Towards a Theory of Morphology as Syntax (2023, Studies in Chinese Linguistics, with Richard Kayne)

Abstract: Phenomena traditionally thought of as morphological can be accounted for in terms of syntactic operations and principles, hence bringing forth questions that traditional morphology fails to ask (for instance, concerning the licensing of empty morphemes). The language faculty contains no specific morphological component, nor any post-syntactic morphological operations.

Link

Morphology as Syntax 5 (University of Delaware, April 16 2027)

The LinguistList announcement for MaS 5 has been launched:

https://linguistlist.org/issues/37/2781/

Please register here:

https://sites.google.com/udel.edu/mas5/registration?authuser=0

Morphology as Syntax 5
Short Title: MaS5
Theme: Reducing morphology entirely to syntax

Date: 16-Apr-2027 - 16-Apr-2027
Location: Newark, Delaware, USA
Contact: Benjamin Bruening
Contact Email: bruening@udel.edu
Meeting URL: https://sites.google.com/udel.edu/mas5/home

Linguistic Field(s): General Linguistics; Morphology; Syntax

Submission Deadline: 15-Jan-2027

Merge is All You Need: An Esquisse of Morphology as Syntax (talk video)

Merge is All You Need: An Esquisse of Morphology as Syntax

YouTube Video

Chris Collins, New York University

August 24, 2026

Syntactic Pathways to Morphology, Online Lecture Series

Faculty of Philosophy, Languages and Human Sciences

University of São Paulo, Brazil

Merge is All You Need: An Esquisse of Morphology as Syntax (talk handout)

 Merge is All You Need: An Esquisse of Morphology as Syntax

handout

Chris Collins, New York University

August 24, 2026

Syntactic Pathways to Morphology, Online Lecture Series

Faculty of Philosophy, Languages and Human Sciences

University of São Paulo, Brazil

Syntactic Pathways To Morphology Online Lecture Series | Chris Collins (August 24, 2026)

Syntactic Pathways to Morphology (SPTM) is a monthly online lecture series hosted by the Department of Linguistics at the University of São Paulo, bringing together researchers working on the morphology-syntax interface, with a particular focus on syntactic approaches to morphology. Conceived as a forum for scholarly exchange, SPTM fosters discussion on the explanatory power of different theoretical mechanisms within syntactic theory in accounting for morphological phenomena.

Registration

Preliminary Book Proposal: Morphology as Syntax, volumes 1 and 2

 Preliminary Proposal: Morphology as Syntax, Volumes 1 and 2.

Abstract: The proposal is for a two-volume set dedicated to defining and exploring Morphology as Syntax, a new theory about the relationship between morphology and syntax.

Morphology as Syntax Workshop: Past, Present and Future

Goal: The purpose of this conference is to investigate the relationship between morphology and syntax, and in particular to investigate the extent to which morphological generalizations can be accounted for in terms of purely syntactic operations and conditions. 

MaS 6

ELTE Research Center for Linguistics, Budapest (Spring 2028)

Organizers: Marcel Den Dikken and Éva Dékány

MaS 5

University of Delaware (Spring 2027)

Organizer: Benjamin Bruening

MaS 4

Queens College and Stony Brook University (April 17, 2026)

Organizer: Francisco Ordoñez

MaS 3

UQAM (September 15-16, 2023)

Organizers: Tom Leu and Heather Newell

MaS2

UCLA (June 10-11, 2022)

Organizers: Stefan Keine, Hilda Koopman and Harold Torrence

MaS1

NYU (December 4-5, 2020)

Organizers: Chris Collins and Richard Kayne

Allomorphy without Context: An MaS Alternative

Abstract: Caha et. al. (2024) give an interesting account of the forms of adjectives in Czech. They propose that the different forms of the positive and comparative can be accounted for by a system of portmanteau lexical items, formalized in the Nanosyntax framework. In this squib, I give a alternative account of the data in the MaS (‘Morphology as Syntax’) framework (see Collins and Kayne 2023) without invoking portmanteau or Late Insertion. Rather, the account developed makes crucial use of the licensing of empty elements.

Allomorphy without Context: An MaS Alternative

A Very Short History of Mas (Morphology as Syntax)

December 2020

First version of “Towards a Theory of Morphology as Syntax” posted to Lingbuzz.

(published in 2023)

August 2018

Collins’ “The Logical of Contextual Allomorphy” posted to Linguzz. “I explore ways of analyzing contextual allomorphy that eschew reference to competition and blocking.”

December 2016

Kayne’s “What is Suppletive Allomorphy? On ‘went’ and ‘*goed’ in English’ posted to Lingbuzz (published in 2019). “These analyses do not invoke late insertion. It may be that late insertion is systematically unavailable.”

September 28, 2015

The name “Morphology as Syntax (MAS)” is proposed for first time.

December 13, 2012

Considering names for approach:

syntax-based morphology, Merge-based morphology, minimalist morphology

January 14-19, 2012

Long e-mail discussions about English past tense morphology.

January 14, 2012

Long e-mail discussion of “contextual allomorphy” with the conclusion that there is no contextual allomorphy.

Two Allomorphy Models without Late Insertion (Morphology as Syntax)

 Here is a handout from my seminar with Richard Kayne (Morphology as Syntax). On this handout, I outline two approaches to allomorphy not involving late insertion. This list is not meant to be exclusive. In fact, in the very same class period (September 23 2023), I presented yet another completely different model of allomorphy based on autosegmental phonology.