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In several three cell paradigms, it has been observed that one logically conceivable pattern - ABA under some arrangement of cells - is unattested. Existing approaches assume that such ·ABA generalizations provide evidence for feature inventories which are restricted to features that stand in containment relations, and are thus subject to Pāņinian rule order. We present a novel approach to ·ABA generalizations that derives from general properties of feature-based morphology. To this end, we develop a formal account of the widespread view that morphological paradigms derive from rules that relate abstract features from an inventory to morphological exponents. We demonstrate that the feature-based view restricts the space of typological patterns even without any further assumptions. We show furthermore that the feature-based theory derives ·ABA as a special case of a broader class of generalizations if the number of features in the inventory must be minimal, and that these generalizations arise under a variety of general assumptions about feature-algebras (extrinsically ordered or Pāņinian and with or without feature intersection). We discuss which explanation might be correct for actual cases of ·ABA constraints, and we explore the consequences of the feature-based general approach for a range of paradigm sizes including those with more than three cells.
Keywords: features; morphology; combinatorics; syncretism; typology
1Introduction
One of the most interesting and difficult questions in research on language lies in formally characterizing the class of possible grammars. One aspect of this challenge asks whether there are constraints on grammars of a general, abstract nature, and in turn, whether these constraints are specific to language or instantiations of even broader, domain-general constraints on cognitive systems, with manifestations observable elsewhere. For example, some progress has been made in syntax on the basis of Formal Language Theory and the Chomsky Hierarchy (Chomsky 1956) for the analysis of sets of string sequences. We aim to contribute to the development of a similarly general perspective for morphology, particularly with respect to morphological features, i.e. the features that underlie the variation in how different concepts are grouped across languages as evidenced by exponence by the same form (syncretism). The architecture of feature-based morphological systems predicts that only certain patterns of variation are possible. In this paper, we address ·ABA generalizations from this perspective. We show...