Conversion, inflectional complexity and affixation: denominal verb formation in English and Modern Greek

Koutsoukos, Nikolaos [UCL] Van Goethem, Kristel [UCL] et al.

Background-Aim Conversion can be defined as the change in word class of a form without any corresponding change of form (Bauer 1983: 32), e.g. bridge (noun) > to bridge (verb). Conversion is usually considered as a common phenomenon only in languages with weak inflectional systems (cf. Bauer 2005, Valera 2014). Marchand (1969: 364) casts doubt on this claim on the basis of diachronic data: he argues that conversion already existed in English when it was still a more amply inflected language, while a cross-linguistic survey on conversion shows that conversion can also be productive in languages with strong (or rich) inflection (Štekauer et al. 2012; Valera 2015). Concrete examples have been provided by, among others, Manova (2011) on Bulgarian, Russian, and Serbo-Croatian, and Szymanek (2010) on Polish (see also, Don 1993 for Dutch, Thornton 2004 for Italian, Tribout 2010 for French). Based on the assumption that conversion can be “integrated into a paradigm of morphological processes” (Corbin 1987: 241), the aim of this paper is to examine whether the productivity of conversion can be related to other morphological parameters, and, more specifically, to probe into the relation between conversion and other derivational processes with the same functional potential, such as suffixation. Data-Analysis We compare denominal verb formation by conversion and suffixation in English, e.g.: mother > to mother (conversion) and apology > apology-ize (suffixation), and Modern Greek, e.g. μπάκακας [bakakas] ‘frog’ > μπακακίζω [bakakizo] ‘to act like a frog’ (suffixation), γλωσσολόγος [glosologos] (noun) ‘linguist’ > γλωσσολογώ [glosologo] (verb) ‘to perform the activity of a linguist’ and mother (conversion). Based on the view that morphological processes may in general compete for the creation of new lexemes (among others, Aronoff, forth., Bauer 2006), we compare the two processes on the basis of their functional potential, i.e. the semantic patterns they cover. Denominal verb formation by suffixation and conversion as well as the competition between the two processes in English have been discussed in a number of significant publications (Bauer 2006, Plag 1999, Bauer, Valera & Negrillo 2010). In Modern Greek, denominal verb formation by suffixation and conversion has been studied by among others Anastasiadi-Symeonidi (1996), Anastasiadi-Symeonidi et al. (2012), Efthymiou et al. (2012), Koutsoukos (2013a,b) and Ralli (2005, 2008), yet without any comparative examination to conversion. Results In English, although overt suffixation with -ize and -ify displays some semantic and structural salience and is more robust in specific domains, conversion prevails over overt suffixation in the number of semantic patterns that are covered and the types of bases that can be involved. In Modern Greek, conversely, conversion is rival to verb-forming suffixation only in one specific domain, i.e. the creation of denominal verbs with similative semantics, while overt suffixation with the suffix -izo is the most productive verb-forming process. These results demonstrate that there exists a kind of ‘complementary distribution’ between the productivity of these processes and that the productivity of conversion may also depend on other morphological factors such as the existence of strong competitors.