A Description of Persian Derivational Suffix Ordering on the Basis of Complexity-Based Ordering Approach

Affix ordering is a theoretical discussion in morphology. Till now, three approaches considered affix ordering such as layered approach (siegel 1974), Selectional restriction approach (Fabb 1988) and complexity-based ordering approach (Hay and Plag 2000). The Complexity-Based ordering create the present theoretical framework article. The purpose of this research is assessing this approach in Persian derivational suffix ordering. For this end, about 41 Persian derivational suffixes are selected. Then from the Persian corpus of the Institute of Humanities and Cultural Studies 9172 derivative words is extracted. The results show that there is a covering between parsability continuum and Persian suffix ordering in the most cases. But this covering is not complete and, in some cases, parsability can’t describe some of the derivate combinations. According to Hay and Plag (2004), It seems that for presenting a description of Persian suffix ordering beside parsability we must consider the Selectional restriction on affixes.