Words don't come easy

This issue of Lingue e Linguaggio is a monographic volume dedicated to some fundamental subjects in current morphological theory. The issue contains four papers presented at the International Workshop “Words don’t come easy”, held in Verona on November 17-18 2008 and organized by some members of LiVe, a group of linguists active at the Dept. of Linguistics, Literature and Communication Sciences of the University of Verona. Moreover, two further thematically related articles are included in this issue. The papers collected within this volume explore the boundaries of morphology and its interfaces with prosodic phonology, syntax and lexical semantics, while challenging the traditional conception of morphology and its place within the language design. A special attention is dedicated to word formation and, in particular, to compounding, an acknowledged interface-phenomenon for its contiguity with phrasal syntax.