Frequency and prototypicality determine variation in the Hungarian verbal 1 SG.INDEF

Rácz, Péter (2019) Frequency and prototypicality determine variation in the Hungarian verbal 1 SG.INDEF. Acta Linguistica Academica, 66 (4). pp. 601-620. ISSN 2559-8201

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Abstract

Abstract I provide a synchronic account of the variation between the marked and unmarked forms of the 1<sc>SG.INDEF</sc> of Hungarian (-ik) verbs; verbs that end in (-ik) in the 3<sc>SG.INDEF</sc>. I use a generalised mixed-effects regression analysis to explore how these forms vary in an extensive sample of the language, the Hungarian Webcorpus. I find that verbs' preference for the marked/unmarked form is determined by their lemma frequency and their prototypicality as members of the (-ik) class. These results are consistent with a morphological levelling account of variation in Hungarian verbal morphology, in which verbs migrate away from the minority (-ik) class and into the majority regular class. This suggests a picture of variation in Hungarian verbs that is shaped by lexical organisation, morphophonology, and social dynamics.

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