An Optimality Approach to the Study of Syntactically Derived Nominals in Yoruba

Abstract

Most of the existing studies on nominal derivation in Yoruba exclusively employed rule-driven derivational frameworks, such as Government-Binding theory and Minimalist framework. This paper attempts an application of Optimality Theory to the study of nominal derivation in Yoruba, following the assumption that the well-formedness of derived nominals in natural language is ultimately governed by an interaction of conflicting constraints. It examines two categories of syntactically derived nominals: minimal projection and extended projection. Findings show that Yoruba, being a language which subscribes to the head parameter value head-first, ranks the alignment constraint ALIGN-LEFT very high. This is in conjunction with the markedness constraint which requires that every structure or projection is headed (OB-HD). Whereas minimally projected nominals satisfy STAY and NO-LEX-MVT, extendedly projected nominals violate them because the former category of nominals generally does not allow movement.