Mari and Udmurt do not require postsyntactic operations (A reply to Georgieva et al. 2021 and Guseva and Weisser 2018)

Abstract Georgieva et al. (2021) argue that negation in Meadow Mari and Udmurt requires the Distributed Morphology conception of grammar with a postsyntactic level of grammar where extrasyntactic operations take place. I show that, by modifying one of their assumptions, a purely syntactic head movement account becomes available that uses no operations other than those of the phrasal syntax. I further show that suspended affixation in Meadow Mari does not require postsyntactic operations, either, contra Guseva and Weisser (2018). I argue that the default view of grammar should be one where there are no operations other than those of the phrasal syntax, and there is only one level of grammar, the morphosyntax. Cases where extrasyntactic levels and mechanisms have been proposed, like Mari and Udmurt, can and should be analyzed in purely syntactic terms.