Permalink : http://hdl.handle.net/2115/77608

KEYWORDS : Morphology;Linguistic Typology;Sakha;Tyvan;Lexical Integrity

This paper first provides a brief overview of the definitions and properties of morphological units and morphological typology. The paper then examines the morphologies of Northeastern Eurasian languages, particularly Sakha and Tyvan, from the perspective of morphological typology. In conclusion, the two languages are not polysynthetic even though they have rich morphology; instead they have a distinctive derivational process called syntactic derivation that is exceptional in light ofthe lexical integrity hypothesis. Section 2 provides an overview ofthe definitions and properties of morphological units: words, clitics, and affixes. Section 3 gives an overview of the definitions and properties of morphological typology: isolating, fusional/inflecting, agglutinative, and polysynthetic languages. Section 4 argues for the polysynthesis of Sakha and Tyvan by focusing on the lexical suffixes in the two Turkic languages. Section 5 illustrates examples of syntactic derivation in Sakha, Tyvan, andJapanese, and assertsthat the lexical integrity hypothesis is not a cross-linguistic principle.