Allomorphy, morphological operations and the order of Slavic verb-prefixes

Abstract

Slavic verbal prefixes are traditionally divided into lexical and superlexical types. Lexical prefixes are base-generated below the verb, while superlexical prefixes are generated within the verb’s functional projection. However, this analysis incorrectly predicts their linearization. We propose that all verbal prefixes correspond to argument-structural effects, generated as heads of a voice projection. Our PF analysis follows Embick & Noyer (2001), with heads linearizing bottom-up, accompanied by local dislocation. Default dislocation is string-vacuous; inversion occurs only when the head participates in allomorphic realization. Strict implementation of this algorithm precisely yields the observed surface order.