The Morphology-Syntax Interface
The morphology-syntax interface concerns how word structure and sentence structure interact: whether words are built in a separate component or by the syntax, and how the two domains divide their labour.
Definition
The morphology-syntax interface is the set of questions and theories about how the principles that build words relate to those that build phrases and sentences, including whether the two share a single combinatorial system.
Scope
This area covers phenomena and theories at the boundary between morphology and syntax: the syntactic theory of word formation in Distributed Morphology, the lexicalism debate over where words are assembled, the intermediate status of clitics between words and affixes, and head movement and noun incorporation as cases where syntax builds complex words. It does not cover purely morphological or purely syntactic topics, which are treated in neighbouring areas.
Sub-topics
Core questions
- Are words built in a presyntactic lexicon or by the syntax itself?
- Which phenomena require interaction between word structure and sentence structure?
- How should elements intermediate between words and affixes, such as clitics, be analysed?
- When does syntactic movement create complex words?
Key concepts
- lexicalism
- Distributed Morphology
- late insertion
- head movement
- incorporation
- clitics versus affixes
- the lexicalist hypothesis
Key theories
- Distributed Morphology
- Halle and Marantz's syntactic theory of word formation, on which there is no separate generative lexicon; words are assembled by the syntax and given phonological form by late vocabulary insertion.
- Syntactic word formation by head movement
- Baker's theory of incorporation, on which complex words such as noun-incorporating verbs are derived by syntactic head movement, constrained by general locality principles.
History
Chomsky's (1970) Lexicalist Hypothesis held that derivational word formation belongs to the lexicon, separate from syntax. This view was challenged by syntactic theories of word formation: Baker (1988) derived incorporation by head movement, and Halle and Marantz (1993) proposed Distributed Morphology, dissolving the lexicon and building words in the syntax. The status of clitics, studied by Spencer and Luís (2012), continues to test where the boundary lies.
Debates
- Lexicalism versus syntacticism
- Whether word formation occurs in an autonomous lexical component or in the syntax, a foundational disagreement separating lexicalist frameworks from Distributed Morphology and related approaches.
- The status of clitics
- Whether clitics are syntactic words, phrasal affixes, or a sui generis category, given that they show properties of both independent words and bound morphemes.
Key figures
- Morris Halle
- Alec Marantz
- Mark Baker
- Andrew Spencer
Related topics
Seminal works
- chomsky1970
- baker1988
- hallemarantz1993
- spencerluis2012
Frequently asked questions
- Why is the morphology-syntax boundary controversial?
- Because many phenomena, such as incorporation, clitics, and inflection, show properties of both word structure and sentence structure. Theories disagree on whether these should be handled in a separate morphological component or by the same system that builds sentences.
- What is the lexicalist hypothesis?
- It is the claim, originating with Chomsky's work on nominalisation, that words are formed in the lexicon by principles distinct from syntax, so that syntax cannot manipulate the internal parts of words. Distributed Morphology rejects this view.