Joseph E. Atkins, Dean of Students

Joseph E. Atkins, Dean of Students reading The Seven Sins of Memory by Daniel L. Schacter ( BF376 .S33 2001 )

Language processing and acquisition in languages of Semitic, root-based, morphology / Joseph Shimron

This book addresses a fundamental question in the morphological analysis and representation of Semitic languages&mdash;namely, whether Semitic word morphology is root based or word based. As Shimron suggests, &ldquo;there are reasons to view the templates, not the roots, as the more influential factor in determining Semitic morphology&rdquo; (p. 5). Yet, as others would argue, there are reasons not to disregard the root-based hypothesis altogether. In the case of Arabic morphology, for example, verbal forms inherently contain three nonlinear levels: the consonantal root, the vowel pattern, and the templatic prosody. This nonlinear feature provided a perfect illustration of what has become termed in the literature as root-and-patterns morphology (McCarthy &amp; Prince, 1986, 1990).<br />