Distributed Selection
Distributed Selection
This chapter discusses why phrasal affixation is more restricted than phrasal compounding. The restrictions follow from the correspondence rules that regulate the relation between the syntactic and the phonological macromodules. One such rule requires that if an affix is external to a constituent in syntax, then the corresponding affix should be linearly external to the corresponding constituent in phonology. A second requires that if an affix selects a phrase headed by X in syntax, the corresponding affix should attach to the correspondent of X in phonology. These requirements conflict when the affix selects for a phrase the head of which is not adjacent to the affix. This is what rules out most cases of phrasal affixation. Phrasal affixation is predicted to be possible in the following circumstances: (i) when the correspondent to an affix is an independent phonological word in phonology; (ii) when the head of the phrase and the affix are adjacent; and (iii) when the affix does not have a correspondent in phonology; (iv) when the phrase has a null head. All these possibilities are attested, accounting for such things as bracketing paradoxes and mixed categories.
Keywords: phrasal affixation, bracketing paradoxes, conversion, mixed categories
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