Lexicalists assume that words with derivational morphology and compound words are not formed by syntactic transformation (Selkirk, 1982). The Lexicalist Hypothesis implies that the principles of universal grammar are not operative to word formation. / This thesis argues that a word is composed of lexical constituents and post-lexical constituents, and that the post-lexical constituents can incorporate into a verb, to form the complex predicate. This formational process is subject to syntactic constraints and principles. Therefore, I claim that the principles of universal grammar are also operative to word formation. This hypothesis will throw a new light upon the area of language acquisition of complex predicates.

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