Lexical Licensing in Formal Grammar

Abstract

This paper discusses instances of restricted combinability of lexical items (words and multi-word units) with their contexts. Different subtypes of distributional idiosyncrasies are presented, which occur on the phonological, morpho-syntactical, and semantic levels. Notably, external sandhi, cranberry words, decomposable idioms and (idiosyncratic) polarity items are addressed. These phenomena reveal an interesting interplay with regular language as well as between the different levels themselves. A detailed lexicalist analysis is provided within a formal grammar framework, Head-Driven Phrase Structure Grammar. This approach motivates an architecture of grammar that includes a module to accommodate specific restrictions on the occurrence environment of a lexical unit.