Carson Schutze: Noun Compounding Question (reply to Rolf Noyer)

[Martha McGinnis]

Thanks to Rolf for all of that explication. I think I followed it, but I have
a couple of follow-up questions:

>mostly true) that the choice of compound stem form (aside from "linking"
>-s-) is  the same as the stem used in the plural, this is not necessarily a
>problem, it simply means that the "second" stem that a root has is
>polyfunctional.

Ah OK, I think this was mostly a terminological confusion on my part: having a
"second stem" is not the same as true suppletion (e.g. go-went).

>(how to actually "name" or "point
>to" the stems is a difficult issue as well, but I'll leave that aside for
>now).

I'd be interested in discussing this more, actually. If in DM we implement
these multiple stems via readjustment rules that contain lists of the stems to
which they apply, then there seems to be some danger of needing to duplicate
some of the vocabulary insertion contexts in the readjustment rules.
That is, as
I understand the model, we would insert the "wrong" (i.e. first) stem at the
point of vocabulary insertion, and we could then, say, insert a plural suffix
chosen with reference to the phonological context, i.e. the end of the first
stem. Then we "switch stems" via a readjustment rule, but in so doing we may
have altered the environment to which the suffix allomorphy was sensitive,
thereby requiring more readjustment rules to fix up the mismatch.
Indeed your example would have this character, I think:

>So, if we are dealing with  Geist-er 'spirit (pl.)' we have in fact
>Geist+r+0/e  where the 0 plural allomorph is chosen after a sonorant
>(epenthesis is assumed before /r/).

If the "first stem" is Geist then we will at first wrongly insert -e, right?

>I have nothing to add on the point of learnability except to say that this
>issue is not confined to German but arises wherever stem allomorphy
>involves affixal material.

Well I wonder if the German case isn't especially pernicious because it
requires the learner to identify *some* instances of 'added stuff' as part of
a stem allomorph, but other instances of added stuff in the same syntactic and
morphological context (namely, the -s plural) as crucially NOT part of the
stem, else we should find it inside compounds. One wonders whether something
like the Pinker/Clahsen "diagnostics" for the "default plural suffix" could be
used by the learner to conclude that -s could not possibly be part of 2nd
stems, e.g. if the learner believes that proper names, foreign-sounding words,
etc. couldn't have stem allomorphy (of this sort, at least). Or do you think
the fact that -s is "less vocalic" than r/n/e might play into the learner's
search for a "theme vowel", i.e., could there be a universal expectation that
such things should be sonorants?

>To the extent that
>this distinction exists, so might we also expect there to be a distinction
>between stem-extensions and affixes.

I agree. The obvious question would be whether you have any "diagnostics" for
the distinction in your diss. that might be carried over to help the learner
here.

>Another useful analogy may be to French adverbs which are traditionally
>thought to be formed from the "feminine" form, e.g. _certain-e-ment_
>'certainly.'  It is, I think, evident that there is nothing "feminine"
>about adverbs and that no plausible "rule of agreement" could supply the
>property "feminine" in such cases.  Logically one is led to the conclusion
>that the "feminine" form is a stem allomorph and that the -e- here does not
>"spell" "feminine" per se.

No argument. But somehow I had thought of theme vowels as something that are
inserted during vocabulary insertion, corresponding to some 'templatic
position' created in the morphological component. (Maybe just misremembering a
class discussion.) Still, that view might at least lead you to expect a
certain uniformity in *where* the stem augment shows up. If we do it with
readjustment rules instead, don't we expect that we could just as easily have
one noun class that augments with a suffix and another that augments with a
prefix in forming the second stem, or even greater heterogeneity?
(Maybe that's the right prediction, I don't know--how wild do these systems
get?)

	Carson

mcginnis at ucalgary.ca