The morphology-semantics interface in word formation

Laburpena

The main purpose of this paper is to expand the proposal for lexical decomposition presented in Mairal and Ruiz de Mendoza (this volume) as to cover word-formation processes. In doing so, Lieber’s conditions for a theory of lexical semantic representations is considered in detail as well as their role in the design of an adequate framework for a proper treatment of the processes that motivate semantic composition in word formation. In line with the Lexical Constructional Model, the central claim of this paper is that both free and bound morphemes are lexical predicates and, therefore, both are to be defined in terms of the same kind of semantic representation. Much like word lexical templates, affixal lexical templates are thus enriched by incorporating central aspects of Pustejovsky’s Qualia Theory