No more phology!

West Greenlandic evidence against a morphological

tier of linguistic representation

Sylvain Neuvel

This paper is an attempt to demonstrate how the morphological phenomena

found in West Greenlandic and other polysynthetic languages are best accounted
for within a simple, truly word-based theory of morphology, without the use of
morphemes, morpho-phonological rules, or anything else that could remotely
justify the existence of a morphological level of linguistic representation.

1. Introduction1

In parallel-modular theories of grammar, a level of linguistic representation generally

corresponds to a module of grammar whose rules or principles affect it. The rules of
syntax operate on syntactic representations, the rules of phonology operate on phono-
logical representations, and so on.
I adopt here a version of Autolexical Grammar (Sadock 1983, 1991), also similar
in spirit to the view espoused in Jackendoff 2002, and use evidence from West
Greenlandic morphology to argue against the existence of a morphological level of
linguistic representation. While morphological principles can be shown to affect any
and all levels of linguistic representation in West Greenlandic, I suggest that there
is no evidence of, nor need to postulate a level of representation containing objects
proper to the realm of morphology.
I hope to show how the morphological phenomena found in West Greenlandic
and other polysynthetic languages are best accounted for within a simple, truly word-
based theory of morphology (Ford & Singh 1991, 1996; Ford et al. 1997; Neuvel &
Singh 2002). Within this view, morphology is simply a set of rules defining correspon-
dences between words on one or many levels of linguistic representation.

. I would like to express my gratitude to Jerry for expanding my mind, making me read
Greenlandic children’s books, and for the most intellectually challenging cigarette breaks in
recent history.
 Sylvain Neuvel

2. West Greenlandic

West Greenlandic [henceforth WG] is a polysynthetic language (according to every-

one but Baker’s (1988) definition) spoken by approximately fifty thousand people on
the westernmost part of Greenland. Several Greenlandic grammars have been pro-
duced over the years (Bergsland 1955; Rishel 1974; Fortescue 1984; Sadock 2003), all
of which use a more or less classical approach to morphology. WG is described in
traditional terms as having anywhere from 400 (Fortescue 1984: 313) to 700 (Rishel
1974: 89) derivational affixes, which can occur in multiple combinations and in a
somewhat free order (usually determined by semantics). There are an estimated 800 to
1000 different WG inflectional endings (Sadock 2003). Throughout this paper, phone-
mic and surface representations are given for each word and the following (somewhat
simplified) automatic phonological alternations are assumed:2

–– The vowels /i/, /a/ and /u/ are respectively realized as [e], [#] and [o] before pho-
nemic /r/ or /q/ (/r/ is a uvular continuant and /q/ a uvular stop). ex: /qimmiq/
‘dog’ → [qimmeq].
–– Except for the sequence /ai/ which only occurs word finally, a vowel assimilates to a
preceding short /a/. ex: /qimmiarauvuq/ ‘he/she is a young dog’ → [qimmi#raavoq].
–– A consonant completely assimilates to a following consonant, except for the
sequence /ts/. ex: /sinikta/ ‘let us sleep’→ [sinitta].
–– All non-nasal consonant clusters are voiceless. ex: /sinikvikmi/ ‘in the bed’ →
[siniffimmi].
–– /t/ is affricated before a phonemic /i/. ex: /qamutit/ ‘sleds’ → [qamutsit].

3. Representations

3.1 Evidence in favor of a syntactic representation at the word level

The existence of syntactic structure, be it in West Greenlandic or in another language,
seems fairly self-evident but a close examination of WG syntax strongly suggests that a
single WG word may correspond to more than one syntactic element.
In WG, head nouns take nominal modifiers that agree in case, while verbs do not.
In constructions involving what is usually referred to as an incorporated noun (i.e. a
noun converted into a verb by affixation), a verb can combine with a nominal modifier
that has semantic scope and agrees in case with what appears to be the nominal part of
the verb. The now illustrious sentence below illustrates this phenomenon.

. All phonemic representations are from Jerry Sadock, personal communication.

 No more phology! 

(1) [ataatsinik] [qamutseq#ppoq]

/ataatsinik/ /qamutiqaqpuq/
‘one.instr.pl.’ ‘have a sled.ind.3sg.’
‘he has one sled’ (adapted from Sadock 1980: 309)
In (1) the modifier ataatsinik (/ataatsinik/) ‘one’ seems to have scope over and agree
in number and case with the instrumental ‘plurale tantum’ qamut (/qamut/) ‘sled’.
This phenomenon has been widely discussed in the literature (c.f. Sadock 1980, 1986;
Mithun 1984, 1986; Baker 1988, 1995; Anderson 2001) and has led most people to
assume that what ataatsinik modifies is the actual sequence /qamut/ we find in
qamuteqarpoq (/qamutiqaqpuq/) ‘he has a sled’. What is interesting about the Green-
landic example in (1) is that the modifier also agrees in case and number with the noun
it modifies. If we assume, like everyone else, that agreement is a syntactic pheno­
menon, (1) can be taken as evidence of syntactic structure. If agreement is totally or
even partly governed by syntax, there must be something in the syntactic representation
of qamuteqarpoq that the modifier can agree with.
(2) S

NP V NP
[pl., instr.] [3sg.]

NP N
[pl., instr.]
The word qamuteqarpoq ‘he has sled(s)’ corresponds in the syntactic representation
above, not only to a V node, but to part of the object NP as well. In other words,
qamuteqarpoq is not a simple syntactic verb in this structure, but corresponds to a
complex non-constituent unit. Given the evidence just presented, I also assume that
qamuteqarpoq is not a syntactic atom and includes an NP, but I give the sentence
ataatsinik qamuteqarpoq a slightly different syntactic structure shown below.
(3) S

V NP
[3sg.]
NP V

N NP
[pl., instr.]
The differences between the two structures are minimal, but the representation I have
chosen makes this sentence syntactically intransitive. The subject NP in this sentence
appears in the absolutive case (Hansi(*p) ataatsinik qamuteqarpoq ‘Hans.abs (*erg)
has one sled’; and the ending of the verb is that of an intransitive verb. Moreover,
before it is combined with other words to form a sentence, the verb qamuteqarpoq
 Sylvain Neuvel

corresponds under my view to a syntactic unit of category V ([V V NP]), albeit a

complex one. Regardless of what representation one wishes to give the above sentence,
it is clear that it will involve some degree of syntactic compositionality which must be
represented on some level of representation belonging to syntax.

3.2 E
 vidence in favor of one or many semantic representations
at the word level
3.2.1 Function/Argument structure
Function/Argument Structure: F(unction)/A(rgument) structure is a semantic represen-
tation that reflects the logical configuration of a given construction. F/A structure
is articulated around the basic categories of argument and proposition, roughly
corresponding to entity expressions and truth-valued expressions. These two basic
types serve as the building blocks for other recursively defined categories, as per the
axiom in (4) (Sadock in preparation).
(4) a. There are two basic categories: Arg(ument) and Prop(osition)
b. If A and B are categories, then there is a category C such that C(A) = B
The categories defined in this manner are of two general types, functors and
modifiers. Functors are categories that combine with arguments and/or propositions
one by one to produce, in the end, a proposition. Following Sadock (in preparation),
I symbolize functors as Fψ, where ψ is a string of a(rguments) or p(ropositions) with
which the functor must combine (in the given order) to yield a proposition. A transi-
tive verb like kiss, as in Moya kisses Maggie, would belong to the category Faa since it
first combines with one argument (corresponding to the object) to form a predicate of
category Fa, which takes another argument to form a proposition. A verb like believe,
as in Maggie believes that Leeloo is a cat, is of category Fpa; it first combines with a
proposition to form a one place predicate (Fa). The F/A representations of both sen-
tences are given below. Note that these trees represent only logical hierarchy and that
the direction of branching is irrelevant.

(5) a. Prop b. Prop

Arg Fa Arg Fa
moya maggie
Faa Arg Prop Fpa
kiss maggie believe
Arg Fa
leeloo cat
The other type of semantic category that lexical items can belong to is modifiers (Mx).
A modifier is a function from a given category (x) to a more complex function of the
same category. A lexical item of category Mfa is thus a predicate modifier (slowly, for
example), one of category Mp, a propositional modifier, etc.
 No more phology! 

For the sake of clarity, I repeat the WG example given in (1)

(1) [ataatsinik] [qamutseq#ppoq]
/ataatsinik/ /qamutiqaqpuq/
‘one.instr.pl.’ ‘have a sled.ind.3sg.’
‘he has one sled’ (adapted from Sadock 1980: 309)
Again, the modifier ataatsinik (/ataatsinik/) ‘one’ seems to have scope over and agrees
in number and case with the instrumental ‘plurale tantum’ qamut (/qamut/) ‘sled’.
Semantically speaking, there is nothing in (1) that we don’t find in a more familiar
language. The phrase is in fact very similar to the English transformational grammar-
ian, which often has been taken as evidence of word-internal morphological structure.
The only thing such examples tell us about is semantic compositionality, nothing else.
The sentence Reaganites think he’s amazing does not tell us that the word Reagan is
found somewhere in it, simply that the meaning of Reagan is part of the meaning
of the word Reaganites. There are countless similar examples. The sentence Ping is a
Chinese cook (meaning ‘Ping cooks Chinese food for a living’) gives us no evidence
that the word cook contains a morpheme food; no more than the various readings of
I almost killed him (c.f. Morgan 1969; McCawley 1971) tell us about the syntactic or
morphological structure of kill.

3.2.2 Role structure

Role Structure: Role structure describes any linguistic expression in terms of the
event(s) it denotes and the types of participants involved in the event. It carries roughly
the same kind of information found in Pusteyovsky’s (1995) Argument Structure and
Extended Event Structure. The Role Structure entry of a predicative element is given as
a list. The truth conditional meaning of the predicator appears first, followed by a list of
roles associated with this meaning. Following Faarlund (1989), event participants can
be either Ag(ent), Th(eme), Lo(cus), or a sub-event invoking participants of its own.
The Syntactic, Function/Argument and Role Structure representations for the English
verbs sneeze, take and claim are given in (6) (Sadock in preparation).
(6) sneeze
Syn: V in [__]
F/A: Fa
RS: ‘sneeze’, Th
take
Syn: V in [__ NP]
F/A: Faa
RS: ‘take’, Ag, Th
claim
Syn: V in [__ S’]
F/A: Fpa
RS: ‘claim’, Ag, Event
 Sylvain Neuvel

For our purposes, it is sufficient to point out that the verb in (1) is a predicate that has
two semantic arguments, the meaning ‘sled’, and a 3rd person argument, and that the
word qamut ‘sled’ has a simpler meaning and a simpler role structure. Any description
of the relation between these two words will therefore involve knowledge which, in
Autolexical grammar, is described in F/A structure and in role structure.

4. Morphological representations in WG

To illustrate the type of information required to represent the relation between WG

words, I have chosen the habitual form of verbs, which follows a very productive and
predictable pattern. While the use of the habitual arguably does not affect syntactic
structure, it undoubtedly must be represented on both semantic levels of representa-
tion. I assume here that the habitual is represented in Function/Argument structure
and functions as a predicate modifier. The four words below can be given the following
F/A representations. Subscript italics indicate specified argument positions that are
filled at the sentence level.
(7) a. [nerisippai] [nerisitt#ppai]
/nirisitpai/ /nirisittaqpai/
‘he/she causes them to eat’ ‘he/she habit. causes them to eat’
Prop Prop

Arg Fa Arg Fa
3sg. 3sg.
Fpa Prop ModFa Fa
cause habit.
Fa Arg Fpa Prop
eat 3pl. cause

Fa Arg
eat 3pl.
b. [sanioqquttoq] [sanioqqutt#ttoq]
/saniuqquttuq/ /saniuqquttaqtuq/
‘one who goes by’ ‘one who habitually goes by’
Fa Fa

GO_BY Modfa Fa
habit.
GO_BY
Any description of the morphological phenomenon involved above will have to account
for the difference in Function/Argument structure described above, either relationally,
or compositionally.
 No more phology! 

When it comes to Role structure, the relation between the words in (7a) does
not involve a difference in the number of roles associated with each meaning. The
truth conditional meanings of the words involved simply differ in that one includes
the habitual ‘sense’ and the other does not. Based on the words in (7) alone, one could
represent the Role Structure correspondence between these words as (8) (where υ
represents the list of roles associated with the meaning θ):

(8) RS: ‘θ’, υ ↔ ~‘habitually θ’, υ

This formulation is insufficient. Since the habitual can occur more ‘deeply’ into the
semantic structure of a word and modify a subordinate event, it will not in all cases
simply affect the entire truth conditional meaning of a word in the manner suggested.
In the next examples, the habitual modifies not the entire meaning of the word, but
only the act of winning.

(9) a. [ajugaanir#ppaa]
/ajugaaniraqpaa/
‘he/shei said that he/shej wins’
b. [ajugaas#nnir#ppaa]
/ajugaasaqniraqpaa/
‘he/shei said that he/shej often wins’ (Bittner 1995)

The RS correspondence must account for the fact that the habitual event may be
included in a larger meaning. In a relational system, we can represent the modified
meaning (θ) as included in a set (ψ) (possibly equal to θ), as in (10) below.

(10) RS: ‘θ’ ∈ ψ, υ ↔ ~‘habitually θ’ ∈ ψ, υ

The words in 7 also differ phonologically in that the habitual forms include the
sequence of phonemes /taq/. Again, any account of the habitual in WG will have to
include that difference in form.
In a truly word-based theory of morphology where the word is the smallest
unit of interest, the relation between the words in (7) can simply be represented as
a bidirectional relation describing the contrast between every word pair involved in
this relation. I refer the reader to Ford & Singh 1991, 1996; Ford et al. 1997; Neuvel &
Singh 2002 and Neuvel 2003, in press, for a description of Whole Word Morphology, a
genuine example of such a word-based theory. In Whole Word Morphology, the rela-
tion between verbs and their habitual form would, using an autolexical representation,
be represented as (11).

(11) MSyn: α V αV
F/A: ϕ[Fa ρ] ↔ ϕ[Fa [MOD habit.] [Fa ρ]]
RS: ‘θ’ ∈ ψ, υ ~‘habitually θ’ ∈ ψ, υ
Form: /XC CY/ /XC taq CY/
 Sylvain Neuvel

The lexical correspondence in (11) describes the contrast between verbs and their
habitual form on every level. Variables on every level can be filled with information
from any word that fits on one of the two lexical patterns.3 In a theory such as WWM,
anything that can be said morphologically of the relation between two words has to be
described in terms of contrasts between representations. The very concept of a mor-
phological level of representation is therefore illogical, since morphology is simply a
contrast, the expression of a productive difference on every level of representation.
On the other hand, one could ascribe to a more traditional theory of morphology
where words are formed compositionally using morphemes. In such a case, the first
thought that comes to mind is to give morphemes their own level or representation.
Under a compositional view, the difference between the words in (7) would be
accounted for by the addition, to the verb, of the habitual morpheme -taq-. The caus-
ative in (7a) would come from the morpheme -sit-, the eating part from the morpheme
niri-, and the third person with the morpheme -pai.
If we add a morphological level to the representation of the words in (7), the word
nerisippai could be represented as something like (12).
(12) [nerisippai]

Syn: V NP
[3sg.]
NP V
[3pl.]
F/A:
Prop

Arg Fa
3sg.
Fpa Prop
cause
Fa Arg
eat
3pl.
RS: ‘cause to eat’, Ag, theme
Morph: niri + sit + pai
(whether concatenated or in a tree structure)
Form: /nirisitpai/

While this representation may seem “normal” at first glance, it is interesting to ask
what exactly we’ve just added on this level. The “niri”, on the morphological level, is

. See Neuvel 2003 for a description of how the variables X and Y on the Form level can be
filled and resolved.
 No more phology! 

not the sequence of phoneme /niri/ since that is part of the formal representation, it
is not a syntactic verb, since that is part of the syntactic representation, and it has no
meaning, since that information is represented on the remaining levels of represen-
tation. In fact, the combination of the morphemes niri-, -sit-, and -pai, is the sum
total of the representation of the word. In terms of information, all we are adding in
the morphological representation is the fact that there are three morphemes, so the
morphological representation could very well be written as M + M + M. For this to
be remotely interesting, we need to know which part of the syntax, the meaning and
the form belong to each morpheme. Let us then look at the representation they would
receive in an Autolexical account.
Based only on the information we’ve used so far, the representation of these
morphemes would have to include something like (13).

(13) a. niri-
Syn: V
F/A: Prop

Fa Arg
eat
RS: ‘eat’, Ag, Th
Form: /niri/
b. -sit-
Syn: [V [V]]
F/A:
Prop

Arg Fa

Fpa Prop
cause
RS: ‘cause’, Ag, Event
Form: /sit/

I’ve included some information on the combinatorics of each morpheme on every

level. One has to know that -sit- attaches to a verb, that it semantically modifies a
proposition, etc. Now let’s add a morphological level to the representation of (13a).
What could we possibly add? We could say that it belongs to the category of verb, but
that would be redundant, since we’ve already seen that it must be a “real” V in the
syntax. Its meaning and form are represented on other levels as well. So what is a mor-
pheme on the morphological level? We could mention that this is a sub word unit. It is
unclear to me what the point of the exercise would be however. Every word of WG is,
 Sylvain Neuvel

under that view, exhaustively composed of these smaller units that each have their own
representation on the syntactic, semantic and formal levels of representation. In other
words, if we were to build a lexicon of WG, it would, for all intents and purposes, only
contain units of this type, making their identification as such fairly pointless.
In fact, besides the fact that such an analysis will run into all the well documented
problems faced by an Item-and-Arrangement approach to morphology, it also ironi-
cally makes most of what we conceive of as grammar completely redundant since
100% of the syntax and semantics of WG will be contained in the combinatorics that
must be specified for each of these mini lexical entries.
The very point of having a multi-level theory of grammar is that there can be
mismatches between levels. If we assume the existence of morphemes as the smallest
lexical entries, mismatches will only occur within the representations of morphemes.
Every word is exhaustively composed of morphemes on every level of representation,
and as such, the correspondence between levels beyond the morphemic level is by
definition 1 to 1.
The idea each level being the product of its own generative device also becomes
fairly difficult to maintain since, in the end, it must generate in parallel precisely what
is described in the lexical entries of morphemes.

5. Conclusion

I would suggest that there is an essential difference between morphology and the other
components of grammar. While each component corresponds to actual properties of
language utterances, morphology is simple the expression of certain regularities in the
properties of words on EVERY level of representation at once. In other words, mor-
phology, whether seen in relational or compositional terms, is not a level of represen-
tation but a set of generalizations about all the formal aspects of any given language.
Furthermore, the very existence of the morpheme, when pushed to its natural
conclusion, seems to deny the properties that make Autolexical grammar what it is.
One could conclude that in order to exist, Autolexical grammar has to evacuate the
concept of the morpheme and rely on a relational word-based theory of morphology
to account for the regularities between lexical units in any language.
The arguments made here naturally lead to the discussion of other linguistic
phenomena, like clitics, whose analysis often involves some sort of morphological
representation.4 While a detailed analysis of clitics is far beyond the scope of this paper,

. In his review of this paper, Anthony Woodbury rightfully points out that I have avoided
what is traditionally described as incorporation in this paper (Woodbury 1996). Much like
 No more phology! 

the logic remains essentially the same. In a theory of grammar in which each level of
representation is independent, there simply cannot be any evidence of a particular
structure or of anything else on a morphological tier: form is evidence of what goes
on the formal level, anything involving scope is either syntactic or semantic or we
wouldn’t know it’s there. A morphological representation is, however, a great place to
hide exceptions. But if the content of this representation is useless or entirely redun-
dant, except when it “explains” an exception to a syntactic or semantic generalization,
and if it is only arrived at using syntactic or semantic evidence, I would just call it for
what it is.

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 Sylvain Neuvel

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