formswelke

Formswelke is a theoretical term in linguistics describing a class of inflected word forms whose choice depends on both grammatical features and discourse-pragmatic context. The term combines "forms" with the Dutch welke (which), signaling that the form encodes which features apply in a given situation. It is a proposed concept rather than a standard category in reference grammars.

Definition and structure: A formswelke is realized by a stem plus affixes or morphophonological changes that encode person, number, tense, and a pragmatic layer such as focus or definiteness. The defining property is context-driven selection: a function maps the contextual features to a single form from the lexeme’s available options. Variation across languages is expected.

Example: In a fictional language LangX, the verb mab yields formswelkes such as mab-1sg-PRES-FOC and mab-3pl-PAST-DEF. The first marks first-person singular in focus; the second marks third-person plural in past with definiteness. These forms illustrate how information-structure can be reflected in morphology within a single lexeme.

Applications and critique: The concept can inform computational morphology and natural language generation by tying form realization to discourse context. Critics caution that the notion may be overly abstract and language-specific, and empirical validation is needed before broad adoption.

See also: inflection, morphology, syntax, information structure.