MORPHOSYNTAX: WHAT IT STUDIES AND EXAMPLES - LITERATURE - 2025

The morfosintaxis is the study of grammatical categories whose properties are definable morphological and syntactic criteria. Some authors point out that the term replaces what was traditionally called grammar. In this sense, morphosyntax is intimately linked with morphology and syntax.

In turn, both disciplines are related to the rules for the formation of linguistic structures, but at different levels. In the first instance, morphology is the mental system related to the formation of words, and also the branch of the linguistic discipline that studies the components of words: internal structure and formation.

On the other hand, syntax studies the ways in which words can be combined to form phrases and sentences. It also refers to the knowledge about the formation of grammatically correct sentences.

The relationship between these two disciplines is evident in polysynthetic languages ​​in which a single word can contain many morphemes (minimum unit of meaning) with grammatical and lexical information.

What does morphosyntax study?

Many authors equate morphosyntax with grammar. Under this approach, both disciplines have the same scope of study. In fact, a simple definition of this term seems to corroborate it: morphosyntax is the study of words and how they work together.

For example, mention is made of the fact that the parts of speech (nouns, verbs) are distinguished both by their distribution in the sentence (syntax) and by the form of the words (morphology); hence the interrelation.

However, not everyone agrees on this position. Some point out that morphosyntax encompasses aspects that can hardly be solved through morphology or syntax alone.

In this way, it is not a matter of the sum of purely morphological (word form) or purely syntactic (rules for combining these words) analyzes, but it is a relationship of complementarity.

Some of the aspects studied by morphosyntax include ellipsis (omission of structures), redundancy (repetition of elements) and concordance (normative coincidence of certain grammatical accidents).

Likewise, from morphosyntax, comparisons can be made on the different grammatical processes through the various existing languages, and thus discover the underlying mechanisms in the language.

Morphosyntactic relationships

Morphosyntactic relationships are expressed through grammatical forms (grammatical accidents, verbal mood and aspect). These forms vary depending on the characteristics of each language.

Thus, the different languages ​​can be classified according to the morphosyntactic procedures to relate the words within the phrases or sentences: isolating, binders, inflectional and polysynthetic.

In isolating languages, words are not transformed by inflection (adoption of different forms for the expression of grammatical accidents) or by derivation (formation of new words from a root).

Therefore, the grammatical relations of this type of language are expressed by the order of the words or with the addition of an autonomous word.

Second, in binding languages ​​morphosyntactic relationships are expressed through the use of affixes, which are particles added to the root of a word to form a new one or change its grammatical form.

For its part, in inflectional languages ​​the same affix can express several grammatical relationships. Such is the case of the inflectional forms of the verb in Spanish that indicate number, time, mood and aspect.

Finally, the relationships in synthetic languages ​​can be expressed by means of attachments or transformations to the root, maintaining a strict syntactic order.

Concordance and cases

Morphosyntactic marks are not universal. Many languages ​​mark only the concordance (Mohawk, Bantu), only the cases (Japanese, Korean), some mixture of the two (English, Russian) or have no marks (Haitian Creole, Chinese).

In Spanish there is nominal agreement (the noun matches in gender and number with the determiners and adjectives) and verbal agreement (gender and person match between the subject and the verb).

For example, in the clause “the shirts are white”, the nominal agreement exceeds the sentence and is manifested in both the subject and the predicate. The interrelation between morphology and syntax is then observed.

With respect to cases, in Spanish this phenomenon is manifested in personal pronouns with the nominative, accusative, dative and prepositional, but it consists of a free morpheme (not an affix).

Examples

- I (nominative / subject) believe that I (prepositional) will not be chosen (accusative / direct object) for the position that (dative / indirect object) had promised me.

- He (nominative / subject) believes that he (prepositional) will not be chosen (accusative / direct object) for the position that (dative / indirect object) had promised him.

Parataxis and hypotaxis

Another topic in the field of morphosyntax is parataxis (coordination) and hypotaxis (subordination). In the first, there is no hierarchy between two or more clauses, which does occur in hypotaxis.

Coordination and subordination relationships are key in the type of morphosyntactic marks that are used in each case. This can be seen in the following sentences:

- «After you eat, wash the dishes».

- "Eat, and then wash the dishes."

As can be seen, the meaning of both sentences is similar. However, the first uses subordination and the second coordination.

Among other things, this implies that the verb takes the subjunctive mood in the first sentence and the indicative in the second.

Examples

On the morphophonology and morphosyntax of the ho (Pucilowski, 2013)

Ho is an Indian language known for its complex verb forms. Pucilowski's work analyzed various characteristics of these verbs.

One of the most important morphosyntactic characteristics of this language is that it traditionally marks the aspect in the verb rather than in time, especially for transitive verb constructions.

Furthermore, in his analysis he concluded that several serial verbs (sequences of verbs without coordination or subordination marks) in ho are grammaticalized, becoming auxiliary verb constructions.

Morphosyntax in two and three year old children (Rissman, Legendre & Landau, 2013).

Young English-speaking children often omit auxiliary verbs from their speech, producing expressions such as baby crying, along with the appropriate form baby is crying (the baby is crying).

Some researchers have argued that children's knowledge of the auxiliary verb be is specific to that element, and that it develops slowly.

In a sensitization experiment, the researchers showed that 2 and 3-year-old children represent the forms are and is (verbal forms of being as helper) as part of an abstract syntactic framework.

Acquisition of morphosyntax in a second language in adulthood: the phonological factor (Campos Dintrans, 2011)

Campos Dintrans' study examined the challenge for adult second language speakers to produce functional morphology, even in advanced stages of second language acquisition.

Specifically, it looks at how native speakers of Spanish, Mandarin, and Japanese use past morphology and grammatical number in English.

The results of the experiments in this study strongly suggest that phonological factors may explain part of the inappropriate use of functional morphology.

References

1. Harsa, LN (s / f). Introduction to Words and Morphemes. Taken from repository.ut.ac.id.
2. Aronoff, M. and Fudeman, K. (2011). What is Morphology? Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons.
3. Radford, A. (1997). Syntax: A Minimalist Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
4. Rodríguez Guzmán, JP (2005). Graphic grammar to the juampedrino way

   Barcelona: Carena Editions.

5. Strumpf, M. and Douglas, A. (2004). The Grammar Bible: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Grammar but Didn't Know Whom to Ask. New York: Henry Holt and Company.
6. Sabin, A.; Diez, M. and Morales, F. (1977). The languages ​​of Spain. Madrid: Ministry of Education.
7. Markman, VG (2005). The Syntax of Case and Agreement: its Relationship to Morphology and Argument Structure. Taken from ling.rutgers.edu.
8. Royal Spanish Academy. (2005). Pan-Hispanic Dictionary of Doubts. Taken from lema.rae.es.
9. Pucilowski, A. (2013). On the morpho-phonology and morphosyntax of ho. Taken from scholarsbank.uoregon.edu.
10. Rissman, L.; Legendre G. and Landau, B. (2013). Morphosyntax in Two- and Three-Year-Old Children: Evidence from Priming. Language Learning and Development, Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 278-292.
11. Campos Dintrans, GS (2011). Acquisition of morphosyntax in the adult second language: the phonology factor. Taken from ir.uiowa.edu.