Morphology Is in the Lexicon

Evidence is presented for the claim that all morphological operations occur in the lexicon, including cases where inflectional structures provide the input to derivational processes. The absence of clear distinctions between derivational & inflectional morphology points to the same conclusion, since the same category such as plural can be inflectional in some languages (eg, IE) but derivational in others (eg, Kwakwala). The lexical model rejects the post-syntactic spell-out of inflectional categories but instead generates inflectional forms in the lexicon, appealing to independently required principles of feature percolation (which assigns features of morphemes to the words they comprise, affixes taking precedence) & unmarking (which assigns the unmarked value of features not specifically given by overt morphemes). Universal principles such as disjoint reference also apply in the lexicon, blocking the generation of forms inflected for subject & O both in the first or both in the second person, in languages such as Georgian. Where these principles are insufficient, lang-specific rules & conditions come into play. Several cases that have been adduced as evidence for the spell-out theory of inflections are reanalyzed in lexical terms. 2 Tables, 28 References. AA