The More The Merrier: A Distributed Morphological Analysis of Occitan Verbal Morphology and Extreme Polymorphy in the Context of Language Attrition

Abstract

Occitan, a Gallo-Romance language spoken in the South of France, exists at an interesting nexus – it has been documented since the Middle Ages to exhibit polymorphy, the free variation of forms with identical semantic and pragmatic value, and also has been undergoing language attrition for centuries. Current literature has suggested that Occitan verbal polymorphy, in which up to four paradigms for a given verb can exist in free variation, has phonological roots and cannot be correlated with attrition at all, a surprising result given that attrition has infiltrated almost every aspect of Occitan grammar. Much of the polymorphy presented in the literature, however, cannot be explained solely through phonology, necessitating a morphological analysis. This thesis presents a novel analysis of Occitan verbal morphology and polymorphy through a Distributed Morphology framework, first analyzing verbs in the standard dialect and then extending into polymorphic paradigms. In addition to elucidating the vocabulary items and underlying rules governing standard verbal morphology, this analysis yields seven morphological processes that generate polymorphism in Occitan, all of which are correlated to language attrition patterns. While this does not imply that polymorphy and language decay are inherently linked in all circumstances, it indicates that Occitan morphology and grammar cannot be extricated from its sociolinguistic situation, suggesting future avenues for research in attrition, polymorphy, and minority languages.