{"title":"Morphological interpretations of syncretism in the panorama of Greek","authors":"Michail Ι. Marinis","doi":"10.1515/flin-2024-2021","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"This paper explores the nuanced realm of case syncretism, focusing primarily on its synchronic presence in Modern Greek (dialectal variety) and on the diachronic emergence of the phenomenon, classifying the distribution of syncretic cells in the nominal inflectional system of the language. This analysis shows that syncretism has been extended over time to many nouns, no longer limited either to neuter nouns or to the cells for the Nominative and Accusative. I suggest that the distribution of syncretic cells in Greek is influenced primarily by grammatical gender, but it is also affected by the productivity of each inflectional class, which I attribute to the morphomic (in terms of Aronoff [1994]. <jats:italic>Morphology by itself: Stems and inflectional classes</jats:italic>, vol. 22. MIT Press.) nature of the phenomenon. I propose a decisive new factor preventing a cell from participating in syncretic patterns: inter-paradigmatic similarity of affixes appears to block syncretism. Further, I examine the factors facilitating the development and expansion of syncretic patterns.","PeriodicalId":45269,"journal":{"name":"Folia Linguistica","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.6000,"publicationDate":"2024-04-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Folia Linguistica","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1515/flin-2024-2021","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
This paper explores the nuanced realm of case syncretism, focusing primarily on its synchronic presence in Modern Greek (dialectal variety) and on the diachronic emergence of the phenomenon, classifying the distribution of syncretic cells in the nominal inflectional system of the language. This analysis shows that syncretism has been extended over time to many nouns, no longer limited either to neuter nouns or to the cells for the Nominative and Accusative. I suggest that the distribution of syncretic cells in Greek is influenced primarily by grammatical gender, but it is also affected by the productivity of each inflectional class, which I attribute to the morphomic (in terms of Aronoff [1994]. Morphology by itself: Stems and inflectional classes, vol. 22. MIT Press.) nature of the phenomenon. I propose a decisive new factor preventing a cell from participating in syncretic patterns: inter-paradigmatic similarity of affixes appears to block syncretism. Further, I examine the factors facilitating the development and expansion of syncretic patterns.
期刊介绍:
Folia Linguistica covers all non-historical areas in the traditional disciplines of general linguistics (phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics), and also sociological, discoursal, computational and psychological aspects of language and linguistic theory. Other areas of central concern are grammaticalization and language typology. The journal consists of scientific articles presenting results of original research, review articles, overviews of research in specific areas, book reviews, and a miscellanea section carrying reports and discussion notes. In addition, proposals from prospective guest editors for occasional special issues on selected current topics are welcomed.