Inessential features and expressive power of descriptive metalanguages

Pullum, Geoffrey K.; Tiede, Hans-Jörg

doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199577743.003.0011

Cited by 3 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“…That is, a feature is redundant in a sequence if it is bled by earlier rules of exponence, and thus in principle cannot be exponed. Eliminating a redundant feature from a sequence is indistinguishable from the sequence with that feature (compare the notion of inessential feature in Kracht 1997;Pullum & Tiede 2010). The sequence (12d), for example, is formally indistinguishable from the partial order in (10b), since the first two rules are sufficient to cover all of the cells.…”

Section: Partition Setsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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ABA and the combinatorics of morphological features

Bobaljik

Sauerland

2018

Glossa: A Journal of General Linguistics

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In several three cell paradigms, it has been observed that one logically conceivable pattern -ABA under some arrangement of cells -is unattested. Existing approaches assume that such *ABA generalizations provide evidence for feature inventories which are restricted to features that stand in containment relations, and are thus subject to Pāṇinian rule order. We present a novel approach to *ABA generalizations that derives from general properties of feature-based morphology. To this end, we develop a formal account of the widespread view that morphological paradigms derive from rules that relate abstract features from an inventory to morphological exponents. We demonstrate that the feature-based view restricts the space of typological patterns even without any further assumptions. We show furthermore that the feature-based theory derives *ABA as a special case of a broader class of generalizations if the number of features in the inventory must be minimal, and that these generalizations arise under a variety of general assumptions about feature-algebras (extrinsically ordered or Pāṇinian and with or without feature intersection). We discuss which explanation might be correct for actual cases of *ABA constraints, and we explore the consequences of the feature-based general approach for a range of paradigm sizes including those with more than three cells.

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Section: Partition Setsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…15 We accord no special status to pairs of features in this way: an inventory containing f 0011 may or may not contain the complement as a second feature (see also Pullum & Tiede 2010). In at least some cases, including two-and three-cell paradigms, imposing binarity complicates the analysis (cf.…”

Section: Binarity and Dimensionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

ABA and the combinatorics of morphological features

Bobaljik

Sauerland

2018

Glossa: A Journal of General Linguistics

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“…Things are no better when we consider substantive universals. While most generative linguists agree that the inventory of lexical categories includes N, V, and A, there is little agreement on what the functional categories are (see Newmeyer, 2008 ; Corbett, 2010 ; Pullum and Tiede, 2010 ; Boeckx, 2011 ). Newmeyer (2008) surveys some of the relevant literature and concludes:…”

Section: What Exactly Is Ug?mentioning

confidence: 99%

What exactly is Universal Grammar, and has anyone seen it?

Dąbrowska

2015

Front. Psychol.

104

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Universal Grammar (UG) is a suspect concept. There is little agreement on what exactly is in it; and the empirical evidence for it is very weak. This paper critically examines a variety of arguments that have been put forward as evidence for UG, focussing on the three most powerful ones: universality (all human languages share a number of properties), convergence (all language learners converge on the same grammar in spite of the fact that they are exposed to different input), and poverty of the stimulus (children know things about language which they could not have learned from the input available to them). I argue that these arguments are based on premises which are either false or unsubstantiated. Languages differ from each other in profound ways, and there are very few true universals, so the fundamental crosslinguistic fact that needs explaining is diversity, not universality. A number of recent studies have demonstrated the existence of considerable differences in adult native speakers’ knowledge of the grammar of their language, including aspects of inflectional morphology, passives, quantifiers, and a variety of more complex constructions, so learners do not in fact converge on the same grammar. Finally, the poverty of the stimulus argument presupposes that children acquire linguistic representations of the kind postulated by generative grammarians; constructionist grammars such as those proposed by Tomasello, Goldberg and others can be learned from the input. We are the only species that has language, so there must be something unique about humans that makes language learning possible. The extent of crosslinguistic diversity and the considerable individual differences in the rate, style and outcome of acquisition suggest that it is more promising to think in terms of a language-making capacity, i.e., a set of domain-general abilities, rather than an innate body of knowledge about the structural properties of the target system.

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Modelling Inflectional Structure

Brown

2015

The Oxford Handbook of Inflection

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The purpose of modelling inflectional structure computationally is addressed. It is a good way of checking analyses, and it provides external evidence for their validity. The development of a computational analysis can lead to the discovery of new generalizations about a language’s morphology. Finite state morphology and default inheritance methods are discussed. One question is whether morphological entities such as inflectional classes should be treated in terms of morphological features or whether they should be seen as emerging from the structure of the hierarchy or network. Both inflectional classes and stem classes can be treated as inheritance hierarchies. The issue of the different types of feature involved is raised again when deponency and syncretism are considered. Because it raises these issues, computational modelling allows for subtle distinctions in the treatment of a particular typological phenomenon, as well as providing a better understanding of the basic connections between related phenomena.

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Inessential features and expressive power of descriptive metalanguages

Cited by 3 publications

References 103 publications

ABA and the combinatorics of morphological features

ABA and the combinatorics of morphological features

What exactly is Universal Grammar, and has anyone seen it?

Modelling Inflectional Structure

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