always possible.

Feature [2] means that the same element can potentially occur twice within

the same word (which is the case in PNC) or within the same sentence (which

is the case in syntax), one having scope over the other. Its presence is again con-

ditioned by semantic plausibility. Recursion is certainly connected to productiv-

ity, since it is hard to imagine recursion without the productivity o the elements

involved.

Feature [3] means that the elements are going to be in some linear order. I donot expect nonconcatenative morphology such as suppletion or Semitic-style

morpheme-internal change to exist in PNC, just as it does not exist in syntax.

Feature [4] means that in some cases, the order o elements can be ree. Just

Table 1.

Inflection

(Nonproductive)

derivation Pnc Syntax[1] Productive? yes no yes yes[2] Recursivity possible? no no yes yes[3] Necessarily concatenative? no no yes yes[4] Variable order o elements possible insome instances?

no no yes yes

[5] Interaction with syntax possible? yes no yes yes[6] Lexical/phrasal category changingpossible?

no yes yes yes


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as in ree word order languages in the syntax, some elements o PNC can be reely

ordered, most likely constrained by pragmatic actors only. Tis is impossible in

derivation. Feature [5] has to do with relationships between the PNC element and elem-

ents o syntax. As is well known (Anderson 1982, 1988), inflection interacts with

syntax as in agreement or case marking. Derivation does not interact with syntax.

PNC can interact with syntax, especially in the case o noun incorporation.

Feature [6] means that the element can change the lexical category in the

morphology. Derivational morphology can do this as well, but inflectional morph-

ology does not. Here, PNC lines up with derivational morphology, but in some

sense, it lines up with syntax as well. Indeed, in the syntax, the addition o an elem-

ent can change the category, now called the phrasal category. For example, very

good is an Adjective Phrase, but very good quality is a Noun Phrase.

. PNC illustrated in Central Siberian Yupik Eskimo and Western Apache

I now illustrate PNC with two polysynthetic languages rom two very different

amilies: Central Siberian Yupik Eskimo (CSY), spoken by over a thousand people

on St. Lawrence Island, Alaska, and Chukotka, Russian Far East, o the Eskimo–Aleut amily; and Western Apache (WA), spoken by about 7,000 people on and

near five reservations in central and east-central Arizona, USA, o the Athabascan

amily. (1) is an example o eature [1], productivity, in CSY:

(1) negh yaghtughyugumayaghpet aa5

negh- yaghtugh-yug -uma-yagh -pete -aa

eat -go.to.V -want.to.V----.3s.3s

‘It turns out s/he wanted to go eat it, but…’

In (1), only the stem negh- and the inflectional -aa are obligatory. Te stem is

always initial, and the inflection is always final. Any or all o the other elements,

which I consider to be part o the PNC, can be lef out. So using at least one PNC

element, one can make thirty different words rom this (de Reuse 1992:

166–7).

Te word can be made longer, and this is only a slightly longer than average word.

For semantic reasons, it happens to be the case that the order o elements has to be

-yaghtugh-yug-uma-yagh-pete- . Eskimo has derivational morphology as well (de

Reuse 1992, 1994), which is not illustrated in (1).

Sentence (2) is an example o productivity in WA.

. In the example sentences and the morphological analysis, elements to be discussed are in

bold type. Te accepted St. Lawrence Island orthography is used in CSY orms (de Reuse 1994)..


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Willem J. de Reuse

(2) nanāānádagoch’ilzéh6

na -nāā -ná -da-go -ch’i-l -zéh

them-again-usually --them-4S -them-play 1a 1b 2 3 4 5 9 10

‘Tey usually play again.’

Te structure o the WA verb is more complex than in CSY.

In WA, one can pos-

tulate a set o position classes in which the different HEMAIC, PNC, inflectional

(and derivational, not illustrated here) prefixes have to go. Te position classes are

numbered with the numbers under the glosses in (2). Te order o prefixes with-

in WA verbs is fixed (but not entirely so, as we will see later). Tere are about ten

or twelve positions, and one cannot really add to the verb beyond that. Te three

prefixes called them have no clear meaning, they just have to be there, and togeth-

er with the stem -zéh, they indicate the verb ‘to play’. So the sequence na…go…lzéh

means to ‘to play’. Te elements da- and ch’i- are inflectional and can be replaced

by zero or other inflectional elements. Te elements that are productive, but not

inflectional, are the two PNC prefixes nāā- ‘again, one more time’ and ná- ‘usual-

ly’. Each o those can be added to the verb or deleted. However, i one removes the

ná- ‘usually’, the verb stem gets changed to -zēē. So either we have to postulate that

elements o PNC can induce changes elsewhere in the words, or maybe it is evi-dence that ná- ‘usually’ is inflectional. In the literature on Athabascan languages,

ná- ‘usually’ is considered to be inflectional, but I am not convinced that it is.

All in all, there is PNC in WA, but there is less o it per word than there is

in CSY. What seems to ascinate people about Athabascan languages, and what

makes their analysis difficult are all the them elements that have to be present in

various positions and interrupt the morphemes that have independent semantic

content. Hence the term “interrupted synthesis”, coined by Sapir in a course on

Athabascan (Kari 1989: 428).

Let me now illustrate eature [2], recursion, in CSY with (3). Tis is a real word

rom a story. I took it out o the sentence so it would be easier to ollow.

(3) iitghesqesaghiisqaa

itegh -sqe -yaghtugh-sqe -aa

come.in-ask.to.V-go.to.V -ask.to.V-ind.3s.3s

‘Hei asked him j to go ask himk to come in.’

Te element sqe- ‘ask to V’ is used recursively. Te morphophonemics explain

the differences between the analysis and the actual orm. We have seen -yaghtugh- already in (1). Te inflection is also the same as in (1).

. Te spelling o WA is described in de Reuse (2006b).


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In WA, examples o recursion cannot be provided because recursion does not

seem to occur. Again, this is evidence that WA does not have as much PNC as CSY

has. I do not need to illustrate eature [3], concatenation, because one can clearly

see in the CSY and WA examples that the morphology is concatenative.

Feature [4], variable order, is illustrated with (4) and (5) in CSY.

(4) aananiitkaa

aane -nanigh -utke -aa

go.out-cease.to.V-V.on.account.o-.3s.3s

‘He ceased going out on account o it.’

(5) aanutkenanighaa

aane -utke -nanigh -aa

go.out-V.on.account.o-cease.to.V-.3s.3s

‘He ceased going out on account o it.’

Even though generally in CSY the rightmost element o PNC has scope over

what is on the lef, this principle does not seem to be working here. Tese two sen-

tences mean exactly the same thing and were uttered within three lines rom each

other in the same story (de Reuse 1994:

93).

Sentences (6) and (7) are potential WA examples. Both (6) and (7) were re-

corded rom the same speaker, but on different occasions; (7) was recorded rom

another speaker as well.

(6) yońłhazh

y -o -n -H -ł -ghazh

3O--them--trans-bite

4 6a 6b 7 9 10

‘S/he took a bite out o it.’

(7) hoyińłhazh

o -y -n -H -ł -ghazh

-3O-them---bite

6a 4 6b 7 9 10

‘S/he took a bite out o it.’

Some comments on the analysis o these WA orms are necessary. Te expect-

ed prefix order is (6), as shown by the position class numbers underneath it, but

I have also heard (7) rom two speakers. 3O is the third person object marker, andthe third person subject is zero here. dir is directive, marking the act that the ob-

ject is only partially affected, so this is the difference between taking a bite out o

it and completely biting it off; them is a thematic prefix, apparently conditioned


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Willem J. de Reuse

by the presence o the dir. Te word-initial h- in (7) is prosthetic and phonologic-

ally predictable. So this is an example o prefix order variation in Apache. How-

ever, one might ask whether the prefixes involved are elements o PNC.

Te prefix y- is inflectional, and the prefix o- is not productive and thereore has to be consid-

ered derivational. We thereore need to conclude that (6) and (7) are actually not

examples o PNC, but rather show variable order between an inflectional element

and a derivational element. As a result, we need to qualiy eature [5], and postu-

late that variable order within elements o PNC is possible, but that variable or-

der within inflectional elements and variable order within derivational elements is

not possible. However, variable order between an inflectional element and a der-

ivational element is also possible, as shown in the WA examples. Tis sort o vari-

able order is not relevant to my claim about PNC.

Feature [5], interaction with external syntax, is best illustrated with noun-in-

corporating suffixes in CSY, in (8).

(8) atan aangelghiimeng

ata -n aange-lghii -meng

ather-.2s.. be.big-.-.

qikmilguuq

qikmigh-lgu -uq

dog -have.N-.3s

‘Your ather has a big dog.’

As Sadock (1980, 1991) has demonstrated on the basis o parallel construc-

tions in Greenlandic Eskimo, the element -lgu ‘have N’ (which I would call an

element o PNC) acts like a morphologically intransitive verb, and like other in-

transitive verbs, it can occur with a direct object in an oblique case (here the mod).

Since elements o PNC cannot attach to inflected words, the mod case marking

cannot occur on qikmigh- ‘dog’, but it does show up in the morphologically ree

and stranded modifier aangelghiimeng ‘big’. Tis is expected, since CSY modifiers

agree in case with their heads. At the syntactic level then, aangelghiimeng qikmigh-

‘big dog’ orms a constituent to which the -lgu- is attached.

When considering WA, the situation is different again. Te elements o PNC

do not seem to interact with the syntax in WA. Tere is no noun incorporation

in WA. Tis is not particularly significant or Athabascan as a whole, since some

Northern Athabascan languages have noun incorporation (Axelrod 1990).

Finally, let us look at eature [6], lexical category changing, in CSY. (9) is an

example o a word changing rom a verb yughagh- ‘to pray’ to a noun yughaghvig- ‘church’ to another noun yughaghvigllag- ‘big church’, back to a verb yughaghvigl-

lange- ‘to acquire a big church’. In this word, there are actually two lexical catego-

ry-changing suffixes. Te first is the derivational suffix -vig- ‘place to V’, which is


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lexicalized with ‘pray’ to mean ‘church’, and not the completely predictable ‘place

to pray’, any place to pray. Te second lexical category-changing suffix is -nge- ‘to

acquire N’ which can be productively added to any nominal orm to change it to a verbal orm, and thereore is an element o PNC.

(9) yughaghvig llangyugtut

yughaghvig -ghllag-nge -yug -tut

pray -place.to.V-big.N -acquire.N-want.to.V-.3p

‘Tey want to acquire a big church.’

In WA, lexical category changing is not a productive process. Within the ver-

bal word, there are no productive category-changing mechanisms or this, and

certainly no changing back and orth rom one category to another. One thing

that can happen or some verbs is that the thematic prefix -ł- in position 9 is de-

leted. Alternatively, one might just as well say that or some nouns, derived verbs

are ormed by adding the thematic prefix -ł- to them. Let us look at two examples

in (10). Note the presence o the prefix -ł- in the orms to the lef, and its absence

in the orms to the right.

(10) yáłti’ ‘S/he is talking.’ yáti’ ‘word, speech’

ółtag ‘S/he is counting.’ ótag ‘school’

In WA, there are also some nominalizing enclitics at the right edge o the verb,

which also indicate things such as topic, specificity, and definiteness. Tey are not

clearly part o the morphology. Tere is one category-changing mechanism chan-

ging nouns to verbs, involving a lexicalized proclitic and enclitic combination, but

which is not productive, and thereore it is not PNC (de Reuse, 2008). Here again,

there are real differences between the polysynthetic morphology o CSY and that

o WA.

. Consequences of a PNC view of polysynthesis for typology and

morphological theory

One consequence o accepting PNC as the definitional eature o polysynthesis is a

“trinitarian” view o morphology. Rather than distinguishing between inflection-

al and derivational, we now have to distinguish between inflectional, PNC, and

derivational morphology. So PNC is a type o morphology, on a par with inflec-

tional and derivational. Tis is o course a controversial idea, since many linguistsare unsure about the traditional distinction between inflectional and derivation-

al morphology, and thereore are particularly unwilling to accept a three-way dis-

tinction o morphology into inflection, derivation, and PNC.


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Willem J. de Reuse

Another consequence o this view is that there is no such thing as a “polysyn-

thetic type” o languages. Te languages called “polysynthetic” are languages with

large or notable amounts o PNC.

Te difference between polysynthetic languagesand non-polysynthetic languages is thus a quantitative difference, not a qualitative

one. Te stereotypical “polysynthetic type” is represented by the languages that

happen to have many (a hundred or more) PNC elements, such as CSY.

I will re-

turn to the case o WA in section 6 below.

As mentioned already, another consequence o this view is that what is tra-

ditionally called derivational is now split into derivation and productive deriv-

ation, i.e. PNC.

But one should not conclude rom this that only polysynthetic lan-

guages have PNC elements, and that non-polysynthetic languages have derivation

only. Indeed, PNC elements are not completely absent rom non-polysynthetic

languages. Some o the affixes traditionally called “derivational” in Indo-European

languages are productive, and among these productive ones, some have recursion

as well. Examples o PNC affixes in non-polysynthetic languages are shown or

English in (11) and (12). Tey are productive and recursive as well.

(11) anti- as in antiabortion, antiantiabortion, etc…

(12) re- as in rewrite, rerewrite, etc…

Te diminutive suffix o Dutch, -(t)je, is also productive. It can be added to any

noun with which it is semantically compatible. It cannot be used recursively, but I

think that is more a semantic and pragmatic restriction than a morphological one.

Tis Dutch diminutive suffix contrasts starkly with the diminutive suffixes o French

-et, (eminine) -ette,7 and the diminutive suffixes o English, such as -ette, -let , -kin,

-ling , which are unproductive. I propose to reclassiy such productive affixes as anti-

, re-, and the Dutch diminutive as PNC suffixes, rather than as derivational ones.

Tus, elements o PNC do occur in non-polysynthetic languages, but they are not

numerous. CSY has hundreds o PNC affixes, European languages just a ew.

. A further property of PNC elements, possibly not shared by derivational

elements of the same meaning

CSY ofen has elements o PNC o adverbial meaning, and independent adverbial

words o exactly the same meaning. Consider the CSY word in (13). It is possible

to add a PNC suffix to it, meaning ‘to V in vain’, as in (14). It is also possible to use

. Some varieties o Belgian French use -et , -ette productively, presumably under Germanic in-

fluence.


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the separate adverb leganiitek ‘in vain’ as in (15), and it is possible to use both the

PNC suffix as well as the separate adverb, as in (16). Forms (14) through (16) have

the same meaning, although there must be pragmatic differences among the three. (13) igaamalghiinga

igagh-uma-lghiinga

write --..1s

‘I wrote.’

(14) igaa pigesnaamalghiinga

igagh-pigesnagh-uma-lghiinga

write -V.in.vain --..1s

‘I wrote in vain.’

(15) leganiitek igaamalghiinga ‘I wrote in vain.’

(16) leganiitek igaa pigesnaamalghiinga ‘I wrote in vain.’

What I would like tentatively to suggest is that this co-occurrence o an item

o PNC with an independent word o the same meaning is a characteristic o PNC

and not o derivation. In other words, I am suggesting that a derivational suffix o

the same meaning cannot co-occur with an independent word o the same mean-

ing. Tis co-occurrence is not a possibility with all items o PNC, however. It does

not seem possible with elements o PNC that are easily recursive; so building rom

example (11), the phrase against antiabortion obviously does not mean the same

as against abortion or antiabortion.

Obviously, this suggestion needs to be checked with more data in more lan-

guages with PNC. Let us now contrast examples with a PNC suffix with examples

with a derivational suffix o the same meaning. Consider the Dutch diminutive

suffix which, as stated at the end o section 4, I consider to be a PNC suffix. From

examples (18–20), it is clear that the suffix can co-occur with the independent adjective klein ‘small’. Now there are subtle pragmatic differences between (18), (19),

and (20), but it is not the case that (20) reers to a chair in some way smaller than

the chairs reerred to in (18) and (19).

(17) stoel ‘chair’

(18) stoel tje ‘chair-dim’

(19) een kleine stoel ‘a little/small chair’

(20) een klein stoel tje ‘a little/small chair’

Now let us compare this with the derivational diminutive suffix -ette in French.

Te orm (22) with the diminutive suffix does not really mean ‘little girl’ (as the


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Willem J. de Reuse

orm in (23) does). It is lexicalized with the meanings ‘schoolgirl o a certain age

range’ or ‘girlish boy’. But regardless o what it actually means, one cannot add the

independent adjective petite ‘small’ to it. My own intuitions on French, as well asthe hal-dozen French speakers I consulted, reject (24) as very strange.8

(21) fille ‘girl’

(22) fill ette ‘girl-’

(23) une petite fille ‘a little girl’

(24) *une petite fill ette

Te intuition o native speakers o French is that you cannot use (24) because

you are expressing smallness twice. But that is not what is happening, because in

Dutch, there are no restrictions on using the adjective and the diminutive together.

My claim is that the derivational status o the French suffix and the PNC status o

the Dutch suffix are responsible or the difference in grammaticality.

. Conclusions

I have argued in this paper that there exists a type o productive morphology that

is neither inflection nor derivation (as traditionally defined), but is a third kind o

morphology which I call PNC.

It is large numbers o PNC that best characterize

polysynthetic languages. As a result, some languages, like those belonging to the

Athabascan amily, are not particularly polysynthetic, even though they have great

morphological richness and complexity.

Te reader might object to my characterization o “polysynthetic” that by re-

defining the term as meaning “having lots o PNC” elements, I am guilty o the

same sin that I accused Baker o in section 1, since some languages traditionally

called “polysynthetic”, such as Athabascan, must be considered less polysynthetic

in my characterization. At the risk o engaging in some casuistry, I will argue that

I am a bit less guilty o this sin.

Eskimo, which has always been a good exemplar o polysynthesis, even in the

vaguer conceptions o polysynthesis, now becomes the best exemplar o polysyn-

thesis. Words in other polysynthetic languages might be long, as shown by WA,

but they are never quite as long as in Eskimo languages. As Woodbury (2002)

. Speakers o Belgian French who use -et , -ette productively can use it with the adjective petite.

An example is farde ‘older’, une fardette ‘a little older’, and une petite fardette ‘a little older’ (de

Reuse, 1977 ervuren, Belgium, fieldnotes, overheard).


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points out, Eskimo languages are extreme rom that point o view. In Baker’s the-

ory, it is Iroquoian that is the best exemplar o polysynthesis, and Eskimo is not

even considered polysynthetic. So I would argue that Baker does more violence tothe term “polysynthesis” than I do, and that my interpretation o polysynthesis as

“lots o PNC” is closer to the popular conception o polysynthesis.

As ar as Athabascan languages are concerned, I am indeed orced to draw the

conclusion that Athabascan languages are not particularly polysynthetic. Tis is a

conclusion that is surprising to Athabascanists, who tend to think that Athabas-

can languages are rather good exemplars o polysynthetic languages. It is interest-

ing, however, that Edward Sapir, the first linguist to study Athabascan morphology

rom a typological point o view, apparently did not think o them as polysynthetic.

According to Kari (1992:

109, 203), Sapir used the term “interrupted synthesis” to

characterize Athabascan languages, “and was using it in contradistinction to poly-

synthesis ” (emphasis Kari’s).9

Returning now to the issue o productivity, I agree with Fortescue, Mithun,

Sadock, and ersis (p.c. 2006) that there are “clines o productivity” in affixation.

However, I would preer to call them “clines o nonproductivity”. I think o pro-

ductivity as I think o pregnancy, i.e., as an all-or-nothing phenomenon. And ur-

thermore, I would like to keep the clines o nonproductivity within derivation.

Whatever is not productive can be very rare or very common. We all agree thatthere is a lot o difference between an affix that only occurs with a ew stems, and

an affix which, without being productive (and thereore qualiying as PNC), oc-

curs with hundreds o stems. I claim that there is a serious qualitative difference

between productive affixation and affixation that is not productive, even though it

occurs on hundreds o stems and thereore looks productive.

Tis is a stronger claim than claiming that whatever is not inflection is all just

derivation (in the traditional sense), and that everything inside that derivation is

a cline. It might well be the wrong claim, but it is worth checking into more than

has been done.

One possible objection against the idea o absolute productivity in morphology

is the ollowing. According to Mithun’s research on noun incorporation in Iro-

quoian and her research on affixation in Central Alaskan Yup’ik Eskimo (Mithun

and Gorbett 1999, Mithun p.c. 2006), speakers can ofen tell which morphological

. Other intriguing characterizations o polysynthesis in Athabascan languages with compari-

sons to Eskimo are provided in Fortescue (1992:100) where he notes that there is in Athabascan

something he calls “‘extended derivation’, (…) the extensive middle-ground between ‘true’ der-ivation and inflection so characteristic o polysynthetic languages”. In Fortescue (2006), he com-

pares “old polysynthesis” with “new polysynthesis”, and concludes that both West Greenlandic

(an Eskimo language) and Koyukon (an Athabascan language) display “old polysynthesis”. Un-

ortunately, space is lacking to discuss these ideas here.


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Willem J. de Reuse

constructions are used and which ones are not in use. Tis might be an indication

that there is no difference between the absolute productivity I claim or PNC and

the “cline o productivity” in derivation. I have no fieldwork experience with Iro-quoian, so I will take Mithun at her word regarding Iroquoian. Regarding Eskimo,

my experience with native speakers is rather different rom that o Mithun’s. Some

o my CSY consultants could indeed tell whether they had heard a particular mor-

phological construction, but others could not tell, and others even thought that

the question was absurd. Tereore, I am not sure that we can trust Eskimo speak-

ers with judgments about whether they have heard a word beore or not. Tere are,

o course, elements o Eskimo morphology that have undergone lexicalization and

are derivational suffixes. An example is -vig - ‘place to V’, in (10) above. CSY speak-

ers can generally tell which stem with a derivational suffix is in use and which one

is not. So I think that the distinction between derivational suffixes and suffixes o

PNC is genuine rom the point o view o Eskimo speakers, even though it is hard

to discern rom a ormal point o view.

As ar as WA is concerned, the reactions I obtain rom native speakers are very

similar to the reactions Mithun obtained rom Iroquoian and Central Alaskan

Yup’ik speakers. WA speakers can generally tell which morphological construc-

tions are used and which ones are not in use, even though WA morphology is very

complex. I take this to mean that most o the affixes o WA are derivational andnot elements o PNC.

Abbreviations

3O third person object

4S ourth person subject (a type o polite third person)

diminutive

directive, marking the act that the object is only partially affected

rustr rustrative: ‘but.., in vain’

H means: put a high tone on the previous syllable

.3p indicative mood, third-person plural subject

.3s indicative mood, third-person singular subject

.3s.3s indicative mood, third person subject acting on third person object

inerential evidential, ofen translatable as ‘it turns out’

. intransitive participial, can be a nominalizer

..1s intransitive participial mood, first-person singular subject

.sg modalis singular, a type o oblique case

N nominal expression (always preceding) past tense

perective aspect

plural subject or object


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.2s.. absolutive singular case, second-person singular possessor

themative prefix (has no clear meaning, it just has to be there) qualiying the stem

transitivizing derivational prefix, also called “classifier”

V verbal expression (always preceding)

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polysynthesis as a typological feature

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