Declensions and conjugations are manifestations of language subregularity. But natural language lexicons are studded with sui generis lexemes. Such lexical irregularity occurs predominantly in the most frequently used items and thus cannot be ignored by NLP researchers. In the English verb have, for example, the stem loses its coda in the third person present tense singular form and in all past forms. With get, the peak is different in the present and past forms, and no suffixation takes place in the latter.
Have:
<> == Verb
<phn syl1 onset> == h
<phn syl1 peak> == {
<phn syl1 coda> == v
<phn syl1 coda past> == Null
<phn syl1 coda pres tense sing three> == Null.
Get:
<> == Verb
<phn syl1 onset> == g
<phn syl1 peak> == E
<phn syl1 coda> == t
<phn syl1 peak past> == Q
<mor suffix past> == Null.
The German noun Planet exhibits a unique inflectional pattern, omitting the expected declensional suffix in the nominative singular, whilst Herz omits the suffix in both the nominative and accusative singular forms.
Planet:
<> == Noun_J
<phn syl2 onset> == p l
<phn syl2 peak> == a
<phn syl1 onset> == n
<phn syl1 peak> == e:
<phn syl1 coda> == t
<mor suffix sing nom> == Null.
Herz:
<> == Noun_K
<phn syl1 onset> == h
<phn syl1 peak> == E
<phn syl1 coda> == r t s
<mor suffix sing nom> == Null
<mor suffix sing acc> == Null.
Exercise 6031
Provide lexical entries for the English verbs be, come, do, go, make and take.
Exercise 6032
Provide lexical entries for the German nouns Gott and Phosphor.
Exercise 6033
There are no irregular present participles in English. How can this be?
