Unexpected Plural Inflections in Spanish: Reduplication and Metathesis

We examine the puzzling displacement in various Spanish dialects of a plural suffix from a verb where it is motivated semantically, syntactically,and morphologically onto a following clitic. We present previously unreported data and a new analysis of this material that succeeds where earlier efforts fail to provide a unified account of related phenomena. Our solution,which employs recent work on reduplication and metathesis,allows us to account for seemingly disparate phenomena as special cases of a single general framework and demonstrates that these operations are more versatile than previously thought. Directions for future research are indicated.