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Learning What Cannot Be by Failing Expectations
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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 October 2010
Abstract
This article presents an explanation for the lack of some neuter gender forms in an otherwise productive paradigm for the formation of neuter gender adjectives. The explanation draws on a proper understanding of (exemplar-based) analogy under some conditions. One condition is that the problematic form resembles a free morpheme by the loss of a morpheme/syllable boundary in its derivation. The second condition is that the problematic forms tend to share some property (for example, referring to a nonverifiable property such as internal (mental) states). Problematic forms might thus mutually support other such forms by analogy and similarity, and thus create a paradigmatic gap. It is argued that exemplars (with context), and analogy between similar exemplars, necessarily restrict and licence the use of derived forms.
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- Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1999
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