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Productivity of the Weak Verbs in Romanian

Abstract This paper analyzes the productivity of weak verbs (1st conjugation with present in -ez and 4th conjugation with present in -esc) in Romanian. The weak model originated in two derivational patterns common to all Romance languages, that developed into inflectional mechanisms only in some of them. Among its sister languages Romanian has exploited most intensively the weak inflection. It has been maintained that Modern Romanian has a single fully productive class, namely the 1st conjugation. However, there is no analysis that clearly distinguishes the productivity of the weak vs. the strong model in the 1st conjugation and that determines the domains of competition between the 1st and the 4th conjugation, which is also productive. This paper tries to fill this lacuna by a more accurate analysis of the productivity in the Romanian verb inflection. Based on an analysis of modern and historical data, and using also data from an experiment with nonce words, the conclusion is that Modern Romanian has two fully productive classes: weak verbs of the 1st conjugation and weak verbs of the 4th conjugation. The competition between these two classes seems to be governed by diaphasic and phonological criteria.