Punjabi Adjective Formation from Nouns: An OT Analysis

This study explains how prefixes are used when Punjabi adjectives are derived from nouns. It highlights only the prefixes used as adjective markers. The attachment of borrowed prefixes with native nouns as well as borrowed nouns to derive adjectives presents a very interesting phenomenon and same is the case with native prefixes. 11 prefixes out of 20 have the same semantics of negation, but they cannot be replaced with each other for the same word. Surprisingly, none of the rest of the prefixes has same semantics. OT is used as framework for the analysis of adjective formation and non-violable and violable constraints are devised.