Morphological Defectivity in Polish: Nouns

This post extends the discussion on morphological defectivity in Polish by including nouns. To that end, it follows the taxonomy proposed by Dyszak (2001)¹ and implemented in the the previous post. Taking into account the understaning of defectivity as a morphological phenomenon whereby the grammar is unable to generate certain inflectional forms, the landscape of Polish nominal defectivity can be expressed in terms of two main categories: nouns that are formally defective, and nouns that are defective both formally and functionally. A more granular representation of this classification is presented below:

• Formally defective nouns
  • Nouns that lack morphological case distinction in the singular but not in the plural forms: ‘muzeum’, ‘faksymile’, etc.
  • Nouns that lack morphological case distinction both in the singular and the plural: ‘escudo’, ‘peso’
  • Nouns that don’t decline by case or inflect by the grammatical number: ‘atelier’
  • Nouns that exist and decline only in plural: ‘sanie’ (sleigh), ‘chrzciny’ (christiening), ‘nożyczki’ (scissors), etc.
  • Nouns that exist only in the singular:
    • Nouns that decline by cases: ‘sanna’ (a road covered in snow)
    • Nouns that don’t decline by cases: ‘forum’, ‘profesor’ fem., ‘pekao’ (bank PKO)
• Formally and functionally defective nouns
  • singularia tantum
    • declinable by case: ‘złość’ (anger), ‘chuliganeria’ (hooliganism), etc.
    • non-declinable by case: ‘tabu’, ‘kworum’ (quorum)
  • Nouns existing only in the singular: ‘stryjostwo’ (uncles)
  • pluralia tantum
    • non-countable nouns such as: ‘fusy’ (dregs), ‘rodzice’ (parents)
  • Nouns existing only in the plural: ‘rodzice’ (parents)

Sources

1. Dyszak, A. (2001). Rzeczowniki i czasowniki defektywne w systemie fleksyjnym współczesnej polszczyzny. Bulletin de la Société Polonaise de Linguistique, 57, 141-154.