An Adjunction-Based Approach to Non-Standard Variation (“el microalga”, “un alita”)

Bárbara Marqueta Gracia

doi:10.5565/rev/catjl.483

An Adjunction-Based Approach to Non-Standard Variation (“el microalga”, “un alita”)

Authors

Bárbara Marqueta Gracia Universidad de Zaragoza https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2199-1689

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Abstract

In Spanish, feminine singular nouns beginning with a stressed /a/, such as arma ‘weapon’ and asa ‘handle’, do not take the standard article forms la and una, but el and un. This paper examines the non-standard uses of el and un observed in morphologically complex words, such as prefixed nouns (el microalga) and diminutives (un alita). The hypothesis is that what makes these variants possible is the adjunct status of prefixes and diminutive suffixes. It is claimed that adjuncts do not obligatorily trigger the reassignment of standard forms la and una, like a head would, because they can be late-merged.

Keywords

article, late-merge, gender, morphology, adjunct

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An Adjunction-Based Approach to Non-Standard Variation (“el microalga”, “un alita”)

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