Word Structure (review)

This introduction to traditional morphological analysis includes ten units: ‘Dividing words up’ (1–9); ‘Words and paradigms’ (10–18); ‘Lexical and grammatical morphology’ (19–26); ‘Roots, bases, stems and other structural things’ (27–33); ‘Compound and complex bases’ (34–39); ‘Identifying grammatical morphemes’ (40–46); ‘Where to fix affixes’ (47–55); ‘Word-formation by reduction’ (56–61); ‘Allomorphy: Books with more than one cover’ (62–72); and ‘Allomorphy in other languages’ (73–82). It concludes with suggestions for reading (83–84), solutions to exercises (85–97), an index of technical terms (99–100), and a language index (101).

Coates has given us a manual with much to recommend it. He presents essential morphological concepts comprehensively in clear, concise language and provides ample illustration in the form of examples and problems for analysis. Some aspects of the exposition, however, may not be agreeable to all. Perhaps the most obvious of these is the relatively small amount of theoretical discussion. Sections in each chapter are labeled ‘discussion’, but they are too often devoted to analytical and methodological assertions relating to the data under consideration. Although, with respect to morphological principles and their application, they incorporate claims and assumptions which, generally, are in widespread acceptance, many are disputable and, especially recently, disputed (e.g., the very existence of the morpheme as a composite of form and meaning is disputed within some contemporary approaches). The paucity of discussion combined with the fact that a substantial amount of the author’s illustrative data is English will, I fear, inevitably result in the mistaken impression among many beginners, especially English-speaking, that morphological analysis is a simple matter, generating little exchange or argument among scholars and implemented largely on the basis of one’s intuition as to the division of word-level units and the assignment of meaning—especially grammatical meaning—to form in them.

Equally important is C’s apparently intentional failure to distinguish clearly and consistently between ‘transcription’ and ‘spelling’. Much of his data is in the orthography, transliterated when necessary, of the relevant language, with no explanation of this deviation from standard procedure other than the one inferable from comments here and there (e.g. 69) that he does not assume background in phonology. The chapter on allomorphy is particularly problematic in this regard because C recognizes allomorphic relationships which exist only in the orthography (67); e.g. the relationship between date and dat in the English words date and dating (< date-ing). This practice and the confusion to which it may give rise among beginners is too high a price to pay for the absence of a short survey of fundamental phonological concepts. In addition, the author makes no distinction between phonologically conditioned and grammatically conditioned allomorphy and hence offers no discussion of the potential function of allomorphy in linguistic systems, an important notion in some traditional frameworks. Finally, the presentation of solutions gives inadequate attention to alternatives although their existence in morphology is common, reflecting the inherent organizational ambiguity in most, if not all, word-level corpora.

Such weaknesses notwithstanding, this book is potentially of substantial value as a pedagogical tool, providing an accessible, well-organized overview of the subject matter for newcomers. It is therefore especially well-suited in content and length to introductory courses in linguistics. Used skillfully and with appropriate amplification, it will provide more than adequate background for advanced study and understanding of contemporary models of word formation. It would nevertheless have benefitted greatly from brief introductory remarks by the author on the intended goal and on the decisions he made relating to matters of procedure (e.g. the use of untranscribed data) and theory (e.g. the presentation of claims relating to segmentation without discussion).