On the cognitive autonomy of morphological processing

Does morphological knowledge define an autonomous domain of grammar or is it rather the by-product of syntax-based principles and representations? We address this question by tapping a large body of cognitive language evidence, focusing on what is known about the way speakers learn, structure, access and use their mental morphological lexicon to parse and produce words. In line with the assumption that empirical evidence of concrete language usage can shed light on issues of domain-specificity in grammar, we conclude that it is difficult to reconcile usage-based language facts with the view that morphology is the syntax of morphemes. However, it would be equally misleading and logically unnecessary to characterise the functional autonomy of morphology from syntax in terms of processing modularity.