Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1 The study of word structure
- 2 Why have a morphology at all?
- 3 Is morphology really about morphemes?
- 4 The interaction of morphology and syntax
- 5 The theory of inflection
- 6 Some complex inflectional systems
- 7 Morphology in the lexicon: derivation
- 8 Clitics are phrasal affixes
- 9 The relation of morphology to phonology
- 10 How much structure do words have?
- 11 Composites: words with internal structure
- 12 Morphology and the typology of languages
- 13 Morphological change
- 14 Morphology as a computational problem
- References
- Index
Introduction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 January 2011
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- 1 The study of word structure
- 2 Why have a morphology at all?
- 3 Is morphology really about morphemes?
- 4 The interaction of morphology and syntax
- 5 The theory of inflection
- 6 Some complex inflectional systems
- 7 Morphology in the lexicon: derivation
- 8 Clitics are phrasal affixes
- 9 The relation of morphology to phonology
- 10 How much structure do words have?
- 11 Composites: words with internal structure
- 12 Morphology and the typology of languages
- 13 Morphological change
- 14 Morphology as a computational problem
- References
- Index
Summary
As its title suggests, this book presents the major points of a theory of morphology and some reasons for viewing word structure in a particular way. Readers may legitimately wonder about whether the theory in question ought to bear a distinctive name, and if so, why this one: A-Morphous Morphology. In that connection, consider the following (probably apocryphal) story that was current around the MIT Linguistics Department when I was a student there.
One day one of the graduate students, who may as well remain nameless for present purposes, was talking with the chairman, Morris Halle, and asked him “What must I do to become rich and famous?” Morris's reply: “Go forth and name things!” True or not, this undoubtedly represents a valid observation about the socio-politics of linguistics. Anyone who has been in the field for any length of time knows a number of cases in which the credit for some principle or theoretical position, at least in the general perception of linguists, went not to its originator(s) (insofar as it is possible to be clear who that might be), but rather to whoever first called it a principle, or a theory, and gave it a memorable name. More seriously, perhaps, we can take Morris's observation as the recognition that principles and theories come into clear focus when their unity is recognized (or at least asserted) and a distinctive and unitary way is provided by which to refer to them.
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- Information
- A-Morphous Morphology , pp. 1 - 6Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1992