Quasi nambu-goldstone fermions

We explore in detail the hypothesis that quarks and leptons are the approximately massless quasi Goldstone fermions of a supersymmetric preon theory. In particular, we discuss the possible patterns of states emerging from the spontaneous breakdown of global symmetries in supersymmetric theories and construct the low-energy effective lagrangians describing the interaction of these states. In contrast to what happens in the Goldstone sector, the interactions of the quasi Goldstone fermions contain arbitrary parameters which directly reflect the preon dynamics. Various models are explored, including both models in which the weak interactions are residual and models where these interactions are fundamental. A variety of issues are addressed, from the universality and approximate SU(2)_L nature of the weak interactions, for the former class of models, to the generation of states beyond the quarks and leptons and the nature of the dynamical breaking of SU(2)_L×U(1), for the latter class of models. Open questions and speculations connected with the origin of families and the nature of fermion mass generation, including supersymmetry breaking, are also discussed.