Phono-semantically Motivated Lexical Patterns: Evidence from English and Modern Greek.

Generally, linguistic theory assumes that the association between sound and meaning is essentially arbitrary: a meaning can theoretically be represented by almost any set of sounds in a language. This study, however, will show that linguistic signs appear to be less arbitrary and their meaning highly motivated by their sound. In particular, of the sound-symbolic forms, as exposed in Hinton et al (1994), I will confine myself only to those referred to as phonaesthemes (Firth, 1930). In Mela-Athanasopoulou (2001), I argued that phonaesthemes do meet the criteria for being full morphemes, due to their ability to recur with the same meaning at the same position operating as root-forming elements. Here, I will provide a more detailed analysis of the multiple parameters of expressive elements in both English and Modern Greek and indicate that the semantic features of such forms are more evaluative and subjective as well as language specific

The polysemy of -ize derivatives and the ModGreek counterpart -pi`o

Derivatives involving the suffix -ize in English are extremely heterogeneous with regard to their semantics, syntax and the types of bases the suffix attaches to. A similar claim can be made for the ModGreek counterpart -pi`o. In this study I argue that the case of     -ize and -pi`o derivatives has implications for morphological theory with regard to the status of the derivational affix in general, and word-formation rules (WFRs) in the lexicon, as well as the role of semantic and pragmatic information in lexical morphology. Based on the theory of Lexical Conceptual Semantics (LCS) (Jackendoff 1990; Plag 1999), I show how the meaning of the derived verbal is compositional and results from the interaction of the meaning of the stem with the semantic structure of the potential -ize/-pi`o derivative

The function of semantically motivated suffixes in gender inversion of Modern Greek derivatives

The main issue of this study is to show that semantically motivated suffixes, such as diminutives and augmentatives, for instance, may change the grammatical gender of nouns in highly inflected languages such as Modern Greek (henceforth MG). For example, a semantic marker of diminution (Melissaropoulou & Ralli 2008), say {-aki} of neuter (NTR) gender, attached to a stem of masculine (MSC) gender (by nature), will convert it into neuter, e.g. andr(as)MSC ‘man’ (natural gender), plus the diminutive     {-aki}NTR will invert to andrakiNTR ‘little man’. Similarly, korits(i)NTR ‘girl’, feminine (natural gender), plus the augmentative {-aros}MSC will become koritsaros ‘big girl’. Also aet(os)MSC ‘eagle’ masculine (natural gender), plus the diminutive {-opoulo}NTR will turn into aetopouloNTR ‘baby eagle’.Moreover, other categories of semantically motivated suffixes capable of changing gender, such as the case of –ieraFEM or –ierisMSC denoting a container and an agent respectively (Roché 2000), as well as –iaFEM standing for a fruit tree will also be investigated. The scope of the paper will be to show not only that, in MG, gender is inherent to the stem noun and not to the word (Ralli 2002), but also discuss both natural and grammatical gender (normally shown formally by an inflectional suffix) as an inevitable consequence of gender inversion by means of the afore mentioned suffixes. The notion of agreement regarding the gender of the noun qualifiers, e.g. enasMSC isichosMSC andrasMSC, ‘a quiet man’ vs. enaNTR isichoNTR andrakiNTR ‘a quiet little man’, will also be investigated as a result of gender inversion (Anastasiadi et al 2003).Furthermore, particular attention will be paid on the fact that the natural/biological gender remains the same at least semantically –as it is inherent to the stem- despite the attachment of a different gender grammatical suffix, only when the latter is either a diminutive or an augmentative. In all other cases, where the gender is indicated by form only, and not by sex, i.e. it is not natural, it converts to the gender of the suffix, e.g. tsaiNTR ‘tea’ plus –ieraFEM/‘container’ will be tsaγieraFEM ‘teapot’; miloNTR ‘apple’ plus –iaFEM/’fruit tree’ will be miliaFEM ‘apple tree’

The Gender of the English Derived Nominal and the Modern Greek Counterpart: A morphological approach

The main issue of this paper is to show that for the derived nominalizations1 unmarked for gender in English, the Modern Greek counterparts are nominals, usually of feminine gender, which is always marked due to the high inflectionality of the language. So derived nominals, such as adoption, demonstration, abundance, and brevity, can be replaced by the equivalent Greek nominals, all of feminine gender: υιοθεσία, /ioθesia/, διαδήλωση, /δiaδilosi/, αφθονία, /αfθοηiα/ and βραχύτητα, /vraxitita/. Conversely, underived English nominalizations are replaced by Modern Greek nominals usually of masculine gender and, to a lesser extent, neuter gender according to our statistical work

Conversion: A typological and functional analysis of the morphophonological structure of zero-derivation in English word formation.

It will be argued that the phenomenon of conversion or zero-derivation, typical of marginally inflected languages, such as English, solves the problem of word formation without affixal attachment to the base (Spencer 2001, Plag 1999, Beard 1998, Katamba 1993, Bauer 1988, et al.). The scope of this study is to expose the most productive cases of conversion and show how the unmarked derivational affix may produce new words at the same pace as an overt form. Moreover, it will be shown that being a stem language, ModGreek exhibits instances of conversion by using identical stems for both Nouns and Verbs

The problem of word identification in Modern Greek dialects: Evidence from Lefkada documented data

This study investigates the issue of word identification, focusing on the morphophonological description of cliticization phenomena, such as auxiliary verbs, weak object pronouns, genitive possessives, negative markers, etc., as observed in dialectal data bearing on the analysis. The research is entirely based on a huge corpus of fieldwork recordings of speakers from the Greek islands of the Ionian Sea, and in particular, from Lefkada. The primary data (Himmelmann 2006) collected, are spontaneous dialogues, or tales and songs, among native speakers of five distinct age groups. The paper is organized as follows: First, morpho-syntactic issues of clitics in English and Modern Greek are thoroughly discussed. Second, according to my findings, a phonological analysis of the dialectal data is attempted. Phenomena such as palatalization, syncope, elision, synaliphe, etc, regarding the dialect, are argued. Next, it is shown that the indications of affixal status clitics seem stronger in the dialects than in the standard language

Phonaesthemes: evidence from English and Modern Greek

Α problem which morphological theory has left unsolνed is the status of phonaesthetic elements, the so called phonaesthemes (Firth 1930) which can be classified on the basis of the initial consonants, νowels or final consonants of words, associated with a common component of meaning. For example, the sl- and the γl- sequence in English and Modern Greek respectiνely , are consistently associated with a particular semantic content, that of 'smoothly wet, slippery; sticky' and in general, something with a negatiνe connotation, (e.g. slime, slither, slip, slick, slobber, slug, etc. and the Modern Greek ylifo 'lick; suck ', ylistro 'slip', ylisteros 'slippery', ylioois 'slimy" and ylitsa 'grime', etc.). These phonaesthetic properties of words, also referred to as onomatopoeic sounds, haνe been marginally inνestigated by linguists. They haνe been referred to as meaningful sub morphernic segments (Weinreich 1953), signs whose sounds haνe some intrinsic non arbitrary connections with their meanings (Aronoff 1976) and sensory-based as sociatiνe meanings (Joseph 1998).In this study, we will attempt to show that phonaesthemes to a certain limited extent, do meet the criteria for being full morphemes in the sense that they constitute a minimal phonetic-semantic unity (Bloomfield 1933: 16) or a minimal same of form and meaning - an indiνisible stretch of phonetic (or phonological) material with a unitary meaning (Anderson 1992: 49). Αll these properties will be tested on data drawn from both English and Modern Greek

Meaningless prefixes in English word-formation

Latinate or Greek prefixes are extremely productive when attaching to Latinate or Greek verbal or nominal stems. Once archaic prepositions or adverbs in Latin and Greek, those word initial morphs behave as lexically attached prefixes in the sense that they obey to lexical word formation rules and are semantically non-compositional, i.e. despite a certain amount of commonality of meaning among them, they have no fixed meaning and also display distributional gaps. Moreo­ver, the verbal or nominal stems they attach to become lexically derived com­posites. For instance, the Latinate in-, con-, re- and de-, and the Greek epi-, dia-, and pro- prefixes affixed to the Latinate and Greek stems -fer- and -gram- re­spectively, will produce semantically unrelated forms such as infer, confer, re­fer, defer and epigram, diagram and program. The main issue in this study is the treatment of such prefixes as lexically attached entities to classical (Latin / Greek) stems producing an abundant number of lexical units with distributional gaps and noncompositional semantics, even though morphologically transparent and segmentable. In our analysis, the more productive prefixes un-, dis-, in- and to a certain extent de-, en-, be- bearing a relatively constant lexical meaning the former as well as a categorial meaning (i.e. category changing prefixes) the lat­ter, will not be taken into consideration

The Dartmouth Method of ELT and the Greek EFL teacher

This paper is a response to the Dartmouth Method of ELT (known as the J. Rassias method: H.H. Stern, 1983:475) designed and conducted by John Rassias in a series of innovative and interactive workshops held in Constantinople (12-15 November 1997), with teachers of English at both High School and University level. The spirit and substance of this article originates primarily from the discussions I had with Professor Rassias after the workshops. I will argue, in this paper, the aspects of his method which could be effectively applied in both Elementary and Secondary/High School Greek education as far as ELT is concerned. To start with, I support that Rassias's approach to teaching, based on dramatic techniques, is ideal, in primarily Elementary School education. The importance of drama and emotions is feasible in relatively small groups of 9-12 year olds: whereas the same dramatic technique is less effectively manipulated by the High School EL teacher working with 30 member groups of more sophisticated Greek teenagers. Furthermore, I propose that the technique of dramatization, stressing the interaction of the cultural features of both mother tongue and English, would be better substantiated with students of Secondary/High School education. Finally, the actor-teacher association triggering motivation via spontaneity could find a realistic basis in only Elementary School education irrespective of the number of pupils. My arguments have been based on empirical work and information drawn from (a) personal participation in authentic classroom ELT situations with both Elementary and Secondary Schools in Thessaloniki (the 45th Primary School of Thessaloniki and the 3rd High School and 3rd Lyceum of Thessaloniki), and (b) personal involvement of ELT at an Advanced level, working with University students with EL courses

The productivity of ancient Greek Prepositions in modern Greek nominalizations

Ancient Greek prepositions -though not occurring by themselves in Modern Greek as free elements (with a few exceptions)- are extremely productive when attaching to verbal or nominal stems (i.e., nominalizations). Our basic issue, in the present study, is that these prepositions function as lexically attached prefixes in the sense that (a) they follow lexical word-formation processes, i.e., word-formation rules (WFRs), (b) they are semantically noncompositional, and (c) the verbal or nominal stems when combined with them become lexically derived composites. For example, the archaic prepositions apo, ek, en, pro, ana, meta, epi and hypo, all prefix to a stem such as trop- <verb stem trep- "to turn", nominal stem trop- "the act or result of turning", etc., to produce semantically unrelated forms such as: apotropi "aversion", ektropi "change of course", entropi "shame", protropi "urge", anatropi "upset, overthrow", metatropi "change", epitropi "committee" and hypotropi "relapse