A Consumer’s Guide to Contemporary Morphological Theories

When a linguist goes in search of “the best” theory in some domain, it is important for him or her to ask “best for what purpose?” Individuals will of course prefer to work with an approach that makes sense to them, one that complements—or at least does not contradict—other assumptions they hold with respect to grammatical theory. This is not to say, however, that “it’s all relative,” that theory choice is solely an aesthetic selection from among notational variants. The relative quality of a theory can be evaluated on empirical grounds, based on the particular predictions that the theory’s assumptions entail.