Naslov
Prefixal combinations in Croatian

Autori
Srebačić, Matea ; Šojat, Krešimir

Vrsta, podvrsta i kategorija rada
Sažeci sa skupova, sažetak, znanstveni

Izvornik
9th Mediterranean Morphology Meeting Book of Abstracts / Raffaelli, I., Kerovec, B., Srebačić, M. - Zagreb, 2013, 48-49

Skup
9th Mediterranean Morphology Meeting

Mjesto i datum
Dubrovnik, Hrvatska, 15.07.2013. - 18.07.2013

Vrsta sudjelovanja
Predavanje

Vrsta recenzije
Međunarodna recenzija

Ključne riječi
Prefixes ; Croatian ; verbs ; CroDeriV

Sažetak
The paper discusses prefixal combinations of Croatian verbs and their semantic and distributional properties. As in other Slavic languages, verbal prefixes in Croatian form a heterogeneous class in terms of possible combinations and semantic impact on verbal stems. In numerous recent approaches to prefixation in Russian, Bulgarian or Polish, especially on multiple prefixation, prefixes are divided into two broad classes – lexical prefixes and superlexical prefixes. Whereas superlexical prefixes express meanings that combine with the meaning of a verbal stem in a rather systematic and predictable way, combinations of lexical prefixes and stems are more idiosyncratic in terms of compositionality of their meanings. Superlexical prefixes are usually described as prefixes with specific meanings, e.g. distributive, inceptive, terminative, repetitive or excessive meaning. Syntactically, it is generally assumed that superlexical prefixes do not affect the argument structure, as opposed to lexical prefixes. In case of multiple prefixation, superlexical prefixes regularly occur outside lexical prefixes. Finally, superlexical prefixes can stack, i.e. the appearance of more than one prefix on a single stem is possible, whereas it is never the case with lexical prefixes. In this paper we focus on combinations of two or more prefixes with verbal stems in Croatian. Prefixal combinations can comprise two, three and very rarely four prefixes. These combinations were recorded in CroDeriV, a database consisting of app. 14 000 verbs segmented into lexical and derivational morphemes. The database enables the detection of all combinations of particular stems and affixes and provides extensive information on distribution and frequency of particular affixes and their combinations as well as combinations with particular stems. All detected combinations of prefixes and their frequency is presented in the paper. Second and third prefixes in combinations of multiple prefixes were analyzed in terms of their meaning. The obtained results indicate that the possible range of their meanings is expectedly narrower in comparison to cases when they are used as single prefixes. The list of detected combinations enabled the identification of superlexical prefixes and their meanings as described above. The results also indicate that the division into superlexical and lexical prefixes requires further elaboration since some features are shared by both groups. It is argued that in Croatian both groups can stack to some extent. Finally, it is argued that some combinations of prefixes cannot be separated since they bring about idiosyncrasy in the verbal meaning only when combined together.

Izvorni jezik
Engleski

Znanstvena područja
Filologija

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