Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 November 2008
1. In a recent historical survey of work in morphology, Matthews claims that in the 1940s and early 1950s the question ‘What are the basic units of morphological structure, and what are the relations which obtain between them?’ received a comparatively simple answer, namely that the units were morphemes and the relation between them one of linear succession (1970: 97–98). This seems to me inaccurate in two respects. Firstly, some linguists (notably Harris) recognized ‘morphemic components’ as well as morphemes; secondly, and more generally, explicit provision was made (following Bloomfield) for a statement of the order of elements in a grammatical construction – and simple succession, with X preceding (or following) Y was not the only order relation recognized. Allowance was also made, implicitly or explicitly, for (a) simultaneity, with X and Y occurring at the same time; and (b) discontinuity, with Y interrupting X. It will be convenient to discuss morphemic components in the larger context of simultaneous ordering; I shall then return to discontinuity in 3.