Language Research

Language Research

A Study of Fusion in Persian and English Inflection Based on Natural Morphology Theory

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors
leila Gholipour Hasankiadeh 1
foroogh kazemi 2
Maryam Iraji 3
1 PhD Student of Linguistics Department, Central Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
2 Associate Professor of Linguistics, Central Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran.
3 Assistant Professor of Linguistic Department., central Tehran branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
10.22059/jolr.2024.364792.666854
Abstract
 
Inflectional features of languages have diversity and each language utilizes a range of these features to express its grammatical relations. Sometimes, in an inflection of a grammatical category (such as a verb), the semantic conditions require that several inflectional features come into use simultaneously in order to express a correct and accurate description of the event. In this case, this simultaneity is formed in an interwoven manner in the application of inflectional values and the phenomenon of fusion occurs. The main goal of this research is to examine fusional forms, including pormanteau, suppletion and fusions in the inflection of two languages, English and Persian, based on natural morphology theory, in order to determine the naturalness of these forms in the grammatical categories of noun, verb, adjective and pronoun of both languages and answer the question that what are the similarities and differences of these two languages in terms of the degree of fusion and naturalness of inflection and inflectional rules. The Persian and English data are extracted from the Persian language database and Corpus of Contemporary American English respectively by random sampling based on the equal number of words, and then analyzed based on the natural morphology theory. The results signify that the phenomenon of fusion occurs in the inflection of both languages and can be noticed in the inflection of different grammatical categories in the form of cumulative, strong and weak suppletion and pormanteau. In both languages, the frequency of fusion in verbs is more than other categories, namely nouns, adjectives, and pronouns, and this is one of the common features of these two languages. In the category of pronouns, in English, there is a greater diversity of fusion. One of the reasons is the presence of gender feature in English pronouns and its absence in Persian. The results of the research highlight the fact that the inflectional forms with infusion do not follow the most important principles of the theory of natural morphology, which is the existence of a biuniqueness between the form and the meaning. They distort the criteria of naturalness and cause a decrease in the naturalness of the Persian and English inflectional systems.
Keywords
inflection
grammatical categories
fusion
natural morphology
Subjects
 
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  • Receive Date 03 September 2023
  • Revise Date 21 June 2024
  • Accept Date 16 June 2024