Towards a Theory of Morphological Information

Most processual theories of morphology propose that inflectional operations apply to a pair involving a phonological form and a fully specified morphosyntactic feature array. This interpretation of inflectional operations denies the existence of any structure intervening between a stem and a word. Drawing on insights developed in information-based syntactic theories, this paper proposes an alternative processual theory. Articulated Morphology, which requires that inflectional operations apply to informationally impoverished representations and increase information. An analysis of Potawatomi verb morphology within this theory, contrasted with Anderson's 1992 analysis, shows that positing intervening structure has clear benefits.