LSTL 63: The Interaction of Functional Morphemes inside the Nominal Phrase

The Interaction of Functional Morphemes inside the Nominal Phrase

Veronika Kloudová

Masaryk University

This book explores the limits and possibilities of morpheme ordering in the noun phrase. Based on a sample of fifty geographically and genetically diverse languages, it presents the attested – and unattested – combinations of case, number, and definiteness morphemes. The account covers not only languages with agglutinative morphology but also languages that fuse more grammatical categories into a single morphological exponent – a portmanteau. The book shows that not all patterns of morpheme ordering that are logically possible are equally represented within the sample and, importantly, certain patterns are not attested at all. The book provides an account for this observation by using the latest theoretical tools from the nanosyntactic framework, namely spellout-driven movement, backtracking, and Spec formation. The results of this study provide evidence for the hypothesis that ordering in morphology is governed by the same principles as in syntax.