Abdessamed ZAARAOUI

This thesis investigates central issues in the phonology–morphology interface of Moroccan Arabic (MA) through a detailed examination of morphological exponence, with particular emphasis on Multiple and Cumulative Exponence. While exponence has long been recognized as a locus of irregularity in morphological systems, MA presents a rich yet underexplored domain in which single morphosyntactic features are systematically realized by multiple phonological formatives. Such patterns have often been marginalized in previous analyses or treated as non-canonical, obscuring their theoretical significance and typological relevance.

Adopting a constraint-based framework within Optimality Theory and its sub-frameworks, this study argues that multiple exponence in MA is neither accidental nor exceptional, but rather the outcome of ranked and interacting phonological, morphological, and prosodic constraints. The analysis demonstrates how seemingly redundant or discontinuous exponents emerge as optimal realizations under competing pressures on faithfulness, alignment, templatic well-formedness, and feature realization. By modeling these interactions, the thesis provides a unified account of exponence patterns that challenges morpheme-based and purely concatenative approaches.

Beyond descriptive adequacy, the thesis engages with broader theoretical questions concerning the representation, storage, and learnability of multiply exponentiated forms. It explores whether such forms are stored as independent lexical items or derived from shared lexical representations, situating the discussion within ongoing debates in morphological theory and acquisition. By grounding the analysis in MA, this work contributes novel empirical evidence to cross-linguistic typologies of exponence and advances our understanding of how complex morphological systems are structured, acquired, and cognitively represented. Ultimately, this thesis positions Moroccan Arabic as a key testing ground for theories of exponence and constraint interaction, revealing universal properties of morphological systems while highlighting the theoretical value of non-canonical patterns.