Korean KE compounds as novel evidence for phrase-to-word compounding in the syntax

Abstract

This paper reports on undocumented Korean data, dubbed as KE compounds and analyzes the structure thereof syntactically by alluding to detailed nominal structure and previous (re)analyses of compounding in the syntax, especially addressing the debate between Lexicalism and Anti-lexicalism. Korean KE compounds cannot be analyzed as typical CPs, despite surficial similarities, and they require an analysis with finer nominal structure and compounding in the syntax. Therefore, Korean KE compounding advocates the idea of finer nominal structure and syntactic operations substituting for lexical processes. The paper goes as follows. Firstly, I will outline the ongoing question in linguistic architecture around the lexicon, by addressing the major points and analysis on compounding that Lexicalism and Anti-lexicalism provide, respectively. Secondly, I will report Korean KE compounds data and show how they differ from typical Korean CP constructions. Lastly, I will analyze Korean KE compounding using finer nominal structure and the ideas of forming compounds using syntactic operations. That is, Korean KE compounding is an AspP-to-nP nominalization.