Polysynthetisch

Polysynthetisch (English: polysynthetic) describes a typological feature of languages in which words, especially verbs, are formed with extensive morphological material. A single verb may incorporate many morphemes that encode the core predicate together with participants, circumstances, and evidential or modal information. In such languages, argument structure can be encoded within a word rather than by separate words.

Key characteristics include noun incorporation, where a nominal is included as part of the verb; highly synthetic morphology with long verb complexes; the use of affixes, infixes, circumfixes, and sometimes suppletive forms to mark tense, aspect, mood, evidentiality, and agreement with subject or object. Word order tends to be relatively free because the grammatical relations are carried by morphology. The boundary between what counts as a word and a clause is thus blurred.

Polysynthesis is found in several language families, most prominently in the Arctic and American regions. Eskimo-Aleut languages such as Inuktitut and Greenlandic are classic examples; other languages in the Americas also show polysynthetic traits. The degree of polysynthesis varies: some languages are highly polysynthetic, producing single words that express what would require a full sentence in other languages, while others are only partially polysynthetic.

The concept is typological rather than genealogical; polysynthesis can occur across unrelated families. It is distinct from agglutinative and fusional systems, though languages may combine features. For linguistic study, polysynthesis illuminates how morphology and syntax interact to encode meaning.