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On the Distinction between Regular and Irregular Inflectional Morphology: Evidence from Dinka

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 February 2026

D. Robert Ladd,
Bert Remijsen and
Caguor Adong Manyang
D. Robert Ladd*
Affiliation:
University of Edinburgh
Bert Remijsen*
Affiliation:
University of Edinburgh
Caguor Adong Manyang*
Affiliation:
University of Bahr El Ghazal
*
Linguistics and English Language, School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences, Dugald Stewart Building, 3 Charles Street, Edinburgh EH8 9AD, United Kingdom [bob.ladd@ed.ac.uk]
[b.remijsen@ed.ac.uk]
[adongdit@hotmail.com]
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Abstract

Discussions of the psycholinguistic significance of regularity in inflectional morphology generally deal with languages in which regular forms can be clearly identified and revolve around whether there are distinct processing mechanisms for regular and irregular forms. We present a detailed description of Dinka's notoriously irregular noun number inflection and suggest that no pattern can usefully be designated as regular. Psycholinguistic studies of Dinka would make a valuable contribution to our understanding of inflectional morphology crosslinguistically.

Keywords

DinkaNiloticdual-route hypothesisnumber markingirregular morphologysuprasegmentals

Information

Type
Short Report
Information
Language , Volume 85 , Issue 3 , September 2009, pp. 659 - 670
Copyright
Copyright © 2009 by Linguistic Society of America

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