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Paradigmatic Saturation in Nuer

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2026

Matthew Baerman  and
Irina Monich
Matthew Baerman*
Affiliation:
University of Surrey
Irina Monich*
Affiliation:
Princeton University
*
[m.baerman@surrey.ac.uk]
[imonich@princeton.edu]
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Abstract

Nouns in Nuer (Western Nilotic) have been presented as an extreme example of inflectional complexity, where a ‘chaotic’ distribution of suffixes combines with dozens of different stem modifications to yield dozens of inflection classes (Frank 1999, Baerman 2012). We show that all of the apparent surface variety can be reduced to a handful of operations. The proliferation of inflection classes is due to a property we call paradigmatic saturation: practically every combination of inflectional operations is attested, yielding the maximum variety with the minimum of means.

Keywords

inflection classparadigmsmorphophonologyallomorphyNilotic

Information

Type
Research Report
Information
Language , Volume 97 , Issue 3 , September 2021 , pp. e257 - e275
Copyright
Copyright © 2021 Linguistic Society of America

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Footnotes

*

We would like to thank our Nuer language consultants for sharing their knowledge with us: John Nguany Gai Yok, Andrew Kuong, Yak Wichok, Chuol Tut, Mathew Juany Riek, John Chuol Kuek, Lam Muang, Phillip Muk, Jacob Gatkuoth, John Makuac, John Pelpel, and Buk Chuol Obek. We would also like to thank the following individuals and organizations for their input and assistance with data collection: Noam Faust, Sharon Rose, the University of California San Diego, and Princeton University. Helpful commentary on earlier drafts was provided by Greville Corbett and Patricia Cabredo Hofherr, and the suggestions from three anonymous referees contributed substantially to improving the paper. The research was funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council (UK) under grant AH/L011824/1 (‘Morphological Complexity in Nuer‘). Their support is gratefully acknowledged.

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