ABSTRACT
This chapter considers recursion and argues that an analysis involving recursion is always simpler than, and therefore to be preferred to, one not involving recursion. It describes prosodic recursion viewed as a purely formal, expression-side para-phonotactic phenomenon within phonology, arguing that this maximally simply reflects para-syntactic recursion of the type. It also considers phrase-structural para-syntactic recursion, arguing for its viability in relation to Sudanese Arabic. Recursion is not necessary for linguistic or semiotic structure. The great majority of non-linguistic semiotic systems do not have recursion, and it has even been claimed that natural languages may lack syntactic recursion. Significantly, however, while the global phonetic evidence (above) runs counter to the notion of syntactic difference between 20 and 21, more detailed phonetic analysis provides support for syntactic difference.
