Plural in German

[Martha McGinnis]

Hi,

I've been following the discussion on gender and compounding and I
have  another question regarding plurals in German. Considering that
the particular plural suffix that is attached to a noun is determined
by gender and certain phonological features, I wonder what cyclic
insertion means exactly. If we insert the root first, mapping its
morphosyntactic features, is it still visible for insertion of the
plural suffix? And if this is the case, what is the advantage of a
derivation a la DM as opposed to a lexicalist framework in terms of
predictibality? To be more specific, masculine and neuter nouns with
at least two syllables, where the last syllable contains a "schwa"
have zero plural (mostly). Here, the morphosyntactic plus the
phonological features of the noun determine the particular plural
suffix. Other masculine/neuter nouns ending in a consonant take -en
or -er. So, if we insert the root first, are the phonological
features of the noun visible for the insertion of the plural or do we
spell-out in a strict cycle as well? Is there any work on what
triggers spell-out?

Thanks,
Bettina Spreng
Dept. of Linguistics
University of Toronto
130 St. George Street, 6th floor
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
M5S 3H1
bspreng at chass.utoronto.ca

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