The provided text, consisting of excerpts from René Kager's Optimality Theory textbook, offers a comprehensive overview of Optimality Theory (OT) within linguistics, particularly its application in phonology and morphology. It explains that OT replaces rule-based derivations with a system where universal constraints are hierarchically ranked to select the most optimal output from a set of candidates. A core tenet is the constant conflict and interaction between markedness constraints (favoring unmarked, universal patterns) and faithfulness constraints (requiring the output to match the input), with differences in ranking explaining cross-linguistic variation. The text illustrates these principles with detailed analyses of phenomena like syllable structure, epenthesis, neutralization, reduplication, and its extension to syntax and the problem of learnability in language acquisition.

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