0-IntroductionConversion is one of the mechanisms which are responsible for the formation of deverbal nouns in Portuguese. Portuguese converted deverbal nouns are morphologically characterised by a stem, inherited from the base verb, and a theme vowel (1).(1)corte 'cut'-CONVERTED DEVERBAL NOUN cort 'to cut'-VERBAL STEM e-NOMINAL THEME VOWEL voo 'flight'-CONVERTED DEVERBAL NOUN vo-'to fly'-VERBAL STEM o-NOMINAL THEME VOWEL This theme vowel, as is common to nouns which have not a deverbal origin nor even a derivational one, i.e., which are basic nouns (mesa 'table', gato 'cat', ponte 'bridge'), does not have a derivational status (cf. Aronoff (1994: 45-46) for the arguments of stating a theme vowel -Aronoff's work is related with theme vowels of Latin verbs, but the arguments are transferable to nominal theme vowelsas a morphophonological unit lacking semantic content; cf. Rodrigues (to appear) for the negation of the derivational status to the theme vowel of Portuguese converted deverbal nouns; cf. Kerleroux (1996) forthe assumption of conversion as the mechanism that forms French nouns such as attaque 'attack' and avance 'advance' from the verbs attaquer 'to attack' and avancer 'to advance', respectively; and Rodrigues (2001) for the same assumption related to Portuguese converted deverbal nouns).The aim of this paper is to demonstrate that there are constraints that govern the formation of converted deverbal nouns with regard to the kind of verbs that may or may not function as bases of these deverbal nouns and that those constraints, although belonging to different structures of language, have interfaces with each other. The existence of those constraints shows that (i) the constraints on the bases are not exclusively founded on morphological incompatibilities between derivational affixes and other morphological units to which those would be adjoined, and thus, a derivational mechanism which does not involve affixation, such as conversion, is also ruled by restrictions on the bases; (ii) structural constraintsbased on prosodic, morphological, lexical-semantic and argument
Limits on the extension of affixal combination: structural restrictions and processing conditions The study of the mental lexicon has been fostered by the analysis of the way complex words are mentally represented and processed. This paper concerns the syntagmatic extension of multiple affixation; specifically, the processing of complex words that contain four suffixes that operate in word-formation patterns of Portuguese. Although the individual addition of suffixes obeys structural constraints, the multiple combination results in complex words with low frequency and low expectedness by the speaker, which contribute to the lack of semantic transparency and of affixal salience of the combination. Our study demonstrates a relation between these factors and the experience of the speaker with the affixal combination, which determines the pattern character of the combination. We suggest that a suffix exerts the prediction of other suffixes as long as the combination is expected. Non-frequent heterocategorial complex words with a combination of four suffixes are contrasted with non-frequent words containing pleonastic affixation. In the latter type of words, the redundancy of semantic structures increases the semantic transparency of the word, which suggests a prediction effect operating on the semantic level of the affixal combination. Processing of complex words is dependent on the level of expectedness of the speaker towards the affix combination, which constrains the level of word acceptance by speakers.
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