J A M E S P. BLEVINS
SYNCRETISM
AND PARADIGMATIC
OPPOSITION*
This paper aims to consolidate the insights of two feature-theoretic treatments of inflectional syncretism within an account that recognizes morphological paradigms as a locus of distinctive grammatical oppositions. The
proposed account in large part adopts the underspecification analysis of
syncretism presented in Andrews (1990), in which 'non-third person singular' forms like walk in English are simply unmarked for person and number
features. It also follows Andrews in attributing the illformedness of *he
walk to a morphological blocking condition that prohibits the use of an
unmarked form when a more specific alternative - in this case, walks exists. However, I will argue that the operative notion of 'alternative' is
more revealingly and efficiently characterized in terms of paradigmatic
relatedness than in terms of the synonymy relation invoked by Andrews.
In this respect, the present account develops the more 'logistic' approach
to syncretism represented by Pollard and Sag (1987), in which the specifications assigned to walk are defined in direct opposition to the features
associated with the marked form (again walks) of the same lexeme. The
principal innovation in the synthesis outlined below involves organization
of the lexicon into hierarchical paradigms, consisting of lexical items that
either share a lexeme-identifying feature value or are defined from a
common base specification.
The feature type hierarchies employed in Pollard and Sag (1987) complement the underspecified paradigms in this account by providing a global
representation of feature neutralization. Thus the coalescence of nominative and accusative case or masculine and neuter gender in German
declensional paradigms is succinctly represented in a hierarchy that includes 'nonoblique' and 'nonferninine' macrotypes. The inclusion relation
between such feature macrotypes and their partially neutralized subtypes
supplies a restricted alternative to the disjunction of feature specifications.
Disjointness relations among the feature types in a hierarchy likewise
provide a constrained alternative to negative specifications. These alterna-
* I am grateful to Shelly Harrison, Roger Higgins and Edwin Williams for helpful discussion,
and to two anonymous reviewers for comments and suggestions that have led to improvements in the present version.
Linguistics and Philosophy 18: 113-152, 1995.
© 1995 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.
114
JAMES P. BLEVINS
tives moreover achieve the economy of disjunction and negation while
incurring few of the attendant complications.
The use of feature underspecification and structured feature inventories
primarily identifies their distinctive contribution to the reduction of inflectional syncretism. However this account also highlights a couple of points
of general interest for current feature-based approaches. In the first place,
it suggests the utility, both theoretical and practical, of incorporating
information about paradigmatic relations in the description of syntactic
systems. Moreover, it illustrates a useful division of logical labour, as
the structure assigned to the general feature inventory permits radical
simplification of individual entries. This simplification or partial underspecification in turn facilitates a morphological blocking analysis of the
sort proposed in Andrews (1990).
The body of the paper is divided into four sections. The first identifies
more precisely the sort of formal redundancy that the present account
seeks to eliminate. The second section reviews the approaches to this
problem proposed in Karttunen (1984) and Andrews (1990). The third
presents a paradigm-based alternative and provides illustrative fragments
of English verbal morphology and German declensional morphology. The
final section concludes by elucidating the basic distinction between the
alternatives considered with reference to the GPSG feature system, which
represents a simple inheritance hierarchy in terms of a propositional language.
1.
PARADIGMATIC SYNCRETISM
It is useful at the outset to distinguish 'artifactual' syncretism, which
reflects an overarticulated grammatical description, from 'fortuitous' or
'accidental' syncretism, which involves simple homophony within a paradigm. The present section discusses examples of artifactual and accidental
syncretism, and outlines a general strategy for reducing - and, in some
cases, eliminating - the former type. While the classification of individual
instances is not always straightforward, these examples illustrate how
artifactual syncretism arises through distinguishing properties that are in
fact fully or partially neutralized within a grammatical system. The strategy
for collapsing such hyperarticulated descriptions involves designating one
form as the unmarked member of a lexical paradigm, and recognizing
only as many marked alternatives as there are contrastive oppositions in
the paradigm. By representing only distinctive oppositions, the resulting
description prunes artifactual syncretism. However, this procedure will
not collapse arbitrary homophones, as entries that cannot be amalgamated
SYNCRETISM
AND PARADIGMATIC
OPPOSITION
115
through the neutralization of noncontrastive features will remain distinct.
This arguably reflects a useful distinction, as the recognition of nondistinctive features is a correctable defect of a linguistic description, whereas
homophony is an intrinsic, albeit contingent, property of a grammatical
system.
Traditional classifications of English verbal paradigms typically involve
considerable syncretism. This is clearly illustrated in the proliferation of
analyses for walk in the present indicative paradigm in (1), from Curme
(1947).
(1)
1ST
2ND
3RD
SINGULAR
PLURAL
walk
walk
walks
walk
walk
walk
The evident redundancy in this description is due to the fact that it does
not accurately represent the distinctive oppositions within the English
present indicative paradigm or, for that matter, within any verbal paradigm in English. Rather, the artificial distinction between the non-third
person singular forms reflects extrinsic considerations, often, as Huddleston (1984:77) suggests, the fact that these positions contrast in the verbal
paradigms of classical languages.
As Huddleston (1984) and Quirk et al. (1985), among others, have
observed, the distinctive opposition in such regular paradigms is much
more perspicuously described in terms of a contrast between a marked
third person singular form, and an unmarked, or general, form. 1 Thus the
six-way contrast in (1) can be reduced to the more revealing binary paradigm in (2).
(2)
3rd Singular Form
walks
General Form
walk
This economical classification identifies the syncretism in (1) as an artifact
of a defective description that fails to represent the complete neutralization
of person and number distinctions in non-third person singula; forms.
Unmarked general forms likewise permit the simplification of systems
that contain more than one marked alternative. This can be illustrated
1 Qu irk et al. (1985) describe the m a r k e d form as the -s form.
116
JAMES P. BLEVINS
with reference to the basic three-way contrast in the present indicative
paradigm of the English copula. The traditional description in (3) again
incorporates various noncontrastive person and number distinctions.
(3)
1ST
2ND
3RD
SINGULAR
PLURAL
am
are
is
are
are
are
The artifactual syncretism in (3) can accordingly be eliminated by representing only distinctive oppositions, as in (4).
(4)
1st Singular Form
am
3rd Singular Form
is
General Form
are
The concise descriptions in (2) and (4) reveal a dynamic complementarity
that is obscured by the proliferation of entries in (1) and (3). In each
case, the combinatorial options of marked forms are determined by their
agreement specifications, while the distribution of the unmarked form has
an 'elsewhere' character. As a consequence of this dynamic opposition,
the distribution of general forms may vary across paradigms. 2 The regular
present walk is opposed by the dedicated third singular form walks and
accordingly combines with the non-natural class of person and number
combinations that conflict with walks. The general present form of the
copula, are, is likewise compatible with the person and number combinations that conflict with third singular is or first singular am. The preterite
walked, in contrast, is unopposed by marked alternatives and hence compatible with all person and number combinations.
The simple paradigms in (2) and (4) distinguish fully specified from
completely unspecified forms. However, more complex paradigms typically exhibit more intricate patterns involving the partial neutralization of
2 Such variation in the distribution of general forms is what ultimately permits a uniform
description of paradigms. This contrasts with the account in Huddleston (1985:85fn8), where
the uniform distribution, assigned to general forms demands a correspondingly overarticulated
description of the copula, which, Huddleston suggests, "does not have a general present
tense form, for in the present tense we have a three-way person-number contrast is (3rd
person singular) vs a m (1st person singular) vs a r e (2nd person or plural)".
117
SYNCRETISM AND PARADIGMATIC OPPOSITION
features that are contrastive elsewhere in the paradigm. The nominal
declensions of modern German clearly illustrate the rampant syncretism
that may arise as a result of such 'local' neutralization. For example, the
matrix description of the definite article in (5), from Lederer (1969),
assigns a total of sixteen analyses to the six distinct forms of the article.
(5)
SINGULAR
NOMINATIVE
ACCUSATIVE
DATIVE
GENITIVE
PLURAL
MASCULINE
NEUTER
FEMININE
MASC/N-EUT/FEM
der
den
dem
des
das
alas
dem
des
die
die
der
der
die
die
den
tier
This description again obscures significant patterns, as not all combinations
of person, number and gender specifications define contrastive entries.
Thus the distinction between masculine and neuter genders is entirely
neutralized in the dative and genitive cases, while feminine and plural
forms are identical except in the dative. Nominative and accusative are
likewise collapsed in all but the masculine gender, while the feminine
dative and genitive also coincide.
Yet these limited neutralizations cannot be expressed in the four-way
case and three-way gender system in (5). Forms like dem or des are neither
uniquely masculine or neuter, nor wholly unmarked for gender, but rather
non-feminine. Neuter das is likewise neither distinctively nominative nor
accusative, nor unmarked for case, but rather non-oblique. Conversely,
feminine der is better described as oblique than as unmarked or as ambiguously dative and genitive.
To capture these local neutralizations, we require some means of imposing additional structure on the feature system in (5). The form that
this structure takes is to some degree dependent on how the contrast
between marked and unmarked entries in (2) and (4) is represented. One
strategy, proposed in Karttunen (1984) and developed in much subsequent
work, accommodates unmarked entries and local feature neutralization
by extending lexical entries to include negative and disjunctive feature
specifications. The alternative proposed in Andrews (1990) preserves the
unmarked character of general forms by leaving them unspecified for
agreement features, and attributing the distributional complementarity
with marked forms to a morphological blocking condition. The present
account extends this basic strategy to deal with cases of partial neutraliz-
118
JAMES P. BLEVINS
ation by encoding the locus of neutralization in a global feature type
hierarchy. 3 The following section contrasts these alternatives after reviewing their use of syntactic features.
2. FEATURE-BASED
A N A L Y S E S OF S Y N C R E T I S M
Nearly all current syntactic frameworks make some use of syntactic features and articulated feature structures. In the simplest case, features are
atomic attribute-value pairs, such as [PER
or [NUMSg], and feature
structures are collections of such pairs. These collections are typically
represented as attribute-value matrices (ArMs), as in (6). 4
3Fd]
(6)
3rd]
LNUMsg 3
[PER
The array of feature-value pairs in such representations is interpreted
conjunctively, so that (6) represents a linguistic object that is both third
person and singular in number.
A distinguishing property of the family of 'constraint-based' or 'unification-based' formalisms is the use of features with complex values. The
treatment of agreement within these formalisms provides a clear illustration of the descriptive utility of complex features. Generalized Phrase
Structure Grammar (GPSG; Gazdar et al. 1985) expresses subject agreement requirements in terms of a feature AGR that takes, as in (7), a feature
structure as its value.
(7)
[AGR[PER 3rd]]
LNUM s g
33
Functional Unification Grammar (FUG; Kay 1979) and Lexical Functional
Grammar (LFG; Kaplan and Bresnan 1982) likewise incorporate agreement specifications in the feature structure that occurs as the value of a
functional SUBJ(ECT) attribute.
sg
LNUM
j•
s As suggested in the introduction, the analysis of German proposed in Section 3.2.1 recognizes a primary distinction between feminine and nonfeminine gender, and a subsidiary
distinction between the nonfeminine subcases. Case features are analogously divided into
primary oblique and nonoblique (or 'direct') macrotypes which subsume the four basic values
in (5).
4 Attributes are uniformly represented in SMALLCAeS and attribute values in italics in AVMs.
SYNCRETISM AND P A R A D I G M A T I C OPPOSITION
119
Current models of Head-Driven Phrase Structure Grammar (HPSG;
Pollard and Sag 1994) similarly introduce complex agreement specifications as values of an embedded INDEX feature.
(9)
[SYNSEM ] LOCAL I CONTENT [ INDEX IP?LR ~gd 1 ]
However, since the present paper is concerned more with the logical
structure of categories than with the precise inventory of agreement features or their location in the feature geometry of signs, the substantive
differences in analysis reflected in (7)-(9) are of less importance than their
formal similarities. The illustrative paradigms below accordingly suppress
the inessential variation in (7)-(9), and amalgamate agreement features
with the categorial features in the SUBCAT lists that represent valence
in HPSG. This generic alternative, illustrated in (10), again integrates
agreement specifications with subcategorization demands, as in FUG and
LFG. 5
(10)
While these simple examples clearly do not determine a theory of
agreement, they do show how complex features provide a straightforward
analysis of the agreement properties of marked verb forms. The partial
feature structures in (7)-(10) each represent the subject agreement specifications of a third person singular verb like walks. The requisite match
between these specifications and the agreement features of a subject is
then regulated by a principle that UNIFIES the subject's features with the
verb's agreement features. 6 For example, the agreement specifications in
(7)-(10) all unify with the feature structure in (6), but do not unify with
any feature structure that contains alternative values for PER or NUM.
Associating these specifications with the entry for walks thus expresses
the fact that walks requires a third person singular subject.
Complex features also provide a transparent representation of the highly
syncretistic paradigms in (1) and (3), as each member of these paradigms
can be associated with distinct person and number specifications. How5 The SIJBCATattribute in (10) suppresses the path prefix SYNSEM[ L O C A L I CATEGORY,while
the familiar symbol 'NP' is viewed as a mnemonic alias for appropriate feature specifications.
6 Unification is essentially the feature structure analogue of set union. The unification of
two feature structures A and B is the smallest feature structure that contains atl of the
specifications from A and B, provided that A and B are consistent. If A and B assign distinct
values to any feature, unification fails. See Shieber (1986a) for discussion of unification and
its role in a variety of constraint-based formalisms.
120
JAMES
V. B L E V I N S
ever, a clear descriptive p r o b l e m arises in connection with the 'disjunctive'
agreement requirements of u n m a r k e d forms in the collapsed paradigms
in (2) and (4). The various person and n u m b e r combinations associated
with walk and are cannot be expressed as the conjunction of atomic
person and n u m b e r specifications. The following subsections review two
approaches to this problem. The proposals summarized in Section 2.1
extend feature structures (or corresponding constraint languages) to include negation and disjunction operators. In contrast, the account in Section 2.2 maintains the basic conjunctive format for feature structures,
while adding a general wellformedness condition on lexical preterminals
that allows partial underspecification of general forms. Let us now consider
each alternative in turn.
2.1. Logical Extensions of Feature Structures
Karttunen (1984) captures the disjunctive specifications associated with
the general forms in (2) and (4) by introducing disjunctive and negative
feature structures. Karttunen argues that the use of single entries with
negative and disjunctive specifications yields m o r e concise and revealing
descriptions than the corresponding disjunction of nondistinctive lexical
entries.
There are many cases, especially in morphology, in which the most natural feature specifications are negative or disjunctive... Although the features "number" and "person" are
both clearly needed in English verb morphology, most verbs are very incompletely specified
for them. In fact, the present tense paradigm of all regular verbs has just two forms of which
one represents the 3rd person singular ("walks") and the other ("walk") is used for all other
persons. Thus the most natural characterization for "walk" is that it is not 3rd person
singular. The alternative is to say, in effect, that "walk" in the present tense has five different
interpretations... The system of articles in German provides many examples that call for
disjunctive feature specifications. The article "die", for example, is used in the nominative
and accusative cases of feminine singular nouns and all plural nouns. The entry given [in
(12)] succinctly encodes exactly this fact. (pp. 24-5)
The specific analyses that Karttunen proposes are repeated in (11)
and (12) below. The structure in (11) represents the negative agreement
specifications assigned to non-third person singular forms like walk.
(11)
[AGR [ PER3rail
/NUM sg J]
Negative specifications are interpreted as constraints on unification; a
specification of the form -qA blocks unification with the feature structure
SYNCRETISM AND PARADIGMATIC
OPPOSITION
121
A (and any feature structure subsumed by A). 7 The agreement specifications in (11) thus bar unification with any third person singular feature
structure, and permit unification with any other person-number combination. As desired, this expresses the disjunctive subject agreement requirements associated with walk.
The disjunctive inflectional specifications associated with the German
article die are likewise amalgamated in (12).
(12)
]
L[Nu pq
J
LCASE {nom acc}
Disjunctive specifications of the form {A B} unify with a structure C just
in case C unifies (ultimately) either with A or with B. 8 Hence the INFL
specifications in (12) unify with structures that are compatible with one
of the disjunctive values of the complex AGR feature and one of the
disjunctive values of the atomic CASE feature.
In the passage cited above, Karttunen identifies the reduction of syncretism within morphological paradigms as the primary empirical motivation for these extensions. The agreement specifications of the general form
walk in (11) are the negation of the specifications assigned to the marked
paradigmatic opponent walks, while the disjunctive entry for die collapses
the four elements in (5) that contrast with the specifications for the competing articles der, das, dem, des and den. This implicit morphological
opposition is somewhat more explicitly represented in the hierarchical
lexicon proposed in Pollard and Sag (1987:209ff) as a contrast between
lexical rule-mediated relations. The fragment in (13) illustrates the general
structure in which "regular inflected forms are computed (deduced) from
a single base form".
7 Subsumption imposes a partial 'informativeness' order on feature structures, corresponding
to the inclusion relation on sets. See again Shieber (1986a) for discussion.
s The qualification here is required by the fact that disjunctions, as Karttunen notes, often
cannot be directly unified, but must be maintained until one of the disjuncts is excluded as
a consequence of later unification. Karttunen (1984:28-9) proposes that the unification of a
structure C with a disjunction {A B} introduces a 'positive constraint' on A and B requiring
that "[a]ll later unifications involving them must keep at least one of the two pairs (A,C),
(B,C) unifiable. If at some later point one of the two tuples becomes inconsistent, the
members of the sole remaining tuple finally can and should be unified. When that has
happened, the positive constraint on A and B can be discarded".
122
JAMES e . BLEVINS
ialki 1tl
3rd
SUBCAT NP
LNUM sg • I ]
-PHON walk] 'b~~/ ~
SUBCAT (NP}/
VFORM base J <°~3,~
-%.
VFORM
3rdsng
-PHON walks
J
]/]
SUBCAT(NP -q [PER 3rd
\
LNUMsg 3 / |
WORM non3rdsng
J
In the present case, the lexical rules 3rdsng and non3rdsng relate the base
verb walk to the corresponding present tense forms. The paradigmatic
opposition between third person singular walks and the general term walk
is thus reflected in the fact that these forms are related to a common base
verb by distinct lexical (indeed inflectional) rules. 9
As Karttunen acknowledges, the use of negative and disjunctive constraints to record what amount to partial feature specifications may involve
significant overhead for a unification routine. Much subsequent work on
feature logics has accordingly investigated strategies for controlling the
effects of negation and disjunction. 1° However, the use of negative and
disjunctive constraints to collapse lexical disjunctions introduces more
fundamental problems, as the generality of these devices yields unrevealing descriptions of paradigmatic contrasts.
To begin with, the analyses in (11)-(13) have the somewhat counterintuitive consequence that unmarked forms are often the MOST marked
form, since they must be specified, albeit disjunctively or negatively, for
each of the distinctive agreement features. Disjunctive specifications must
in many cases list each compatible person-number specification; since
these are not guaranteed to form a natural class, it is not in general
possible to provide a concise representation of the alternatives. Although
negative specifications sometimes allow, as Pollard and Sag (1987) note,
a somewhat more economical representation of disjunctive specifications,
this is achieved in (11) by explicitly recording the marked alternative.
9 See Riehemann (1993) for a recent approach to derivational morphology in HPSG.
lo Thus Kaplan and Bresnan (1982) and Kasper and Rounds (1990) enforce a distinction
between feature structures and the constraint language in which they are defined, and
introduce negation and disjunction in the constraint language rather than in the feature
structures. For discussion see also Moshier and Rounds (1987) and Johnson (1990).
SYNCRETISMAND PARADIGMATICOPPOSITION
123
Moreover, while the specifications for walk can be represented as the
negation of a simple conjunctive feature structure, the agreement features
associated with non-third and non-first person singular are are no more
economically represented by the negative structure in (14) than by the
corresponding disjunction in (15).
(14)
[AGR-I [--I[PER 2g/d]]]
L-~ [NUM sg] 3 J
(15)
[AGR~[PER2nd]~]
k
[[NUMpl] JJ
More generally, the feature structures above do not transparently reflect
the generalization that walk and are are unmarked forms, as their agreement specifications are in no obvious respect less articulated than those
assigned to the marked alternatives walks, is and am.
One possible response to this objection would be to specify a normal
form for feature structures and formulate a weighted markedness scale
that discounts negative and disjunctive specifications. However, this would
not only be highly contrived, but also inconsistent with the markedness
conventions assumed in Karttunen (1984:310. Alternatively, it is possible,
as Sag et al. (1985:154fn22) remark, to question the validity or even
relevance of claims about markedness. However, the overspecification of
general forms is effectively a symptom of a more basic failure to capture
the dynamic character of oppositions within a paradigm. An unopposed
form like walked is most succinctly and revealingly analyzed as lacking
person and number specifications; such an analysis concisely expresses the
fact that person and number are not distinctive for preterites. Although
it would be possible to assign walked a disjunction of person-number
specifications, it is hard to imagine any motivation for such a verbose
analysis. One immediate consequence of the analyses proposed above is
that unmarked forms are restricted to single-member paradigms. Since
general opposition to a marked form is represented in terms of negative
or disjunctive specifications, the presence of a single marked alternative
ensures that there is no unmarked form. This analysis is not only inconsistent but - more importantly - incomplete, as nothing guarantees the basic
complementarity of paradigmatic oppositions.
Thus while the negative specifications in (11) define the general form
walk in direct opposition to the marked alternative, this is a purely contingent property of the defining entry or rule. A different entry or rule could
just as well have assigned walk the specifications in (14) or (15), given
that none of the accounts discussed above include any notion of a
124
JAMES P. BLEVINS
wellformed or coherent paradigm. The choice of (11) over (14) or (15)
thus ultimately reflects the grammar writer's knowledge of English verb
paradigms rather than a systematic pattern dictated by the grammar.
Before developing an alternative that does more successfully capture
the dynamic character of paradigms, let us consider another consequence
of the general approach outlined above. As the analysis of die in (12)
reveals, disjunctive specifications do not eliminate the disjunction in the
syncretistic paradigm (5), so much as relocate it within complex entries.
The disjunctions in the analysis assigned to die capture a partial neutralization of case distinctions, specifically the contrast between nominative and
accusative, which is neutralized in the feminine singular and across all
genders in the plural. Yet burying this disjunction in the entry for die
misses a clear descriptive generalization, as the same neutralization of
inflectional features recurs in other declensional paradigms in German.
For example, the negative determiner keine and strong adjectival forms
like kleine 'small' again neutralize the contrast between nominative and
accusative in the feminine singular and across all genders in the plural.
Other forms likewise incorporate just one of the disjunctive specifications
in (12). The feminine singular form of the indefinite article, eine, and
weak adjectival forms like kleine again collapse nominative and accusative
cases, as do the neuter singular determiners das, kein and ein, and the
corresponding strong and weak adjectives kleine and kleines. Indeed no
declensional paradigm in German distinguishes the structural cases nominative and accusative in the feminine singular (and only personal pronouns
distinguish these cases in the plural). It is evidently redundant and unrevealing to stipulate these general declensional patterns in individual lexical
entries like (12). Extracting such generalizations and declaring them globally in the feature system of German provides a more modular and
perspicuous alternative. 11
The sheer generality of feature structure disjunction also contributes to
linguistically unrevealing descriptions, as disjunction permits the amalgamation of essentially arbitrary formal specifications. We can illustrate this
by comparing die with other forms that recur in the paradigm in (5). The
form der, for example, occurs in the singular as the masculine nominative,
feminine dative and feminine genitive, and in the plural as the generalpurpose genitive. This convergence of distinct forms cannot be described
as the partial neutralization of particular features, as it encompasses all
three genders, both numbers and three of the four cases. Nevertheless,
11 See again Section 3.2.1 for one representation of the inflectional category space of
German.
SYNCRETISM AND PARADIGMATIC OPPOSITION
125
as (16) shows, it is straightforward to provide a disjunctive entry that
consolidates these disparate specifications.12 While it might be possible to
distinguish (12) from (16) in terms of relative complexity, it is clear that
disjunctive feature specifications, like disjunctive extensions generally, do
not support a distinction between linguistically significant generalizations,
neutralizations in this case, from random assemblages of feature specifications.
rr°°mscl}
(16)
"NUM sg
[CASE
nora j
INN.
i
i
CASE
]
genj
In sum, while Karttunen (1984) provides clear empirical motivation for
extending feature systems to accommodate complementary or disjunctive
specifications, the logical extensions Karttunen proposes suffer from clear
descriptive limitations, as they fail to capture both systematic contrasts
and also significant convergences within paradigms. Like the abbreviatory
conventions of a standard transformational grammar, these extensions
provide a standard of concision that is almost completely orthogonal to
considerations of linguistic significance. Contrasts and convergences are
effectively stipulated, albeit somewhat concisely, on a case by case basis.
Given that examples like walk and die constitute the primary empirical
motivation for negative and disjunctive specifications, these shortcomings
also cast doubt on the general utility of augmenting standard conjunctive
feature structures with additional logical operators. ~3
12 Subordinate AGR attributes are suppressed to enhance the legibility of (16).
13 Nevertheless, as an anonymous reviewer observes, disjunction also plays a role in the
control structures and constraint languages of a variety of grammar formalisms. Most grammars interpret at least some rules and principles disjunctively, and many adopt explicit
disjunction in abbreviatory conventions for optional elements. The relational constraints
incorporated in HPSG accounts of binding and subcategorization provide a further source
of disjunction. While it may be possible to view optionality as an opposition between texical
entries, and express all essential uses of disjunctive constraints via partitions in a global type
hierarchy, a defense of this proposal is beyond the scope of the present paper. For general
126
J A M E S P. B L E V I N S
Let us thus turn now to an approach that is closer in spirit to the
treatment of negation and disjunction in phonological feature systems.
Such systems universally lack complementation operators, and most contemporary approaches also dispense with explicit disjunction. These deliberate omissions in part reflect the fact that phonological descriptions are
primarily concerned with characterizing alternations in terms of natural
classes of elements and environments. Since the result of negating or
disjoining natural classes does not typically constitute a natural class,
phonological systems do not incorporate explicit terms to denote negations
and disjunctions, but rather treat processes that apply to non-natural
classes as the residue of a general rule or constraint that is overridden by
a more specific rule or constraint.14
2.2. Morphological Blocking
A feature-based implementation of this basic strategy is developed in
Andrews (1990), which exploits a morphological blocking condition to
capture the 'elsewhere' character of general forms. As in the accounts
summarized above, marked forms like walks are fully specified for appropriate person and number features. However, the disjunctive agreement
requirements of general forms are not expressed as the negation of marked
alternatives, or as an explicit disjunction of remaining person-number
combinations. Instead, general forms are literally unmarked for person
and number. The lack of agreement specifications allows forms like walk
to combine with the non-natural class of non-third person singular subjects. The illformedness of examples like *he walk is then attributed to a
morphological blocking condition that effectively prohibits the use of an
unmarked form when a more specific alternative - here walks - exists.
Andrews' analysis belongs to a family of proposals in which the existence
of a distinguished form is credited with preventing the formation or use
of another. 15 Like most previous blocking accounts, Andrews' blocking
principle applies to lexical items, in this case blocking lexical insertion
discussion of the role of disjunction in grammar formalisms, see Kasper (1993) and Penn
and Carpenter (1993).
14 For discussion of the origins and use of disjunctive rule application see Kiparsky (1973),
though see also Hayes (1986) and Schein and Steriade (1986) for recent alternatives in which
non-natural classes are viewed as epiphenomena of general constraints on possible rule
targets.
15 For examples of blocking, and discussion of the domain of blocking, see Aronoff (1976),
Di Sciullo and Williams (1987), Farkas (1992), Poser (1992), and references cited therein.
SYNCRETISM AND PARADIGMATIC
OPPOSITION
127
of a general item in environments where a specific alternative may be
inserted. 16
Andrews (1990:513) suggests in particular that "[t]he resources of LFG
permit a straightforward solution to the [problem] o f . . . Morphological
Blocking", and formulates his account in this framework. Although we
will see later that an analogous solution is generically available within
the family of constraint-based formalisms, let us begin by reviewing the
formulation that Andrews proposes, and consider an example that illustrates its application.
(17)
Morphological Blocking Principle (MBP; Andrews 1990:519)
Suppose the structure S has a preterminal node P occupied by
a lexical item ll, and there is another lexical item/2 such that
the f-structure determined by the lexical entry of ll properly
subsumes that determined by the lexical entry of/2, and that of
/2 subsumes the f-structure associated with P in S (the complete
structure, after all unifications have been carried out). Then S
is blocked.
The application of this principle to a simple example like *he walk illustrates its intended effect. The c(onstituent)-structure tree standardly associated with this sentence is represented in (18).
(18)
S
NP
I
he
VP
I
i
walk
16 This lexical bias may reflect an artifactually narrow conception of blocking, as Di Sciullo
and Williams (1987), Farkas (1992) and Poser (1992) argue. While a genera1 account of
blocking phenomena may have to countenance phrasal blocking effects, the use of blocking
to reduce syncretism only requires that blocking may be lexical in scope, not that it must be
lexical.
128
JAMES P. BLEVINS
The annotated phrase structure rules that sanction this tree are given in
(19) .17
(19)a.
S .9
NP
VP
(I"SUBJ)=¢ 1"=,1.
b.
VP -9
V
The functional annotations in these rules determine the f-structure corresponding to (18), in conjunction with the f-structures determined by the
lexical entries for he and walk in (20). The mnemonic attributes in these
structures are largely self-explanatory, with the exception of the "special
grammatical feature PRED", which Andrews (1990:514) characterizes as
"function[ing] like a name of or pointer to the semantic representation
associated with a lexical item". 18
(20)
walk:
[TENSE pres
PRED
'Walk((~SUBJ))'
[PER3rd]
The f-structure for he walk in (21) combines the structures in (20) in
accordance with the annotations in (19). The (1' SUBJ) = $ annotation in
(19a) identifies the f-structure associated with he as the value of the SUBJ
attribute in (21). The ]' = $ equations in (19a) and (19b) likewise indicate that the V, VP and S projections in (20) all share the top-level fstructure in (21).
(21)
[PER
hewalk:
SUBJ
3rd]
[pNREUMDSgO]
TENSE pres
?RED 'Walk (('~SUBJ)):
17 These are in fact particular expansions of the more schematic rules generally proposed in
LFG analyses of English, though nothing hinges on this simplification.
18 See below for discussion of the distinguished role of PRED features in this account.
SYNCRETISM AND PARADIGMATIC OPPOSITION
129
Comparison of the f-structure determined by the entry for walks, in
(22), reveals that the structures associated with walk, walks and he walk
exhibit the proscribed subsumption pattern.
(22)
gUBJ
walks:
TENSE
[PER
pres
3r~
sg
j
PRED 'Walk (('I'SUBJ))'
The f-structure determined by the entry for walk in (20) properly subsumes
the more specific structure in (22), as (22) contains all of the attributes in
(20) plus additional suBJ specifications. The structure in (22) in turn
subsumes (21), as (21) contains all of the specifications in (22) plus a PRED
attribute for the suBJ feature. Thus the f-structure associated with walk
properly subsumes the f-structure associated with walks, which in turn
subsumes the f-structure assigned to he walk. Since this is precisely the
pattern barred by (17), the illformed *he walk is blocked.
This analysis directly captures the systematic character of the opposition
between walk and walks, while representing the intuition that walk is an
unmarked, rather than a contra-marked form. The effective partitioning
of agreement requirements follows from the dynamic opposition enforced
by (17), as unmarked forms are compatible with all and any personnumber specifications that are not stipulated by a marked alternative. This
in turn supports a consistent, alternative-independent treatment of general
forms. Unopposed forms like walked are, like walk, unmarked for agreement specifications. The lack of marked alternatives guarantees that preterites are compatible with all person-number combinations without violating (17). The general form are is similarly unmarked, though its more
limited combinatorial options follow from the existence of two singular
alternatives, third person is and first person am.
This general and revealing treatment nevertheless misidentifies the locus
of the opposition between marked and unmarked alternatives. The interpretation of the 'special' PRED features in (20)-(21) is the crux of the
problem. Andrews follows LFG accounts generally in treating PRED values
as pointers to a lexical semantic representation. However, these pointers
also effectively anchor the lexical oppositions regulated by the blocking
condition in (17), as Andrews (1990) acknowledges in his discussion of
the search problem engendered by this condition.
130
JAMES P. BLEVINS
when searching for forms more highly specified than the one that actually appears in a given
position, we need only consider forms with the same PREp-value. The search task can
therefore be expedited by organizing the lexicon so that forms with the same ~RED-feature
are all grouped together in some fashion (each PRzD-feature might be associated with a
pointer to the list of forms that specify it, for example). (pp. 551-2)
Y e t this use of P R E D
specifications e n t i r e l y ignores their s e m a n t i c
f u n c t i o n , a n d exploits P R E D values as u n i q u e l e x e m e identifiers.19 M o r e over, the efficiency of the search task o u t l i n e d a b o v e d e p e n d s essentially
o n this diacritic i n t e r p r e t a t i o n . T o clarify this p o i n t , let us briefly c o n s i d e r
the role of semantics in the b l o c k i n g a c c o u n t p r o p o s e d b y A n d r e w s .
A n d r e w s does n o t specify a s u b s u m p t i o n r e l a t i o n that applies to s e m a n t i c
r e p r e s e n t a t i o n s , or e v e n identify the s e m a n t i c p r o p e r t i e s that might be
reflected b y s u b s u m p t i o n relations. H o w e v e r , he does p r o v i s i o n a l l y c o u n t e n a n c e the possibility of a b l o c k i n g effect i n d u c e d b y s e m a n t i c s u b s u m p tion.
Where blocking might occur between kill and murder would be in a structure where kill was
surrounded by extra modifiers that built up a structure that really was subsumed by the
structure of murder. We do not know enough about the nature of semantic structures to
predict what such structures would look like, or even whether they could be formed at all.
(p. 521)
A practical o b j e c t i o n to this p r o p o s a l is that it u n d e r m i n e s the c o n s t r a i n t s
that A n d r e w s suggests e n s u r e the tractability of a b l o c k i n g analysis. I n
particular, the search for m o r e highly specified a l t e r n a t i v e s to a given i t e m
l c a n n o t b e c o n f i n e d to entries with the same P R E D v a l u e as l, b u t m u s t
s e e m i n g l y c o n s i d e r a l t e r n a t i v e s whose PRED values are s u b s u m e d by the
PRIED v a l u e of l. U n l e s s the o r g a n i z a t i o n of the lexicon reflects the r e l e v a n t
s u b s u m p t i o n o r d e r i n g of PRED a t t r i b u t e s , t h e r e is n o r e a s o n to expect that
this search will b e restricted to a discrete sublexicon. 2°
19 The general-purpose PRO value assigned to pronouns is one exception, though, significantly, this exception complicates Andrews' (1990:518f) account of the complementarity of
analytic and synthetic forms in Irish. While Andrews restores PREDuniqueness by invoking
a diacritic PREDindexing, this artifice (and the need to ignore PP,~Dindexing in determining
subsumption relations) can be eliminated if PREDvalues are consistent lexeme identifiers.
2o It is likewise unclear that the relevant relation could be defined exclusively in terms of fstructures. The scenario that Andrews discusses above involves three basic elements: an fstructure f(S) associated with a sentence containing kill, an f-structure f (kill) associated with
kill, and an f-structure f(murder) associated with the blocking alternative murder. The
condition in (17) is triggered just in case f (kill) properly subsumes f(murder) and f (murder)
subsumes f(S). By assumption, f(murder) subsumes f(S) due to the presence of "extra
modifiers" in S. However, syntactic adjuncts in LFG do not destructively revise the content
of the PREDattributes of the constituents they modify, but rather specify additional f-structure
attributes (including their own PRED feature) that may figure in semantic interpretation.
Consequently, if the subsumption relation between f(murder) and f(S) indeed depends on
the contribution of extra modifiers, this relation cannot be determined simply with reference
S Y N C R E T I S M AND P A R A D I G M A T I C O P P O S I T I O N
131
More generally, the tentative character of Andrews' proposals regarding
semantic subsumption does not, as he suggests, simply reflect imperfect
or incomplete knowledge of lexical semantics. 2~ It is not so much that too
little is known about lexical semantics to develop an account of semantic
blocking, but rather that too little is known about putative cross-paradigm
blocking to confirm the semantic basis of this effect. The three cases
that Andrews mentions involve temporal phrases whose illformedness he
ascribes to the existence of a lexical alternative.
It is highly plausible to suggest that tomorrow and yesterday differ semantically from day
precisely in the addition of the semantic content of the phrase after today and before today,
and it is therefore reasonable to suggest that the Morphological Blocking Principle, or some
generalization of it might play a role in explaining why these phrases [the day before~after
today] sound bad. (pp. 521-2)
However, the principle in (17) does not, as it stands, apply to these cases,
and Andrews does not propose a generalization, or indeed establish that
these isolated cases should - much less can - be handled by an extension
of (17). 22
In the absence of concrete proposals for incorporating semantic information, it is clear that interpretive properties can play no substantive
role in the blocking account proposed by Andrews. Thus while Andrews
identifies PREP features as semantic placeholders, their interpretive contribution is completely inert in the present account. It is ultimately the
common PRED values assigned to the members of a paradigm, rather than
the interpretation associated with those values, that determines the locus
of the Morphological Blocking Principle. Even the internal structure of
PRED values (which is transparent to other LFG conditions, such as Completeness and Coherence) is consistently ignored. The pivotal subsumption
relation simply treats such values as atomic symbols which are either
to the semantic placeholders that occur as top-level PRIEDvalues in these f-structures. Rather,
the actual semantic interpretations corresponding to the f-structures f(murder) and f(S) must
seemingly be considered in determining subsumption relations.
21 In particular, the integrated semantic representations of HPSG and various of the semantic
approaches that analyze lexical meanings in terms of semantic features or primitive attributes
would support feature structure subsumption or a direct analogue. See, e.g., Pollard and
Sag (1987), (1994), Katz and Fodor (1963) and Jackendoff (1983).
22 A blocking account of the putative deviance of the day before~after today would appear
to preclude all synonymy between lexical and phrasal expressions, and thus must seemingly
explain why (to pick two cases at random from the literature on analytic statements) oculist
does not block the compound eye doctor and bachelor does not block the phrase unmarried
male. The wellformedness of definitions like 'tomorrow' is the day after today further suggest
that these cases involve a pragmatic concision or avoidance strategy rather than a fully
grammaticized blocking effect, though see Di Sciullo and Williams (1987) and Poser (1992)
for discussion.
132
J A M E S P. BLEVINS
identical to or distinct from other values. Since any feature that assigns
unique values to the members of a paradigm will encode the requisite
distinctions, the use of an existing feature for this function can in part be
attributed to considerations of parsimony.
Yet, as the earlier passage illustrates, the use of semantic placeholders as
lexeme identifiers is not completely innocuous, as this feature overloading
obscures the locus of the morphological blocking relation and contributes
to the unsupported and arguably implausible claim that a member of one
verbal paradigm could be blocked by a more semantically specific member
of a distinct paradigm. 23 The overloading of the PRED attribute is not
specific to the blocking analysis proposed by Andrews but rather reflects
a more basic equivocation in LFG accounts. Consequently, it is possible
to preserve the basic insight of Andrews' proposal by assigning the members of a paradigm the same value for some dedicated feature, and ensuring that no other entries are assigned that value. Alternatively, paradigmatic relations can be represented directly in the structure of the lexicon,
along the lines developed in HPSG accounts.
3. P A R A D I G M A T I C B L O C K I N G
The present section explores these alternatives, and suggests that the
notion of paradigmatic relatedness supports an effective and efficient
morphological blocking condition. The following subsections provide two
illustrations of the use of this condition to reduce artifactual syncretism
within paradigms. The degenerate verbal agreement paradigms of English
are reprised in Section 3.1. The analysis of declensional paradigms in
modern German in Section 3.2 likewise combines feature underspecification with general case and gender neutralization.
3.1.
Subsumption Paradigms
The notion of a paradigm occupies a central role in traditional grammatical
descriptions, as well as in morphological analyses within the descendant
Word and Paradigm (Matthews 1973) or Extended Word and Paradigm
(Anderson 1992) models, and other recent work (Williams 1994). Matthews (1973) concisely presents the case for this framework of analysis
below.
23 It is noteworthy that a prior formulation of the MBP in Andrews (1982:495) identifies
paradigms as the locus of blocking, and perhaps significant that each analysis in which
Andrews invokes (17) involves a paradigm-internal opposition.
SYNCRETISM AND PARADIGMATIC
OPPOSITION
133
If we say that sailed is the 'Past Tense' of [the lexeme] SAIL or simply that its grammatical
elements are Past Tense on the one hand and SAIL on the other - this in itself is enough to
distinguish it from every other word in English syntax. We add nothing, so far as the needs
of grammatical or syntactic representation are concerned, by saying that there is a sequence
with SAIL coming first and 'Past Tense' after. The same holds for the relationship between
any English lexical element and any of the grammatical elements that go with it. (p. 138)
-
-
Feature-based accounts support a straightforward encoding of this style of
analysis. One feature can represent the paradigmatic affinity of a particular
form, while others (TENSE in the case that Matthews discusses) express
the morphosyntactic contribution of the associated grammatical element
or elements. The analysis proposed by Andrews can, as remarked above,
be interpreted in just this way, with VREDacting as the paradigm identifier.
One benefit of this interpretation is the rationale it provides for "organizing the lexicon so that forms with the same PREp-feature are all
grouped together". If PRED features represent paradigm affinity, this organization will directly reflect the structure imposed by lexical paradigms,
rather than represent a purely expedient ordering introduced to promote
the efficient application of the blocking principle in (17). Moreover, the
efficiency of the search for lexical alternatives can be enhanced if paradigms are partially ordered by subsumption, as this will help to pinpoint
the entries that must be considered. In the case of walked we need only
determine that there are no more specific preterites; the present and
nonfinite forms are of no possible relevance. Likewise, the distribution of
the present form walk depends solely on the properties of walks; it is not
only inefficient but in fact misguided to check preterite and nonfinite
forms.
Let us now consider how the relevant notion of paradigmatic opponent
can be built into the structure of the lexicon. The paradigm fragment
in (23), which represents subsumption and inheritance in the top-down
dominance order, contains the syntactic entries for the three finite forms
of walk. The root of the structure specifies the PRED value shared by all
members of the paradigm. The subordinate nodes inherit this specification
and add attributes that define individual entries. On this 'static' conception, a paradigm consists simply of a set of lexical entries whose syntactic
(or grammatical) specifications are partially ordered by subsumption.
134
J A M E S P. B L E V I N S
(23)
[TENSE
paSt]
[TENSEpies]
[PARTICIPLE
present]
"I
. o .
The notion of paradigmatic opposition relevant to morphological blocking
is directly represented in (23). The class of blockable items corresponds
to the nonterminal entries in a paradigm. This example is representative
of English paradigms in containing only one blockable specification, here
associated with the general present form walk. The blocking alternatives
to a blockable item will invariably occur as descendants of the associated
nonterminal. Thus in the present case, the third singular entry for walks
is immediately dominated by the general entry.
This pattern suggests a reformulation of the MBP in (17) as a constraint
on the lexical insertion of general forms associated with nonterminal specifications in lexical paradigms. The desired blocking effects of (17) follow
from the somewhat more succinct constraint in (24), which restricts the
syntactic distribution of nonterminal specifications. 24
(24)
Let l be an item assigned the nonterminal specification f in a
paradigm P. Then l is licensed in a feature structure S only if
f has no descendant in P that subsumes the final specification
associated with l in S.
This revised formulation contributes to the efficiency of a blocking account
by circumscribing more precisely the effective scope of blocking effects.
Since the marked forms and unopposed general forms that occur as termin24 The 'final' specification here incorporates Andrews' (1990:519) insight that the relevant
check is against the specification assigned to an item after "all unifications have been carried
out" in S. However, as an anonymous reviewer notes, application of the MBP to final
specifications has implications for whether the descriptive economy of a blocking account
yields corresponding gains in processing efficiency, since violation of a negative or disjunctive
constraint may be detected on the basis of a partial analysis. The relative efficiency of
processing regimes incorporating blocking and logistic accounts thus remains an open question, hinging on the relative cost of delayed application of the MBP vs the overhead
associated with disjunctive and negative constraints.
SYNCRETISM AND PARADIGMATIC OPPOSITION
135
als in a paradigm are never subject to blocking by paradigmatic opponents,
there is simply no point in considering paradigmatic opponents in determining the wellformedness of a structure containing terminal specifications.
Identifying lexical paradigms as the locus of the opposition between general and marked alternatives also provides a principled account for the
lexical domain of the MBP, even if blocking relations may apply to phrasal
units.
While the simple paradigm fragment in (23) reflects the degenerate
morphological system of English, the lattice structures generated by more
complex systems will maintain the central distinction between terminal
and nonterminal exploited in (24). Moreover, as Andrews (1990) remarks,
the efficiency of a blocking account in languages with highly productive
morphology can be further enhanced by treating such paradigms as the
output of morphological rules.
in a morphology with large numbers of forms, these do not have to be listed individually.
Rather they can be regarded as being manufactured from (ultimately listed) stems by successive applications of various regular and semi-regular processes... Of particular importance
is that in inflectional morphology, the accumulation of feature specifications is essentially
monotonic: once one has added material that signals some features, it will not normally
happen that this information is erased or changed by subsequent processes. (Andrews 1990,
p. 552)
The inflectional rules 3rdsng and non3rdsng in the lexicon fragment (13)
above illustrate the use of lexical rules to construct structured paradigms
in HPSG. These rules express the paradigmatic relatedness of walks and
walk by deriving both present tense forms from a common base form,
walk. The paradigmatic opposition between these derived forms is likewise
represented by the distinct WORM and agreement specifications assigned
by the lexical rules.
We can replicate the more articulated and monotonic paradigm structure in (23) by revising these rules to reflect a marked/unmarked conception of paradigmatic oppositions. To begin with, we can extract the [WORM
nonpast] specification from the 3rdsng and non3rdsng rules and associate
this specification uniquely with a nonpast rule. This rule will define a
general present form that can supplant the negatively specified output of
the expendable non3rdsng rule. The portmanteau rule 3rdsng can likewise
be recast as a rule that applies to the general nonpast form and adds
appropriate agreement specifications. The resulting structure is depicted
in (25).
136
J A M E S V. B L E V I N S
(25)
-PHON
walk]
SUBCAT <NP)J
"PHON
walked- [VFORM nonpast] PHON
VFORM past
t~
VFORM
walking]
presp j
wa,ki.rdl]
SUBCAT (NP [NUM
sg J
The structure in (25) represents a somewhat more 'dynamic' or 'constructive' conception of a paradigm, corresponding to what Anderson
(1992:134) characterizes as "the complete set of surface word forms that
can be projected from the members of [an item's] stem set by means of
the Word Formation Rules of the language". Like (23), the dominance
relations in (25) represent inheritance and a proper subsumption relation
on syntax attributesY As Pollard and Sag (1987:209ff) argue, the use of
such rules may considerably reduce the number of lexical forms that must
be stored. In the case of regular verbs like walk only the stem form must
be listed. The syncretism between this form and the general present form
is represented by direct inheritance in (25), while the regular past and
participial forms are specified by the phonological operation incorporated
in the corresponding rules. Leaving the stem form in (25) unspecified
for VFORM preserves the monotonic structure of syntactic attributes in
inflectional paradigms. 26
The use of a maximally underspecified entry as the root in (25) also
illustrates the excisable character of the dedicated feature that encodes
25 In HPSG accounts these are bundled together as the value of an aggregate SUN (or
SYNSEM) feature, though this additional structure can be suppressed in (25), since the PHON
feature is the only nonsyntactic attribute represented in the partial entries.
26 Due to the presence of the Piton attribute, the paradigm in (25) represents more generally
a default inheritance system in which, unlike the strict inheritance network in (23), elements
inherit only compatible feature specifications from dominating specifications. The operative
notion of default inheritance can be expressed in terms of conservative addition (Shieber
1986b), priority union (Kaplan 1987) or default unification (Bouma 1992). See also Krieger
and Nerbonne (1992) and Zajac (1992) for discussion of inheritance in lexical networks.
137
SYNCRETISM AND P A R A D I G M A T I C OPPOSITION
paradigmatic relations in (23). 27 Moreover, this underspecification allows
the stem to function as a general-purpose default form that may occur in
syntactic environments that do not call for more highly marked alternatives. It is of course still necessary to specify the subcategorization demands of verbs that select complements headed by stems. Thus, modals
will subcategorize for [VFORM base] VPs, while the clauses selected by
'subjunctive' verbs like require or demand can be specified either as
[VFORMbase] or, say, [VFORMsbjntv]. Since all non-stem verb forms will
bear a distinct VFORM specification, only the underspecified stems will
satisfy the subcategorization demands of modals and subjunctives.
Conversely, the morphological blocking condition, whether formulated
as in (17) or as in (24), will prevent underspecified stems from occurring
where more specified forms are required and available. It is worth digressing for a moment to consider this case, as it clarifies why the conditions must apply to 'complete structures' or 'final specifications'. Let us
consider the simple contrast between the wellformed sentence they stopped
walking and the blocked alternative *they stopped walk.28 The diagram in
(26) provides a partial tree representation of the relevant attributes of the
HPSG feature structure assigned to the blocked alternative.
(26)
S
F
VP [VFORM past]
NP
[VFORM
past
V [SUBCAT ( V P [VFORM
t
they
stopped
presp] )
] VP[VFORMpresp]
[
V [VFORM presp]
l
walk
The entry for walk in (25) properly subsumes the entry for walking, so
that the first condition imposed by (17) and (24) is clearly met. Moreover,
the entry for walking subsumes the final specification associated with walk
27 This paradigm further illustrates the inessential role of the LFG feature system, and such
formalism-dependent properties as the postulation of separate constituent and functional
structures.
28 The general present form is also barred here, due to its conflicting [VFORMnonpast]
specification.
138
JAMES P. BLEVINS
in (26), which includes a [WORMpresp] attribute that is not present in the
lexical entry for walk. This additional specification is supplied by the
syntactic context in (26), specifically through the interaction of the subcategorization demands of stopped and the structure-sharing of constitutive
'head' features like VFORMwithin a verbal projection. 29
The subsumption pattern involving the entries for walk and walking and
the preterminal V in (26) triggers, as desired, the blocking conditions
in (17) and (24). More generally, this example demonstrates how such
conditions exploit the accretion of specifications in a feature structure. In
the present case, the specifications associated with the alternative walking
do not subsume the specifications on the preterminal contributed by walk
alone. A conspiracy involving subcategorization requirements and general
feature sharing conventions (whether enforced via the HPSG Head Feature Principle, or via the corresponding 1' = $ equations in annotated
LFG rules) must supply the VFORM attribute that induces blocking.
3.2. Inflectional Underspecification
The analyses considered in the preceding subsections propose to reduce
artifactual syncretism within verbal paradigms by recognizing a general
form that may be used in contexts where it is not opposed by a marked
alternative. While these analyses provide an economical description of
finite verbal forms in English they also reveal some of the basic limitations
of this general strategy. A conspicuous example is the syncretism between
verbal stems and general present forms in all verbs except the copula.
Another, arguably more tractable, case involves the coalescence of forms
in the declensional paradigms of German. As suggested in connection
with the use of disjunctions in Kartunnen's original account, the neutralizations in different nominal declensions exhibit various general patterns that
are most revealingly expressed in the global feature hierarchy of German,
rather than in the feature structures assigned to individual lexical items.
The present subsection outlines a general feature hierarchy or 'map' that
incorporates some of the general patterns of convergence and neutralization observed above.
3.2.1. Feature Type Hierarchies
The feature structure hierarchy in Pollard and Sag (1987:197) in which
29 The token-identity of the VFORM specifications in (26) would thus be more perspicuously
represented in terms of boxed integers or other strategies for cross-indexing attribute values.
139
S Y N C R E T I S M AND P A R A D I G M A T I C O P P O S I T I O N
"[t]he set of feature structure types is assumed to be ordered by subsumption" provides a suitable point of departure. The fragment in (27) represents the position and structure of the case, num and gend sorts within
the sort hierarchy in Pollard and Sag (1994). The object sort is the root
of the hierarchy and subsumes, among others, the case, num and gend
subsorts. Following Pollard and Sag (1987) and Carpenter and Pollard
(1991), the boxes that enclose these sorts in (27) mark them as partitions
that subsume exhaustive and mutually incompatible daughter specifications. 3°
(27)
. . .
nom
acc
sing
plu
masc fern
neut
Inspection of the paradigm for the negative determiner kein in (28)
reveals a number of general patterns that can be transparently encoded
in a sort hierarchy. Examining first gender, we see that masculine and
neuter forms are distinct only in the accusative, and feminine and plural
forms differ only in the dative. If we consider case, we find that nominative
and accusative are neutralized except in the masculine, while dative and
genitive are merged in the feminine.
(28)
SINGULAR
NOMINATIVE
ACCUSATIVE
DATIVE
GENITIVE
PLURAL
MASCULINE
NEUTER
FEMININE
MASC/NEUT/FEM
kein
keinen
keinem
keines
kein
kein
keinem
keines
keine
keine
keiner
keiner
keine
keine
keinen
keiner
In effect, the declensional system of German recognizes three pairs of
partially interdependent 'macrotypes':plu(ral) and nonplu number; fern(inine) and nonfern gender; and obl(ique) and nonobl case. The nonfem
30 Such partitions thus express general negative and disjunctive constraints within a type
hierarchy.
140
JAMES P. BLEVINS
type subsumes masc(uline) and neut(er) specifications. The subtypes of
obl are just dat(ive) and gen(itive) in the simple case system of German,
while the direct or 'structural' nonobl cases include nom(inative) and
acc(usative).
Since each of these macrotypes subsumes their subtypes, they are readily
integrated into a sort hierarchy ordered by subsumption. This is illustrated
in the more articulated hierarchy in (29), in which the case and gend
partitions directly capture the global neutralizations in (28) (and (5)
above). As in Carpenter and Pollard (1991), the bold terminals in (29)
represent basic feature types that may occur in individual feature descriptions. The italicized partitions, in contrast, define high-level sorts that
occur in the feature declarations that specify legal feature values. Bold
partitions accordingly represent nonbasic types that may occur in feature
descriptions. 31
(29)
plu
dat
gen
nom
acc
nonplu
mast
neut
Let us next consider an additional feature dependency that does not
directly reflect the structure of feature macrotypes in German. As (28)
and (5) again show, gender distinctions are distinctive in the singular and
completely neutralized in the plural. This pattern of neutralization can be
incorporated within a type hierarchy by adapting the strategy that Carpenter and Pollard (1991) outline to accommodate the dependency between
gender and person and number in English.
Each partition may also have dependencies which must be fulfilled for the choice to be
made; in our case, before an element of the gender partition is chosen, singular must be
chosen for number and third for person. (p. 13)
31 This use of partition labels thus diverges from the notation in Pollard and Sag (1987), in
which the partitioned types would be expanded as a nonbasic type dominating a single
partition.
S Y N C R E T I S M AND P A R A D I G M A T I C O P P O S I T I O N
141
This dependency is represented by the arcs from sng and 3rd to the gend
partition in (30). 32
(30)
agr
plu
sng
rose
s
1st
3rd
fern
neu
An analogous dependency between nonplu and the gend partition is represented in (31). 33
(31)
f
plu
I
nonplu
~
S
dat
mase
c
gen nom
ace
neut
The fact that nonplu dominates the gend partition in the hierarchy in (31)
again ensures that each gender specification inherits nonplu. The plu
32 See Section 4 for discussion of conjunctive specifications like {sng, 3rd} in (30).
33 Although overt gender distinctions in German are likewise confined to the third person,
person specifications are, inessentially, suppressed in (31), and in following declensional
paradigms.
142
J A M E S P. B L E V I N S
specification is accordingly incompatible with gender features, ensuring
that no wellformed feature description will contain both plu and any of
fern, nonfem, masc or neut. The structure in (31) thus partially encapsulates the wellformed inflectional specifications in German, encoding the
dependency between number and gender, and identifying nonplu, nonfem,
obl and nonobl as loci of inflectional neutralization.
The use of dependency links in (30) and (31) distinguishes these general
inheritance hierarchies from the strict subsumption hierarchy in (27). We
can carry this development a step further by integrating feature declarations. The declaration in (32), from Pollard and Sag (1994:339), identifies
the features appropriate for the sort index, and the sortal restrictions on
feature values.
(32)
index:
PER
]NUN
per ]
num [
kGEND gend J
Substitution of the features NUM, GEND and CASE for the corresponding
high-level sorts in (31) yields the hybrid inheritance network in (33). The
resulting NUM, GEND and CASE partitions in this hierarchy now represent
the type restrictions on these features. Dominance links between sorts
continue to represent subsumption, while links from a sort to a feature
partition represent dependency. The root substantive sort subsumes each
of the traditional nominal subsorts that are specified for case and agreement features. 34 Like the type hierarchy in (31), the hybrid feature 'map'
in (33) provides a global, entry-independent representation of the category
space for third-person inflectional specifications in G e r m a n y From the
standpoint of the present proposal, the differences between these alternatives are less significant than the similarities, as it is the partition structure
and basic geometry of (31) and (33), rather than the ontological status of
their elements, that facilitates simplification of the declensional paradigms
in Section 3.2.2.
34 It would be possible to represent each of these distinct relations by a different link type
in (33). However, as long as a unique relation holds between each kind of element, classification of elements into features and sorts will suffice to disambiguate the relations between
elements.
35 A more complete hierarchy would include a person partition, and likely a partition,
corresponding to the AORnode in the feature geometry model of Gazdar and Pullum (1982)
or the index sort in (32), intervening between the root and agreement sorts/features.
SYNCRETISM
AND
(33)
PARADIGMATIC
143
OPPOSITION
substantive [
f-
1
p|u
nonplu
I
dat
gen nora
ace
rem
mast
neut
3.2.2. Declensional Paradigms in German
Let us next consider how the feature geometry and constraints in (31) and
(33) complement the blocking conditions in (17) and (24) and support an
economical description of German declensional paradigms. For concreteness, consider again the highly syncretistic description in (28) above,
which recognizes 16 distinct forms of the determiner kein. This matrix
assigns four separate analyses to the item keine, three analyses each to
kein and keiner, and two analyses to the remaining elements keinen,
keinem and keines. The structured paradigm in (34) provides a more
succinct description of this system, as it recognizes syncretism between
incompatible entries for keinen, and assigns unique, albeit highly underspecified, analyses to all other forms.
[VrlONkeine]
(34)
/
[
-q
vHor~ keiner]
PHON kein
CASE obl
CENO nonyem[
J
]
CASE nonoblJ
I
PHON keines 1
GEND nonfem J
1
PHON keinem]
ASE dat
]
PHON keinen"
plu
LCASE dat
]
J
GEND masc
CASE acc
144
JAMES
P. BLEVINS
As in previous paradigms, this structure represents subsumption and inheritance relations among syntactic specifications, so that the entries form
an ascending hierarchy of relative underspecification. The wholly unspecified root keine is thus the absolute default form, while keiner is the default
oblique; the lack of gender or number marking allows these forms to
amalgamate unopposed plural and feminine singular specifications. The
remaining entries exploit the dependency between gender and number in
(31) and (33), and specify just one of these features.
The opposition between the general kein and the accusative alternative
keinen represents the partial neutralization of nonfeminine gender and
nonoblique case in (28). Although the genitive keines is similarly desigv~ated as a general nonoblique nonfeminine form, with keinem as the
marked dative alternative, these relative assignments are arbitrary here.
Reversing the position of keines and keinem, or even introducing both as
daughters of keiner would attribute essentially the same distinctive structure to this paradigm.
The residual syncretism in (34) reflects the fact that the distinct specifications associated with keinen in (28) are not fully neutralized in this
declensional paradigm. Whereas keine and keiner neutralize the implicit
conflict between masc (which inherits nonplu) and plu, there is no general
coalescence of accusative and dative forms in (28). This illustrates a general restriction on the use of underspecification and blocking conditions
to reduce paradigmatic syncretism. While these devices yield a reasonably
concise analysis of declensidnal paradigms, they do not - unlike explicitly
disjunctive systems - eliminate syncretism that cannot be characterized as
feature neutralization. It is of course possible to realign the type hierarchies in (31) and (33) to include an 'objective' macrotype that subsumes acc
and dat types. However, the resulting structure will effectively relocate,
and indeed increase, syncretism by forcing duplication of entries subsumed
by obl and nonobl in (34). Adding an objective macrotype to the existing
CASE subhierarchy also will not do, as this addition converts the CASE
feature from a partition to a mixed type whose three subtypes are neither
uniformly complementary nor compatible. This immediately precludes the
relative underspecification of CASE features in (34), unless obl and nonobl
values are distinguished as mutually incompatible.
The paradigm in (35), corresponding to the description in (5), further
illustrates this point.
145
SYNCRETISM AND P A R A D I G M A T I C O P P O S I T I O N
[PHONdie]
(35)
Y
PHON deq
PHON das
I
CASE oblJ
GEND hot,fern
I
PHON dem]
CASE dat J
I NUM plu I
LCASE dat J
]
nonobl J
I
PrlON der ]
GEND mascl
I
PHON den"
CASE acc 2
This paradigm again recognizes syncretism between the masculine (singular) accusative and the dative plural forms. In addition, the form der is
analyzed both as a general oblique, and as a general masculine nonoblique.
In both cases, the proliferation of analyses is due to the oblique/nonoblique partition in (31), which again captures nominative/accusative neutralization in all but the masculine subparadigm, and additional dative/genitive coalescence in the feminine.
Yet the residual syncretism in (34) and (35) is arguably a desirable
result of the fact that underspecified paradigms cannot collapse arbitrary
non-natural classes without creating compensating syncretism elsewhere
in the description. This is perhaps clearest in connection with der, which
represents the only case in which the nominative form of an article or
adjective coincides with a particular or general oblique form. Although
these distinct specifications are straightforwardly disjoined in the complex
entry in (16) above, it would appear that no structured paradigm consistent
with (31) can assign a unique entry to der without proliferating artificial
distinctions among forms that are assigned a single analysis in (35). The
role of ostensibly natural classes in these descriptions thus suggests that
the paradigmatic redundancy that can be simplified by underspecification
corresponds to what was earlier termed artifactual syncretism, while the
recalcitrant cases represent simple homophony, or accidental syncretism.
Before turning to some implications of this general approach to paradigm simplification, let us briefly consider a case of recurrent or systematic
homophony in German declensional paradigms. As noted immediately
above, the paradigms in (34) and (35) each recognize homophonous masculine accusative and dative plural forms. Since definite articles in effect
incorporate 'strong' declensional endings, strong adjectival forms exhibit
the paradigm structure in (35) and show the same overlap between mascu-
146
JAMES P. BLEVINS
line accusative and dative plural. Moreover, the masculine accusative is
similarly syncretistic in the weak adjectival forms that follow a definite
article (or other determiner with a strong ending). The weak adjectival
declension exhibits a particularly degenerate contrast between -e, for all
nonoblique singular forms except masculine accusative, and -en otherwise.
The paradigm for k l e i n 'small' in (36) provides the most economical description of this system consistent with the global type hierarchy in (31).
(36)
[PHONkleinen]
I
[~r~4N kleine
nonplu
[.CASE notlobl
I
PHON klein~n]
GENDmasc |
CASE acc
I
Here again we find a distinguished masculine accusative form that coincides with a general form that here subsumes oblique and nonoblique
subtypes. Yet it is unclear that this syncretism can - or indeed should be eliminated. As the matrix description corresponding to (36) illustrates,
weak adjectives exhibit a fundamental contrast between singular nonobliques, ending in -e, and a general 'elsewhere' form, ending in -en.
(37)
SINGULAR
NOMINATIVE
ACCUSATIVE
DATIVE
GENITIVE
PLURAL
MASCULINE
NEUTER
FEMININE
MASC/NEUT/FEM
-e
-en
-en
-en
-e
-e
-en
-en
-e
-e
-en
-en
-en
-en
-en
-en
However, this binary split is disrupted by the masculine accusative, which
exceptionally ends in -en rather than -e. This layered opposition is perspicuously encapsulated in the structured paradigm in (36): the first two
levels capture the general binary split, while the terminal specification
superimposes the marked masculine accusative form. However, syncretism
is the cost of this perspicuity, as the form of the marked alternative
coincides with the general form.
SYNCRETISM AND PARADIGMATIC OPPOSITION
147
4. S U M M A R Y A N D C O N C L U S I O N
Morphological blocking conditions restore the paradigmatic axis of structuralist analyses, as they introduce a dynamic opposition between an item
in a grammatical construction and its lexical alternatives. Andrews (1990)
argues that this opposition provides a more insightful treatment of 'degenerate' agreement requirements than the LFG alternative that exploits
default specifications. The present account attempts to extend and reinforce this conclusion, arguing that the combination of underspecified
forms with blocking conditions is also more revealing than descriptions
that employ negative or disjunctive entries. The division of labour in this
account is nevertheless designed to amalgamate the insights of blocking
and logical approaches. As in Andrews' analysis, the effects of disjunctive
and negative specifications are captured through the underspecification of
general forms. However, following Pollard and Sag (1987), lexical paradigms are recognized as the locus of the opposition between marked and
general forms. 36 Moreover, the present account does not entirely eliminate
logical relations on feature structures, but rather confines them to global
feature hierarchies of the sort illustrated in (31). Let us now conclude by
clarifying how the global representation of logical feature structure directly
complements the use of lexical underspecification and morphological
blocking.
The different interpretations for the GPSG feature system provide a
concrete illustration of the fundamental distinction between attributing
logical structure to lexical entries and representing this structure in a
general feature map. The Feature Cooccurrence Restrictions (FCRs) and
Feature Specification Defaults (FSDs) of GPSG are formulated in a constraint language that includes conjunction and implication connectives.
Yet the GPSG system differs from the approaches summarized in Section
2.1 in excluding explicitly negative feature specifications. The closest approximation is provided by the unary operator ' - ' which Gazdar et al.
(1985:24; henceforth GKPS) " u s e . . . to show that a feature is undefined".
This operator typically applies to a feature name (or a conjunction of
feature names) F; the resulting expression ' - F ' states that v is undefined
on a given category. GKPS also allow individual feature values to be
36 The recognition of lexical paradigms as the locus of this opposition also highlights systematic properties that are latently attributed to paradigms. For example, while blocking conditions neatly capture the complementary character of paradigmatic oppositions, they do not
guarantee their generally exhaustive nature. In fact, no principle precludes or discourages
truly degenerate paradigms containing one or more marked forms and no general unmarked
opponent.
148
JAMES P. BLEVINS
specified as undefined. In particular, the expressions -[nom] and -[pas]
in FSDs 4 and 7 effectively abbreviate --[CASE nom] and --[WORM pas]. 37
Undefined values of this sort correspond directly to negative specifications.
Thus the constraint in (38), formulated in the GKPS feature system,
specifies a category which is not both third person and singular.
(38)
--([PER 3rd] & [PLU--1)
The GPSG system can therefore be viewed as an incomplete variant of
the general logicist approach, one that contingently lacks a means of
associating complex constraints like (38) with the lexical entry for walk.
Alternatively, one can view the network of cooccurrence restrictions expressed by FCRs as a more intrinsically restricted system whose actual
properties and limitations are somewhat obscured by the logical notation
employed in GPSG accounts. The GPSG constraint language effectively
uses implication, conjunction and ' - ' to express feature dependency, cooccurrence, and disjointness. In each case, these basic notions can be
expressed in global feature hierarchies of the sort illustrated in (31) and
(33). The dependency relations expressed by material implication can, as
Gazdar and Pullum (1982) suggest, be directly represented in the inheritance ordering in a feature hierarchy.
Consider again the fact that gender is only distinctive for singular articles
and adjectives in German. This cooccurrence relation, expressed by the
implicational FCR in (39), is likewise represented in the dependency
between ~END and PLtJ in (31) and (33).
(39)
[GEND]D [t'LU --]
Conjunction can likewise be incorporated into a feature hierarchy by
adding conjunctive specifications, as in (30) above. The converging
branches in the graph fragment in (41) thus represent the conjunctive
specification I N - , V+], typically assigned to verbal elements in X-bar
accounts. This dependency between VFORM and categorial features in
(41) thus expresses FCR 2 in (40).
(40)
FCR 2: [VFORM]D [ N - , V+]
37 Though this abbreviatory convention can only be used for atom-valued features with
unique values, since the feature name in a complex, integer-valued or Boolean-valued
specification cannot normally be suppressed without ambiguity.
S Y N C R E T I S M AND P A R A D I G M A T I C O P P O S I T I O N
(41)
149
HEAD
4-
--
PAST
4-
NONPAST
_
PRESP
Disjointness is also largely expressible in terms of partitions in a global
feature map. Absolutely incompatible features (e.g., SLASH and WH in
GKPS) can be introduced as the values of a partitioned macrotype. The
incompatibility of particular specifications will in many cases be a side
effect of the dependency structure. Thus the FCRs in (42) can, if desired,
be expressed in a feature map by introducing SUBCATunder the [BAR0]
specification. 3a Incompatible pairs of specifications would likewise subsume distinct values for some partitioned feature type.
(42)
FCR 8: [BAR1] D ~[SUBCAT]
FCR 9: [BAR 2] ~ ~[SUBCAT]
The resulting type hierarchy defines the category space of a language
in terms of basic subsumption, disjointness and conjunction relations. The
illustrative fragments in (31), (33) and (41) are highly schematic and
suppress in particular multiple inheritance of features and specifications.
Nevertheless, the conspicuous absence of negative feature specifications
in these graphs is fully representative: the constitutive relations in (31)
and (41) simply do not support the direct negation of feature specifications.
Hence specifications like (11) or even (38) are not possible categories and
cannot be assigned to lexical entries. To sum up this brief discussion,
hierarchical feature maps provide a plausible and arguably faithful representation of the network of cooccurrence constraints in the GPSG feature
system. The lack of negative (and disjunctive) specifications clearly distin-
3s These constraints apply to the integer-valued SUBCATfeature in GPSG accounts, and not
to the list-valued HPSG descendant incorporated in the paradigms above.
150
JAMES P. BLEVINS
guishes this representation from a standard logical interpretation. Confining negation and disjunction to the global feature hierarchy however complements the blocking analyses defended earlier, as these accounts exploit
relative underspecification rather than complex structures or constraints
to reduce syncretism.
Let us close now by reviewing the central claims adopted and defended
in this account.
1. Degenerate or syncretistic paradigms are revealingly and efficiently
described in terms of oppositions between marked and unmarked
alternatives.
2. Structured lexical paradigms are the fundamental locus of this opposition.
3. General patterns of neutralization and exclusion are appropriately
encoded in a global feature type hierarchy ordered by subsumption
and disjointness relations.
The first claim, and its subsumption-based implementation follows Andrews (1990). The third claim likewise extends the type hierarchies developed in HPSG accounts. The second claim combines these components
by literally reconstructing the paradigmatic dimension of structuralist accounts.
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Centre for Linguistics
University of Western Australia
Nedlands, Western Australia
Australia 6009
jblevins@uniwa, uwa.edu.au