Conversion as Zero Affixation : Evidence from Affix Interaction

There are several conflicting views on the theoretical status of conversion in current morphological research. This paper reviews these different views and shows that conversion is better understood when it is viewed as affixation that involves zero morphemes. The arguments come from the overall simplicity of morphological operation, the overt similarity of conversion to derivation and the problem of approximate conversion. This paper will also examine the problems of conversion as zero affixation. It will be shown that the zero morphemes are problematic only in the framework of Lexical Morphology. With the incorporation of recent research, we can clearly see the interaction of overt and zero morphemes. This evidences that conversion is a kind of derivation by adding zero-morphemes.