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raft-
[+Pl]
raft-s
Number
The first two dimensions of the English verb are person and and number:
Number
[ -Pl]
[ +pl]
[+1st ] play-
play-
[ -1st ] play-
play-
[ +Personal]
Person
[ -Personal]
play-s
play-
Person has a second layer: [+Personal] which contains [+1st] and [--1st].
[+1st] refers to the first person and [-1st] refers to the second person.
All these feature are binary. Binarism is a theoretical concept in which
everything is paired off either as plus or minus. The concept of plus
and minus falls within marking theory. In marking theory, the marked pair
(plus) is the non-default, and unmarked (minus) pair is the default. The
marked (+) feature is
[+pl]
[ +1st] play-
play-
[-1st]
play-
play-
play-s
play-
[+Personal]
Person
[-Personal]
[-Past]
[+Past]
play-ed
The third dimension is not easy to show on a two dimensional plane. The
angled lines are the best I can do for the moment, but it is not ideal.
Number and person play no role in the past tense inflectional paradigm.
Number does occur in the past tense, but it occurs only in the suppletive
pair was and were. The grammatical distinction of number is covert except
for these two verbs.
In many languages, tense is not the distinctive feature, but perfect. The
feature [+Perfect] refers to the completion of an action. Sometimes the past
tense of tensed languages can be
in
Arabic,
Derivation
(lexical)
obligatory
optional
relevant to syntax
limited applicabilit y
may be cumulative
not it erable
iterable
The first four criteria are the most reliable ones. The first is very reliable, since one cannot choose to
omit an inflectional affix at will. That is, one must say John sleeps, not *John sleep. As I discussed
earlier, it may be always possible to find some way to get around a derived form even if the resulting
construction is very awkward and clumsy and nearly unacceptable though grammatical.
Cumulative refers to a single morpheme that contains more than one feature:
E.g. The verbal inflectional suffix in English -s contains [-Pl] and [-Personal]. It is rare to find a
derivational suffix that clearly contains two or more readily identifiable features.
QP
N
HAND
[ _ _ Pl]
Q
ONE
[-Pl]
In the above diagram AP is omitted for the sake of clarity and other nodes dominating NP are also
omitted. The Linking Principle states that only like features may be linked; that the two like features
must share the same feature sign: [+X] <--> [+X]. Unacceptable is [-X] <--> [+X]. One kind of speech
error occurs when features dont match. Speakers tend to correct themselves so that the features
agree. If a feature has no positive or negative sign, then a sign must be inserted. If an unmatching
sign is inserted, the construction fails because it violates the Linking Principle. Thus a minus sign
must be inserted before Pl in the above figure:NP
QP
N
HAND
[ -Pl]
Q
ONE
[-Pl]
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The link is shown here in red. The colour is for illustrative purpose; it has no theoretic significance.
VP
NP
QP
Q
ONE
[-Pl]
N
HAND
[ -Pl]
[-Personal]
V
[_ _ Pl]
[_ _ Personal]
The feature [-Personal] is innate in all nouns. Only the first and second pronouns may be
[+Personal]. It is a property of the verb that is must be marked for plural and personal; they are not
innate:
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VP
NP
QP
Q
ONE
[-Pl]
N
HAND
[ -Pl]
[-Personal]
V
[-Pl]
[-Personal]
Note that in addition to Q and N being linked, N and V are also linked. Hence plural agreement is
required in both links, which form a chain. This is as far as I will go here. It introduces how
morphology interacts with syntax. Remember the third goal: Explanatory Goal. The theories of binary
features, unacceptable empty features (neither plus nor minus), linking and feature matching are the
explanatory theories that have the power here. Together they form a set of constraints that limit the
power of grammars. To account for theory of linking that apparently limits links to be built between
heads and complements will force a major change in Chomskys theory of phrase structure rules.
However, there are many syntacticians who revere Chomsky as a god. And being a god, everything
he says must be necessarily correct
In the continuum approach, H lists in his table 4.6 a continuum from simple inflection to
derivation. The continuum table is rather interesting. The factor cumulative in features is rather
logical, once we see that some features can be represented in a single morpheme. The English suffix
-s = [+Pl] is not cumulative since only one feature is marked. The same holds for Eng. Past tense:
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