Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
Editors
Mouton de Gruyter
Berlin New York
Vowel Harmony
and Correspondence Theory
by
Martin Krmer
Mouton de Gruyter
Berlin New York
2003
ISBN 3-11-017948-2
Bibliographic information published by Die Deutsche Bibliothek
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Copyright 2003 by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, D-10785 Berlin.
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in writing from the publisher.
Cover design: Christopher Schneider, Berlin.
Printed in Germany.
Contents
Abstract
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
ix
xi
xii
Harmonic features
Single feature harmonies
Multiple feature harmonies
Restricted harmonies
Summary and discussion
The role of consonants in vowel harmony
The domain of harmony
Opacity and transparency
Opaque vowels
Transparent vowels
Trojans and Hybrids
Dominance, morphological control, and Umlaut
Setting the scene
Chapter 2
Optimality Theory and the formalisation of harmony
2.1
2.2
2.3
2.4
2.4.1
2.4.2
2.4.3
3
5
6
9
15
16
21
24
26
27
28
33
35
43
49
49
54
59
61
62
66
69
vi
2.5
Constraint coordination
Chapter 3
Cyclicity and phonological opacity as constraint coordination
and positional faithfulness
3.1
3.2
3.3
3.4
3.5
3.6
77
89
90
96
104
107
108
109
113
4.1
4.2
4.2.1
4.2.2
4.2.3
4.3
4.3.1
4.3.2
4.3.3
4.4
4.5
4.6
4.6.1
4.6.2
4.6.3
4.7
4.7.1
4.7.2
4.7.3
4.8
113
115
116
117
119
120
121
123
126
133
135
137
137
140
145
147
147
148
149
152
Introduction
Yoruba and anchoring
Harmony and the right word edge in Yoruba
An anchoring analysis of the asymmetry in roots
Harmony, anchoring, and affixation
Turkish anchoring and integrity
Left-anchoring
Root control and integrity
The exceptions
Dgma and integrity
Diola Fogni dominance as local conjunction
Pulaar affix control as positional faithfulness
The data
An analysis as affix control
Possible alternatives to affix control
Recent accounts
The alignment approach to harmony
First syllable faithfulness
The SAF approach to root control
Conclusion
Contents
vii
Chapter 5
Vowel transparency as balance
157
5.1
5.1.1
5.1.2
5.1.3
5.1.4
5.2
5.2.1
5.2.2
5.2.3
5.3
5.3.1
5.3.2
5.4
158
158
160
161
163
172
173
174
180
182
182
183
186
Chapter 6
Trojan vowels and phonological opacity
6.1
6.1.1
6.1.2
6.1.3
6.1.4
6.2
6.2.1
6.2.2
6.3
6.4
6.4.1
6.4.2
6.4.3
6.4.4
187
188
189
191
194
200
200
200
201
209
215
217
219
232
237
viii
6.5
6.6
242
244
Chapter 7
General conclusion
247
7.1
7.2
7.3
7.4
7.5
247
250
254
256
259
Overall summary
The ghosts of serialism
Underspecification and Lexicon Optimization
Factorial typology and constraint coordination
Outlook
Notes
Appendix I: Constraints
Appendix II: Languages
References
Index
263
271
277
283
299
Abstract
The aim of this book is twofold. One goal is to give a broad overview of the
patterns of vowel harmony that can be found in the world's languages. The
second and central goal is to give a unified account of these patterns within
Optimality Theory (henceforth OT, Prince and Smolensky 1993) and its
extension to Correspondence Theory (McCarthy and Prince 1995).
With respect to the second aim the question is justified why this should
be necessary, given the large amount of research that has been done on
vowel harmony within the framework of OT in recent years. In optimalitytheoretic accounts of vowel harmony a rich inventory of theoretical devices
has been applied and developed to explain various aspects of vowel harmony like vowel transparency, cyclicity and phonological opacity, relating
to the question whether OT can be maintained as a non-derivational
parallelist framework. I claim that this theoretical wealth is unnecessary
and propose an account of the relevant patterns in terms of local constraint
coordination (Crowhurst and Hewitt 1997, It and Mester 1998, ubowicz
1999, Smolensky 1993, and others) and positional faithfulness (McCarthy
and Prince 1995, Beckman 1995, 1997, 1998). The phenomenon of vowel
harmony proves an especially fruitful field for the application and further
development of the theory of local constraint coordination, since it reveals
some of the limits of constraint interaction and how these interactions and
their restrictions can be motivated on external grounds. Moreover, this
book gives additional arguments for the treatment of assimilation as
syntagmatic correspondence (Krmer 1998, 1999, 2001).
The book is divided in two large parts. First, I will give an overview of
vowel harmony patterns (chapter 1), showing in particular that we have to
add the pattern of affix controlled harmony to the typology of vowel harmony. After this I will introduce the fundamentals of Optimality and Correspondence Theory (chapter 2). The introductory section is completed by
the basic outline of my own proposal (chapter 3). In the second part I will
apply the proposed theory to a range of languages. Each case study is intended to contribute a specific piece to the puzzle. Yoruba, Turkish, and
Dgma show us how root control works in languages with prefixation,
suffixation, and both types of affixation, respectively. They provide insights into the intertwining of phonological faithfulness and morphological
organisation. In Diola Fogni, this morpho-phonological interaction is
broadly ignored by the phonology itself. Futankoore Pulaar is an illustration
for the existence of the mirror image of root control, affix controlled
Acknowledgements
This book grew out of my work in Janet Grijzenhout's research project on
lexical phonology and constraint-based phonology at the Heinrich-HeineUniversitt Dsseldorf. An earlier version was submitted as my PhD thesis
to the faculty of philosophy at the Heinrich-Heine-Universitt Dsseldorf.
This book would have been much poorer without the help of many,
many people. Bits and pieces of this work were presented at the Manchester
Phonology Meeting, GLOW 2001 in Braga, Portugal, the 'Jordanstown Linguistics Day' 2001, the SFB conference 'The Lexicon in Linguistic Theory'
in Dsseldorf, 2001, various SFB colloquia in Dsseldorf and Wuppertal,
and at the 19th SCL in Troms, Norway, 2002 and improved through the
critical comments of the audiences. I would like to thank the organisers and
the participants of these conferences on this occasion. The participants of
the Forschungsseminar and the Phonologie-Zirkel at the Heinrich-HeineUniversitt Dsseldorf had to endure various presentations of earlier versions of the ideas and analyses in this book. In particular I would like to
thank Diana Apoussidou, Heather Goad, Dafna Graf, Wolfgang Kehrein,
Paul Kiparsky, Sebastian Lbner, Albert Ortmann, Alexandra Popescu,
Carsten Steins, Barbara Stiebels, Jeroen van de Weijer, Richard Wiese and
Dieter Wunderlich for all their appalling and encouraging comments, suggestions and questions. More than anybody else I have to thank Janet
Grijzenhout for her support and guidance, who read various versions of
every chapter and never gave up.
Thanks go also to Orla Lowry and Alison Henry for reading and correcting the pre-final version. Tnde Vallyon, her husband Miklos, Andrea
Velich, Chris Pion, and Tuulikki Virta kindly helped me with the Hungarian and Finnish data.
The Sonderforschungsbereich 282 "Theorie des Lexikons" and the
University of Ulster supported the research reported in this work.
Finally, a big hug for my family and friends, and particularly for
Emanuela and Alessio for their encouragement, support, and inspiration.
Of course, nobody of all these people is to blame for any errors or
misconceptions in this book. The responsibility lies with the author.
Abbreviations
Abbreviations of optimality theoretic constraints are listed with the
definitions of constraints in appendix I.
AC
AG.NOM
ATR
bk
C
Cx
CG
CLASS
CON
CT
dat.
DIM
DIM.PL
EVAL
F
GCat
GEN
hi
imp.
ind.
IPA
L
LC
LCC
LCD
lo
LPM-OT
m.
MCAT
neg.
NOM
OCP
ODT
OT
Association Convention
agentive nominaliser
Advanced Tongue Root
back
Consonant
Constraint
Clitic Group
noun class marker
constraint set
Correspondence Theory
dative
diminutive
diminutive plural
Evaluation function in OT
feature
Grammatical category
Generator function in OT
high
imperfective aspect
indicative
International Phonetic Alphabet
left
Local constraint conjunction
Local constraint conjunction
Local constraint disjunction
low
Lexical Phonology/Morphology- OT
masculine
morphological category
negation
nominative
Obligatory Contour Principle
Optimal Domains Theory
Optimality Theory
Abbreviations
PCat
pl.
pres.
Pwd
R
rd
RTR
SAF
seg.
sg.
SPE
V
Phonological category
plural
present tense
Prosodic/phonological word
right
round
Retracted Tongue Root
Stem-Affixed-Form Faithfulness
segment
singular
Sound Patterns of English
Vowel
xiii
Part I:
The phenomenon and the theoretical
background
Chapter 1
An introduction to vowel harmony
The first issue to be addressed in this work is, of course, identifying the
phenomenon of vowel harmony. Even though vowel harmony is one of the
standard examples of phonological feature interaction in almost every
introductory textbook on linguistics, whatever its theoretical orientation,
there is little consensus on which phenomena exactly may be labelled
'vowel harmony' and which ones do not deserve this name, or which
characteristic property sets vowel harmony apart from other types of phonological assimilation. On this issue, see for instance the discussion in
Clements (1976) and Anderson (1980). For the current purpose, a rather
rough statement will be fully sufficient. I regard vowel harmony as the
phenomenon where potentially all vowels in adjacent moras or syllables
within a domain like the phonological or morphological word (or a smaller
morphological domain) systematically agree with each other with regard to
one or more articulatory features. The presence of a certain feature specification (either underlyingly or in the surface form) on a vowel triggers a
systematic alternation in vowels which are in direct neighbourhood on the
syllabic or moraic level of representation with the result that the involved
vowels look alike with respect to the active feature.
(1) Vowel harmony
a. disharmony1
[+F] [-F]
b. harmony2
[+F]
[+F]
V
[+F]
This description even though very vague excludes many types of Umlaut,
where (as in German) a neutral affix vowel imposes fronting on the preceding root vowel. Consequently, I will have nothing to say about umlaut in
this work.
Harmonic features
1.1
Harmonic features
and Hume (1995). In utilising feature labels like 'labial', 'palatal', 'coronal',
and 'dorsal', again an attempt is made to unify vocalic and consonantal features, acknowledging the various ways of interaction among both segment
types. Yet another possibility is an analysis in terms of abstract primitives
or radicals which eventually combine to more complex vowels, as proposed
in work by Kaye, Lowenstamm and Vergnaud (e.g., 1985). They assume
the three radicals I, U, and A to be the basic abstract components to derive
all other vowels.
There are two reasons for not using the latter three choices here. The
first is mere convenience, driven by the fact that the SPE/IPA-style features
are used in most of the literature. The second reason is that I do not intend
to contribute any argument in favour of one or the other approach, even
though the feature geometric approach to unified consonantal and vocalic
features as well as privative feature theory will be touched upon, where
they are relevant for the current discussion (see in particular sections 1.2
and 1.6, respectively). Similarly, I will only briefly enter the discussion
whether features are organised hierarchically as in feature geometry
(Clements 1985, see in particular Odden 1991 on vocalic feature geometry)
or not (as in the unstructured matrices in Chomsky and Halle 1968).
Instead, I will work on the hypothesis that vocalic features may be anchored prosodically, rather than in any root nodes or segments, but even
this statement serves as a working hypothesis only.
After these clarifying remarks on the nature of assumed features I will
advance to the actual topic of this section, an overview of attested harmony
patterns in terms of the affected features.
1.1.1 Single feature harmonies
One type of harmony affects the dimension of backness or palatality. This
type of harmony can be found in the Finno-Ugric languages (Kiparsky
2000a), as well in Turkic languages, Caucasian languages, in the NorthAmerican language Yawelmani (or Yowlumne)5, in Chamorro (van der
Hulst and van de Weijer 1995 and references cited there), and in many
other languages. In the example below some Finnish words are listed which
contain exclusively front vowels (3a) or exclusively back vowels (3b).
Harmonic features
'curve'
'stupid'
tond-esa
om-esa
sek-erera
'make to face'
'cause to get dry'
'laugh on and on'
bvum-isa
pind-irira
'make agree'
'to pass right through'
(Beckman 1997: 1)
The position of the tongue root, with an advanced tongue root (ATR), as,
e.g., in the vowel [o], in opposition to a retracted tongue root (RTR), as in
the vowel [o], is the active feature in Niger-Congo languages (e.g. Yoruba,
Wolof, Fula, Diola Fogni) and many Nilo-Saharan languages (Kalenjin,
Pkot, Maasai, Luo). Below are listed some Yoruba words, which have
only mid vowels. In such words, all vowels have to have the same ATR
specification. Forms like *CeCo or *C(Co (with 'C' standing for any consonant) are not attested in Yoruba. They violate the harmony requirement
on the ATR specification of vowels in a word. With words containing high
or low vowels as well the Yoruba pattern is more complex as will be discussed in chapters 4 and 6.
(6) Yoruba ATR harmony among mid vowels
a. ATR words
b. RTR words
eb
'heap for yams'
(s(
'foot'
epo
'oil'
(ko
'pap'
ol
'thief'
ob(
'soup'
ow
'money'
oko
'vehicle'
(Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1989: 177)
Geographically isolated occurrences of tongue root harmony henceforth
'ATR harmony' can be found for example in Nez Perce, a native North
American language, as well as in the two Afro-Asiatic languages Somali
(Cushitic) and Tangale (Chadic) (see Hall et al 1973 for an overview of
ATR harmony systems in African languages, and Hall and Hall 1980 and
Anderson and Durand 1988 on Nez Perce).
Additionally, there are several types of harmony which involve other
features than vocalic place features. In particular we find nasal harmony
Harmonic features
and retroflex harmony (see van der Hulst and van de Weijer 1995: 525).
For reasons of thematic and theoretical restriction, I will not go into the
details of these phenomena. For work on nasal harmony the reader may
consult Cole and Kisseberth (1994), Walker (1996, 1998), and much of the
work of Glyne Piggott (1992, 1996 and elsewhere).
1.1.2 Multiple feature harmonies
Besides the types of harmony which involve only one feature, there are
some combinations of features attested. In multiple feature harmony,
agreement between vowels is not only required for feature x in a language
but also for feature y. This pattern must be distinguished from cases where
a vowel changes two features to be opportune to a harmony requirement on
only one of the two features because the vowel system lacks the respective
allophonic vowel which differs only with regard to the active feature.
Warlpiri and Yawelmani are such cases. Warlpiri (Nash, 1979, 1986, van
der Hulst and Smith, 1985, Sagey, 1990, Cole 1991, Inkelas, 1994, Berry,
1998) has only the three vowels i, u and a (Nash, 1986: 65). In Warlpiri,
suffixes agree with their lexical host in terms of roundness and backness, as
shown in (324a,b).
(7) Warlpiri harmony
a. kurdu-kurlu-rlu-lku-ju-lu
'child-Prop-Erg-then-me-they'
'as for the children, they are with me'
b. maliki-kirli-rli-lki-ji-li
'dog-Prop-Erg-then-me-they'
'as for the dogs, they are with me'
c. minija-kurlu-rlu-lku-ju-lu
'cat-Prop-Erg-then-me-they'
'as for the cats, they are with me'
(Nash 1986: 86 cit. op. Inkelas 1994: 291, Berry 1998: 139)
However, if we consider (324c) as well it emerges that the harmonic feature
has to be backness, since with the root-final vowel a, the harmonic suffixes
turn out with a back vowel, which is disharmonic with the root vowel in
10
Harmonic features
11
In this case, roundness harmony is not triggered by the limits of the vowel
inventory, since Turkish has the rounded and unrounded variants of both
the high front vowels as well as those of the high back vowels.
That in Turkish backness harmony can occur without roundness harmony is an indicator that here two rules or constraints are operative. Odden
(1991) discusses Eastern Cheremis and Tunica in which both features can
be analysed as being subject to one rule or constraint only.
I am not aware of languages where roundness harmony and height harmony co-occur. In Yawelmani (Kuroda 1967), only those vowels harmonise which are of the same height. The restricted vowel inventory does not
allow a decision on whether roundness or backness is the harmonic feature.
If Yawelmani turns out to be a case of rounding harmony (which I doubt),
then this instance of harmony is at least tied to height harmony. Height harmony is no active process in this language, but if vowels agree in height,
then this agreement triggers rounding harmony.
Labial harmony may co-occur with ATR harmony, as attested in the
Niger-Congo language Dagaare (Bodomo 1997) or in Chumburung and Igbo (see van der Hulst and van de Weijer 1995, p. 523 and references cited
there). However, the few instances of roundness harmony combined with
ATR harmony are quite dubious in that the second harmonising feature
could also be backness instead of roundness.
Compare in this respect the examples from Dagaare, cited from Bodomo
(1997: 24). In Dagaare, the imperfective suffix -ro/ -ro/ -re/ -r(/ -ra alternates not only with respect to ATR but also with respect to roundness according to Bodomo. In (9a) we find words with round vowels only, while
the vowels in the words in (9b) are all nonround. At the same time, the suffix vowels alternate in backness. One of both alternations, i.e. either backness or roundness alternation, is triggered by the asymmetry of the vowel
system, which has only front unrounded and back rounded vowels, and
lacks front rounded as well as back unrounded vowels (with the exception
of the vowel D). Since the suffix vowel is forced to change always both
feature specifications (i.e., backness and roundness), in order to harmonise
with the preceding vowel with respect to one of the two features, it cannot
be determined whether the active feature is backness or roundness. The
usual case is that roundness harmony occurs only in systems with a
phonemic rounding contrast among both front as well as back vowels. The
same holds for ATR harmony. Systems which do not distinguish phonemically between ATR and RTR vowels are unlikely to display ATR
harmony. Dagaare lacks the rounding contrast, but, nevertheless, has a
12
b8oro
m8oro
b88ro
'looking for'
'wrestling'
'discussing/planning'
'to rain
'to discover'
'to grind roughly'
miire
piire
gbiere
'raining'
'discovering'
'grinding roughly'
s,,r,
1m(
kp(
'to touch'
'to beat'
'to enter'
s,,r(
1m,(r(
kp,(r(
'touching'
'beating'
'entering'
c. kpa
la
mar,
'to boil'
'to laugh'
'to paste'
kpaara
laara
mara
'boiling'
'laughing'
'pasting'
b. mi
piiri
gbe
The data in (9c) suggest that the feature height or lowness plays an active
role here as well, since the affix vowel surfaces as nonlow with nonlow
root vowels and as low with a low root vowel.
According to Akinlabi (1997), the language Kalabari (Niger-Congo)
displays an instance of restricted backness harmony combined with ATR
harmony. This language has no phonemic rounding contrast either. Kalabari, however, shows evidence that the second harmonising feature (besides
ATR) is backness, not roundness. The low vowel a combines with high
vowels of either backness value, but it is not found with instances of e in
adjacent syllables within a word. Since a can hardly be described as being
rounded Akinlabi concludes that the harmonically active feature has to be
backness.
A more straightforward example of a combination of height harmony
with ATR harmony can be found in the Bantu language Kimatuumbi
Harmonic features
13
(Odden 1991, 1996). Van der Hulst and van de Weijer (1995: 520, and
references cited there) mention Klao and Togo-remnant languages in this
respect as well. According to Odden, Kimatuumbi has a set of super high
vowels L and X, and a set of high vowels i and u, which are roughly equivalent to the sets i and u versus , and 8, which differ in their ATR specification (Odden 1991: 281, 1996: 5). The mid vowels e and o are lax, i.e.
RTR, and the low vowel D is retracted as well. Within a word, all vowels
have to agree with respect to ATR and height. The vowel D does not participate in this pattern. It occurs freely with all sorts of vowels. The pattern
can best be observed with the causative suffix -iy which surfaces as -iy, -,y,
or -(y, depending on the quality of the preceding root vowel in (10).
(10) Height and ATR harmony in Kimatuumbi
a. Root plus low affix vowel
b. Root plus nonlow affix vowel
t-a
'to pull'
t-iy-a
'to make pull'
yb-a
'to steal'
yb-iy-a
'to make steal'
y8y88t-a
'to whisper'
y8y88t-,y-a
'to make whisper'
b,,k-a
'to put'
b,,k-,y-a
'to make put'
goonj-a
'to sleep'
goonj-(y-a
'to make sleep'
ch((ng-a
'to build'
ch((ng-(y-a
'to make build'
kat-a
'to cut'
kat-iy-a
'to make cut'
(Odden 1991: 281)
Hyman (2002), citing data from Paulian (1986a,b, 2001), describes a
harmony pattern involving three features. Klo1, a Bantu language spoken
in southern Cameroon, displays a combination of ATR harmony with
front/backness harmony and rounding harmony. In the examples in (11),
the last vowel of the word alternates according to the ATR, backness and
roundness specification of the preceding vowel. Underlying /a/ can be
realised as either a, e, (, o or o depending on the context. (Note that the
vowel u in the prefix in all these words has no possible more harmonic
alternants, i.e., the vowels 8, y, <, , are not part of the Klo1 vowel
system. For this reason, the language allows disharmony between this
prefix and the root vowel.)
(11) ATR, backness and roundness harmony in Klo1
a. /k-tm-/
k-tm-
'creuser'
/k-fk-/
k-fk-
'fermer'
14
b. /k-fn-/
/k-s(l-/
k-fn-
k-s(l-(
'ddaigner'
'plucher'
c. /k-ps-/
/k-kok-/
k-ps-
k-kok-o
'aboyer'
'tirer'
d. /k-yn-/
k-yn-
'to play'
(Hyman 2002)
Complete copying of all vocalic place features from one vowel to the next
is observed in a variety of languages, such as, for instance, Yucatec Maya,
a native Central-American language (Krmer 1999, 2001) or Ainu, which is
spoken in Japan (It 1984). This instance of total harmony does not apply
across the board but is restricted to vowels in some morphemes only, as
illustrated by the data in (12). The imperfective and the subjunctive suffix
for intransitive verbs in (12a,b) always surface with the vowel quality of the
preceding root vowel, while the imperfective suffix for transitive verbs and
the perfective marker in (12c,d) have invariable feature specifications.
(12) Yucatec Maya complete harmony and disharmony:
a. Intransitive imperfective
b. Intransitive subjunctive
ah-ak
wake.up-SUBJ
ah-al
wake.up-IMPF
ok-ol
enter-IMPF
ok-ok
enter-SUBJ
lub'-ul
fall-IMPF
lub'-uk
fall-SUBJ
wen-el
sleep-IMPF
wen-ek
sleep-SUBJ
kim-il
die-IMPF
kim-ik
die-SUBJ
c. Transitive imperfective
yil-ik
see-IMPF
tsol-ik
explain-IMPF
put6-ik
hit-IMPF
d. Perfective
yil-ah
see-PERF
tsol-ah
explain-PERF
put6-ah
hit-PERF
(Krmer 1999: 184f.)
Harmonic features
15
as reduplication, since harmony applies only between the root vowel and a
few affix vowels and the process is not iterative. Given that this type of
complete harmony affects maximally one vowel in a word it could be
regarded as separate from vowel harmony, just as umlaut.
In the following paragraphs I will introduce harmony systems in which
only a subset of the vowel inventory is subject to a harmony requirement as
well as cases in which both the trigger and the target have to meet a criterion which activates the process.
1.1.3 Restricted harmonies
In many languages, vowel harmony applies only if the target and/or the
trigger of harmony meet certain criteria which can usually be defined in
terms of features which themselves are potential harmonic features. For
instance I have mentioned already that in Yawelmani vowels have to agree
in height in order for backness or roundness harmony to be applicable. The
affix -hin/ -hun is realised with the front high vowel when preceded by a
front high vowel and it has a back high vowel when preceded by a back
high vowel in (13a). In combination with a root containing a nonhigh
vowel, the high affix vowel invariably turns out as i (13b). The nonhigh affix vowel in (13c,d) agrees in backness and roundness only with nonhigh
root vowels. In combination with a high vowel in the root, it surfaces as D,
regardless of the backness/roundness specification of the root vowel.
(13) Yawelmani height uniform harmony
a. xil-hin
'tangles, non-future'
dub-hun
'leads by the hand, non-future'
b. xat-hin
bok'-hin
'eats, non-future'
'finds, non-future'
c. xat-al
bok'-ol
'might eat'
'might find'
d. xil-al
'might tangle'
dub-al
might lead by the hand'
(Cole and Kisseberth, 1995: 1f)
In Turkish, rounding harmony affects only high vowels. Only these vowels
alternate in their rounding specification in order to meet the rounding harmony requirement. Nonhigh affix vowels are invariably unrounded.
16
Kaun (1994) gives a typology of triggering factors for rounding harmony. She reports on languages where the undergoer of rounding harmony
must be a high vowel as in Turkish. Hixkaryana, Kachin and Tsou allow
rounding harmony only among high vowels. In Eastern Mongolian dialects,
Murut and Tungusic languages, both trigger and target must be nonhigh
vowels. Yakut allows rounding harmony only if trigger and target are of the
same height or if the target is a high vowel. In Chulym Tatar and
Karakalpak, rounding harmony applies among all front vowels, but among
back vowels the target must be a high vowel in order to show rounding
harmony. Kyzyl Khakass shows the same pattern of front vowels as the
latter two languages but is more restrictive with back vowels in that among
these trigger and target have to be high vowels. Finally, Kaun lists KirghizB and Altai where harmony applies unlimited among front vowels while
back vowels have to agree in height or the back target has to be a high
vowel.
Donnelly (2000) reports on Phuthi, a Bantu language, in which tongue
root harmony applies only among vowels of the same height. High vowels
agree in tongue root position with other high vowels, and mid vowels agree
with mid vowels, while the only low vowel is excluded from the pattern,
and neither high vowels trigger tongue root alternations in mid vowels nor
is the reverse the case. Tunica (Odden 1991) allows alternation to conform
to backness/roundness harmony only in low vowels.
What is most obvious from all these examples is that harmony patterns
are shaped by the dimension of height in most cases, and that the choice
between rounding and unrounding is more restricted in back vowels than in
front vowels.
1.1.4 Summary and discussion
So far we have seen which features can function as harmonic features and
which combinations of features are attested in the world's languages to
date. Chart (14) shows possible harmony types and possible combinations
of features in harmony. & marks attested types, while ' marks unattested
harmonies, and those harmony types of which no clear instances have been
found are indicated by a question mark.
Harmonic features
&
&
&
&
?
'
&
?
?
Feature combinations
backness + roundness
backness + height
backness + ATR/RTR
height + ATR/RTR
roundness + ATR/RTR
roundness + height
backness + roundness + ATR
backness + roundness +height
backness + height + ATR
17
example language
Finnish
Warlpiri?
Shona
Yoruba
Kikongo
example language
Turkish; Eastern Cheremis
Yucatec Maya (see also viii.)
Kalabari
Kimatuumbi
-Klo1
Yucatec Maya ?
Dagaare
high
colour
low
back
round
18
representation above) and instead the root node is associated with a neighbouring node of the same type as the delinked node. Contrary to this
assumption it seems as if two-feature harmonies in many cases involve
separate actions, i.e. separate rules or separate instances of constraint interaction. The harmony pattern in a language like Warlpiri can quite elegantly
be analysed as double linking of the colour constituent, since vowels automatically change their roundness specification, when backness alternation
is required by the harmony rule or constraint. However such an analysis
either ignores the fact that the alternation of two features is triggered by the
restricted vowel inventory, or it accounts for this fact redundantly. Harmony systems like the Turkish one cannot be analysed by the assumption
of a rule affecting the whole colour node, since backness harmony applies
even if rounding harmony is blocked. We would expect a pattern where the
inapplicability of harmony with regard to one of the two features blocks
harmony of the other feature. Furthermore, with such a representation it
seems somewhat astonishing that backness harmony is paired with ATR
harmony in some instances.
From an articulatory perspective it seems only natural that height and
ATR/RTR harmony co-occur since it is more natural for low vowels to
have a retracted tongue root, while it is more natural for high vowels to
have an advanced tongue root position in the sense that the articulatory
gestures are easier to combine than the opposite combinations (i.e., low
plus advanced and high plus retracted respectively, realised by a movement
of two parts of the tongue into the opposite direction, and which should be
particularly inconvenient for the latter feature combination). Hall et al.
(1974) argue that it is also more natural for advanced vowels to be front
rather than to be back, which can also be explained on grounds of the involved articulatory movement of the different parts of the tongue. They cite
in this respect the example of Somali (as described in Tucker and Bryan
1966: 496), a language with ATR harmony in which all ATR vowels are
front, but vowels with retracted tongue root position occur as front and as
back. In this language all back vowels which are [+ATR] have become
fronted historically and retained their original rounding specification. The
result is the quirky vowel system in (16), which is asymmetric in the sense
that the ATR set lacks back vowels, while it is overcrowded with front
vowels, and the RTR set in contrast contains the basic set of front and back
vowels.
Harmonic features
19
RTR set
front
back
,
8
(
o
a
The Somali harmony data in (17a) seen in isolation could mislead a linguist
to assume backness harmony to be at work here. The suffix vowel is back
with a back root vowel and front with a front root vowel. The data in (17b)
bring light into the misty scenery, which is obscured by the asymmetry of
the inventory. Here we see that it is not the backness of the root vowel
which triggers alternation in the affix vowel but rather the difference in
tongue root position in the root vowel which causes the alternation of the
low vowel from retracted to advanced tongue root, which is accompanied
by a backness alternation. In the first item in (17b), the root vowel is front,
but the affix vowel is disharmonically back. Thus, the harmonic feature
must be ATR/ RTR, not backness.
(17) Somali vowel harmony
singular
plural
a. sab
sab-o 'outcast'
'4d
'4d- 'piece of meat'
b. r((r-ka
gees-k4
'the village'
'the horn'
From a historical perspective one might imagine that we see a system here
which is about to change from an ATR type of harmony to a mixed system,
including also backness harmony. If in a next historical step, the front retracted vowels are moved backwards to minimise the articulatory tension
between tongue root position and the position of the back of the tongue, as
well as to maximise the contrast between the pairs i ~ ,, and e ~ (, respectively, we end up with a system similar to that of Turkish. The backwards
movement of unrounded front vowels creates an apparent roundness
contrast among back vowels just as fronting of advanced rounded back
vowels has created an apparent rounding contrast within the set of front
vowels. Former ATR harmony can now be reinterpreted as backness
harmony. This is illustrated in the table in (18).
20
b. In vowel harmonies:
ATR & height
ATR & backness
backness & roundness
21
vowel (Maas 1999), while the front unrounded vowels can be said to use all
feature dimensions except height to optimise sonority.
The low vowel D does not need to explore the backness dimension
because it already is maximally sonorous, the exhaled air has got the maximum space to escape. Fronting would be accompanied by raising and, thus,
reduce sonority in this case, whereas with all other vowels fronting increases sonority, as does spreading of the lips.
A drawback to this assumption is of course that usually a sonority hierarchy is assumed where D is more sonorous than e, which is more sonorous
than o which is more sonorous than i, which is more sonorous than u. According to the above argument, the sonority relation between o and i should
be the reverse.
Odden (1991) gives an argument from acoustic phonetics for his back/
round and height/ATR constituents. Backness and roundness are reflected
in the height of the second formant, while height and ATR have an impact
on the first formant. With respect to the back/round correlation also Kaun
(1993) observes that rounding lowers the second formant of a vowel and a
relatively low value of the second formant is the characteristic feature of
back vowels as well. Hence, (de)rounding enhances the backness contrast
(at least among nonlow vowels), in Kaun's view.
In short, there is a natural correlation of backness and roundness, but the
motivation might be different from that of the other featural correlations in
single segments as well as in harmony systems. I will leave this issue at this
point and move on to a brief discussion of the role of consonants in vowel
harmony.
1.2
22
Hulst and van de Weijer cite as an example the language Bashkir, which
has backness and roundness harmony. In words with front vowels only,
dorsals are realised as velar, and in words with back vowels, the dorsal
consonants are uvular. Turkish is slightly more complicated. It has the
palatal and non-palatal variants of the consonants k, g, and l (Clements and
Sezer 1982: 233f.). There are minimal pairs among stems which only differ
in the palatality of one of these consonants. However, most of these consonants agree in palatality with the vowel with which they share a syllable.
Some disharmonic stem-final consonants behave less harmlessly: they
trigger palatal assimilation to their specification in following affixes. Alternation of the primary place feature is found for instance in the interaction of
consonants and vowels in Warlpiri. Labial consonants are always followed
by u in this language (van der Hulst and van de Weijer p. 529, Berry 1998).
A case where consonants shape the vowels of the whole word can be
found in Coeur d'Alene (Doak, 1992, Mithun, 1999, and references there).
Coeur d'Alene has a set of 'faucal' consonants (T, T
, Tw, T
w, [. , [. w, ,
, w,
w,
r. , r
. ), which cause retraction or lowering in preceding vowels. The pattern is
illustrated in (20). The vowels which change to conform with the retraction
of the consonant are underlined, triggers are boldfaced.
(20) Coeur d'Alene
a. c-t
c(-alTw
'it is long'
'he is tall'
i/(
b. [. (c-p
t-[. $c-[. c-us
(/$
c. s-tpm-lxw
s-pom-$lqs
u/o
(Doak 1992: 3-4)
23
aperture
C-place
V-place
...
[labial]
[labial]
[coronal]
[coronal]
[dorsal]
[dorsal]
(Clements and Hume 1995: 276)
24
25
s4 meyei. According to Hall et al., the harmony pattern of the whole clause
is shaped by the last element, the verb in both cases.
(22) Somali clause harmony
a. b(ra '8s8b ba lo b(ra,
'New gardens were cultivated for them'
b. ber4 'sb b4 l s4 meyei
'New gardens were made for them'
Cahill and Bodomo (2000) found that particles in Konni agree with their
syntactic host with respect to the feature ATR, and that here the syntactic
configuration is crucial rather than any morphological or prosodic category.
In Finnish, harmony is restricted to the same domain as stress assignment and syllabification. Main stress is assigned to the first syllable of a
word. Since Finnish is a suffixing language, the stress-bearing unit is always the first syllable of the root. Proclitics, which do not influence the
placement of stress, only participate in vowel harmony in fast speech
(Skousen 1975). From the inactive behaviour of clitics with regard to both
processes, it can be concluded that the domain of vowel harmony coincides
with that of the prosodic word in Finnish.
In Turkish, the issue is a little more complicated. Harmony affects all
affixes, but also postclitics, which are clearly outside the domain of stress
assignment (Kabak and Vogel 2000, in press). Kabak and Vogel (2000)
base their claim that Turkish harmony applies rather within the domain of
the Clitic Group (Nespor and Vogel 1986) than within the prosodic word
on the participation of clitics in harmony. Some affixes in Turkish block the
harmony process and start their own harmonic domain. These affixes behave irregularly with regard to stress assignment as well. On the basis of
this observation Kabak and Vogel (in press) argue that vowel harmony in
Turkish simply goes from an underlyingly specified vowel up to the next
specified vowel. It remains an open question in this analysis why disharmonic affixes are also irregular with respect to stress assignment.
Problematic for a clearer definition of the domain of vowel harmony is
also the fact that in most languages compounds consist of as many harmonic domains as compound members. If each of these stems also constitutes a single domain of syllabification and stress assignment of its own one
may again posit the prosodic word as the domain of vowel harmony. In
derivational accounts, the autonomy of each compound member is seen as
26
evidence for the claim that vowel harmony is a lexical process while
compounding applies post-lexically.
Van der Hulst and van de Weijer (1995) argue that because disharmonic
affixes often do not constitute a prosodic unit of their own with regard to
syllabification, and because of the fact that in many languages we find
many roots which have disharmonic vowels, vowel harmony refers to some
morphological unit and happens somewhere within the morphological derivation. If vowel harmony is indeed linked to the morphology, this may be
an indication on the function of vowel harmony. One possible function
could be to mark certain morphological boundaries to deliver a cue for the
listener in the interpretation of speech. Vroomen, Tuomainen and de Gelder
(1998) report that Finnish test persons find it easier to detect word boundaries if there is a mismatch in vowel harmony preceding them than without such a mismatch. From their comparison of word detection tasks performed by Finnish, Dutch and French test persons, they conclude that stress
as well as vowel(dis)harmony are language-specific cues to the retrieval of
word boundaries.
The other often claimed motivation behind vowel harmony is simply
ease of articulation. This would explain why in Finnish fast speech for example the harmony domain is extended to the proclitics.
Now that I have discussed the basic issues of which features can be active in harmony, whether the phenomenon is restricted to vowels or not and
in which domain it applies, it is time to move to those aspects of vowel harmony which will be central for this book.
1.4
27
'start' (nom.)
d. ped-na-n-go
'untied me'
'answer' (nom.)
peer-na-n-go 'compelled me'
'compelled'
ob-na-g-g8 called you' (pl.)
'untied'
ib-na-m-g8 'cooked for us'
'tree' (dim.)
kulag-do
'her frying pan'
'dog' (dim.)
(van der Hulst and van de Weijer 1995: 497)
In (23a), we see that affixes, such as u/8 and o/o, alternate in their ATR
specification in accordance with the adjacent root vowel. (23b) illustrates
the triggering capacity of the low vowel D in case it is a root vowel and is
followed by a potential undergoer of harmony. (23c) shows that root
vowels do not assimilate to the low vowel, regardless of whether the low
vowel precedes the potential target vowel in the root or follows it. Finally
(23d) shows that when the low vowel is preceded by a disharmonic root
vowel, the vowel following the low vowel agrees with the low vowel,
rather than with the root vowel, with regard to ATR. The low vowel is
28
opaque in the sense that the ATR spreading action or harmony rule cannot
pass through it. Instead, the opaque vowel initiates a new harmonic domain.
This is rather trivial and gives evidence for the theoretical claim that
harmony applies somehow locally in that it affects adjacent vowels only.
However, this fact can also be used as evidence for serial derivation of
output forms or the directionality of vowel harmony.
The issue becomes more interesting when another kind of harmony,
namely affix-controlled harmony (to be introduced in section 1.5) is considered in chapter 3.6. The behaviour of opaque vowels in such a system
reveals that vowel opacity is anything else but evidence for serial or cyclic
derivation. However, I will postpone this discussion to the indicated chapters and go on with transparent vowels.
1.4.2 Transparent vowels
Transparent vowels, in contrast to opaque vowels, pose a problem for the
assumption that phonological feature assimilation is local per se. A transparent vowel is one that is immune to assimilation as well, but instead of
initiating its own harmonic domain to one side, the vowel lets the harmonic
feature specification 'pass through' from one side and affect the vowel to its
other side.
Regard in this respect the examples from Wolof. Wolof has ATR harmony like Tangale, which is illustrated by (24a). High vowels trigger advancement of the tongue root in affix vowels (24b). If a high vowel intervenes between two nonhigh vowels, the rightward nonhigh vowel is not affected by its direct neighbour but surfaces with the ATR specification of
the far away nonhigh vowel (24c).
(24) Wolof harmony and transparency
a. r(r-on
'had dinner'
rer-on
'was lost'
(Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994: 227)
b. gis-e
sul-e
nir-o
jit-le
c. t(r-uw-on 'welcomed'
t(k-ki-l(n 'untie!'
29
The high vowels are transparent in that they are skipped by harmony.
Progressive assimilation proceeds on the right side of these vowels notwithstanding their antagonistic feature specification. This phenomenon has led
phonologists to a variety of assumptions about the nature of phonological
features and their interaction in the generation of speech. In his summary of
the main types of analysis applied to transparency, Bakovi (2000) lists
three basic approaches.
One group of authors simply abandons the assumption of locality and
assumes that the harmony process literally skips the transparent vowels
(i.e., Anderson 1980, Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1987, Booij 1984, Cole
and Kisseberth 1994, Ka 1988, Kiparsky 1981, Ringen 1975, Smolensky
1993, Spencer 1986, Steriade 1987, Vago 1988). These types of analysis do
not acknowledge, however, that most instances of phonological feature
assimilation are indeed strictly local, like consonantal place assimilation,
and that even vowel harmony respects certain restrictions on the distance in
which the process applies.
In the account of Calabrese (1995), and Halle, Vaux and Wolfe (2000)
for instance, it is assumed that harmony is not spreading of the harmonic
feature from segment to segment, feature node to feature node, or feature
bearer to feature bearer, but rather applies only to those segments which are
contrastively specified for the harmonic feature.
(25) Locality of harmony with a contrastive feature
X
Y
(Halle, Vaux and Wolfe 2000: 399)8
[back]
where
(or [ATR])
X = a segment contrastively specified for [back] (or [ATR])
Y = a segment that can bear a [back] (or [ATR])
specification
30
this means that the two high vowels are ignored by the rule spreading
[ATR] because they do not bear this feature contrastively.
The difference between languages with transparent vowels and languages with opaque vowels then lies in the exact formulation of the spreading rule. We will see below in chapter 6 that Yoruba high vowels are
opaque to ATR harmony and that the Hungarian high front vowel is opaque
to backness harmony. The difference between these two languages and
Wolof and Finnish (which displays backness harmony with transparent i
and e, see chapter 5), respectively, then lies in the different definition of the
trigger and target in the spreading rules of each language. The spreading
rule operative in Wolof and Finnish applies to contrastively specified
vowels only, while the respective spreading rule in Yoruba and Hungarian
has to apply to all segments specified for the harmonic feature.
Though this account saves at least a relativised notion of locality, it
raises the question why languages should make such a subtle difference in
their rules at all. A further question arising in the context of this analysis is
why the low vowel which served as an example of an opaque vowel in (23)
does not behave as transparent in many languages (see also the behaviour
of the low vowel in Akan; Clements 1976).9 Either such a low vowel is repaired with another nonhigh vowel, which does not exactly match the feature profile of the low vowel or it behaves as opaque to the harmony process. The last objection is tied to the role of the transparent vowel in the
harmony process. In such an analysis, the vowel is not only transparent, it
is also inactive as a trigger (i.e., it is supposed to be completely neutral).
Thus, we would expect that alternating affix vowels would surface with
their underlying feature specification when preceded by a transparent/
neutral vowel only. As will be shown in chapters 5 and 6, such 'transparent/
neutral' vowels impose severe restrictions on their environment, which runs
counter to the prediction made by such accounts.
A similar idea underlies accounts in which vowel transparency is seen
entirely as an effect of different representations for the different vowels. A
theory of this kind is advocated by van der Hulst and Smith (1986) for instance. Since they attempt to explain the behaviour of Trojan vowels as
well with their theory I popstpone discussion of this account until after the
introduction of these vowels.
In the second type of approach feature copying is assumed instead of a
spreading device (Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994, Pulleyblank 1996).
The copying mechanism assumed by Pulleyblank (1996) crucially relies on
featural alignment constraints. I will argue later that the device of featural
31
32
c. dor-at-(
genn-al(
33
Apart from opaque and transparent vowels there is, however, a third and
fourth type of vowel which display a remarkable behaviour with regard to
their neighbours, viz. the one group systematically disagrees with its neighbour, while the other causes free alternation in adjacent potentially harmonic vowels. These vowels may be best illustrated with an example from
Hungarian.
1.4.3 Trojans and Hybrids
Hungarian displays backness harmony, but lacks the back alternant to the
two front nonlow vowels i and e. Usually, vowels following one or more of
these two vowels in a word have the backness specification of the vowel
preceding the neutral or transparent one.
In some mono-syllabic roots which contain one of these two vowels, the
vowel triggers the front alternant of potentially harmonic suffix vowels to
surface (28a), which is just what one would expect since the triggering
vowel is a front vowel as well. In other mono-syllabic roots containing one
of the two vowels under discussion, the suffix vowels occur as back (28b),
which is quite astonishing at first sight, since this creates a harmony mismatch. In a third group, the same suffix vowels occur sometimes as back
and sometimes as front (28c).
(28) Hungarian strange vowels
root
gloss
adess.
a. kz
'hand'
kznl
film
'film'
filmnl
b. hd
cl
'bridge'
'aim; target'
ablative
hdtl
cltl
34
c. pozitv
balk
'positive'
'fool, greenhorn'
delative
pozitvrl /
pozitvrl
balkrl /
balkrl
adessive
pozitvnl /
pozitvnl
balknl /
balknl
(Olsson 1992: 79)
The first group of vowels is rather unspectacular, while the other two are
more interesting. In a serialist approach, the 'neutral' vowels in (28b) can be
analysed as underlyingly back and harmony is assumed to occur at a stage
where the vowel still has its underlying feature specification. After the
application of harmony, the triggering vowel is changed from [+back] to
[-back] by another rule. In an alternative non-serialist view, Ringen and
Vago (1998) posit a floating feature [+back] as belonging to the respective
root.
In reminiscence of the former view I will refer to these vowels as
'Trojan vowels', since superficially they look like peaceful front vowels,
which is not what they really are, and they 'invade' their neighbour by imposing their underlying feature specification on this target vowel. Under
this view they are of the same type as a particular class of vowels in Yawelmani, which apparently contradict the generalisation that harmony applies
only to height-uniform vowels. These vowels are long low vowels which
trigger harmony in adjacent high vowels but not in low ones. The pattern is
exemplified and analysed in more detail in chapter 6, section 4.
The group of Hungarian vowels in (28c) behaves as hybrid, and these
stems are labelled as 'vacillating stems' in the literature (see Olsson 1992).
Such data suggest two treatments, either they might be underspecified or
we have to store two separate items for each stem, one with a back and one
with a front vowel underlyingly. Under the first analysis one might wonder
why the backness specification of the preceding non-neutral vowels does
not simply permeate through the underspecified item. Therefore I opt for
the second choice, i.e., that two variants of the respective stems are stored
in the lexicon.
Trojan vowels occur in systems with opaque vowels (Yoruba), as well
as in systems with transparent vowels. I should add here that the existence
of transparent vowels in Hungarian becomes questionable on the grounds
of the analysis proposed in chapter 6. This, however, is rather a side effect.
The basic analysis of Trojan vowels will follow the path provided by that of
balanced (i.e., transparent) vowels in that the behaviour of Trojan vowels
35
Harmony systems can also be categorised according to the morphophonological characteristics of the triggering and the target vowels.
Along these lines harmony systems are traditionally divided in rootcontrolled versus dominant-recessive patterns. In this section I would like
to add the pattern of affix-controlled harmony to this typology and finally
draw attention to stress-driven harmony as well.
Most examples which have been given in this introduction so far have
been of the root controlled type. In this type of harmony, the specification
of the harmonic feature is induced on the whole word by one of the root or
stem vowels, if there is no opaque vowel. Such opaque vowels shape only
those vowels which are more marginal in the word than the opaque vowel
itself. In these systems it never happens that an affix vowel determines the
quality of a root or stem vowel, and any vowel situated between a root
vowel and an opaque affix vowel with a conflicting feature specification
always gets the specification of the root vowel.
In the affix controlled type of harmony, which is also sensitive to the
categorical status of the morpheme the triggering vowel belongs to, it is the
affix vowels which systematically trigger harmony. In affix-controlled
harmony, the vowel between triggering affix vowel and opaque vowel
always harmonises with the affix vowel. Anderson (1980) states that "there
are apparently no systems in which suffixes exclusively control harmony".
McCarthy and Prince (1995) claim that affix-controlled harmony is impossible as an effect of the universal meta-ranking of root faithfulness over affix faithfulness. Bakovi (2000) excludes this pattern in his OT account of
vowel harmony. However, Noske (2001) argues that Turkana is just of that
type. Here, Fula (as reported in Paradis 1992 and Breedveld 1995) will
serve to illustrate this kind of harmony, because it is a much more straightforward case. Before coming to this pattern I will discuss markedness
driven dominance.
In dominant-recessive systems, in contrast to morphologically controlled ones, the categorial status of the morpheme bearing the triggering
vowel plays no role at all. In such systems, one feature specification is
36
dominant, and if it occurs in one morpheme the whole word has to look the
same. The language is not sensitive to whether the morpheme containing
the dominant feature specification is a root or an affix.
In Kalenjin, for instance, the dominant feature is [+ATR]. If all morphemes contain only retracted vowels, these surface as such (29a), but if
only one morpheme, regardless whether it is an affix or a root, contains an
advanced vowel, this vowel triggers tongue root advancement in all other
vowels (29b,c). In (29b) the root kHr contributes the advanced tongue root
position, which alters the ATR specification in the other vowels. In (29c) it
is the suffix -e which causes the alternation from retracted to advanced
tongue root in the other vowels, including the stem vowel as well.
(29) Kalenjin ATR harmony
a. K,$k(r
DIST.PAST 1SG shut
b. K,DIST.PAST
c. K,DIST.PAST
$kHr
1SG See
[k,$g(r]
'I shut it'
-m
2SG
$k(r -e
1SG Shut NON.COMPL.
[kingHrin]
'I see you(sg.)'
[kingere]
'I was shutting it'
(Bakovi 2000: 52)
37
38
39
Even though affix control is extremely rare, the pattern is quite robust in
Fula. Breedveld (1995) reports the same harmony pattern also for other
Fula dialects.12 The Fulfulde pattern poses severe problems for Bakovi's
(2000) account of vowel harmony, where root control is modelled as an
instance of base-output correspondence, since this approach systematically
excludes affix control. This issue will be subject to a more thorough discussion in chapter 4.
A more widespread pattern where root vowels depend on the quality of
affix vowels is Umlaut, which can be found in Veneto Italian for instance
(Walker 2001). However, in such languages the feature specification of the
affix has an influence only on the neighbouring root vowel, as can be seen
from the data in (31). Mid root vowels are raised before a high affix vowel
in the Veneto dialect of Italian. The harmony process affects only the
stressed vowel preceding the affix. From this fact it must be concluded that
this is an instance of parasitic licensing rather than vowel harmony.13
(31) Affix-induced feature change in Veneto Italian
a. vdo
te vdi
'I see/you see'
kro
kri
'believe 1sg./2sg.pres.ind.'
cro
te cri
'I run/you run'
tso
te tsi
'boy sg./pl.'
b. tornvo
benedto
morso
tornvi
benedti
morsi
'return 1sg./2sg.imp.ind.'
'blessed m.sg./pl.'
'lover m.sg./pl.'
(Walker 2001: 2)
In her analysis, Walker assumes that the height of the affix vowel is marked
in unstressed affix position. Thus, it occupies also the preceding root
vowel, which is in a strong, i.e., stressed position, which provides a licenser
40
for the feature [+high]. The feature [+high] is allowed in this position, but
not in others. If the feature is linked to the stressed syllable, it can also be
extended on the adjacent unstressed syllable, where it belongs to
underlyingly. Of course one could argue that vowel harmony is nothing
else than a case of parasitic licensing. The feature specification in all assimilated vowels is licensed by the triggering vowel which is in a strong
position (such as the first syllable, for instance). This form of licensing is
then less marked than the licensing of each feature realisation by each
associated segment or mora or syllable. This is the view advocated for by
Beckman (1997). If this were the motivation behind harmony, we would
expect the phenomenon attested in Veneto Italian or Icelandic (where
roughly the same happens, see Grijzenhout 1990 and references cited there)
to literally go much further, that is to affect more vowels of the root than
just one or two.
For this reason, I will regard such cases not as instances of vowel
harmony, but as metaphony or umlaut, which should be treated differently
from harmony, what is obviously done in the analysis in Walker (2001).
A second argument for treating vowel harmony and affix-induced
Umlaut as different phenomena comes from the fact that Umlaut often
causes the realisation of a feature specification in the target which is not
present in the trigger. This is illustrated for the case of Icelandic here. In
Icelandic, the dative plural affix -um causes raising, rounding, and fronting
of the last low vowel in the root.14
(32) Icelandic Umlaut
pakki + um
tala + um
almanak + um
apparat + um
pkkum
tlum
almankum
appartum
'parcel-dat.pl'
'to speak-3.pl'
'almanac-dat.pl'
'apparatus-dat.pl'
(Grijzenhout 1990: 57f.)
However, being front is neither a property of the vowel D nor of the vowel
u. To find out about the place feature of the low vowel D in Icelandic one
may have a look at Icelandic diphthongs.
According to Kspert (1988), Icelandic has five diphthongs ei, y, ou,
Di, and Du which all have a short/long distinction additionally. Braunmller
(1991) also regards je as a diphthong. Except for the diphthongs containing
the low vowel the two parts of each diphthong have to share or agree in
41
'to drink'
'drink-2pl.pr.ind.)'
42
43
Kirchner 1993, and many others), or the satisfaction of intra-representational surface correspondence constraints (as proposed by Krmer 1998,
and further developed by Bakovi 2000).
1.6
We have seen in the preceding sections that languages which display vowel
harmony are characterised by the feature or feature combination which is
active, by the occurrence of opaque, transparent or otherwise quirky vowels
or a mixture of these types, by whether the harmony is morphologically
controlled or dominant, and by the domain in which harmony applies. All
of these characterising aspects of harmony raise interesting questions and
posit quirky puzzles. Some of these patterns raise questions which are of
particular interest for the generativist theoretical linguist, and theoretical
questions snowball if one looks at some aspect of vowel harmony. Besides
phonetic, psycholinguistic or socio-linguistic aspects of harmony (see for
instance Boyce 1990, Campbell 1980, Vroomen, Tuomainen and de Gelder
1998), research in vowel harmony can be divided in two larger fields, one
of which is concerned with the nature of the features as such.
In this direction one has to examine which features harmonise, which
group together and which do not, in how far do vocalic features interact
with consonants and vice versa, whether features are privative, binary or
ternary. One deals with the question which instantiation of a feature is the
marked one phonologically and phonetically (do languages explore RTR or
ATR? Does backness spread or frontness?), and which features have to be
assumed at all. For research in this direction see Halle, Vaux and Wolfe
(2000), Calabrese (1995), Clements and Hume (1995), van der Hulst and
Smith (1986), Padgett (1995), Odden (1991) and the references cited in
these works.
The other direction in which research can lead regards the interaction of
phonology and morphology. Here it becomes relevant which factors other
than featural shape the vowel harmony patterns in the languages of the
world, and whether there are connections between the grammar and the
systemic properties of vowels and their interaction. Do underlying
representations and structures shape individual harmony patterns or do
languages diverge in the grammars which have an influence on the output
forms; and if the differences are to be found in the grammars, of which
nature are these differences? Can the cross-linguistic patterns be described
44
45
CV CV CV
AC's
F
b.
CV CV CV
F
CV CV CV
CV CV CV
F
The structure in (35b) is van der Hulst and Smith's representation for transparent vowels. In case the transparent vowel is preceded by another transparent vowel this analysis generates a disharmonic form at first glance, as
illustrated in the lefthand representation of (36). Van der Hulst and Smith
refer to the Obligatory Contour Principle (OCP, Leben 1973, Goldsmith
1976, McCarthy 1986) to avoid such a configuration. According to the
OCP adjacent autosegments with the same specification are not allowed.
The OCP thus transforms this representation into the one on the right in
(36).
(36)
CV
CV
CV
OCP
CV
CV
CV
In this approach neither locality has to be sacrificed nor have extra derivational steps to be introduced. The approach has problems of a different nature. First, we encounter technical problems with monosyllabic roots. If a
root has only one vowel and this is a neutral vowel the vowel should not
spread. The feature is lexically associated with the vowel and according to
van der Hulst and Smith these features do not spread. Data from Wolof
above (especially 24b) show that for instance in ATR harmony affix vowels
46
always surface with the marked value when attached to a monosyllabic root
with a neutral vowel. The only solution in van der Hulst and Smith's model
is to deny the monosyllabic root with a neutral vowel the lexical association
of the feature, as sketched in (37b). Why are neutral vowels in monosyllabic roots different from neutral vowels in polysyllabic roots?
(37)
a. CV
-CV
F
b. CV
F
CV -CV
F
-CV
CV -CV
OCP
F
47
fourth possibility. Apart from being in the scope of a segment features can
also be bound to a segment or syllable. This is a different way of linking a
feature to a segment than via association. In this form of lexical
specification a segment projects its boundaries onto the plane on which the
respective autosegmental feature resides. In such a case no feature outside
this binding domain can extend an association into this domain. On the
other hand a feature residing in this domain can establish associations with
segments outside its domain. With this possibility of extending segmental
domains on autosegmental tiers the theory is thus enriched by three new
types of feature bearing units. Altogether we arrive at six different
possibilities for one autosegmental tier already where theories with binary
features usually allow two choices (maximally four if the options for underspecification and floating features are included). The idea of feature tiers
being bound to segmental domains explains cases of disharmony and can
also be extended to the Trojan vowels. The inconvenient aspect of the
theory is that the unary feature has six different ways of pairing with its
feature bearer and that the lexical association of the feature with the transparent segment has to be stipulated. Furthermore, in this approach it has to
be stipulated for every language whether all affix vowels have to be
underspecified or specified for the harmonic feature.
Another point of criticism arises with regard to the choice of the marked
and unmarked configuration of the privative features. It is debatable
whether frontness is the marked state in the front/back dimension, and in
the discussion of dominance we have seen data challenging the postulation
of a universal A element for advanced tongue root.
It is unlikely that patterns which are apparently shaped by morphological asymmetries can be explained with reference to phonological representations alone. Furthermore, as will be shown in more detail in chapters 3
and 4, languages with suffixation show a greater variety of contrasts in the
first syllable of the root while languages with prefixation show a greater
variety and immunity in the last syllable of the root, and languages with
suffix control show relaxation of general markedness requirements in the
last syllable of the word. To explain these patterns goes beyond a purely
phonological theory. Optimality Theory with its assumption of constraint
interaction offers itself here since optimality-theoretic constraints refer to
all aspects of linguistic analysis rather than being restricted to a particular
component of grammar such as morphology or phonology within one
constraint hierarchy. The discussion in this book will center around the
topics listed in (38). The analyses provided can also be transferred into a
48
Chapter 2
Optimality Theory and the formalisation of
harmony
In the second chapter I will introduce the theoretical framework to be used.
This part serves also to establish the view that assimilation is a correspondence relation which is a driving force behind large parts of the analysis to
be proposed in chapter 3. On the one hand, the analysis of harmony as triggered by a locally operating correspondence constraint, which is negatable
as well as conjoinable with other constraints, opens the doors for the analysis of cyclicity effects and cases of apparent derivational opacity as epiphenomena of constraint interaction in a parallel evaluation of output forms
(see chapters 5 and 6). On the other hand, this conception of harmony as
correspondence causes some of the vital problems to be discussed (such as
the fate of the medial vowel under root control and affix control, respectively; see sections 3.1, 4.3.2, and 4.6.2).
Before going into the details let us begin with the basics. I will start with
an introduction to the basic assumptions of Optimality Theory. Since this is
not intended to be a general introduction to this framework I will restrict
the discussion to those aspects of the theory which will be essential in the
treatment of the vowel harmonic patterns to be dealt with in this book.
2.1
50
Optimality Theory
51
c. constraint set
d. constraint ranking
e. GEN
f. EVAL
The shift of attention from underlying structures and/or derivational structure changing and filling operations to wellformedness constraints and their
interaction is, thus, implemented in the basic architecture of the theory.
Constraint tableaux serve to illustrate the selection procedure. The
example tableau below has to be read as follows: the second column lists
possible output candidates above which an (assumed) underlying representation is displayed with which these outputs have to match. To the right of
the input, relevant constraints are listed. Constraints to the left are more important than constraints to the right. Those divided by a complete line are
ranked with respect to each other, while those which are divided by a
dotted line are unranked. The asterisks symbolise violations of the constraint in the column by the candidate in the respective row. Asterisks
additionally marked with an exclamation mark denote fatal constraint violations in that this violation excludes the candidate from being chosen as the
optimal form. The latter is indicated by the pointing finger to its left.
(40) Example tableau
/input/
a. candidate 1
b. candidate 2
c. candidate 3
) d. candidate 4
CONSTRAINT A
*!
*!
*
*
*
*
*!
52
Optimality Theory
found in all languages. Some languages don't allow for codas at all, others
try to get rid of codas whenever they can in the morphology. To avoid
codas in output forms a language has two strategies, either delete a potential underlying consonant which would be syllabified in coda position or
add an extra vowel to bring the endangered consonant in an onset position.
The story is a bit different with onsets. Some languages permit syllables
without onsets others epenthesise a consonant if no onset is available from
lexical material.16 These typological observations tempted Prince and Smolensky (1993) to propose the following constraints on syllable structure.
(41) Constraints on syllable structure (Prince and Smolensky 1993)
a. H-NUC: A higher sonority nucleus is more harmonic than one of
lower sonority.
b. ONSET: Every syllable has an onset.
c. NOCODA: Syllables do not end in a consonant.
d. PARSE: Segmental material has to be parsed into syllable structure in
the output.
e. FILL: Syllable positions are filled with segmental material.
A language which has the constraint PARSE ranked higher in the constraint
hierarchy than the constraint NOCODA allows for closed syllables, as
illustrated in (42i), while the opposite ranking describes a language in
which all syllables end in a vowel (42ii). In the case where an underlying
form has a consonant at its right edge, these two constraints stand in
conflict. Each output necessarily violates one of both constraints.
(42) Conflicting constraints I
i.
/bob/
) a. bob
b. bo
PARSE
NOCODA
*
*!
ii.
/bob/
a. bob
) b. bo
NOCODA
53
PARSE
*!
*
ONSET
FILL
*!
*
/oti/
) a. o.ti
b. o.ti
FILL
ONSET
*
*!
/bob/
) a. bob
b. bo
c. bo.b
PARSE
NOCODA
FILL
*!
*
FILL
NOCODA
*
*!
*!
54
Optimality Theory
iii.
/bob/
a. bob
) b. bo
c. bo.b
FILL
NOCODA
PARSE
*!
*
*!
The more constraints we consider the more room we create for crosslinguistic variation on the grounds of the conflict potential of the involved
constraints.
2.2
The constraints introduced so far can be divided into two larger families.
The constraints ONSET and NOCODA reflect the assumption that onsetless
syllables as well as closed syllables count as marked structures. Structures
which do not violate these constraints are less marked. They are preferred
cross-linguistically. Other markedness constraints militate against structure
in output forms (the most general being probably *STRUC 'Have no
structure at all.' Prince and Smolensky 1993: 25, footnote 13). In the field
of subsegmental phonology, markedness constraints against the articulation
of single features or against specific feature combinations within single
feature bearing units and the ranking of these constraints account for
markedness relations among segments (Prince and Smolensky 1993,
chapter 9). For instance, one might assume a constraint against rounded
vowels, abbreviated as *[+round] or a more complex markedness constraint
against front rounded vowels *[+round, -back] or a more general one
against front rounded and against back unrounded vowels, *[round,
-back]. The latter two account for the fact that in most five-vowel systems
all front vowels are unrounded and all (nonlow) back vowels are rounded.18
The other big family of constraints is that of faithfulness constraints.
PARSE and FILL are such constraints. However, PARSE and FILL only refer
to the proper prosodification of segmental material, that all underlying
segments are parsed in the surface form and that these surface segments
look like their underlying counterparts with respect to their phonological
features is not accounted for by these constraints. To cover more aspects
than just proper syllabification, McCarthy and Prince (1995) proposed a
broader view of faithfulness constraints in the subtheory of Correspondence, replacing the prosodically defined constraints PARSE and FILL by
the more general constraint schemes of MAX and DEP.
55
56
Optimality Theory
57
Alignment constraints as proposed by McCarthy and Prince (1993) constitute a third family of constraints. Alignment constraints require the
mapping of the edges of certain phonological and grammatical categories
with other phonological or grammatical categories in surface forms. These
constraints regulate, e.g., the interaction of prosody with syntax and morphology. An alignment constraint is a constraint that requires for instance
the left edge of every morphological word or of a root/stem to coincide
with the left edge of a prosodic word. In cooperation with other constraints
on the layeredness of prosodic structure, the assumption of such a constraint then explains why in many languages syllabification does not cross
the left edge of a word, even though syllable wellformedness might prefer
this state of affairs.20 In German, for instance, vowel-initial suffixes resyllabify with the preceding consonant-final morpheme in order to provide an
onset for the first syllable of the affix (47a), while vowel-initial stems do
not display such a syllabification with consonant-final prefixes. Instead,
glottal stop insertion is found in the latter environment (47b).
(47) Word-affix alignment in German
a. /na,g/ 'to tend' + /-81/ NOMINALISER
[na,.g81] 'warp, trend, tendency'
b. /8n-/ NEG + /a^t/ 'manner'
[8n.a^t] 'bad habit'
c. *[na,g.81]; *[8.na^t]
Such a behaviour can be attributed to a highly ranked alignment constraint
demanding the mapping of the left stem edge with the left edge of a
prosodic unit such as the syllable or prosodic word (McCarthy and Prince
1993, Selkirk 1995) which outranks the constraint against epenthesis DEPIO. The general scheme of alignment constraints is given in (48).
(48) Generalized Alignment (McCarthy and Prince 1993: 80)
Align (Cat1, Edge1, Cat2, Edge2) =def
Cat1, Cat2 such that Edge1 of Cat1 and Edge2 of Cat2
coincide.
Where
Cat1, Cat2 PCat GCat21 and Edge1, Edge2 {Left, Right}
58
Optimality Theory
Positional faithfulness
59
Positional faithfulness
60
Optimality Theory
proposal to deal with this phenomenon, see It and Mester (1999b) or here
section 2.5 on local constraint conjunction.
In German, obstruents are systematically devoiced when they are
syllabified in coda position, as can be seen in the singular forms in (51a).
Their underlying voicing specification can be detected by their behaviour
with vowel-initial affixes (as in the plural forms in 51a) in comparison to
the behaviour of underlyingly voiceless obstruents in singular and plural
forms (51b), which show no voicing when brought into intervocalic
position.
(51) German final devoicing
singular
plural
a. Schla[k]
Schl[g]e
Die[p]
Die[b]e
Han[t]
Hn[d]e
b. Blo[k]
Strum[pf]
Hu[t]
Bl[k]e
Strm[pf]e
H[t]e
'beat'
'thief'
'hand'
'block'
'stocking'
'hat'
That German displays a voicing contrast at all is the effect of the ranking of
faithfulness to voice above the markedness constraint against voiced
obstruents.
(52) Constraints on voice:
a. IO-IDENT(voice): Correspondent segments in the input and the output
have the same specification of the feature [voice].
b. *[+voice]: Obstruents are voiceless.
(53) Rankings
a. Contrast: IO-IDENT(voice) >> *[+voice]
b. Neutralisation: *[+voice] >> IO-IDENT(voice)
The ranking in (53a) is required to describe the voicing contrast in onsets
between minimal pairs such as Tier [ti:n] 'animal' and dir [di:n] 'youSG.DATIVE'. Unfortunately, the incompatible ranking in (53b) is required to
account for the neutralisation behaviour of obstruents in German coda
positions. The dilemma is solved if we simply assume a second faithfulness
constraint referring to syllable onsets only.
Positional faithfulness
61
62
Optimality Theory
2.4
Within OT there are three main streams with regard to the analysis of
vowel harmony: the alignment approach (Kirchner 1993, Smolensky 1993,
Cole and Kisseberth 1994, Pulleyblank et al 1995, Ringen and Vago 1995,
Padgett 1995, Pulleyblank 1996 and many others), the positional faithfulness approach (Beckman 1997, 1998), and the view that vowel harmony
is best analysed as an instance of agreement (Bakovi 2000) or correspondence (Krmer 1998, 1999, 2001). In this section I will discuss them all in
turn and argue why the latter should be favoured. I will not discuss shorthand constraints like HARMONY (Inkelas 1994), SPREAD[feature] (Kaun
1995), which certainly are meant only as place holders for more elaborated
technical devices. Otherwise they would inflate the system of constraint
families, and for the sake of theoretical economy such an enrichment of
theoretic tools should be avoided if possible.
2.4.1 Feature alignment
The most widespread approach to vowel harmony in OT is the alignment
approach. In this account, it is assumed that certain constraints of the
Alignment family (McCarthy and Prince 1993) demand that the edges of
certain features coincide with the edges of other phonological or
morphological categories like 'word' or 'stem'.
(56) Featural Alignment (Kirchner 1993)
ALIGN (F, L/R, MCat): For any parsed feature F in morphological
category MCat (= Root, Word), F is associated to the
leftmost/rightmost syllable in MCat (violations assessed scalarly).
The ALIGNRight constraint demands that the right edge of a designated
articulatory span coincide with the right edge of a morphological or
phonological category and is therefore responsible for rightward spreading
(57a). If the target of assimilation is situated to the left of the trigger, this
requires the formulation of the mirror-image constraint, ALIGNLeft (57b).
If in a language assimilation is bi-directional, both constraints are assumed
to play a role (57c).
63
64
Optimality Theory
above, chapter 1). This means that harmony proceeds from left to right. An
additional observation is that Turkish lacks prefixes. So if roots are
phonologically dominant, there can be no leftward spreading/assimilation,
since there are no potential targets to the left of the potential triggers (the
root vowels). Clements and Sezer (1982) discuss cases of epenthesis at the
left edge of loan words. In such words, an epenthetic vowel has to be
inserted at the left edge of the root in order to break up a consonant cluster.
The epenthetic vowel to the left of the first root vowel is a high vowel
which usually agrees with the first root vowel in backness and roundness.
(58) Turkish epenthesis:
a. grup
b. gurup
'group'
kral
kral
'king'
prens
pirens
'prince'
smok'in
smok'in simok'in
'dinner jacket'
kreV
kreV
'creche'
(Clements and Sezer 1982: 247)
The forms in column (a) in (58) are pronounced in careful speech, while the
forms in (58b) are judged as colloquial. This data shows that Turkish vowel
harmony is conceived of as going from left to right only because in the
majority of cases there are no adequate targets to the left of the triggering
vowels in this language. In languages which allow affixation to both sides
of the root, such as Dgma, harmony applies bi-directionally or
directionless from the root outward. The same is observed in languages
with dominant-recessive harmony. The process as such has no directional
preference. Another example might come from voicing assimilation.
Usually voicing assimilation operates from the right to the left within
consonant clusters (as noted above already). However, there are exceptions
to this, as in Dutch for instance where devoicing is progressive if the
rightmost member of the consonant cluster is a fricative. Thus, it must be
concluded that directionality of assimilatory processes is not a property of
the process itself such that it has to be incorporated into the formulation of
the respective rule or constraint, but rather determined by the nature of
target and trigger, as well as by independent factors such as morphological
preferences. In the case of voicing assimilation it is a generally held view in
the literature now that regressivity emerges due to the relatively stronger
faithfulness of onset consonants in comparison to the weaker faithfulness of
coda consonants (cf. Lombardi in various places, Grijzenhout and Krmer
65
2000, and others). Additional arguments and evidence for the claim that
phonological assimilation is directionless by nature can be found in
Beckman (1995, 1997, 1998), Lombardi (1996, 1999), and Bakovi (2000).
To summarise this, if assimilation is not inherently directional we
should not formalise it as such. This also diminishes the number of constraints, since two constraints are necessary when the assimilation constraint refers to edges or directions while otherwise we need only one device like a constraint which says 'adjacent X-s agree in feature [F].'
There are, however, two more arguments against an analysis of
assimilation as alignment, both related to consonantal assimilation. First,
alignment constraints are not capable of covering consonantal assimilation.
In consonantal assimilation (for instance, place or voice), it is usually the
left member of a cluster that changes its feature specification in agreement
with its neighbour to the right. Here, the alignment cannot refer to morphological edges like those of roots or phonological edges like those of prosodic words, feet, syllables or so. An alignment constraint demanding the
mapping of the left edge of a voicing span with the left edge of a syllable
would have no impact on the preceding coda consonant, for instance. Thus,
the preceding coda consonant would not assimilate to the following onset
consonant in voicing. The assumption of alignment constraints referring to
higher prosodic or morphological structure and consonantal features would
a) lead to nonlocal consonantal assimilation (the next argument, see below),
or b) lead to nothing, because the two involved consonants are usually not
even in the same syllable. The only solution would be to refer to a category
like 'consonant cluster' in the formulation of the alignment constraint, e.g.
'align the left edge of the feature c-place with the left edge of the consonant
cluster'. The concept 'consonant cluster' is not required elsewhere and thus
it lacks any motivation of its role as a linguistic entity.
The second argument against featural alignment comes from the observed local restrictions on consonantal assimilation (see, e.g. Odden 1994).
There is no intrinsic ban against long distance consonantal feature
assimilation in the alignment approach, even though this is not attested in
adult language. Consonant harmony affecting the place feature is observed
in child language only. Goad (1996, 1997) presents an alignment analysis
of consonantal place harmony in child language. In her conclusion, Goad
addresses the question why long distance consonant harmony is not found
in adult speech, but she has to leave this issue open.22 The only possible
explanation would be to assume a universal ranking for adult grammars of
LOCALITY or NOGAP (Padgett 1995, It, Mester and Padgett 1995, Pulley-
66
Optimality Theory
'end in'
'sew for'
'be numerable'
'make to face'
'cause to get dry'
'laugh on and on'
b. ipa
bvisa
bvuma
pinda
'be evil'
'remove'
'agree'
'pass'
67
ip-ira
'be evil for'
bvis-ika
'be easily removed'
bvum-isa
'make agree'
pind-irira
'to pass right through'
(Fortune 1955, cit. op. Beckman 1997:1)
The nonlow vowel in the affix is either nonhigh (59a) or high (59b),
according to the height of the preceding root vowel. Beckman's idea is that
multiple linking of a single feature node to several vowels is less marked
than a feature node for each vowel. In optimality-theoretic terms this means
that the respective markedness constraints have less violations in candidates
with feature nodes linked to several vowels than in candidates where each
vowel has its own feature node.
(60) Shona harmony as faithfulness and markedness (Beckman 1997: 18)
/CeCiC/
IDENT-1(hi) *MID *HIGH IDENT(hi)
C e
C
i C
a.
*
*!
[-lo] [-hi] [-lo] [+hi]
C e
C
e C
*
*
) b.
Aperture
C
[-lo] [-hi]
e
C
e
c.
**!
[-lo] [-hi] [-lo] [-hi]
C i
C
i C
*!
d.
Aperture
[-lo] [+hi]
68
Optimality Theory
if the first vowel is a high vowel underlyingly and the second a mid vowel.
However, Beckman has to assume that the affected affix vowels are underlyingly specified for [-low] in order to prevent assimilation of a vowel in
the second or third or further syllable to a following low vowel.
The assumption that harmonic behaviour is solely determined by markedness is further weakened if we regard the behaviour of high vowels in
Turkish. Recall from the introduction to vowel harmony in chapter 1 that
all Turkish vowels have to agree in backness within a word. Furthermore
high vowels agree with their neighbour to the left in roundness. Low
vowels are opaque to rounding harmony. In a word where a high vowel is
situated between a high front rounded root vowel and a low unrounded
vowel, the medial vowel agrees with the preceding root vowel in backness
as well as roundness, as in (61c). This yields a front rounded vowel in this
case.
(61) Turkish medial vowels with conditional suffix
a. gel-dir-sej-di
'come (caus-cond-past)'
b. dur-dur-saj-d
'stand (caus-cond-past)'
c. gyl-dyr-sej-di
'laugh (caus-cond-past)'
d. at6-dr-saj-d
'open (caus-cond-past)'
*gyl-dir-sej-di
(Bakovi 2000: 81)
69
70
Optimality Theory
71
72
Optimality Theory
(= syllable-to-syllable relation)
c. Foot harmony
(= foot-to-foot relation)
(69)
R1
R2
V/
73
If this were the right way to analyse harmony, vowel harmonic systems
should look like this: In a language with CONCORD-R, the first two vowels
of a word should look alike with regard to the crucial feature, but the third
vowel has to look like the underlying form of its neighbour on the left, potentially resulting in a disharmonic surface form. The same holds for all following vowels. The fact is, however: harmonic languages don't look like
this.29 For this reason, I will prefer the symmetric transitive correspondence
relation within surface strings proposed in (66). On the basis of the fact that
harmony is also a relation between prosodic categories, Syntagmatic Identity can be reformulated as in (70).
(70) SYNTAGMATIC IDENTITY (S-IDENT(F)):
Let x be an entity of type T in representation R and y be any adjacent
entity of type T in representation R, if x is [F] then y is [F].
Where T is a segment, mora, syllable, or foot.
(A segment, mora, syllable or foot has to have the same value for a
feature F as the adjacent segment, mora, syllable or foot in the
string.)
The definition in (70) crucially refers to prosodic domains as feature
bearers. Under the assumption that only vocalic features can be associated
to the prosodic categories of the syllable and the mora, the locality problem
with vowel harmony is solved. Such a problem emerges when assimilation
is regarded as applying locally on the segmental tier of representation. On
the syllabic level, vowel features are adjacent to each other. Under the
assumptions made so far, dispensing with traditional planar segregation
(i.e. different consonantal and vocalic tiers in the autosegmental sense),
vowel harmony automatically skips consonants because it goes from mora
to mora or syllable to syllable, while consonantal harmony cannot permeate
through vowels, which by their vocalic nature do not bear consonantal
features. Furthermore, consonants separated by a vowel cannot be regarded
as adjacent on any level of representation if the only admitted structures are
a string of segments dominated by prosodic structure.
74
Optimality Theory
75
*
A
F
B
ta
kla
mz
dn
76
Optimality Theory
ta
kla
mz
dn
For reasons of empirical adequacy and ease of computability, I will opt for
simplicity here, i.e. for the locally restricted view of syntagmatic correspondence.
This, however, excludes the possibility to explain the feature specification of a vowel following a transparent vowel by its relation to the preceding non-transparent vowel in the treatment of vowel harmony. How transparent vowels can be treated without sacrificing locality will be explained
in greater detail in section 3.3. The transparent vowels show that the
assumption of prosodic entities entering into correspondence relations on
articulatory features is not the best choice, and that it might be better to
assume correspondence relations between adjacent stretches of articulatory
feature spans. In most cases, sequences of transparent vowels behave like
one transparent vowel. For reasons of understandability I will postpone this
discussion to the analysis of Finnish transparent vowels in part two of this
book, and subscribe so long to the prosodic view of harmony developed
above following Krmer (1998, 2001).
There is one last remark with respect to the locality issue necessary
here. Odden (1994) develops a theory of locality within feature geometry to
cover the topological restrictions on assimilatory patterns. According to
Odden (1994: 290) "all phonological relations (rules or constraints) are
subject to the Locality Condition, which requires elements mentioned in a
rule to be local within a plane. Relations may also be constrained by adjacency conditions which limit the distance between the target and trigger segments, by requiring segments to be adjacent at the level of the syllable or at
the level of the root node."
Even though Odden writes about relations here, he is far from conceptualising assimilation as correspondence relations. However, the locality to
which assimilation rules have to obey is incorporated in correspondence
theory in the adjacency requirement for correspondence relations. The basic
input-output correspondence relation shares this obedience to locality in
Constraint coordination
77
Constraint coordination
78
Optimality Theory
'A or B'
b. Conjunction:
AB
Constraint coordination
79
Among the infinite set of candidates for the output, the form which satisfies
either C1 or C2, satisfies the local conjunction of C1 and C2 as well. To
satisfy the local conjunction it is not necessary to conform to the requirements of both constraints. That C1 and C2 have to be violated at all is induced by one or more independent constraints, which conflict with C1 and
C2, and which themselves are ranked higher than the latter two. For the
local conjunction to have an effect at all, it must rank higher than those
constraints which force violation of C1 and C2. In the example tableau in
(77), C3 is antagonist to C1. Whenever one of both is satisfied, the other one
is violated. The same conflict situation holds for constraints C4 and C2,
respectively.
(77)
a.
b.
c.
) d.
/input/
cand1
cand2
cand3
cand4
C3
C4
C1
C2
*!
*
*!
*!
*!
*
*
With the ranking of C3 and C4 above C1 and C2, the candidate which violates both C1 and C2 is the winner. The case becomes problematic if we
have established the ranking on independent grounds, but candidate 1 or 2
is the actual output. Here the local conjunction of C1 and C2 plays the
crucial role in candidate selection. If this complex constraint is inserted
somewhere between or above C3 and C4 in the hierarchy, as in (78), we
derive the desired result. The fatality of violating both constraints is accounted for. In (78) the choice of either candidate 1 or candidate 2 as optimal can depend either on the ranking relation between C3 and C4 or the
ranking between C1 and C2, if C3 and C4 are unranked with respect to each
other, or, of course, on the impact of another constraint.
(78)
) a.
) b.
c.
1 d.
/input/
cand1
cand2
cand3
cand4
C1&lC2
C3
C4
C1
*
*!
*
*!
*!
C2
80
Optimality Theory
Bl[k]e
Strm[pf]e
H[t]e
'beat' (sg./pl.)
'thief' (sg./pl.)
'hand' (sg./pl.)
'block' (sg./pl.)
'stocking' (sg./pl.)
'hat' (sg./pl.)
Constraint coordination
81
In (80), I have listed the two crucial markedness constraints and their local
conjunction. The local conjunction is always violated when both constraints
are violated by the same segment, i.e. when a voiced obstruent is in coda
position.
(80) Final devoicing as local conjunction
a. NOCODA: Syllables do not end in a consonant.
b. *[+voice]: Obstruents are voiceless.
c. Local Constraint Conjunction FINDEV: NOCODA&l*[+voice]
These constraints now interact with a variety of faithfulness constraints.
MAX-IO and DEP-IO, the constraints against deletion and insertion,
respectively, have to rank higher than NOCODA, because German allows
for closed syllables. They also have to rank higher than the local
conjunction FINDEV, to account for the fact that neither insertion nor
deletion is an option to avoid violation of FINDEV. This is illustrated in
tableau (81).
(81) German final devoicing I
MAX-IO DEP-IO
/dib/
a. dib
b. di.b
*!
c. di
*!
/ d. dip
) e. tip
FINDEV
NOCODA
*[+voice]
*!
**
**
*
*!
*
*
In this grammar, the obstruent in coda position is neither deleted nor is the
form augmented to avoid a violation of NOCODA. Instead, the winning
form satisfies the high ranking local conjunction by satisfaction of the
constraint against voiced obstruents, in that it has a voiceless coda. This
grammar is still not suitable for German, since the optimal output also has a
voiceless onset. This form performs even better on *[+voice] than the one
which has a voiceless coda only.
However, German allows the voiced/voiceless contrast in onsets.
Therefore we have to consider one more constraint. IO-IDENT(voice)
demands that segments in the output and in the input have the same specification for the feature [voice]. To account for the voicing contrast in onsets
and neutralisation in codas likewise, the constraint has to be inserted in the
hierarchy below FINDEV and above *[+voice]. The evaluation of the
82
Optimality Theory
German word Dieb 'thief' is shown once more with the complete grammar
at work in (82). The completely neutralised form is doomed for its violation
of IO-IDENT(voice) in the onset. The other violation of IO-IDENT(voice)
cannot be avoided. This would result in a violation of the higher ranked
local conjunction FINDEV, which is fatal (see candidate a).
(82) German final devoicing II
/dib/ MAX-IO DEP-IO FINDEV NOCODA IO-ID(vce) *[+voice]
a. dib
*!
*
**
b. di.b
*!
**
c. di
*!
*
- d. dip
*
*
*
1 e. tip
*
**!
What would happen now if the local conjunction of NOCODA and
*[+voice] were not restricted to the domain of the segment? In this case any
two violations of both constraints within a candidate would count as a violation of the conjunction.
(83) German final devoicing and "global constraint conjunction"
/dib/ MAX-IO DEP-IO FINDEV NOCODA IO-ID(vce) *[+voice]
a. dib
*!
*
**
b. di.b
*!
**
c. di
*!
*
/ d. dip
*!
*
*
*
) e. tip
*
**
The favourite German form, candidate (83d) has now a fatal violation of
FINDEV, because one consonant of the form violates NOCODA and another
violates *[+voice].
This minimal analysis of German final devoicing illustrates the basic
idea of local constraint conjunction. The approach was extended from the
mere conjunction of markedness constraints to the conjunction of markedness with faithfulness constraints by ubowicz (1999). She attempts a solution to the problem of analysing derived environment effects in OT without
reliance on cyclic constraint evaluation. The conjunction of a markedness
constraint with a faithfulness constraint activates the markedness constraint
when the faithfulness constraint is violated.
Constraint coordination
83
s u x#
+e
sy.
# e
'to hear'
(ubowicz 1998)
The high ranking local conjunction of the R-ANCHOR constraint with the
constraint demanding palatalisation activates the palatalisation constraint in
the environment where R-ANCHOR is violated.
The grammar is shown at work in (86). Candidate (a) violates the RANCHOR constraint by its syllabification which is not coherent with the
right stem edge. This syllabification is optimal because of higher ranking
constraints like ONSET, which are omitted from the tableau. In addition to
this, the rightmost segment of the stem violates the markedness constraint
PAL, because it is followed by a front vowel and is not palatal itself. These
84
Optimality Theory
two violations count as a violation of the local conjunction of the two constraints. The competing candidate satisfies PAL on the cost of IOIDENT(coronal). Satisfaction of this markedness constraint is sufficient to
avoid the violation of the local conjunction.
(86) Polish palatalisation as local conjunction
/sux# +e +/
PAL&lR-ANCHOR
(Stem, )
a. sy. x#e
) b. sy. #e
IO-IDENT
(cor)
*!
R-ANCHOR
(Stem, )
PAL
*
*
) cand1
cand2
cand3
cand4
*
*!
*!
*!
*
*
*
*
Constraint coordination
85
The little uppercase x to the right of the Boolean conjunctive operator in the
tableau indicates the scope of the constraint coordination. Locality of coordinated constraints is defined by Crowhurst and Hewitt (1997) as argument
sharing.
(88) The shared argument criterion (Crowhurst and Hewitt 1997: 12):
Only constraints whose statements specify a common argument may
be conjoined.
Constraints have a primary argument which is the entity they quantify universally over, as well as a secondary argument, which is the entity they
quantify existentially over. For instance, the constraint NOCODA (Roughly:
'For no syllable there exists a consonant/obstruent at the right edge of ')
makes a claim on all syllables but only on some consonants/obstruents.
Thus, the syllable is the primary argument and any consonant/obstruent is
the secondary argument of NOCODA. The markedness constraint *[+voice]
makes a claim on all obstruents, namely that for all obstruents there exists a
voicing specification which is minus-valued.32
Crowhurst and Hewitt do not go into the question whether the argument
that is shared by two conjoined constraints has to have the same status in
both constraints. Thus, NOCODA and *[+voice] could be logically conjoined because they both have obstruents as one of their arguments. The result should be a language in which for obstruents being in a coda is as bad
as being voiced. I will not discuss this type of constraint further here, since
it will be explored in greater detail in the treatment of the co-pattern of particular left/right-edge faithfulness with leftward/rightward affixation in section 3.2 and chapter 4.
However, it is worthwhile to rest a short moment on the last form of
constraint coordination proposed by Crowhurst and Hewitt (1997). Unfortunately they do not discuss the implicational coordination any further. An
implicational coordination of constraint A and constraint B says basically
that when you satisfy constraint A you should also do that for constraint B,
but if you violate constraint A anyway or constraint A is vacuous you don't
have to care about constraint B either.
Tableau (89) serves to illustrate that only where constraint A is nonvacuously satisfied constraint violations of B become crucial for the implicational constraint. If both constraints share an argument then constraint A
might further specify the environment in which a violation of constraint B
is particularly bad, or satisfaction of B is particularly important.
86
Optimality Theory
) cand1
cand2
cand3
cand4
cand5
*
*
*!
(vac)
*
*
*
(vac)
For illustrative purposes let us regard once more the constraint ONSET,
which might be formulated as 'every syllable has a consonantal/obstruent
onset'. This constraint can be combined via implicational relation with the
faithfulness constraint on obstruent voicing IO-IDENT(voice). What we get
by this move is exactly the positional faithfulness constraint on onsets discussed earlier, IO-IDENTONSET(voice) (see 54). Whenever a syllable satisfies the constraint ONSET, the entity that satisfies this constraint, i.e., the
consonant in onset position, has to satisfy IDENT(voice) as well.
Returning to our example of final devoicing in German, one might now
be tempted to assume that such phenomena, i.e., positional faithfulness
effects, can be broken down to constraint coordination as well.33
(90) Final devoicing as logical implication
/dib/
a.
b.
c.
) d.
dib
tip
tib
dip
ONSET C
IO-IDENT(voice)
*[+voice]
ONSET
IO-IDENT
(voice)
**!
*!
*!
*
*
**
*
*
However, this treatment of positional faithfulness reveals a further restriction on the focus of coordinated constraints. In the tableau in (90) it was
assumed that the consonant in coda position is not assessed by the implicational coordination, because it neither violates nor satisfies ONSET. That is,
both constraints do not only have to share an argument, they also have to be
assessible with regard to the argument, that is the argument has to be in the
focus of both constraints. In our particular case this means that only the
consonant which satisfies onset by being an onset is also in the focus of the
implicational coordination.
Constraint coordination
87
Chapter 3
Cyclicity and phonological opacity as constraint
coordination and positional faithfulness
Within Optimality Theory alone there have been numerous proposals on
how to deal with the peculiarities of vowel harmony. In this book, I attempt
to give an account of the central issues of vowel harmony, which are
related to the discussion on derivationalism, with a maximally reduced
theoretical inventory, and, nonetheless try to extrapolate generalisations
which were not possible under previous accounts. For this reason, and
reasons connected with the respective proposals in the literature I will avoid
the following theoretical assumptions:
Vocalic assimilation as an extension of the alignment scheme
(Smolensky 1993, Kirchner 1993, Pulleyblank 1996 and many
others).
Crucial underspecification in output structure to account for
transparent vowels (as proposed by Ringen and Vago 1998 for
Hungarian);
Floating features to account for Trojan vowels (as proposed by
Ringen and Vago 1998 for Hungarian);
Unexpressed feature domains in surface structure, i.e., non-surface
true analyses of output forms to account for Trojan vowels (as
proposed by Cole and Kisseberth 1995 for Yawelmani phonological
opacity);
Sympathy Theory to account for phonological opacity (transparent,
Trojan vowels, McCarthy 1999, Bakovi 2000);
90
The most common type of vowel harmony found in the world is that where
feature specifications of roots are extended on affixes, and opaque affixal
feature specifications are extended onto more peripheral affix vowels, but
never on root vowels.
Furthermore, a vowel, which is inbetween a potentially triggering root
vowel and an opaque affix vowel always surfaces with the feature specifi-
91
cation of the adjacent root vowel, never with that of the affix vowel to the
other side.
The chart in (91) illustrates this observation. Form (b) where the medial
vowel between a trigger in the root and another trigger in an affix agrees
with the affix is no attested form in languages displaying root control. In
root controlled systems we always find the pattern in (c). The target in the
middle agrees with the root. Form (d) is possible in dominant systems. In
this type of harmony it does not matter in which type of morpheme the
vowel bearing the triggering feature specification is found. If the dominant
feature is found in the root, it colours the whole word (except resistent
vowels, i.e., opaque and transparent vowels), if it is in an affix it does so as
well.
(91) The medial vowel between root and opaque vowel
/root+af+Ef+af/
a. rootafEfaf
no harmony
b. rootefEfef
illicit in root control, possible under dominance
c. rootofEfef
root control
d. reetefEfef
dominance
e. reetefEfaf
affix control
The only configuration in which pattern (91b) can emerge is in a dominant
system with an opaque vowel with the recessive feature in the stem. The
form in (91e) is the expected form under affix control. The righmost affix
vowel withstands harmony and the opaque affix vowel determines the fate
of the rest of the vowels in the word.
Under the positional faithfulness account, special emphasis was given to
IO-Identity constraints. With the distinction of IO-Identity for roots versus
general Identity constraints many phenomena can be explained, but, as
Bakovi (2000) argues convincingly, not the asymmetry between stem and
affix vowels in root controlled vowel harmony.
(92) Positional Faithfulness:
How positional Identity constraints fail to account for root control in vowel
harmony is illustrated by the hypothetical case in tableau (93) once more
(but see also the discussion of Beckman's account in the preceding section).
The crucial point is the fate of the vowel in the first affix. Positional
identity constraints make no decision on the quality of this vowel. It may
92
S-IDENT
IDENT
**!
*
*
***
***
*
**
**
93
concerned with the analysis of coalescence they refer to the root node providing that either all features are redistributed or none. However, they also
consider *MC to be violated in case only one feature is redistributed on two
or more segments in the output. To capture this *MC or INTEGRITY can in
principle be extended to INTEGRITY(feature), as proposed in Krmer
(2001).
(96) INTEGRITY(F) "No assimilation"
No feature of S1 has multiple correspondents in S2.
Under the premise that assimilation is a syntagmatic correspondence effect,
all assimilated feature bearers are at least in indirect correspondence with
the underlying feature specification of the triggering element.
(97) Indirect correspondence of [+F]1 and [+F]2' over [+F]1':
Output:
V[+F]1'
V[+F]2'
Input:
V[+F]1
V[-F]2
V[+F]3'
V[-F]3
94
95
ing constraint refers, while non-affixes may be allowed more easily to increase their prominence in violation of lower ranking INTEGRITYroot.
INTEGRITY
Root
IDENT
S-
IO-ID
Root
IO-IDENT
rootofOfof
reetefEfef
rootafOfof
rootefEfef
rootofEfef
rootafafaf
INTEGRITY
Affix
a.
b.
c.
d.
) e.
f.
NESS
root+af+Ef+af
MARKED-
***
*
**!
*
**!
***
***
*
**
**
*
***
***
*
**
*
*!
*!
**!
*
*
*
96
by one uniting factor, the Integrity constraint (or *MC in Lamontagne and
Rice's terminology).
Another peculiarity which becomes obvious from tableau (99) is that if
root identity is ranked below S-Identity, the (here unspecified) markedness
constraint triggers dominant harmony. I will follow Bakovi (2000) here in
assuming that dominance is triggered by the local conjunction of a markedness constraint on a particular feature specification with the IO-Identity
constraint for that feature.
(101) Dominance as local conjunction
a. *[+F]&lIO-IDENT(F)
b. *[+F]&lIO-IDENT(F) >> S-IDENT(F)
These general considerations regarding morphological control and dominance should suffice for the moment. The issue will be discussed further in
the sections on Turkish, Dgma, Diola Fogni, and Pulaar.
3.2
Many languages with root controlled harmony additionally show asymmetric cooccurrence patterns within words which cannot be derived from the
Integrity meta-ranking developed above. There is furthermore a close relation between vowel co-occurrence patterns and the direction of affixation.
The vowel which triggers harmony is usually situated at the opposite side
of the root than that of affixation. If we have rightward affixation, the
trigger is at the left edge of the root, if affixation goes to the left, the trigger
is usually at the right edge of the root.
Moreover, in many languages, a greater variety of vowels is permitted at
the side of the root, where no affixes are attached.
Beckman (1998) lists a number of such edge faithfulness effects for the
leftmost syllable. Turkic languages show a tendency to have low rounded
vowels preferably in the first syllable. In all other syllables low vowels are
unrounded. Stems with low rounded vowels in the second or third syllable
are usually loan words. Hungarian has mid front rounded vowels in noninitial syllables only as an effect of harmony. Tamil has no mid vowels and
no round vowels in non-initial syllables, while these are readily allowed in
initial syllables. Shona has mid vowels in non-initial syllables only as an
effect of harmony. All these languages are suffixing languages.
97
o p n -be
strictly left-to-right (e.g. Wolof)
b.
b(- op a
strictly right-to-left (e.g. Yoruba)
c.
o p a-b(
left-to-right with opaque vowel
d.
be- o p a
disharmonic root, affix harmony
e.
*op a -b(
unattested in root-controlled system
f.
*b H- o p n
unattested in root-controlled system
Both parameters (directionality of affixation and of harmony) can be
derived if one assumes the elements at the root edge to which no affixes are
attached to be subject to particularly strong faithfulness constraints. In the
following I will explain the technical details of a unified morphophonological analysis of the interdependence of vowel harmony and affixation in
98
99
b. Condition on arguments
Both constraints share their argument(s).
c. Interpretation
The local disjunction C1lC2 is violated iff either C1 or C2 or both are
violated in some domain , to which both constraints apply (in the
sense of b).
It is crucial, however, that both constraints apply within the specified
domain. Consider in this respect anchoring constraints. These constraints
crucially refer to the edges of given structures in the input and the output. If
we combine an anchoring constraint with an Identity constraint, we get the
following:
(104) Positional faithfulness as LCD
a. L-ANCHOR(root, pwd): The left edge of the root corresponds to the
left edge of the prosodic word.
b. IO-IDENT(voice): Consonants have identical specifications in input
and output.
c. L-ANCHORlIO-IDENT(voice): The left edge of the root corresponds
to the left edge of the prosodic word, and the left edge of the root has
the same specification of the feature [voice] as the left edge of the
prosodic word.
If the LCD in (104c) is important in a language, we have a language which
probably has a voicing contrast in the first segment of the root only, and
which is strictly suffixing. The L-ANCHOR constraint is violated whenever
a candidate has some structure at the left edge of the prosodic word which
is not at the left edge of the root, for instance affixes or epenthetic elements. The Identity constraint is violated when the correspondent of the
root at the left edge of the prosodic word is not identical with its input in
voicing. The LCD is satisfied only if a segment that corresponds to the criteria of being at the left edge of the root in the input meets the requirements
of both constraints. For the interpretation of the LCD, argument sharing is
indispensable. Otherwise, the constraint combination would result in simple
promotion of both constraints, which might be undesirable in a grammar
for independent reasons. For illustration let us consider a hypothetical case
100
*VC[-voi]V
*[+voi]
*!
*
**
**
*
**
IO-ID(voi)
**
**
***
**
The LCD of L-ANCHOR and IO-Identity rules out all candidates with
prefixation (e,f), because in these forms the left edge of the root and the
word do not coincide. Candidates (b, d) are suboptimal because they violate
the high ranking LCD by their unfaithfulness to the underlying voicing
specification of the segment targeted by the LCD.
We can extend this LCD as a constraint scheme now, since the features
referred to are interchangeable or even all features. As a general constraint,
we can attribute a language's choice between predominating suffixation and
prefixation as an effect of extended Left-Anchoring or extended R-Anchoring, respectively.
(106) Affixation as RIGHT/LEFT-ANCHORING:
R/L-ANCHOR(root, pwd): Any element at the right/left edge of the
root has a correspondent at the right/left edge of the prosodic word.
(107) {R/L-ANCHOR IO-IDENT(F)}: Complex constraint is violated if
minimally one of the two constraints is violated by an element,
which is subject to both constraints, i.e. in the local domain.
If two constraints are locally 'disjoined' this means that any local domain
must satisfy both constraints. This combination is different from ranking
both disjoint constraints highly in that only those double constraint violations are counted which are incurred within the same domain. Traditionally this domain has been the segment. In the account developed here I will
treat the mapping of segments to edges not strictly in order to be able to
refer to the first/last vowel in a root as well. Thus, I will refer to the edge-
101
most syllable here, like Beckman (1998) does for the IO-IDENT-1 constraint. In case of disjunction of L/R-ANCHOR with any other constraint it is
of course only those consonants/vowels which are affected by the ANCHOR
constraint as well as the other constraint that are subject to the local
disjunction. Any material in a (potential) syllable which is not at the designated periphery mentioned in the Anchoring constraint in S1 is excluded.
In the case of R-ANCHOR(root, pwd) all consonants/ vowels vacuously
satisfy the local disjunction which are not at the right root edge in their
underlying form. Whether we have to treat this affixation parameter as a
local disjunction or as a simplex constraint may be subject to further
research. For the current purposes I will refer to this strong edge faithfulness as given in (108) and (109).
(108) Suffixation as LEFT-ANCHORING (i.e. Local disjunction):
LEFT-ANCHOR(root, pwd): The leftmost consonant/vowel of the root
has an identical correspondent in the leftmost consonant/vowel of the
prosodic word.
(109) Prefixation as RIGHT-ANCHORING (i.e. Local disjunction):
RIGHT-ANCHOR(root, pwd): Any consonant/vowel at the right edge
of the root has an identical correspondent in the rightmost
consonant/vowel of the prosodic word.
In tableau (110) the possibilities to violate Left-ANCHOR are summarised.
The mirror image holds for Right-ANCHOR.
(110) Violation and satisfaction of R/L-ANCHOR:
/CV1CV2Croot +VC +VCV/ L-ANCHOR
a. VCV-CV1CV2C-VC
*
(left root edge is not aligned
with left word edge)
b. CV3CV2C-VC-VCV
*
(leftmost root vowel is not
identical to leftmost vowel of
the word)
c. CV2C-VC-VCV
*
(leftmost part of root is not
mapped to surface form)
d. CV1CV2C-VC-VCV
9
(perfect anchoring and identity
at left root/word edge)
(RIGHT-ANCHOR mutatis mutandis)
102
103
104
IO-IDENTroot
*
*
*
105
b. disharmony
V VI V
[F] [-F] [-F]
106
(118) Local conjunction of BALANCE (first version): S-IDENT(F)&l*SIDENT(F): A vowel may exclusively agree with its neighbours or
exclusively disagree with its neighbours with respect to feature F.
(119) Violation of LC BALANCE I:
BALANCE:
S-ID(F)&l*S-ID(F)
9
9
*
9
**
*
**
9
*
107
The observation to be kept is not simply that high vowels are particularly prone to behave as transparent or balanced, no matter what the
harmonising feature is. Low vowels may behave as balanced as well, in
case they cause an asymmetry to the vowel inventory with regard to the
harmonising feature (as observed in Kinande by Schlindwein 1987).
Therefore, it is not the markedness constraint against high vowels with
retracted tongue root position which deserves a special status, it is the
markedness constraint on vowels which do not have a counterpart with
exactly the same feature profile except the specification of the harmonically
active feature.
The pattern exhibited by Trojan vowels is a peculiarity of surface
asymmetric vowels as well.
3.4
108
Parasitic harmony
a.
[RD]
b.
*[RD]
[H]
[H]
[H]
[-H]
Summary
109
patterns can be accounted for by almost the same local conjunction as in the
initial proposal for transparent vowels above, the harmony constraint is
conjoined with a disharmony constraint. Only the features have to be different in both constraints. If the harmony constraint refers to the feature
rounding while the disharmony constraint refers to the feature height, and
furthermore IO-Identity on height is assumed to be more important than IOIdentity of rounding, we get the desired result.
(124) Local conjunction of UNIFORMVH: S-IDENT(F1)&l*S-IDENT(F2)
In the local conjunction on BALANCE, two conflicting constraints on the
same feature attracted each other. In this case it is two conflicting
constraints on different dimensions of the feature matrix, which are
conjoined. I will use this LC lateron in the analysis of Yawelmani harmony.
Further research will have to show why it is the height features which are
involved as the uniformity condition so often, and which other features can
take on this role as well.
3.6
Summary
In this section I have laid out the technical aspects of the theory which I
propose to analyse vowel harmony. Three points should have become obvious already: Vowel harmony is a prosodically governed phenomenon in the
sense that the elements which stand in correspondence are the prosodic
units of the mora or that of the syllable. Vowel harmony is also strictly tied
to morphology, as can be seen from the connection between asymmetries in
vocalic patterns within words and the parametrisation of affixation, which
is determined by a positional faithfulness constraint on phonological structure. The third point to be made is that the variation attested in the world's
languages regarding the aspects of vowel harmony under discussion can be
theoretically accounted for solely by reliance on positional faithfulness and
local constraint coordination within Optimality Theory.
Of course one could object that the use of the powerful means of constraint coordination opens the doors to arbitrariness. Arbitrariness is
avoided here from two angles: the possibilities of constraint coordination
are reduced by the shared argument condition (Crowhurst and Hewitt) on
the one side and by functional motivation on the other. The latter means
that an instance of constraint coordination has to serve a certain higher
110
Part II:
Case Studies
Chapter 4
Edge effects and positional integrity
4.1
Introduction
114
This analysis has the advantage that it excludes languages with root
controlled harmony where harmony is triggered by the vowel which is
situated in the root at the side where affixation takes place. The analysis
explains furthermore why in strictly suffixing languages regularisation of
loanwords is triggered by the vowel in the first syllable in most cases and
by the vowel in the last stem syllable in prefixing languages.
The Turkish data as well as the Futankoore Pulaar data will also serve to
explain "the fate of the medial vowel". Suppose we have a word with a
stem containing several vowels and with two or more affixes with a vowel
each. If the most peripheral affix has an opaque vowel, one which opens up
its own harmony domain, the question arises what happens to the affix
vowel between stem and opaque affix vowel. In all languages with root
control the medial vowel agrees with the next stem vowel. Under an
analysis which does not assume directionality to be a parameter of the harmony constraint itself the medial vowel could also assimilate to the more
peripheral opaque affix vowel.
The answer to this question lies in the observation that assimilation
maximises the perceptual prominence of the morpheme which contains the
trigger of assimilation, while it reduces the prominence of the morpheme
containing the target of assimilation. Conceptually roots are more important
than affixes, which means that they also deserve greater phonological
prominence.
Technically, the prominence asymmetry between roots and affixes can
be described as an effect of positional variants of the constraint against assimilation. McCarthy and Prince (1995) introduced the constraint INTEGRITY, which was defined as a constraint against gemination by disallowing
the mapping of one input structure onto more than one output correspondent. If the definition of this constraint is extended to the featural level of
structure, it is violated by assimilation, since assimilation is correspondence
with the neighbour in the framework developed here, and as such an indirect correspondence relation with the underlying feature of the neighbour
which is the trigger of harmony. As a faithfulness constraint, INTEGRITY
has a positional variant, which determines the fate of the medial vowel in
vowel harmony.
The example of Dgma, which is a language with root controlled ATR
harmony and affixation to both sides of the root, serves to show how root
control is regulated by positional INTEGRITY in a language where both LeftANCHOR and Right-ANCHOR are ranked very low in the hierarchy.
115
Diola Fogni is similar to Dgma in most respects except that the language displays the dominant-recessive type of harmony instead of root
control. This example serves to illustrate how the root control grammar
developed before can be neutralised by a local conjunction of markedness
with faithfulness (as proposed by Bakovi 2000) such that ATR dominance
results.
The last case study shows how in an unorthodox reranking of positional
constraints affix control can arise.
Before I come to the details of this approach I will show that asymmetries in the cooccurrence patterns of Yoruba vowels are effects of the
Anchoring constraint that is also the source of the direction of affixation.
4.2
Yoruba is a language which has only prefixation and displays root-controlled ATR harmony. The Yoruba vowel inventory is given in (125).
(125) Yoruba vowel inventory (Pulleyblank 1996: 297)
front
advanced
i
high
retracted
advanced
e
mid
retracted
(
advanced
low
retracted
a
back
u
o
o
The system is asymmetric with regard to the harmonic feature ATR, in that
the ATR high vowels do not have retracted counterparts. These vowels
never alternate with regard to ATR. They don't even alternate with regard
to height to make a word more harmonic. High vowels are specific in that
they display patterns which are seen as results of derivational opacity in the
literature. The second asymmetry is caused by the low vowel, which is
retracted and has no counterpart in the system which is [+ATR]. I will postpone the discussion of high vowels to the chapter on Trojan vowels. In this
section, I will concentrate on the patterns found with the mid vowels and
the low vowel.
116
/o + /6w/
/o + /jow/
'publish a book'
'be jealous'
The language has enclitics to the right side of stems. These clitics do not
undergo harmony.
(127) No harmony with enclitics
a. gbgb r( 'forget it'
b. p o
'call you'
In roots containing only mid vowels all vowels agree with regard to ATR.
(128) Yoruba words containing only mid vowels
a. ATR words
b. RTR words
eb
'heap for yams'
(s(
'foot'
epo
'oil'
(ko
'pap'
ol
'thief'
ob(
'soup'
ow
'money'
oko
'vehicle'
(Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1989: 177)
With words which contain a low vowel and mid vowels, the situation is
more complicated. In words with D in the rightmost syllable, only retracted
mid vowels occur (129a). If D is in the first syllable, the mid vowel to the
right can be either advanced (129b) or retracted (129c). In the roots with
the low retracted vowel followed by an advanced mid vowel, the ATR
harmony requirement is ignored.
117
'Spotted Grass-mouse'
'plate'
'palm-nut oil'
c. [a(@
'witch'
[ab(r(@
'needle'
[a6o]
'cloth'
(Pulleyblank 1996: 306)
This pattern has led Archangeli and Pulleyblank (1989) and Pulleyblank
(1996) to assume that Yoruba vowel harmony is a directional process
applying from the right to the left in a word or satisfying a Left-Alignment
constraint, respectively. If harmony operates bidirectionally in other languages (see the discussion of Turkish and Dgma below), why should it be
directional in Yoruba? Furthermore, the alignment approach has been
rejected on general grounds above. An argument for a unified analysis of
affixation and directionality effects of vowel harmony is the observation
that there are no languages in which harmony is systematically triggered by
the root vowel at the edge of the root to which no affixes attach (as schematised in chapter 3).
4.2.2 An anchoring analysis of the asymmetry in roots
Both parameters (directionality of affixation and of harmony) can be
derived if one assumes the elements at the root or stem edge to which no
affixes are attached to be subject to particularly strong faithfulness constraints. In Yoruba, prefixation and the harmony pattern are shaped by the
constraint in (109), which is a combination of an Anchoring constraint and
a featural Identity constraint. The general pattern of this constraint was
motivated in section 3.2.
(130) Prefixation as RIGHT-ANCHORING (i.e., LCD):
RIGHT-ANCHOR(root, pwd): Any syllable at the right edge of the root
has an identical correspondent at the right edge of the prosodic word.
In Yoruba, as we have seen, retracted as well as advanced mid vowels can
stand at the right edge of a word, whether a low (invariably retracted)
vowel precedes them or not. To account for this the constraint R-ANCHOR
118
has to rank above the constraint demanding ATR harmony, i.e. SIDENT(ATR).
(131) Syntagmatic Identity S-IDENT(ATR): Adjacent syllables are identical
in their specification of [ATR].
Satisfaction of the harmony constraint must be more important in Yoruba
than faithfulness to underlying ATR specifications. Otherwise we would
observe no harmony at all. This is accounted for by the ranking of SIDENT(ATR) above IO-IDENT(ATR). The invariability of D with regard to
ATR is an effect of an undominated markedness constraint against the
feature combination [+low, +ATR].
(132) *[+low, +ATR]: Low vowels are not advanced.
This markedness constraint has to rank even higher than the Anchoring
constraint. The latter is a faithfulness constraint and would eventually cause
low advanced vowels to surface at the right edge of words if it were more
important than the markedness constraint.
Bringing all these assumptions together we arrive at the ranking below.
(133) Yoruba ranking:
*[+low, +ATR] >> R-ANCHOR >> S-ID(ATR)
>> IO-ID(ATR) ... >> L-ANCHOR
In tableau (134), the correct output from the underlyingly disharmonic stem
afe 'Spotted Grass-mouse' is evaluated against the Yoruba constraint
hierarchy.
(134) Stem-internal disharmony [afe] 'spotted grass-mouse'
/afe/ *[+lo, +ATR] R-ANCHOR S-ID(ATR) IO-ID(ATR)
a. af(
*!
*
b. nIH
*!
*
) c. afe
*
The most harmonic candidate (a) violates R-ANCHOR, because even though
the rightmost vowel of the root is also the rightmost vowel of the word it is
unfaithful to its underlying ATR specification. The second candidate is
suboptimal in that it violates *[+lo, +ATR]. The only candidate left is
119
120
IO-ID(ATR)
*
**
*
*
**
Turkish has the vowel system given in (137). The system is completely
symmetric in that every vowel has a counterpart with the opposite backness
or roundness specification. This richness is explored in the Turkish vowel
harmony, which covers the features backness and roundness.
(137) Turkish vowels
high
low
round
round
front
i
[y]
e
[2]
back
[]
u
a [$]
o
121
Even though phonetically the low vowels are not all of the same height, the
system is assumed to have only a twofold height distinction by most
authors (see van der Hulst and van de Weijer 1991: 12).
4.3.1 Left-anchoring
Roundness harmony is restricted in that it is fully operative only among
high vowels. This restriction has been described by Kirchner (1993) as an
effect of a Markedness constraint which prohibits roundness on nonhigh
vowels *[-high, +round]. Since the epenthetic vowel in Turkish is high and
the language has only two levels in the height dimension, I would favour
the assumption that the marked height is low, and the whole height
distinction is encoded by the phonological feature [low]. So the active
markedness constraint should be *LORO / *[+low, +round].
In most Turkish roots, the two vowels o and are allowed only in the
first syllable. All affixes containing nonhigh vowels have unrounded
vowels. The only exception is the progressive marker yor which I will
discuss in 4.3.3. In the current approach, the fact that Turkish is a suffixing
language is explained by high ranking of the constraint L-ANCHOR. This
results also in particularly strong faithfulness to the vowel at the left edge
of roots.
(138) Suffixation as LEFT-ANCHORING (i.e., LCD):
LEFT-ANCHOR(root, pwd): Any syllable at the left edge of the root
has an identical correspondent at the left edge of the prosodic word.
If we rank L-ANCHOR above the markedness constraint against low
rounded vowels, which in turn is ranked above general IO-Faithfulness, we
describe exactly the Turkish pattern: The vowels o and emerge in the first
syllable only.
(139)
The data in (140) show the basic harmony pattern. Affixes containing a low
vowel (like the plural marker ler/lar) agree with the root vowel in backness. Roundness harmony does not take place with these affix vowels as is
shown by the nominative plural forms in (140c,d,g,h). High affix vowels
agree in backness and roundness with the preceding vowel, regardless
122
nom.sg.
ip
kz
yz
pul
elj
sap
kjy
son
nom.pl.
ip-ljer
kz-lar
yz-ljer
pul-lar
elj-ljer
sap-lar
kjy-ljer
son-lar
gen.sg.
gen.pl.
ip-in
ip-ljer-in
kz-n
kz-lar-n
yz-n
yz-ljer-in
pul-un
pul-lar-n
elj-in
elj-ljer-in
sap-n
sap-lar-n
j
k y-n
kjy-ljer-in
son-un
son-lar-n
(Clements and Sezer 1982: 216)
Tableau (141) shows the Turkish harmony grammar at work and illustrates
what would happen to a hypothetical underlyingly rounded low vowel in an
affix.
(141) Turkish kjy-ljer 'villages' from hypothetical underlying /kjy-lor/
/kjy -ljor/ L-ANCHOR *LORO S-ID(bk,rd)
IO-ID(rd)
a. kjyljor
**!
*(bk)
b. kjyljr
**!
*
c. kjeyljer
*!
***
) d. kjyljer
*
*(rd)
**
The high ranking markedness constraint *LORO sorts out all forms
containing low rounded vowels (a,b) except one (d). Candidate (d) violates
*LORO by the rounded low vowel in the first syllable, but it fares better
with regard to Left-ANCHOR than its competitor (c). Candidate (c) has an
unrounded first vowel in satisfaction of *LORO, but this first root vowel is
subject to Left-ANCHOR. Unfaithfulness to roundness in the leftmost
syllable of the root violates this constraint. All other underlyingly rounded
low vowels trivially satisfy Left-ANCHOR, because they are not at the left
root edge underlyingly. Their input-output mapping is therefore determined
by *LORO. Since *LORO is more important than S-IDENT(rd), disharmony
with regard to roundness is readily accepted by the output mapping from a
potential harmonic input like /kjy-lor/.
Assuming an input like /-lor/ for the affix demonstrates that the shape of
the vowel in question is completely determined by the grammar, except for
123
*dur-dr-saj-d
c. gyl-dyr-sej-di
*gyl-dir-sej-di
'laugh (caus-cond-past)'
The harmony grammar developed so far, relying on L-Anchoring, IOfaithfulness, and a directionless harmony constraint theoretically allows for
both, assimilation to the root vowel or to the affix vowel. With the input
124
...
*[+rd]
*
**!
One solution to this dilemma has been seen in the assumption that affixes
are not attached simultaneously to a stem but serially. In OT terms this
means that we first evaluate a form of a stem plus one affix. This output
(whether it exists or not) is the input for affixation with the next morpheme,
the opaque one in this case. This has been formalised as Stem-AffixedForm-Faithfulness by Bakovi (2000). The disadvantage of this solution is
that it crucially relies on multiple base-output correspondence. And it is
anything but clear whether all postulated bases in languages with rootcontrolled harmonies are actually occurring independent output forms. The
second disadvantage is that serialism creeps back into the theory through
the backdoor.
The proposal I want to make here relies on the division of faithfulness
into positional and general faithfulness. McCarthy and Prince (1995) dis-
125
126
durdirsejdi
durdrsajd
durdursajd
dirdirsejdi
LS-ID
ANCHOR (bk, rd)
**!
*
*
*!
INTEGRITY
Affix
*!*
**
IO-ID INTEGRITY
(bk, rd)
Root
***
****
**
***
****
/ *glyrm
c. /gel-I-yor-Im/
geliyorum
'come (progressive-1sg)'
/ *geliyerim
d. /bak-I-yor-Im/
bakiyorum
'look (progressive-1sg)'
/ *bakiyarim
(Clements and Sezer 1982: 231)
127
lt6-r
measure + Aorist
b6 bakan
'prime minister'
at6lt6er
'protractor'
128
c. kar
black
denz
sea
kardeniz
'The Black Sea'
(Kabak and Vogel 2000: 8)
S-ID(bk, rd)
*
*
pwd(gel) pwd(yorum)
129
regular grammar if we assume that the affix still has the status of a root in
its underlying form, even though its semantics is erased so much that it cannot be used independently anymore. Such an assumption is not that exotic.
Similar affixes can be found in many other languages. See for instance the
analysis of Dutch suffix classes in Grijzenhout and Krmer (2000).
Given root status for -yor, the underlying o is protected against
neutralisation in satisfaction of *LORO by the high ranking faithfulness
constraint L-ANCHOR. By definition this constraint demands that every left
root edge coincide with the left edge of a prosodic word. This includes the
left edge of -yor as well. Furthermore this constraint demands featural
identity of the underlying material with the surface realisation of the leftmost syllable of every root, again including the root-like affix. The second
requirement, i.e., identity, does not only explain the exceptional occurrence
of o in an affix, but also its capacity of triggering harmony in following
affixes.
In tableau (151) below, all efforts to incorporate -yor in the prosodic
word of the verb root fail because they result in violations of L-ANCHOR
(candidates a-c). Since -yor is a root, its left edge, indicated by # in the
candidates, has to coincide with the left edge of a prosodic word, indicated
by an opening round bracket. Even reversal of the precedence of verb root
and affixal root, as in candidate (c) cannot improve performance on the
anchoring constraint, since this time it is the left edge of the verb root
which is not properly matched with the left word edge. Thus, one prosodic
word is not enough for the affix and its host. Even though provided with
two prosodic words of which the left edges align with the two crucial root
edges, candidate (d) still fails on L-ANCHOR. This is an instance of
violation because the o of -yor is neutralised to e, violating the Identity
requirement of L-ANCHOR.
(151) A Turkish exceptional affix
L-ANCHOR
*LORO
/#gel# +y #jor# +im/
a. (#gely#jorim)
*!
*
b. (#geli#jerim)
*!
c. (#jor#geliim)
*!
d. (#geli)(#jerim)
*!
e. (#geli)(#jorim)
*
f. (#gelu)(#jorum)
*!
*
) g. (#geli)(#jorum)
*
# = root edge; ( ) = prosodic word edges
S-ID(bk, rd)
****
**
***!*
**
**
130
'price'
'auction'
bobin
rozet
billur
kudret
'spool'
'collar pin'
'crystal'
'power'
sifon
peron
muzip
nemrut
131
'toilet flush'
'railway platform'
'mischievous'
'unsociable'
(Kirchner 1993: 2)
Affixes attached to these roots harmonise with the last root vowel. This can
be accounted for by simply ranking IO-Identity for roots (IO-IDENTroot)
above the harmony constraint S-IDENT and above the markedness constraint against low rounded vowels.
(153) Ranking
L-ANCHOR, IO-IDENTroot >> *LORO
>> S-IDENT(bk), S-IDENT(rd) >> IO-IDENT
This grammar predicts unlimited combinations of vowels in roots and the
lack of low rounded vowels in affixes. From a synchronic point of view this
grammar allows unrestricted combinations of vowels in native roots too.
Thus I conclude that the high ranking of IO-IDENTroot is historically an
innovation. The constraint must have been subject to promotion with the
introduction of a huge number of loan words into the language. This then
explains why in older stems vowel combinations are much more restricted.
In a historically earlier stage all roots have been subject to the restrictions
of the harmony grammar. Since roots do not alternate they have been stored
in underlying representations as they occur in surface representations. At
the point where IO-IDENTstem became important the native lexicon
contained harmonic stems only.
At this point we can come back to the issue of disharmonic affixes. Not
all disharmonic affixes are prestressing and therefore compound-like. This
analysis explains also the behaviour of disharmonic affixes such as the
semi-productive Persian borrowing -var ('X-like') which has no alternant
*-veri 39 and the other affixes in (154).
(154) More Turkish irregular affixes
'Shakespearian'
a. ekspir-vari
'Churchillian'
Crcil-vari
James Bond-vari bir casus-luk 'a James-Bond-like case of espionage'
132
b. sekiz-gen-ler
ok-gen-ler
'octagonals'
'polygonals'
c. ermen-istan-i
mool-istan-i
'Armenia'
'Mongolia'
d. mest-ane
dost-ane
'drunkenly'
'friendly'
Polgrdi (1999) analyses those affixes which do not have an irregular stress
pattern but are disharmonic nevertheless as forming one synthetic unit with
the root. She adopts Kaye's (1995) notion of analytic versus non-analytic
morphology. Non-analytic forms behave like underived lexical items while
analytic forms can be of two types. Either two concatenated morphemes are
assigned one government domain each and both these domains are
subsumed under one outer domain or only the first morpheme constitutes a
separate domain. The former are compound-like structures while the latter
are regularly affixed (inflected) word forms. If we have a closer look at disharmonic affixes one striking feature emerges. They are all derivational
affixes. They transfer roots from one lexical category into another. For
instance, the affixes -istan and -gen are noun-forming morphemes and -ane
forms adverbs. Under the assumption that derivational affixes form a stem
together with their host while inflectional affixes are not incorporated into
the morphological domain of the stem we arrive at a principled account of
irregular affixes. On the basis of this observation the positional Identity
constraint can be redefined as referring to stems rather than roots. The
vowels in these derivational affixes are subject to IO-IDENTstem and therefore harmony cannot apply to them.
(155)
/ok -gen -lar/
a. okganlar
b. okgenlar
) c. okgenler
IO-IDENTstem
S-IDENT
*!
IO-IDENT
*
**!
*
Under the assumption that disharmonic affixes are treated like stems or
stem-forming and constructions with the former affixes are structurally
compounds, their disharmonic behaviour is expected. It remains to be
133
explored in greater detail whether exactly the same argument holds for all
exceptional affixes.
In the next section I will show how the INTEGRITY proposal alone
accounts for root control in a language with affixation to both sides.
4.4
high
front
i
,
e
(
back
u
8
o
o
Dgma allows for affixes to both sides of the root. All affixes agree with
the root vowel with regard to ATR.
(157) Dgma vowel harmony
Advanced
high -hr-!m
'surrounding'
-sw-!m 'ironing'
Retracted
8-,
o-8
'leaf'
'doctor'
'descending'
'jumping'
mid
-sn
-vy-!m
'fish'
'fetching'
8-t(v-!m
8-sol-!m
low
-d
'river'
(-nm
'animal, meat'
(Pulleyblank et al 1995: 2)
134
S-ID(ATR)
a. t(v!m
b. tv!m
) c. 8t(v!m
*!*
INTEGRITY
Affix
*!
IO-ID
INTEGRITY
Root
*
**
*
**
In tableau (159), the faithful but disharmonic candidate (a) is ruled out
because it violates high ranking S-IDENT(ATR) twice. Candidate (b) is the
majority candidate in the sense that it is completely harmonic on the cost of
the least number of IO-IDENT(ATR) violations. It has less violations of IOIDENT(ATR) than its competitor (c), but fails on INTEGRITYAffix, in that
the medial vowel has acquired the ATR specification of one of the adjacent
affix vowels. In this respect candidate (c) is more harmonic. It satisfies
INTEGRITYAffix which makes it optimal in comparison with candidate (b).
Dgma is a symmetric system in three respects. The vowel inventory is
completely symmetric in underlying representations and on the surface.
Every vowel in any dimension of height and backness is present as advanced and as retracted. (Compare in this respect Yoruba, where the high
vowels lack a retracted counterpart and the low vowel lacks an advanced
counterpart.) Furthermore, R/L-Anchoring constraints play no decisive role
in the harmony grammar. Therefore we observe no edge asymmetries. The
language is also symmetric with regard to the possible specifications of
ATR. Neither [+ATR] nor [-ATR] is the preferred trigger of harmony,
which means we find no dominance effect. The only asymmetry in the
135
In the following I will show briefly what happens if the local conjunction
*[-ATR]&IO-IDENT(ATR) plays a role in a grammar, as proposed by
Bakovi 2000, drawing on the example of Diola Fogni. Diola Fogni is
similar to Dgma in two respects. It has a completely symmetric vowel
system (see 160), and it has affixation to both sides of the root (161).
(160) Diola Fogni vowel inventory (Bakovi 2000: 52)
front
back
advanced
i
u
high
retracted
,
8
advanced
e
o
mid
retracted
(
o
advanced
)
low
retracted
$
All vowels in a word agree with respect to ATR. If all vowels are RTR
underlyingly as in (161a), this is not particularly spectacular. But look at
the examples in (161b,c). If only one vowel is ATR underlyingly it
determines the ATR quality of all other vowels, regardless of whether the
trigger is a root vowel (161b) or an affix vowel (161c).
(161) Diola Fogni ATR harmony
a. n,- E$M
-(n
-8
CAUS 2PL
1SG have
[n,E$M(Q8]
'I have caused you to have'
136
b. n,1SG
jitum
-(n
-8
lead away CAUS 2PL
[nijitumenu]
'I have caused you to be lead away'
c. n,1SG
b$j
have
[nib)julu]
'I have from you'
(Bakovi 2000: 52)
-ul
from
-8
2PL
SID(ATR)
*[-ATR]&
IO-ID(ATR)
INTEGRITY
Affix
IO-ID
INTEGRITY
Root
*
***
*
***
*!*
*!
***
The most faithful candidate does not display full harmony and is therefore
sub-optimal in comparison with candidates (b,c). The choice between the
root-controlled candidate and the candidate with dominant ATR is made by
the local conjunction. Candidate (b) is unfaithful to its underlying specification [+ATR] of the affix vowel /-ul/ in order to be harmonic with the
root, which violates IO-IDENT(ATR). Now that this vowel has become
[-ATR] in the surface representation it additionally violates the markedness
constraint *[-ATR]. Since the same vowel violates both the faithfulness
constraint and the markedness constraint, it also violates the local conjunction of both. A single violation of this local conjunction weighs more
than three violations of INTEGRITYAffix due to the ranking of both
constraints. For this reason, candidate (c) which has no violation of the
local conjunction is chosen as optimal, even though harmony is determined
by the affix vowel here.
137
In this section, I will discuss the vowel harmony pattern of Futankoore Pulaar as reported by Paradis (1992). I will argue in particular that this pattern
can be accounted for by the above made assumption of one INTEGRITY constraint on affixes or functional elements, and one on roots or lexical elements. To get an understanding of the problem contributed by Pulaar phonology let us first have a closer look at the data.
4.6.1 The data
Pulaar has a surface vowel inventory which is exactly the same as that of
Yoruba discussed above.
(164) Pulaar vowel inventory
high
mid
low
advanced
retracted
advanced
retracted
advanced
retracted
front
i
back
u
e
(
o
o
a
Even though we find a seven vowel system at the surface, Paradis proposes
to analyse Pulaar as a language having only five vowel phonemes (disregarding length distinctions). The vowels she assumes as underlying are i, u,
(, o, and D. With such an inventory, the ATR specification of each vowel
should be predictable, which it actually is. High vowels are invariably advanced and the low vowel is invariably retracted. Mid root vowels always
surface with the ATR specification contributed by the following affix
vowel, as illustrated in (165). In (165a), the affix vowel is advanced and
such is the root vowel, while the affix vowel is retracted in the forms in
(165b), triggering retraction in the preceding root vowel.
138
'ribbon-CLASS'
'ribbon-DIM.SG / -DIM.PL'
'boundary-CLASS'
'boundary-DIM.SG / -DIM.PL'
'shoe -DIM.SG / -DIM.PL'
(Paradis 1992: 1,90)
In (166a), the mid affix vowels have an advanced tongue root, and not even
the low root vowel in the last example can change this. In fact, we see now
that the tongue root position is predictable for mid vowels everywhere
except in the last syllable of the word. In this position it makes a difference
whether a mid vowel is underlyingly specified for [-ATR] or [+ATR]. Also
high root vowels do not change the ATR specification in retracted mid affix
vowels as can be seen in (167), where the mid affix vowels are retracted
even in the presence of a high, i.e., advanced root vowel.
(167) Pulaar high root vowels and harmony
dill-(r(
'riot'
*dillere
fuy-(r(
'pimple'
*fuyere
n
'writer'
*binndoowo
bin d-oo-wo
'small calabashes'
*tummbukon
tummbu-kon
(Paradis 1992: 1, 87)
High vowels in affixes trigger tongue root advancement in mid root vowels,
139
but not in mid affix vowels to their right. In sequences of a mid root vowel
followed by a high vowel, followed by a mid retracted affix vowel, the high
vowel thus behaves as opaque. The retraction of the mid affix vowel cannot
pass through the high vowel to the mid root vowel.
(168) Pulaar high vowels in affixes
a. ATR forms
et-ir-d(
'to weigh with'
hel-ir-d(
'to break with'
okk-i-d(
'to become one-eyed'
feyy-u-d(
'to fell'
b. RTR forms
(t-d(
h(l-d(
okk-o
f(yy-a
'to weigh'
'to break'
'one-eyed person'
'to fell (imperfective)'
(Paradis 1992: 87)
The low vowel determines the ATR specification at least in mid root
vowels. Thus, it behaves as opaque as well.
(169) The low vowel in Pulaar
boot-aa-ri
'lunch'
poof-aa-li
'breaths'
nodd-aa-li
'call'
1
gor-aa-gu
'courage'
*bootaari
*poofaali
*noddaali
*1goraagu
140
141
treating the word edge effects observed in other languages such as Yoruba
on the one hand, and Turkish or Finnish (see chapter 5) on the other, as
epiphenomena of two coordinated constraints rather than as an effect of one
atomar constraint. In Pulaar, the left edge of the root is mapped to the left
edge of the word, regardless of Identity violations in the leftmost root
syllable.
(173) Pulaar ranking III:
*[+hi, -ATR], *[+lo, +ATR] >> IO-IDENTRight(ATR) >> S-IDENT(ATR) >>
IO-IDENT(ATR), L-ANCHOR >> PARSE(seg, pwd) >> R-ANCHOR
The additional ranking of L-ANCHOR above PARSE(seg, pwd), a constraint
demanding that segments are incorporated in higher prosodic structure such
as the prosodic word, which in turn is more important than R-ANCHOR
accounts for the fact that affixes are attached to the right side of the root in
Pulaar. This ranking excludes prefixation as well as cliticisation of the
grammatical morphemes. This is illustrated in tableau (174).
(174) Affixation in Pulaar
/sof -ru/
a.
b.
c.
) d.
(rusof)
ru(sof)
(sof)ru
(sofru)
L-ANCHOR
(root, pwd)
PARSE
(seg, pwd)
R-ANCHOR
(root, pwd)
*!
**!
**!
*
With the above grammar, the basic harmony pattern can be accounted for.
In the following I will disregard the lowly ranked constraints considered in
tableau (174), since they have no impact on the relevant output candidates
whatsoever.
In the combination of a mid root vowel with a high affix vowel we
cannot determine the underlying ATR specifications of the respective
vowels because the outcome is completely determined by the constraints
and their ranking. Lexicon Optimization as proposed by Inkelas (1994)
would predict that the vowel in the trigger is fully specified underlyingly,
since every occurrence of it would violate anti-insertion constraints. Thus,
the grammar is more harmonic with a fully specified vowel in the trigger.
The root vowel would be underspecified according to the same argument,
because it alternates according to the environment (the affix vowel to the
142
*[+hi,
-ATR]
*[+lo,
+ATR]
IO-IDRight
(ATR)
S-IDENT
(ATR)
IO-ID
(ATR)
*!
(**)
(**)
(**)
IO-IDRight
(ATR)
S-IDENT
(ATR)
IO-ID
(ATR)
*
*
*!
*
**
*!
*[+hi,
-ATR]
*[+lo,
+ATR]
*!
*[+hi,
-ATR]
*!
*[+lo,
+ATR]
IO-IDRight
(ATR)
S-IDENT
(ATR)
IO-ID
(ATR)
*
*!
*
What ever the underlying specification of the vowels in (175) may be, in
this case the markedness constraint against high retracted vowels causes
assimilation of the mid root vowel to the high affix vowel. In the tableaux
(176) and (177) I evaluate forms containing mid vowels only. The
difference in the two tableaux lies in the underlying specification of the last
vowel. The affix vowel is [-ATR] underlyingly in the affix -on, while it is
[+ATR] underlyingly in the affix -el. The ultimate position in the word
143
*[+hi,
-ATR]
*[+lo,
+ATR]
a. lefon
b. lefon
) c. l(fon
IO-IDRight
(ATR)
S-IDENT
(ATR)
*!
*!
*[+hi,
-ATR]
*[+lo,
+ATR]
a. l(f(l
b. l(fel
) c. lefel
IO-IDRight
(ATR)
S-IDENT
(ATR)
*!
*!
bootaar,
boot44ri
bootaari
bootaari
*[+hi,
-ATR]
*[+lo,
+ATR]
*!
IO-IDRight
(ATR)
S-IDENT
(ATR)
*
*!
**!
*
The combination of a low or high root vowel plus a mid affix vowel
followed by another affix vowel with the opposite ATR specification than
that of the root vowel shows why the almost universal ranking of
144
a.
b.
0 c.
/ d.
b,nnd-oo-wo
binnd-oo-wo
binnd-oo-wo
binnd-oo-wo
*!
INTEGRITY
Root
INTEGRITY
Affix
S-ID(ATR)
IO-IDRight
(ATR)
*[+hi,
-ATR]
/binnd-oo-wo/
*[+lo,
+ATR]
**
*!
*
*
*
*!
The grammar in (178) does not decide over candidates (c) and (d). Thus we
have to consider less important constraints. The usual ranking of INTEGRITYAffix over INTEGRITYRoot denotes the wrong candidate (c) as the
optimal output in (179). Thus, I assume that in Pulaar, these two constraints
are ranked inversely, as indicated in (180).
a.
b.
1 c.
- d.
b,nnd-oo-wo
binnd-oo-wo
binnd-oo-wo
binnd-oo-wo
*!
INTEGRITY
Affix
INTEGRITY
Root
S-ID
(ATR)
IO-IDRight
(ATR)
*[+lo,
+ATR]
/binnd-oo-wo/
*[+hi,
-ATR]
**
*!
*
*
*!
*
145
146
'ribbon-CLASS'
'ribbon-DIM.SG / -DIM.PL'
'boundary-CLASS'
'boundary-DIM.SG / -DIM.PL'
'shoe -DIM.SG / -DIM.PL'
(Paradis 1992: 1, 90)
Recent accounts
147
span with the left word edge, while the other aligns the left edge of every
RTR span with the left edge of the word. That is, she does not only need a
constraint for each direction (L/R) but also one for each feature specification, both independently rankable.
Furthermore, Archangeli analyses featural faithfulness as MAX and DEP
constraints referring to individual features, which she assumes to be
assessed independently from their segmental or moraic (or syllabic) association. This implies that the grammar contains an additional set of faithfulness constraints, MAXPATH(feature) and DEPPATH(feature), as proposed by
Pulleyblank (1996 and elsewhere). These constraints make sure that
features are also associated to the anchor (segment or mora) they are
associated to underlyingly. Furthermore, her conception of tongue root position as two privative features implies the existence of MAX and DEP
constraints for each of these two features. Having blown up the constraint
inventory by these assumptions, Archangeli feels in no way tempted to
abandon the alternative IO-IDENT(F) constraint family.
Now just imagine that all these faithfulness constraints are freely
rankable with respect to each other and with respect to all other constraints
in the grammar. This enriches the possible typology to an extent which
outnumbers actual linguistic diversity. Furthermore, a ranking of MAX(F)
constraints constitutes a hierarchy of markedness. Such a hierarchy is
provided as well by the ranking of DEP(F) constraints, by the ranking of
IO-Identity(F) constraints, and, of course, by the ranking of markedness
constraints referring to features and their combinations. Where the IOIdentity/Markedness approach followed in this work is already redundant
with respect to markedness, Archangeli's and Pulleyblank's conception of
featural faithfulness exhibits an inflationary redundance with its reference
to nine different faithfulness constraints42 as well as markedness
constraints.
4.7
Recent accounts
148
attested patterns of vowel harmony in connection with morphological patterns in the world, the alignment approach seems less appropriate since
here eventual directionality tendencies of the phenomenon come from direct reference to right or left edges in the harmony constraint, rather than
that they pop up as effects of morphophonological faithfulness asymmetries
(as discussed already in connection with Archangeli's (2000) alignment
analysis of Pulaar harmony). Since most linguists working with the alignment account also assume positional faithfulness as a part of grammar, the
reference to directionality in the harmony process becomes obsolete.
Furthermore, left-to-right assimilation in prefixing languages and rightto-left assimilation in suffixing languages seems quite natural in an alignment account. This is not confirmed by the numerical distribution of root
control and affix control in the world's languages, where affix control is a
marginal phenomenon, while root control is quite widespread.
4.7.2 First syllable faithfulness
In her account of Shona height harmony, Beckman (1995, 1997, 1998)
assumes that the Shona harmony process is shaped by a high ranking faithfulness constraint guarding input-output identity of the first syllable in the
root. As has been shown above such a conception of positional faithfulness
is not sufficient since, as it has been demonstrated for Yoruba and Pulaar, a
language might also choose the last syllable of a word to be the trigger of
harmony, regardless of its morphological status. A mirror image constraint
to IDENT-1, i.e. IDENT-last, alone is not sufficient to account for suffix
controlled vowel harmony. Thus, the positional faithfulness approach must
be extended to a more sophisticated understanding of positional faithfulness
constraints, as is done in this chapter by basically three modifications to the
theory of positional faithfulness. First, a simplex faithfulness constraint on
the first syllable of words does not exist. Second, prominence of the left
word edge is an effect of the coordination of an anchoring constraint with
an Identity constraint. The same holds for the right word edge in languages
with exclusive prefixation. Third, positional variants exist also of the Integrity or *MC constraints, which militate against featural spreading among
other things. These latter constraints have a cross-linguistically preferred
ranking which assures prominence of lexical material over functional
material.
Recent accounts
149
[stem + affix]
150
S-ID(bk, rd)
**
*
*
IO-ID(bk, rd)
***
****
**
The mirror image pattern to root control, i.e., affix control, as found in
Futankoore Pulaar poses a serious problem to the SAF account since this
account was designed to exclude exactly this pattern.
The theory of SAF implies several things: Simplex stems must be real
occurring outputs, and the affixed forms minus one affix must be accessible
for output-output correspondence as well. There are, however, languages,
such as many African ones, in which for instance nouns always have to be
accompanied by a classifier. For these languages access to the simplex
form in order to establish a correspondence relation is quite problematic.
Furthermore, it is not warranted that the intermediate forms with x affixes
minus 1 and so forth exist, since some derivational affixes for instance
might require inflectional affixes to follow in a given language.
Another argument has to do with Yoruba which is Bakovi's test case
for his account of root control. All bi-syllabic roots have to be analysed as
bi-morphemic in Bakovi's approach to account for the right-to-left asymmetry within roots discussed above. There is no other reason to assume
morphological complexity for these forms than Bakovi's account of root
control. To put it the other way around, the SAF account has nothing to say
about the asymmetries observed within single morphemes.
There is one additional argument against this account. In classical cyclic
rule-based derivation (Chomsky and Halle 1968) we find the following procedure: a stem is chosen, all rules like assimilation rules, feature insertion
and others are applied. Then the first affix or class of affixes is attached,
brackets are erased and all rules apply again; now the next group of affixes
is attached, brackets are erased and all rules apply once more, and so forth.
Recent accounts
151
The SAF account assumes the same procedure even though it is claimed
not to be chronologically ordered but processing in parallel. The simplex
stem is evaluated, the minimally more complex forms are evaluated, each
depending on the minimally less complex form and the final form depends
on all these intermediate forms, as would a cyclically derived one. These
forms, however, do not necessarily have actual realisations, as stated above,
and they have a doubtful psycholinguistic status. Therefore, I opt in favour
of an analysis which does not need to assume these abstract constructs.
The argument against the SAF account which is empirically testable
concerns the morphological analysis of bisyllabic or longer words. Words
which consist of two vowels of which the first one is either high or low and
the last one is a mid vowel with an ATR specification that is disharmonic to
that of the first vowel (as those in 185) have to be analysed as bimorphemic
in the SAF approach. This is because the theory has nothing to say about
morpheme-internal faithfulness asymmetries.
(185) Yoruba disharmonic roots
id(
'brass'
iko
'cough'
al(
'night'
ako
'male'
'fish'
od
*oCa
'hunger'
'shea-butter'
'drought'
(Bakovi 2000: 140)
152
Conclusion
The pattern of root control as examined here for Yoruba, Turkish, and
Dgma naturally falls out from the universally preferred ranking of INTEGRITYAffix above INTEGRITYRoot, the two constraints against assimilation.
The former expresses the markedness of affix-induced assimilation.
This general pattern can be obscured by a variety of factors. Local
conjunction of IO-Identity(F) with a markedness constraint on the same
feature yields dominant-recessive harmony (as proposed by Bakovi 2000),
as demonstrated for Diola Fogni here.
Of course it would be even more appealing if one could assume a
positional Integrity constraint (on affixes) and a general Integrity constraint
only, but to date this is not justified since with the theoretical devices at
hand this would exclude Futankoore Pulaar with its affix controlled harmony pattern from being regarded as a human language.
Morpheme-internal assymmetries in vowel cooccurrence patterns (as
observed in Yoruba and many other languages) are mechanically linked to
the morphology in this account by assuming an extended interpretation of
Anchoring constraints, covering also the faithfulness dimension of featural
identity. With these theoretical tools provided it is not necessary to assume
additional theoretical constructs like base-output correspondence, cyclic
rule application or its equivalent in serial candidate evaluations.
With the constraints assumed above we can derive a factorial typology
which gives us the observed patterns. In (187), I have listed the schematic
possibilities, leaving minor peculiarities aside. The first two rankings are
included since the ranking of the anchoring constraints in the hierarchy
does not account for affixation if we rank these constraints with regard to
the constraints directly involved in triggering and blocking harmony (i.e.,
S-IDENT, IO-IDENT and INTEGRITY constraints) but rather in interaction
with a general PARSE constraint, which demands that every segmental
structure is parsed into higher prosodic structure, such as the prosodic
word. In the following rankings all lowly ranked constraints are omitted. If
Conclusion
153
154
edge, while another vowel is immune to assimilation and serves as a potential trigger at the right word edge.
This ranking contradicts both functional motivations for harmony. With
regard to interpretive parsing harmony cannot serve as an aide in the identification of morphological or prosodic domains in such a language, since
potentially every word is divided into two harmonic sets.
The other disadvantage arises from the perspective of production oriented parsing. This division into two harmonic spans acts counter to the purpose of ease of articulation.
The outcomes of such a ranking only serve confusion in the interpretation of utterances. The vowel potentially standing alone in disharmony
with the rest of the word at one edge may have accidentally the same feature specification as the vowels in the neighbouring word and be identified
with this domain. This then disturbs the interpretive task of the listener.
Furthermore, such a ranking can show a stable effect only in languages
which allow long words. If long words are rare in a language, the learner
might mistake this type of ranking for one in which harmony plays no role
at all.
I assume that such rankings are banned from occurrence as anti-functional and counter-productive. McCarthy and Prince (1995) coined the term
'pathological ranking' for those rankings which should never occur in
violation of their proposed meta constraint on the ranking of faithfulness
for roots above faithfulness for affixes. We have seen in the previous
sections that such a meta ranking is in fact a mere almost universal
tendency.
For the phenomenon of vowel harmony this ranking is reversed in the
most common cases, root or root controlled harmony, with respect to the
integrity constraint. However, this ranking reversal serves the functional
purpose that lies behind it, the maximisation of prominence of lexical
items.
Pulaar conforms to McCarthy's meta ranking, but pays this conformity
with a decrease of prominence of lexical entities. However, the Pulaar
ranking of the two positional Integrity constraints still has a positive effect.
Generally, words consistently have the ATR specification of the rightmost
affix vowel. This word identification aide is disturbed only by the behaviour of opaque vowels. However, the behaviour of opaque vowels, as the
behaviour of transparent vowels, has a different source, namely the restriction of the inventory by higher ranked constraints on the system, serving its
optimisation. The term 'pathological ranking', or, 'counter-productive
Conclusion
155
Chapter 5
Vowel transparency as balance
In the phonological literature, transparency is usually thought of as the
skipping of a vowel by the harmony process. That is vowel harmony comes
from one direction, jumps over the inalterable vowel and goes on after that
vowel. In backness harmonies like that of Finnish or Hungarian usually
front nonlow unrounded vowels (i and e) behave as transparent. These
vowels have no back, high, unrounded counterpart (i.e., , )) in the system
and therefore they are excluded from alternation when preceded by a back
vowel. Nevertheless, the following vowel(s) change to backness in such a
constellation. In ATR harmonies, often the high vowels resist retraction of
the tongue root, even though surrounded by retracted nonhigh vowels.
In generative approaches, there is a great dissent on how to explain this
phenomenon. Most approaches maintain strict locality by assuming
stepwise derivation, some kind of sympathy or cumulativity, or surface
underspecification of the crucial feature in the transparent vowel. In derivational approaches, it is assumed that at the lexical level the transparent
vowel takes on the backness or ATR specification contributed by its neighbour. Vowel harmony applies to the next vowel in the chain now. On a later
level the backness or ATR value of the transparent vowel is changed again
to its former state. The result is surface transparency or what is labelled
'derivational opacity'. In a Sympathy based approach the winning candidate
has an additional (sympathetic) correspondence relation with one of the
failed candidates, i.e. that one which is most harmonic with regard to the
active feature. This sympathy relation is less important than the markedness
constraint banning the [+back] or [-ATR] counterpart of the transparent
vowel. These accounts of transparency will be discussed after the
application of the theory of balance to transparency in Finnish and Wolof.
In this proposal, transparency is not thought of as a kind of inactivity of
the transparent vowel or skipping of that vowel by harmony, but rather
transparency is regarded as a result of balancing, or the desire for symmetry. The observation is the following: if a transparent vowel is in a
medial position, i.e. between two other vowels, the relationship with the
158
neighbour to the right should be the same as the relationship with the
neighbour to the left. That is, if disharmony is the relation to the left vowel,
the transparent vowel would have an unbalanced relation to its neighbours
if harmony were the case at its right side. Balance is achieved by being
either disharmonic or harmonic with both neighbours. In the following I
will first apply the analysis introduced in chapter 3.3 to Finnish, which
displays backness harmony and where the front nonlow vowels e and i are
transparent. After this I will extend the analysis for transparent vowels in a
language displaying ATR harmony, which is Wolof in this case.
5.1
Finnish has the vowel system given in (189). It has the five front vowels on
the left and the three back vowels to the right in the chart. The two vowels
in the diagonally shaded cells are the neutral ones. It is exactly these two
vowels to which there exist no counterparts which differ only in backness.
This is indicated by the shaded empty cells on the right in (189). This lack
of back high unrounded vowels makes the whole system asymmetric or
imbalanced. Five front vowels stand in opposition to three back vowels
only.
(189) Finnish vowels
front
unrounded
rounded
high
i
y
mid
e
[2]
low
[4]
back
unrounded
rounded
u
o
a
essive
essive
essive
d.
e.
f.
g.
kesy-ll
vero-lla
kde-ll
koti-na
'tame'
'tax'
'hand'
'home'
159
adess
adess
adess
essive
(Ringen and Heinmki 1999: 305)
The words in (190f,g) have an e and i, respectively, as the last vowel of the
stem. The affix vowel surfaces in these words with the same backness
specification as the stem vowel preceding the neutral vowel.
With stems containing only neutral vowels affix vowels are always
front. This indicates that the notion 'neutral' is a misnomer. If these vowels
were indeed neutral we would expect greater variation in the quality of the
suffix vowels with such stems, because only in the environment of a stem
containing only neutral vowels, the underlying specification of the suffix
vowels would have a chance to surface.
(191) Finnish stems with neutral vowels only
a. velje-ll
'brother' adess.
b. tie-ll
'road'
adess.
'feel-3pl'
'car-essive'
The problem is the following: How can harmony skip a neutral vowel as in
(192b)? The strict locality hypothesis assumes that harmony proceeds from
segment to segment. Even under the approach advocated here, where
harmony affects adjacent syllables, adjacency is not maintained in such a
case.
160
sy-ske-nt-ele-mi-se-ni-k
'my constant eating?'
teh-d
'to do'
tee-ske-nt-ele-mi-se-ni-k
'my pretending?'
(Kiparsky 2000a: 2)
Finnish has primary stress on the first and secondary stress on the third
syllable (e.g., Karvonen 2000). This gives us the foot structure in (194).
(194) Finnish footing: pwd{ft(CV.CV).ft(CV.CV).(...)}pwd
With more than one adjacent neutral vowel within a word, there is at least
one foot intervening between the trigger and target of harmony.
Additionally, in a word with an uneven number of syllables, the last vowel
is not footed, it has no secondary or tertiary stress. It is, thus, no potential
target of harmony. On these grounds an analysis based on foot-to-foot
harmony has to be dismissed.
The idea to account for the transparency problem works as follows:
Note that both neutral vowels are front. Furthermore, if the medial neutral
vowel agrees in backness with the preceding potentially harmony triggering
vowel, it also agrees in backness with the following vowel. In case of
disagreement with the preceding vowel, the neutral vowel also disagrees in
backness with the following vowel. The observation is that the neutral
vowel prefers a situation where the same state of affairs prevails at both its
edges. It is, so to say, in a balanced relation with its environment. Before
161
formally analysing this observation, we have to develop the basic set-up for
an analysis of Finnish harmony.
5.1.3 The basic constraint set-up
Finnish is an entirely suffixing language with root controlled harmony. This
is accounted for by high ranking of L-ANCHOR and low ranking of RANCHOR, the combined alignment/faithfulness constraints. Backness harmony as is found in Finnish is the result of a ranking where IO-Identity
constraints on height and roundness outrank the harmony constraints, i.e. SIDENT. S-IDENT in turn is ranked above IO-Identity of backness.
(195) A first ranking for Finnish
L-ANCHOR, IO-IDENT(hi,lo,rd) >> S-IDENT >> IO-IDENT(bk) >> ...
>> R-ANCHOR
In the tableau in (196) a word containing only non-neutral vowels is
evaluated to show the basic mechanism of Finnish vowel harmony.
(196) Unimpeded harmony in Finnish
L-ANCHOR
/put-n/
a. pytn
*!
b. putn
) c. putana
S-IDENT(bk)
IO-IDENT(bk)
**
*!
**
162
163
164
165
summary, candidate (c), the opaque form, is ruled out for its neutral vowel's
imbalanced or asymmetric relation to the two adjacent vowels. The neutral
vowel in candidate (d), in contrast, is completely balanced with respect to
the adjacent vowels. It is in discorrespondence with both. This violates SIDENT twice, but this doesn't matter at all, because by its disharmonic relation to the neighbours the i completely satisfies low ranking *S-IDENT(bk).
And satisfying only one member of the constraint conjunction of BALANCE
leaves the whole conjunction as satisfied.
IO-ID(bk)
S-ID(bk)
L-ANCHOR
IO-ID
(hi,lo,rd)
BALANCE
(bk)
*
**
*
IO-ID(bk)
a. k4d)ll4
b. k4della
) c. k4dell4
**
*
*!
S-ID(bk)
/k4de-ll4/
*!
BALANCE
(bk)
ii.
kt-na
k2ti-n4
kti-n4
kti-na
*!
L-ANCHOR
a.
b.
1 c.
) d.
IO-ID
(hi,lo,rd)
/kti-n4/
*ALIEN
i.
*ALIEN
*!
**
*
*
*
*!
166
sy-ske-nt-ele-mi-se-ni-k
'my constant eating?'
c. teh-d
'to do'
tee-ske-nt-ele-mi-se-ni-k
'my pretending?'
167
[...]
[...]
V
Another solution to the discrepancy revealed by the data in (205) and (206)
might be the observation that the transparent vowels in (206) are affix
vowels, while those in (205) are stem vowels. That neutral affix vowels do
not trigger harmony in a following non-neutral vowel could then be an
effect of INTEGRITYAffix in conjunction with the relevant markedness
constraint *[-lo, -rd, -bk]. However, this account would have nothing to say
about the large degree of variation observed with Finnish neutral vowels.
168
HARMONY
MARKEDNESS
b.
OCP
BALANCE
LC'
MARKEDNESS
c.
HARMONY
OCP
BALANCE
LC'
MARKEDNESS
d.
HARMONY
OCP
BALANCE
LC'
HARMONY
MARKEDNESS
OCP
At first sight the whole issue seems somewhat odd since a decision between
the different structures in (209) does not change the interpretation of the
whole construction. However, if one of the structures in (209b,c,d) were the
169
BALANCE
(bk)
- ) a. vljell
b. vljella
S-ID
(bk)
IO-ID
(bk)
*!
**
*
pytn
putn
putana
poutna
pytan
pytana
LANCHOR
BALANCE
(bk)
S-ID(bk)&l
*S-ID(bk)
S-ID
(bk)
*!
**
*
*!
*!
IO-ID
(bk)
*!
*!*
**
**
*
***
****
If disharmonic stems are involved, such as in the form verolla 'taxadessive', the interim conjunction (209c) causes disharmony between the
last harmony triggering stem vowel and the affix vowel. See in this respect
tableau (212).44
170
LANCHOR
BALANCE
(bk)
S-ID(bk)&l
*S-ID(bk)
S-ID
(bk)
IO-ID
(bk)
*!
*
**
/ a. vrolla
0 b. vroll
BALANCE
(bk)
S-ID
(bk)
IO-ID
(bk)
**
*
*!
171
/CaCiC-aC/ ~ CaCiC-aC
/CaCiC-aC/ ~ CaCiC-4C
/C4CiC-aC/ ~ C4CiC-aC
/C4CiC-aC/ ~ C4CiC-4C
/CiC-aC/ ~ CiC-aC
/CiC-aC/ ~ CiC-4C
ii.
) a.
b.
) c.
d.
) e.
f.
Enarve Vepsian
/CaCiC-aC/ ~ CaCiC-aC
/CaCiC-aC/ ~ CaCiC-4C
/C4CiC-aC/ ~ C4CiC-aC
/C4CiC-aC/ ~ C4CiC-4C
/CiC-aC/ ~ CiC-aC
/CiC-aC/ ~ CiC-4C
BALANCE
S-ID
(bk)
*
*
**
**
*
*
*
*
*!
*!
*!
*[-lo, -rd, -bk]&
*S-ID(bk)
*!
*
**!
S-ID(bk)
**
*
*
*
*!
For the reason that a partial conjunction should have an audible effect, I
will assume that the conjunction of more than two constraints does not
necessarily happen serially but in parallel. All constraints of a conjunction
are combined at once, which means that the structure of a ternary constraint
conjunction such as BALANCE is flat, like that in (209a) in languages like
172
Finnish. Why should a speaker load her/his grammar with complex constraints which have no observable effect? This assumption does not exclude
the Uyghur variant per se, that is instantiating a partial conjunction as well.
There is one more reason to assume that the partial conjunction of markedness with the OCP is the basic constraint combination on which balance
is built. The same constraint combination in conjunction with an IO-faithfulness constraint explains the patterns of Trojan vowels. A detailed discussion of this pattern will be delivered in chapter 6. Independent evidence for
the local conjunction of the harmony constraint with the OCP (209c) comes
from the height-uniform pattern in Yawelmani, even though it is different
features here which both constraints refer to.
In the following section, I will show that the analysis developed for
balanced vowels in backness harmony can be straightforwardly extended to
balanced vowels in ATR harmony systems.
5.2
The pattern of balanced vowels which will be analysed in this section gives
an additional insight into how violations of the BALANCE conjunction are
assessed in cases where more than one balanced vowel is found in a word,
each surrounded by non-balanced vowels. Furthermore, the patterns found
in Wolof confirm the prediction of the present analysis of Balance that a
language may have balanced as well as opaque vowels.
Wolof is a suffixing Niger Congo language with root-controlled ATR
harmony. According to Pulleyblank (1996: 314), the Wolof vowel inventory contains the vowels given in (216).
(216) Wolof vowel inventory:
high
mid
low
advanced
retracted
advanced
retracted
advanced
retracted
front
i
back
u
e
(
o
o
173
'his/her driver'
'his/her field'
'to smash'
'to bite continuously'
'to hit each other'
'to look at each other'
(Pulleyblank 1996: 314f.)
All nonhigh affix vowels in (217) agree with the preceding nonhigh vowels
with regard to ATR. In (218a) all affix vowels are [+ATR] in
correspondence with the preceding high vowels, while the affix vowels in
(218b) surface with the ATR value of the nonhigh vowel preceding the
high vowel(s) in each word (as shown most clearly in the pair toxi-len
versus t(kki-l(n). (218c) serves to show that high affix vowels, such as the
u in -bobule / -bobul( behave like high stem vowels. They are balanced.
(218) Harmony of high vowels in Wolof
a. gis-e
'to see in'
b. toxi-len
sul-e 'to bury with'
soppiwu-l(n
nir-o 'to look alike'
triji-len
jit-le 'to help with'
t(kki-l(n
c. kriQ-m-bobule
xarit-am-bobul(
174
175
a. gis(
b. g,s(
) c. gise
*!
*[+ATR]
IO-ID(ATR)
S-ID(ATR)
*!
BALANCE
(ATR)
IO-ID(hi)
L-ANCHOR
/gis-(/
*[+hi, -ATR]
*
*
*
**
Now consider tableau (223), where a form is evaluated which has a nonhigh retracted vowel preceding the high vowel. Changing the underlyingly
retracted leftmost vowel to advanced tongue root incurs a L-ANCHOR violation, as in candidate (e). Candidates (b) and (c) change the ATR specification and the height specification, respectively, of the underlyingly high
176
) a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
t(kkil(n
t(kk,l(n
t(kk(l(n
t(kkilen
tekkilen
**
*!
*!
*!
*!
*[+ATR]
IO-ID(ATR)
S-ID(ATR)
BALANCE
(ATR)
IO-ID(hi)
L-ANCHOR
/t(kki-l(n/
*[+hi, ATR]
*
*
*
*
**
*
***
From this standard case of balance we now proceed to a more complex one
in which two balanced vowels are surrounded by other vowels and separated by other vowels as well and encounter a surprising complication.
In example (218c) exactly this configuration is displayed. Tableau (224)
shows that the language chooses the worst candidate with respect to
harmony and it shows as well that the concept of balance alone does not
exclude a decision based on the harmony constraint.
(224) Wolof extreme disharmony
/xarit-m-bobule/
a.
b.
c.
d.
0 e.
/ f.
xar,tambob8l(
xritmbobule
xar(tambobol(
xaritmbobule
xaritambobule
xaritambobul(
*[+hi,
-ATR]
LANCHOR
IO-ID
(hi)
BALANCE
(ATR)
S-ID
(ATR)
*!(a-i-)
*
***
****!
*!*
*!
*!*
177
The problem here lies in the fact that the grammar in its current form
prefers a more harmonic form than the language actually does. I will consider in detail what this evaluation reveals for the analysis. First of all, the
grammar developed so far excludes the candidate with unimpeded root
control, candidate (a), because this root controlled harmony maximisation
is achieved by a double violation of the markedness constraint against high
retracted vowels. Both high vowels, i and u, are retracted in this form. The
candidate displaying dominance of the feature [+ATR] is as bad as candidate (a), because this candidate (b) has altered the ATR specification of the
leftmost root vowel. This constitutes a violation of high ranking LANCHOR. The last candidate with complete ATR harmony has circumvented violation of both constraints by lowering of the high vowels. Once
lowered, they can also have a negative ATR specification without violating
*[+hi, -ATR]. Lowering, however, violates the IO-Identity constraint on
height. This constraint is ranked topmost as well. The result is ungrammaticality of candidate (c).
In candidate (d) the first balanced vowel behaves as opaque. This form
is almost completely harmonic with regard to ATR, but the opaque behaviour of i violates the local conjunction of BALANCE. The vowel i is disharmonic with its neighbour to the left and harmonic with its neighbour to the
right. The candidate is judged as sub-optimal for this fauxpas.
The interesting point is the decision between the last two candidates.
Both candidates avoid all violations of the top-ranking constraints, including the BALANCE conjunction. The decision on the output is passed down
to the next constraint in the hierarchy, which is the harmony constraint SIDENT(ATR). Candidate (f) displays the same configuration in the environment of the two balanced vowels. They are both disharmonic with every
neighbour. This sums up to four violations of S-IDENT(ATR). Candidate (e)
has a comparatively better performance on the harmony constraint in that
the second balanced vowel has harmonic neighbouring vowels. A side
effect of this is disharmony between the two vowels in the middle of the
word, D and o. All in all, candidate (e) has one harmony violation less than
candidate (f).
This reveals that the language prefers a parallel relation of separated
balanced vowels with their environment to a pattern where one balanced
vowel is disharmonic with its environment and the other is in harmony with
its neighbours. This pattern of an analogous behaviour of both vowels
emerges even on the cost of having a higher degree of disharmony in the
word.
178
179
*[+hi]
xaritambobule
xaritambobul(
kriQmbobul(
kriQmbobule
*SID(ATR)
/kriQ-Am-bObulE/
1 a.
- b.
1 c.
- d.
S-ID(ATR)
/xarit-Am-bObulE/
BALANCE
(ATR)
*!
***
****
***
**
*
**
*****
**
**
**
**
*!
Candidate (a) has one high vowel violating the harmony constraint (the
vowel i). Additionally, the candidate has a high vowel u which is harmonic
with its environment in violaton of the dissimilation constraint *SIDENT(ATR). Collective assessment of violations then takes into account
all violations incurred by all elements which violate the triggering constraint of the local conjunction of BALANCE(ATR). Even though each high
vowel individually satisfies the local conjunction, as a group they perform
bad on this complex constraint. The result is the assignment of a violation
mark on that constraint since the high vowels violate all involved constraints. In candidate (b), however, both high vowels violate the harmony
constraint maximally, but, by this maximal disharmony with their environment, completely satisfy the dissimilation constraint *S-IDENT(ATR). Each
member of the set of vowels violating the triggering constraint passes *SIDENT(ATR). This renders the whole conjunction of BALANCE satisfied.
The same evaluation applies to candidates (225c) and (225d), with the
slight difference that the winning candidate (d) passes the BALANCE conjunction for the good performance of its high vowels on the harmony constraint, which outweighs the multiple violations of the dissimilation constraint and the markedness constraint.
With this new insight into the assessment of the violations of local
conjunctions we can reconsider tableau (224), here given as (226).
The collective or cumulative interpretation of BALANCE explains why in
this special case, i.e., words such as xaritambobul(, the Wolof grammar
chooses a candidate as optimal which is less harmonic with regard to ATR
than most of its competitors. Furthermore, if the meta-balance effect is
caused by the evaluation metric for local conjunctions, this predicts that
other languages with balanced vowels are likely to display the same effect
180
as well if phonotactic restrictions and the morphology allow for such long
words.45
(226) Wolof extreme disharmony reconsidered
/xarit-m-bobule/
a.
b.
c.
d.
1 e.
- f.
xar,tambob8l(
xritmbobule
xar(tambobol(
xaritmbobule
xaritambobule
xaritambobul(
*[+hi,
-ATR]
LIO-ID
ANCHOR (hi)
BALANCE S-ID
(ATR)
(ATR)
*!*
*!
*!*
*!(a-i-)
*!
*
***
****
In addition to the high balanced vowels, Wolof has a low vowel which
behaves as opaque. The whole analysis of balanced vowels does not affect
the behaviour of the low long vowel as will be illustrated in the next
section.
5.2.3 The opaque vowel
A particularity of Wolof is the invariability of the long low vowel. It is
invariably retracted and behaves opaque to harmony. (227c) shows that the
long low vowel initiates a new harmonic domain also when preceded by an
advanced vowel. Balanced vowels would prefer disharmonic ATR specifications to both sides (see 218b,c).
(227) The Wolof low long vowel
a. xar-(
'to wait in'
jay-l(
'to help sell'
b. yab-at-(
'to lack respect for'
wow-al( 'to call also'
c. dor-at-(
genn-al(
181
) a.
b.
c.
d.
gennal(
gennale
gennle
g(nnal(
*
**!
*!
*!
IO-ID(ATR)
S-ID(ATR)
BALANCE
(ATR)
IO-IDENT(hi)
L-ANCHOR
*[+low,
+long, +ATR]
/genn-al(/
*[+hi, -ATR]
*
**
*
In tableau (229), candidate (c) which shows alternation of the low vowel in
order to optimise performance with regard to the harmony constraint is
ruled out by the highly ranking markedness constraint *[+low, +long,
+ATR]. Shortening, combined with ATR alternation, a strategy which is
not included in the tableau is no choice either due to an obviously highly
ranked faithfulness constraint on underlying length or moraic structure
(MAX). Candidate (d) is no alternative to candidates (a) and (b) because
in contrast to the latter it violates the important L-ANCHOR constraint. If the
BALANCE(ATR) constraint does not contribute to the choice of the optimal
candidate among the balanced and the imbalanced (i.e. opaque) candidates
(a) and (b) it must be a lower constraint which decides the matter. The next
lower constraint in which both candidates fare differently is SIDENT(ATR). This constraint of course prefers the more harmonic imbalanced candidate.
This section has shown that balance in ATR harmony systems is guided
by the same principles and constraints as in backness harmony systems.
182
5.3
Previous analyses
tI
na
ko
ti
na
Previous analyses
c. [+back]
*
ko
[-back]
[+back]
ti
na
183
With a representation like that in (230a), the alignment constraint is satisfied which says that the right edge of the backness feature has to coincide
with the right edge of the word. The I becomes front in the phonetic component. (230b) is suboptimal for its crossing association lines (i.e., locality
violation), and (230c) fares less good with respect to the alignment constraint than structure (230a). In this account, the transparent vowel is literally neutral, in that it does not even have the active feature at all.
Pulleyblank (1996) shows that the high vowels in Wolof can also be
seen as neutral from another perspective. In his account the Alignment constraints which trigger harmony refer to the feature Retracted Tongue Root
only. Retracted Tongue Root and Advanced Tongue Root are two antagonistic privative features in Pulleyblank's view. Thus, in his account the
harmony constraints are neutral with regard to the high vowels in that they
do not have their tongue root feature as an argument. As in the account
developed here, the surface ATR specification is solely determined by the
markedness constraint on the features high and ATR.
Since Pulleyblank provides a comparative study of Wolof and Yoruba, I
will come back to his account in chapter 6.
What the first two accounts have in common is their serialist conception
of candidate evaluation. We will see below that the accounts which were
designed to avoid serialism of any kind also share an important feature with
serialist derivations, that is reference to an intermediate abstract representation.
5.3.2 Targeted constraints and sympathy
Bakovi (2000) and Bakovi and Wilson (2000) propose an analysis of
Wolof transparent vowels which relies on a form of candidate evaluation
which elementarily differs from the usual procedure. Optimality is determined by reference to a constraint which is labelled as 'targeted'. The basic
idea of targeted constraints is that the candidate is chosen which is maximally identical to the one which would be optimal if the targeted constraint
were not present in the grammar. The actually chosen candidate differs
from the otherwise optimal candidate only in that it avoids violation of the
184
a. t((r8woon
b. t((ruwoon
*[+hi, -ATR]
a. t((ruwoon
b. t((r8woon
Previous analyses
185
control, not dominance), but not for its performance on either the targeted
markedness constraint nor the harmony constraint, thus it should be
considered under the targeted constraint analysis. Maybe I missed a crucial
point and Bakovi and Wilson have good reasons for not considering the
latter candidate, but if not this would be a nontrivial disadvantage of their
analysis.
Of course the basic idea behind this analysis is that the candidate with a
transparent vowel looks more like the fully harmonic candidate than the
candidate with an opaque vowel. According to Bakovi and Wilson, fully
harmonic words are what the language strives for (p. 45). Thus, in its spirit
this is exactly what a Sympathy based approach would do. In Sympathy
Theory (McCarthy 1999) an output form stands not only in correspondence
with its input, it also has to be faithful to specifically defined failed candidates. To facilitate comparison I will line out the basics of a potential analysis of transparency in Sympathy Theory:47 The actual output is chosen
because it looks more like the fully harmonic form than any other candidate, and it looks better than the fully harmonic form in that it has no retracted high vowel. In such an analysis the harmony constraint would be the
selector. The selector constraint is marked by in the following. This constraint selects the sympathetic candidate (which is marked with a flower in
tableau 232), the one which is suboptimal because it violates a higher ranked constraint, but which is the best candidate with respect to S-IDENT.
The optimal output is then chosen by the intercandidate faithfulness constraint, which in this case would be UIO-IDENT(ATR). The candidate with
the transparent vowel violates UIDENT(ATR) less than that with an opaque
vowel. The analysis is illustrated in tableau (232).
(232) Transparency as Sympathy
t((ruwoon
fully harmonic
opaque V
transparent V
U a. t((r8woon
b. t((ruwoon
) c. t((ruwoon
*[+hi,
-ATR]
UID
(ATR)
S-ID
(ATR)
IO-ID
(ATR)
**!*
*
9
*
**
?
?
?
*!
One handicap for the stipulated Sympathy analysis is that McCarthy tries to
restrict Sympathy Theory by stipulating that selector constraints can only
be recruited of the set of IO-faithfulness constraints. The selector in (232) is
a syntagmatic correspondence constraint in turn. Either Sympathy Theory
186
Conclusion
Chapter 6
Trojan vowels and phonological opacity
In some vowel harmony systems there are certain vowels (usually high
vowels), which behave as neutral (i.e. transparent or recessive) in some
morphemes, but as active (or dominant) in other morphemes. That is, some
instances of such vowels cause their environment to harmonise, while
others don't.
For instance in Hungarian, two instances of i are observed, which phonetically seem to be the same. But in the phonology, one of these behaves
like a transparent vowel, while the other triggers backness in a following
affix vowel. Under the assumption that the last one is underlyingly [+back],
but changes to [-back] due to a markedness constraint on the surface representation, it is in a certain sense similar to the Trojan horse, which looked
like a gift (i.e., looked peacefully), but in fact contained the troops of the
agressor.48
Similar cases are found also affecting other dimensions of the vocalic
feature inventory. In Yoruba, we observe the same phenomenon regarding
the feature ATR. Some advanced high vowels cause their neighbours to become [+ATR] while others cause a [-ATR] specification of their neighbour
at the surface. Yawelmani has height-uniform backness harmony. Some
nonhigh vowels trigger backness assimilation in a following affix vowel
even though the latter is a high vowel.
An analysis based on the assumption of Trojan vowels, which have an
effect on surface structures via a local conjunction of markedness with IOfaithfulness and harmony constraints has the advantage of unifying the
treatment of all these superficially different phenomena. In the generative
literature such cases have been subject to a variety of approaches going
from step-wise derivational analyses over assumptions of floating features,
the stipulation of phonetically unrealised phonologically present features in
surface representations to Sympathy.
In this chapter, I will first apply the constraint coordination approach to
the example of Hungarian, and then extend the analysis to Yoruba, Nez
Perce, and Yawelmani. The discussion of previous approaches to the res-
188
Hungarian has a rich vowel system, which is displayed in (233). The vowel
[e] is placed in brackets because not all dialects have this vowel. In some
it has merged with (.
(233) Hungarian vowel inventory (Ringen and Vago 1998: 394)
front
back
[-round]
[+round]
[-round]
[+round]
short
long
short
long short long short
long
i [i]
[i]
[]
[]
u [u]
[u]
high
[]
[]
o [o]
[o]
mid ( [e]) [e]
low e [(]
[a] a [o]
Harmony affects the feature backness in Hungarian. The system lacks a
back counterpart of the high unrounded vowel i in surface structures. The
vowel is missing in the surface system. The other front unrounded vowel
e has a back counterpart in that it patterns with a [a, o] in some instances.
In some it does not. Changing the roundness specification of i is no choice
in Hungarian, therefore i does not undergo backness harmony when
preceded by a back vowel. This largely reminds of Finnish. What is so
interesting about Hungarian in comparison to Finnish is that some instances
of i are followed by a front vowel, while others are followed by a back
vowel, as can be seen in (234d,e).
(234) Hungarian basic harmony
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
hz
tk
radr
vz
hd
'house'
'pumpkin'
'eraser'
'water'
'bridge'
Dative
hz-nak
tk-nek
radr-nak
vz-nek
hd-nak
Adessive
hz-nl
tk-nl
radr-nl
vz-nl
hd-nl
f. nansz
g. sofr
'nuance'
'chauffeur'
nansz-nak
sofr-nek
189
nansz-nl
sofr-nl
In Ringen and Vago's (1998) analysis, words of the two types (234d,e) are
distinguished by an assumed floating feature [+back] in the lexical
representation of those words which are accompanied by back vowels in
suffixes. Hence, under their analysis, a root like hid 'bridge' is specified as
/hid[+back]/. A faithfulness constraint MAXsubsegment/root then chooses the
candidate which assigns the floating feature to the affix vowels.
The question arises why they do not simply assume that the instance of i
which causes backness in following affix vowels is underlyingly back. This
would free the analysis from the notion of floating features. Moreover, this
would bring the Hungarian data in line with other languages, i.e. Yoruba
and Nez Perce for which an analysis along this line of thought has been
proposed as well (see Hall and Hall 1980 on Nez Perce, and Bakovi 2000
on both languages).
Except for the assumption of an underlying // for i's like the one in hd
'bridge', I will depart in most respects from the proposals by Hall and Hall
as well as Bakovi. To minimise confusion, I will first outline my analysis
for Hungarian, then apply it to the other three languages as well, and then
discuss the other approaches.
6.1.1 A preliminary harmony grammar for Hungarian
Now let's have a look at the basic harmony pattern in Hungarian.
Hungarian vowels agree in backness but do not alternate in height or
roundness to optimise performance with regard to S-IDENT(bk). The only
exception is short e, which becomes round when back. Thus, we can say
that IO-IDENT(hi) is ranked above S-IDENT(bk). That i does not undergo a
repairing with u can be attributed to a local conjunction of *[+hi] and IOIDENT(rd), which seems to be ranked at least above S-IDENT(bk).
(235) First ranking for Hungarian
IDENT[hi], *[+hi]&lIO-IDENT(rd) >> S-IDENT(bk) >> IO-IDENT(rd)
This accounts for the basic backness harmony pattern. The fact that i is
transparent can be analysed analogous to Finnish by the slightly different
local conjunction of *[+hi, -bk]&l*S-IDENT(bk)&lS-IDENT(bk), the 'con-
190
uC
uCu
u C aa
uCi
*ALIEN
IOID(hi)
*[+hi]&l
IO-ID(rd)
SID(bk)
IOID(rd)
IOID(bk)
*!
*!
*!
*
The inalterability of the first vowel in the sequence, which could also alternate with to optimise harmony, is an effect of the highly ranking LeftANCHOR constraint in coordination with IO-Identity, as in the analyses of
Turkish and Finnish as well.
In the following tableau, the BALANCE constraint (the local conjunction
of markedness, harmony and OCP) is added to the grammar.
191
rodirnek
rodrnok
rodurnok
rodirnok
*ALIEN IO-ID
(hi)
*[+hi]&l
IO-ID(rd)
BALANCE
(bk)
S-ID
(bk)
*!
IO-ID
(rd)
*!
*!
*
**
192
'bridge'
'aim; target'
ablative
hdtl
cltl
/h:d/
/ts):l/
In line with Vago (1973) and many others I will assume that the vowels in
(240b) are underlyingly specified as [+back]. They surface as [-back] in
satisfaction of *ALIEN, the inventory constraint against back nonlow unrounded vowels.
The problem in dealing with the Trojan vowel is now how to modify
the grammar in such a way that the underlying backness feature of this
vowel is mapped onto the following vowel when one is available, without
affecting the entire harmony pattern.
Dissimilation occurs only when the underlying backness specification
is not realised faithfully on the surface, which is a violation of IOIDENT(bk). Dissimilation in backness is an effect of the constraint *SIDENT(bk). The generalisation is covered formally by the local conjunction
of both constraints. The local conjunction of these two constraints alone
brings the grammar in a dilemma: All vowels which do not map their
underlying backness specification to the surface should be eager to disagree
with their neighbours to perform better on that local conjunction. The
dissimilation pattern is restricted to vowel combinations in which a nonlow
front unrounded vowel is found. Nonlow front unrounded vowels violate
the markedness constraint *[-lo, -rd, -bk]. Exactly these vowels make the
whole inventory asymmetric since they do not have a back high and
unrounded counterpart in the surface inventory. The solution to the
dilemma above is to include the markedness constraint *[-lo, -bk, -rd] in
the local conjunction as was the case already for the local conjunction of
BALANCE.
(241) The constraint on Trojan vowels in Hungarian
TROY(bk): *[-lo, -rd, -bk]&lIO-IDENT(bk)&l*S-IDENT(bk)
The analysis of the Trojan vowel in Hungarian is illustrated in tableau
(242).
193
*ALIEN
IOID(hi)
*[+hi]&
IO-ID(rd)
TROY
(bk)
SID(bk)
*!
*!
*
194
vz-nok
vaznok
vuznok
viz-nek
viz-nok
*ALIEN
IOID(hi)
*[+hi]&l
IO-ID(rd)
TROY
(bk)
S-ID
(bk)
*!
*!
*!
*!
195
1998, 2000). Just suppose a child which is learning Hungarian has adjusted
its constraint ranking accordingly after being confronted with stems
containing Trojan vowels. From this point the child may also conclude that
the balanced vowels are not balanced like those in Finnish, a part of them
could likewise be Trojan stems. When a learner postulates /rodr/ as the
underlying form of the stem [rodir] there is no evidence for the local
conjunction of BALANCE anymore, as is illustrated in tableau (244).
S-ID(bk)
IO-ID(rd)
*[+hi]&l
IO-ID(rd)
BALANCE
(bk)
rodrn(k
rod rnok
rodurnok
rodrnok
TROY(bk)
a.
b.
c.
) d.
IO-ID(hi)
/rodr-nok/
*ALIEN
*!
*!
*!
*
**
The learner will simplify the grammar by not conjoining these constraints
and leave the potential conjoints where they are, at the bottom of the
Hungarian hierarchy. This leaves us with the simplified grammar in (245).
(245) Hungarian final ranking
*ALIEN, IO-ID(hi), *[+hi]&lIO-ID(rd), TROY >> S-ID(bk) >> IO-ID(rd), IOID(bk)
If a learner of Hungarian has arrived at this grammar s/he has made a
decision about the optimal underlying representations of stems like those in
(246). The crucial front vowels in second position in these stems behave as
balanced, agreeing with both their neighbours or disagreeing with both their
neighbours with regard to backness.
(246) Some neutral vowels in Hungarian
stem
gloss
adessive
a. tvis
'thorn'
tvisnl
tndr 'fairy'
tndrnl
196
b. muri
radr
kv
murinl
radrnl
kvnl
t2visnal
- t2visnel
IO-ID(bk)
IO-ID(rd)
S-ID(bk)
TROY(bk)
*[-lo]&l
IO-ID(rd)
IO-ID(hi)
*ALIEN
*!
*
t2visnal
/ t2visnel
IO-ID(bk)
197
IO-ID(rd)
S-ID(bk)
TROY(bk)
*[-lo]&l
IO-ID(rd)
IO-ID(hi)
*ALIEN
*
*
*!
With 'neutral' vowels which are disharmonic with regard to their neighbourhood the situation looks different. In (248a), where an underlyingly disharmonic stem is chosen as input the desired output loses by violating SIDENT(bk), while this candidate becomes optimal when an underlying back
vowel is assumed as in (248b).
/ murinal
murinel
- murinal
murinel
IO-ID(bk)
IO-ID(rd)
*!
IO-ID(bk)
IO-ID(rd)
S-ID(bk)
TROY(bk)
*[-lo]&
IO-ID(rd)
IO-ID(hi)
*
*ALIEN
S-ID(bk)
TROY(bk)
*[-lo]&
IO-ID(rd)
IO-ID(hi)
*ALIEN
(248) The optimal input for [muri-nal] 'party, spree; rebellion, ADESS'
*
*!
198
*tvisnal
*tvisnal
In the historic stage of Hungarian, where back unrounded vowels were still
allowed these must have been subject to harmony and must have undergone
assimilation to the preceding front vowel regularly. The pattern front
harmonic vowel followed by back high unrounded vowel ( or )) was
excluded at any time by the harmony grammar. Thus, it never had a chance
to be stored as a lexical representation and be kept as such.
When formerly balanced vowels are analysed as Trojan vowels now
this predicts that loans, which are newly introduced to the language pattern
as opaque because the BALANCE constraint plays no role anymore. And this
is what actually happens with loans as shown in (250).
(250) Hungarian opaque front vowels
gloss
delative
koncert
'concert'
koncertrl
bronchitisz 'bronchitis'
bronchitisrl
adessive
koncertnl
bronchitisnl
(Olsson 1992: 78)
The nonlow front vowels in (250) behave as opaque. Given that Hungarian
speakers posit surface-true disharmonic underlying forms for such words
the last front nonlow vowel induces harmony on the following vowels in
satisfaction of the harmony constraint.49
(251) Evaluation of Hungarian opaque vowels
/koncert-rl/
) a. koncert-rl
b. koncert-rl
*ALIEN
IO-ID
(hi)
*[+hi]&
IO-ID(rd)
TROY
(bk)
S-ID
(bk)
IO-ID
(rd)
*!
Candidate (b), which shows the balanced pattern is sub-optimal because the
alternative candidate is more harmonic with regard to backness. The
constraint TROY would choose the disharmonic candidate, but this
constraint is satisfied vacuously since the front nonlow vowel in koncert
does not violate IO-Identity on backness.
199
Just let us consider briefly what would happen with such loans if
Hungarian had not abandoned the BALANCE constraint in favour of the
TROY constraint.
IO-ID(rd)
TROY(bk)
BALANCE
(bk)
*[+hi]&
IO-ID(rd)
S-ID(bk)
/ a. koncert-rl
0 b. koncert-rl
IO-ID(hi)
/koncert-rl/
*ALIEN
*!
The grammar would predict the balanced pattern for disharmonic loans.
The e or i in medial position violates the markedness constraint in the
BALANCE conjunction as well as the harmony constraint. To escape from
violation of the whole conjunction, the candidate would be chosen which at
least satisfies the OCP constraint. Since this grammar evaluates not the
same output as Hungarians prefer, the grammar without the BALANCE
constraint seems to be more appropriate.
There are some words in Hungarian which show free variation in the
choice of the suffix vowel. These have been termed 'vacillating stems' in
the literature.
(253) Hungarian hybrid front vowels / 'vacillating stems'
gloss
delative
adessive
pozitv 'positive'
pozitvrl /
pozitvnl /
pozitvrl
pozitvnl
balk
'fool, greenhorn'
balkrl /
balknl /
balkrl
balknl
(Olsson 1992: 79)
These words must have been introduced to the language at a stage where
the decision whether the language has balanced or Trojan vowels was still
an open issue. The solution of the language learner is to posit two
competing underlying forms for these stems, one containing a back vowel,
one containing a front vowel. The choice among these two stems is
arbitrary. The result is free variation in the suffix vowels depending on the
free variation in the choice of the underlying form.
200
6.1.4 Summary
To summarise the findings, it was observed in this section that even though
Hungarian has a number of vowels which pattern like balanced vowels (as
in Finnish), the language has only Troyan and imbalanced or opaque
vowels. The latter are imbalanced in the sense that the harmonic domain
(i.e., backness) stops before them, and they start a new domain (i.e.,
frontness) with the following vowels. The result is disharmony to their left
and harmony to their right, as is observed with the low unrounded vowels
in Turkish for instance.
Balance plays no active part in the Hungarian grammar. What is crucial
for the Hungarian surface pattern and for the shape of many underlying
forms is the complex constraint, which I labelled TROY, a combination of
markedness and faithfulness constraints which together trigger activation of
an OCP constraint. The purpose or effect of this complex constraint is
twofold. The major function is to maintain a phonemic contrast in the
language which has no direct surface reflex anymore due to other forces
operative in the Hungarian grammar. The second effect is that this constraint, together with the rest of the Hungarian grammar forces backness
harmony also on most underlying representations. We will see in the
following that exactly this mechanism applies in languages unrelated to
Hungarian. The effects of this grammatic constellation have formerly been
described as derivational opacity.
6.2
The basic issues of Yoruba vowel harmony have already been examined in
chapter 4.2. In that section, I excluded high vowels from most of the
discussion, because they exhibit a different pattern than the opaque or
imbalanced low vowel a.
6.2.1 High vowels and mid vowels
The patterns found with high vowels are illustrated in (254). Recall from
section 4.2 that the harmonising feature is [ATR] in Yoruba, and that mid
vowels are regularly subject to this harmony requirement under root
201
control. The low vowel a allowed [+ATR] as well as [-ATR] mid vowels to
its right, but only [-ATR] vowels to its left.
(254) Yoruba high vowels
a. il 'house'
iJeE
id( 'brass'
iko
ebi 'hunger' r
(bi 'guilt'
ot
b. il
fi
igi
aja
'forest, wood'
'cough'
'shea-butter'
'wine/beer'
'okra'
'except'
'tree'
'dog'
eku
(tu
'rat'
'deer'
w 'cotton'
orX 'heaven'
at
ik
'type of dress'
'death'
(Bakovi 2000: 140)
202
/,d(/
a.
b.
c.
) d.
,d(
(d(
ide
id(
IO-ID
(hi)
RANCHOR
S-ID
(ATR)
IO-ID
(ATR)
**
*
*!
*!
*!
er
NOM + 'to disrupt'
'dishonesty'
e+r
(r
NOM + 'to haft'
'the haft'
b. o + mu
NOM + 'to drink'
o + k
NOM + 'to die'
omu
'drinker'
k
'corpse'
c. e + r
NOM
+ 'to see'
(r
'evidence'
203
er,
(r,
(r(
iri
eri
(ri
*[+hi,
-ATR]
IO-ID
(hi)
TROY
(ATR)
*!
*!
S-ID
(ATR)
IO-ID
(ATR)
*
*!
*!
*
*!
*
*
*
*
*
**
In the above tableau, all forms which faithfully contain a retracted high
vowel (candidates a and b) fatally violate the markedness constraint *[+hi,
-ATR]. Candidate (c) which mapps the underlying ATR specification of the
204
(t8
(to
etu
(tu
*[+hi,
-ATR]
IO-ID
(hi)
TROY
(ATR)
S-ID
(ATR)
IO-ID
(ATR)
*
*
*!
*!
*!
205
206
c. (br
'shortcut'
If there are underlying [-ATR] high vowels in Yoruba with a surface effect,
why are there none in three-syllable roots such as those in (261) and (262)?
The situation is even worse. If sequences like *(lubo or *(lubo are out, why
are forms like (263b,c) with a [-ATR] mid vowel followed by two high
vowels allowed?
A possible solution to the problem might lie in the exact formulation of
the TROY constraint. If we replace the IO-Identity constraint in this conjunction by the R-ANCHOR constraint, which was already crucial in the
analysis of the edge asymmetry with regard to nonhigh vowels, and furthermore define the domain of the local conjunction over the designated feature
span instead of that of the segment or syllable, the phenomenon can be
explained. Let me first dwell on the former modification. If the local
conjunction refers to R-ANCHOR, then potential underlyingly high retracted
vowels in the penultimate syllable are advanced in surface representations,
and they do not have any retracting influence on their neighbour. This is
because R-ANCHOR, which is one of the constraints which conjoin to
trigger retraction in the neighbour of an underlyingly retracted high vowel
refers only to material that is underlyingly at the right edge of the stem.
This constraint is vacuously satisfied by all vowels other than the one in
rightmost position of the stem. In the absence of a surface reflex of an
underlying RTR specification of high vowels in the penultimate or
antepenultimate syllable, these vowels must be stored as advanced. That is,
all i's and u's in penultimate position must be i's and u's underlyingly, not /,/
or /8/, respectively. In this way the grammar eliminates all high retracted
vowels in penultimate position from underlying forms.
The definition of the R-ANCHOR constraint is repeated in (264). The
new version of the local conjunction on Trojan vowels, where IO-Identity(ATR) is replaced by R-ANCHOR is given in (265).
(264) RIGHT-Anchoring:
RIGHT-ANCHOR(root, pwd): Any syllable at the right edge of the root
(i.e., the input) has an identical correspondent at the right edge of the
prosodic word (i.e., the output).
207
el8bo
(l8bo
elubo
(lubo
elubo
(l(bo
*[+hi,
-ATR]
IO-ID
(hi)
TROY
(ATR)
RANCHOR
*!
*!
S-ID
(ATR)
IO-ID
(ATR)
*
*!
**!
*
*!
*
**
*
*
*
or8p
or8po
orp
or8po
orp
oropo
*!
*!
RANCHOR
S-ID
(ATR)
IO-ID
(ATR)
**
*
*!
*
*!
*!
*
**
**
*
*
**
208
From this point it appears strange that when two high vowels are at the
right side of a word, retracted mid vowels are allowed to their left. Why do
forms like (br 'shortcut' exist? In this context the scope of the local
conjunction TROY(ATR) in Yoruba becomes crucial. If it were the segment
or syllable this pattern could not occur. With the domain specified as the
[high] feature span this pattern emerges as a consequence of an underlyingly retracted high vowel in rightmost position.
(268) TROY(ATR) redefined again:
TROY(ATR) or *[+hi]&lR-ANCHOR&l*S-ID(ATR): 'High Vowels in
the rightmost syllable either map their underlying ATR specification
to the surface or disagree in ATR with their neighbour.'
Domain: [hi] span.
We have seen already in the analysis of Finnish that the domain of a local
conjunction can either be the syllable or a feature span, which may also
extend over two or more syllables. Yoruba is another instance where the
domain of a local conjunction is an articulatory domain. The newly defined
constraint TROY(ATR) can be seen at work in tableau (269).
(269) Yoruba (br 'shortcut' from /ebur8/
/ebur8/
a.
b.
c.
d.
) e.
ebur8
(b(r(
eburu
(b8ru
(buru
*[+hi,
-ATR]
IO-ID
(hi)
TROY
(ATR)
RANCHOR
*!
S-ID
(ATR)
IO-ID
(ATR)
*
*!*
*!
*!
9
*
*
*
*
*
*
**
*
***
**
With the form (br the question arises whether Trojan vowels are permitted in the penultimate syllable when followed by another high vowel or
if not how the Trojan vowel in the rightmost syllable can disagree with the
antepenultimate mid vowel through another high, ATR vowel. The complete harmonic form where this does not happen (candidate c) violates the
TROY constraint. The two adjacent u's are analysed as one [+high] feature
span, and such a feature span is the domain of the local conjunction TROY.
The whole feature span violates the markedness constraint *[+hi] by being
exactly this. The constraint R-ANCHOR is violated by the rightmost part of
the feature span in that this vowel is not identical with its underlying form
Nez Perce
209
in its ATR specification. Since the domain of the local conjunction is the
whole feature span, violation of the third part of the conjoint has to be
assessed over this domain as well. *S-IDENT is violated here when the local
domain agrees with its neighbour with regard to ATR. Exactly this is the
case with candidate (c). By violating all three conjoint constraints the
whole local conjunction is violated. Candidate (e) avoids violation of *SIDENT in the same context. It has an unfaithful retracted mid vowel. By this
characteristic the candidate also avoids violation of TROY(ATR). Since this
is the only candidate which fares better than candidate (c), it is chosen as
the optimal output for the Trojan input given in tableau (269).
Another possibility would be that roots containing two high vowels at
their right edge, such as (br 'shortcut' are underlyingly consonant-final
(i.e., /(b8r/). The rightmost vowel is always an identical copy of the underlying vowel, provided only to avoid a consonant-final syllable. Under such
an analysis, the R-ANCHOR constraint would probably be always violated
by such words. A form like rg 'molar tooth' should then not be consonant-final underlyingly, since the prosodically driven reduplication would
trigger ATR dissimilation in the first vowel. Under the latter analysis the
syllable could be maintained as the scope of the local conjunction.
However, in this scenario the underlying ATR specification of the probably
consonant-final roots becomes irrelevant again. A choice between both
alternatives requires a more in-depth investigation of Yoruba prosodic
phonology.
6.3
210
nato.t
'my father'
to.ta
'father!'
all recessive
dominant root
Nez Perce
c. c4q4.t + -ayn
raspberry + for
211
caqa.tayn
dominant affix
'for a raspberry'
(Hall and Hall 1980: 202f.)
The vowel i belongs to both series. This is so, because there are instances
of i which behave as dominant and those which behave as recessive. In
(273a), the i in the Nez Perce word for 'mother' does not trigger an
alternation in the possessive and vocative suffixes, they surface as [+ATR],
while the i in the word for 'paternal aunt' does. The possessive and the
vocative surface as retracted disagreeing with i in that respect.
(273) The behaviour of Nez Perce [i]
a. n4- + i.c
1POSS + 'mother'
i.c + -4
'mother' + VOCATIVE
b. n4- + ci.c
1POSS + paternal aunt
ci.c + -4
paternal aunt + VOCATIVE
n4i.c
'my mother'
i.c4
'mother!'
recessive i
naci.c
dominant i
'my paternal aunt'
ci.ca
'paternal aunt!'
(Hall and Hall 1980: 203)
There have been numerous proposals in the literature to account for this
different behaviour of two vowels which are phonetically the same (Aoki
1966, 1970, Rigsby 1965, Jacobsen 1968, Rigsby and Silverstein 1969,
Chomsky and Halle 1968, Kiparsky 1968, Zwicky 1971, Kim 1978, Hall
and Hall 1980, Bakovi 2000). The pattern can be explained by different
underlying representations for both instances of i, as was exercised here
already for Hungarian i and high vowels in Yoruba.
Hall and Hall as well as Bakovi treat Nez Perce harmony as dominantrecessive advanced tongue root (ATR) harmony, with the dominant set
being [-ATR]. In the proposal by Hall and Hall, an i with the underlying
specification [-ATR] causes the vowels in the other morphemes in (273b)
to become [-ATR] too. In a later step of derivation, retracted i then is
subject to phonetic readjustment rules and is thus changed to advanced i.
In a declarative output-oriented framework, which does not assume
stepwise derivation, the analysis is somewhat more complicated. Bakovi
(2000) proposes an analysis which relies on targeted constraints and cumu-
212
INTEGRITY
Affix
IO-ID
(ATR)
*
**
To cover the repair strategies, that u alternates with o, while i does not
alternate at all, Bakovi proposes a range of markedness and faithfulness
constraints and their respective ranking. The result is a grammar that allows
for a symmetric underlying system which is mapped on an impoverished
surface system. For the current purpose it is sufficient to know that Nez
Perce can be described as a language with an underlyingly symmetric
vowel inventory.
Nez Perce
213
214
Given the high ranking of constraints which prohibit repairing of /,/ with
other vowels differing in height, this constraint triggers ATR dissimilation,
which is in direct conflict with the harmony constraint S-IDENT(ATR).
Thus the local conjunction has to be ranked above the latter to show any
effect on the choice of output forms.
(278) Nez Perce Trojan grammar
TROY(ATR), *[+ATR]&lIO-ID(ATR) >> S-ID(ATR)
>> INTEGRITYAffix >> IO-ID(ATR)
With this grammar we can corretly evaluate input-output mappings of
forms which have underlying vowels which are not allowed to surface in
Nez Perce.
(279) The emergence of the Trojan vowel in Nez Perce
/c,.c + -4/
a.
b.
c.
d.
) e.
c,.c4
c,.ca
c4.c4
ci.c4
ci.ca
*[+hi,
-ATR]
*[-hi, -bk]&l
IO-ID(hi)
TROY
(ATR)
*[+ATR]&l
IO-ID(ATR)
*!
*!
S-ID
(ATR)
*
*!
*!
*
*
Yawelmani opacity
215
Retracted series
/,/ [i]
/8/ [o]
/a/ [a]
If historically there have been any other underlying contrasts in the Nez
Perce inventory, i.e., distinctive mid vowels, these have been erased from
the underlying inventory by the rigid markedness restrictions on surface
forms. Any underlying e, (, o, o must be repaired with other vowels or look
like the repaired underlyingly retracted high back vowel (/8/ [o]) and
hence the contrasts collapse as shown by Bakovi. In comparison to
Bakovi's account this approach to Nez Perce avoids the use of a second
kind of candidate evaluation like cumulative candidate ordering by targeted
constraints. From the viewpoint of learnability the local conjunction
approach should be preferred. Nevertheless, I will come back to the targeted constraints analysis in section 6.5, where previous accounts of Trojan
vowels are reviewed.
6.4
Yawelmani opacity
216
The second rule lowers these vowels. Afterwards long vowels are shortened
within a closed syllable. Underlyingly short high vowels always surface as
such and harmonise only with other high vowels.
If an underlyingly long high vowel precedes a suffix containing a low
vowel, the triggering factor for hamony (i.e., height uniformity) is missing
at the point of derivation where harmony applies. After non-application of
harmony the whole lowering and shortening apparatus does its work. The
result is two height-uniform low vowels which do not harmonise. Additionally the harmony grammar interacts with epenthesis and shortening, the
latter applies to the lowered vowels and obscures the harmony pattern even
more. The whole phenomenon is schematised in a serialist fashion in (281).
(281) Yawelmani in serialist terms
Input
Epenthesis
Height-uniform harmony
Output
Within levelless Optimality Theory there are two proposals to deal with the
problem of harmonic vowels which do not obey the height uniformity
requirement and with those disharmonic vowels which superficially meet
this requirement. McCarthy (1999) assumes a Sympathy relation of the
actual output form with certain failed candidates, while Cole and
Kisseberth (1995) deal with this type of opacity by unexpressed feature
domains in surface representations. They neglect the theoretical claim of
surface truth. Both accounts will be discussed in more detail below, but
before this I will introduce the Yawelmani vowel patterns and develop my
own account on the premises set so far in the analyses of Hungarian,
Yoruba, and Nez Perce.
Yawelmani opacity
217
'might eat'
'might find'
c. xat-hin
bok'-hin
'eats, non-future'
'finds, non-future'
d. xil-al
dub-al
'might tangle'
might lead by the hand'
e. bok'-k'o
bok'-sit-k'a
'find (it)!'
'find (it) for (him)!'
(Cole and Kisseberth, 1995: 1f)
The data in (283) show that the language distinguishes two types of
nonhigh back rounded vowels. One group, to which belongs oW 'steal',
causes a following high affix vowel to harmonise in backness and roundness. These instances of o do not trigger harmony in following nonhigh
affix vowels. These nonhigh root vowels violate the height uniformity
restriction on Yawelmani vowel harmony. The second group of o's behaves
exactly the other way around (see /gop/ 'take care of an infant' in 283a,b).
These instances of o trigger harmony in following low vowels, but not in
following high vowels, just as expected.
218
b. Passive aorist
mek'-it
'swallow'
oW-ut
'steal'
gop-it
'take care of an infant'
xat-it
'eat'
In the literature (i.e., Goldsmith 1993, Cole and Kisseberth 1995, and many
others) it is generally assumed that the former nonhigh vowels are underlyingly high, and that the described irregularities are the result of opaque
rule interaction. (Cole and Kisseberth 1995 propose a different analysis in
terms of constraint interaction; but see below.) High long vowels are not
allowed in Yawelmani. Therefore it is assumed that underlying high long
vowels (u, i) are lowered to o and e, respectively.
The examples in (283) show evidence for an additional process: Whenever the underlyingly high long vowel is at risk of creating a superheavy
syllable together with a following consonant, it is not only lowered but also
shortened. In (283b) the consonant following the vowel of /mek, oW/ is
syllabified as the onset of the following syllable, and the root vowel is long,
while in the forms in (283a) the vowel is followed by two consonants, a
coda and an onset. In these cases the vowel is short. Harmony applies
before lowering takes place. The result is a surface violation of height
uniformity.
This is the classical case of phonological opacity (Kiparsky 1971, 1973),
which is analysed in OT by Sympathy Theory (McCarthy 1999). In what
follows I will give an account of the Yawelmani data which entirely relies
on the means already introduced in the analysis of transparent vowels and
Trojan vowels. The analysis crucially rests on the local conjunction of
faithfulness and OCP constraints. This shows that these data are anything
else but supporting evidence for theoretical devices like Sympathy or levels
of derivation.
Before turning to a novel analysis of the harmony data, we have to
determine which feature harmonises. First, there are no front rounded
Yawelmani opacity
219
[+back]
u, u(o)
o, o
220
Yawelmani opacity
221
bok'al
buk'al
bok'il
bok'l
bok'ol
ROBA
IO-ID
(lo)
UNIFORM
VH
IO-ID
(bk)
*!
*S-ID
(lo)
S-ID
(bk)
*
*
*!
*!
*!
*
*
222
bok'hin
bok'hon
bk'hin
bak'hin
bok'hun
bok'hn
ROBA
IO-ID
(lo)
UNIFORM
VH
IO-ID
(bk)
*S-ID
(lo)
S-ID
(bk)
*
*!
*
*
*!
*!
*!
*!
Yawelmani opacity
223
The next question is why underlyingly high long vowels are lowered and
shortened to avoid superheavy syllables. Shortening alone would be absolutely sufficient, because in this case a trimoraic syllable is avoided and the
high vowel is not long anymore, i.e. *[hi,long] is satisfied.
Vowel shortening occurs to avoid syllables with more than two moras.
(292) Yawelmani shortening
Aorist
Passive aorist
a. /hoyo/ hoyohin
hoyot
'name'
b. /pana/ panahin
panat
'arrive'
c. /uW/
oWut
'steal'
oWhun
If the vowel is shortened anyway, why does lowering take place then in
(292c)? This suggests an account relying on serially ordered rules or constraints, with lowering preceding shortening (see Goldsmith 1993). In the
account proposed here, this overapplication of lowering is attributed to a
local conjunction of UNIFORMITY, the constraint against coalescence, and
*[-lo]. If you do not parse all moras of a segment you should not do this to
a surface high vowel.
Before illustrating this idea, simple shortening must be analysed.
McCarthy (1999) attributes Yawelmani shortening to a markedness constraint against superheavy syllables *[]. Mora assignment to coda consonants satisfies an undominated constraint on coda moraicity. I follow
McCarthy in these aspects of the analysis. The constraint against superheavy syllables is ranked above the faithfulness constraint on length,
MAX.
One may suspect now why in the case of consonant clusters, vowels are
epenthesised, but in connection with potentially too heavy syllables not. In
particular, an epenthesised vowel could split the material of one too heavy
syllable on two less heavy syllables, taking the potential coda of the first as
the onset of the second. This asymmetry in epenthesis could be an effect of
a different ranking of faithfulness of vowels and consonants, with
faithfulness to consonants ranking higher than faithfulness to vowels, and
the latter ranked below the anti epenthesis constraint DEP-IO. It might
likewise be an effect of high ranking general MAX-IO and low ranking of
UNIFORMITY. Otherwise we would observe consonant deletion in the
context of too heavy syllables.
224
MAX
MAX-IO
DEP UNIFORMITY
*!
*!
*
The choice between candidates (c) and (d) in tableau (294) is either made
by the segmental faithfulness constraint MAX-IO or by a morphological
constraint demanding the expression of the morphological information
added by the affix (for discussion of such constraints see Canclini 1999,
Popescu 2000, Krmer 2001, among others). Shortening does not incur a
MAX violation since the second mora present on the long vowel in the
underlying representation fuses with the consonant t in the surface representation (d). This, in turn, constitutes a violation of UNIFORMITY.
If an underlyingly high long vowel is shortened it can not be high in the
surface form, it is lowered as well. This observation is covered by the local
conjunction of the markedness constraint against high vowels *[-lo] with
the relevant faithfulness constraint, UNIFORMITY.
(295) Local conjunction: *[-lo]&lUNIFORMITY.
'Do not violate *[-lo] and UNIFORMITY in the same instance.'
For an exemplification, let's have a look at the evaluation of a form like
meknDl 'swallow-MEDIOPASS.DUBITATIVE' (first given in 283a) with the
proposed constraints (tableau 296). The candidate under discussion, (296c),
the one that has shortening only to escape violation of the constraint against
too heavy syllables as well as violation of the IO-Identity constraint on
vowel height pays maintenance of faithfulness by a violation of the local
Yawelmani opacity
225
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
) f.
mik.nal
mek.nal
mik.nal
me.nal
me.ki.nal
mek.nal
UNIFORMITY
DEP
IO-ID(lo)
MAX
*!
MAX-IO
*!
*!
*[-lo]&lUNIF
*[hi, long]
/mik + n + al/
*[]
*
*!
*
*!
*
*
*
*!
*
226
Yawelmani opacity
227
228
In cooperation with the rest of the grammar the first three of the four
constraints determine the context in which the last constraint is activated.
Given the newly established conjunction, the form meknal is not
threatened by potential dissimilation anymore and the form otnal is
evaluated disharmonically as desired.
(302) The emergence of the less marked low affix vowel
i. /mik+n+al/
IO-ID(lo)&l*[+lo, +bk]
&l*S-ID(lo)&l*S-ID(bk)
- a. meknal
' b. meknol
ii. /ut+n+al/
- a. otnal
' b. otnol
IO-ID(lo)&l*[+lo, +bk]
&l*S-ID(lo)&l*S-ID(bk)
*!
IO-ID(lo)
&lS-ID(bk)
IO-ID
(lo)
UNIFORM
VH
*!
*
*
IO-ID(lo)&l
S-ID(bk)
IO-ID
(lo)
UNIFORM
VH
*
*
The candidates in (302i) both satisfy the topmost local conjunction in the
following way. The first vowel in these forms is not faithful to its
underlying height, but it is also no low back vowel. Satisfaction of the
second member of the local conjunction satisfies the whole conjunction.
The second vowel is underlyingly low, so it satisfies the local conjunction
via the faithfulness constraint. Therefore neither the height OCP nor the
backness OCP is activated for these forms. The choice between them is
then made by the next lower ranking constraint, the local conjunction of
height faithfulness and the backness harmony constraint.
The second candidate in (302ii) is correctly marked as sub-optimal in
comparison to its competitor. The first vowel in candidate (b) is
underlyingly high, but low in this form, which violates the height faithfulness constraint. It is furthermore a back low vowel, in offence of the involved markedness constraint. Moreover it is of the same height and backness as its neighbour, which completes the list of offences to the involved
constraints. No constraint in the conjunction is satisfied by this vowel. The
competing candidate (a) has a front vowel in the second syllable, satisfying
the backness OCP in the local conjunction.
The evaluation of lowered back vowels combined with high affix
vowels is not affected by the newly proposed constraint conjunction, since
this combination satisfies the conjoined constraint *S-ID(lo), which renders
Yawelmani opacity
229
the whole conjunction IO-ID(lo)&l*[+lo, +bk]&l*S-ID(lo)&l*S-ID(bk) satisfied. Given this the next lower ranked constraint IO-ID(lo)&lS-ID(bk) decides the choice of the optimal output in these cases.
(303) Lowered vowels cause harmony in high vowels
/ut+it/
IO-ID(lo)&l*[+lo, +bk]
&l*S-ID(lo)&l*S-ID(bk)
IO-ID(lo)
&lS-ID(bk)
IO-ID
(lo)
UNIFORM
VH
a. otit
) b. otut
9
9
*!
*
*
*[+lo,
+bk]
IO-ID
(lo)
*S-ID
(lo)
*S-ID
(bk)
- a. otit
- b. otut
9
9
*
*
*
*
9
9
9
*
ii. /ut+n+al/
IO-ID(lo)&l*[+lo, +bk]
&l*S-ID(lo)&l*S-ID(bk)
*[+lo,
+bk]
IO-ID
(lo)
*S-ID
(lo)
*S-ID
(bk)
9
*!
*
**
*
*
*
*
9
3*
i.
/ut+it/
- a. otnal
/ b. otnol
230
In part (ii) of tableau (304), the same procedure is applied for an input
containing a high root vowel and a low affix vowel. The two considered
candidates fare equally bad on the markedness constraint and the IO faithfulness constraint for the same reasons as the candidates in part (i). They
additionally fail to satisfy the height OCP in that both candidates contain
two adjacent low vowels. Their performance on the last remaining constraint, the backness OCP, is crucial now for determining which one passes
the local conjunction of all four constraints and which one fails. Candidate
(a) has the back vowel o and front D. This diversity in backness specifications leaves the backness OCP satisfied. Having passed at least this constraint, candidate (a) is judged as fine with respect to the whole constraint
conjunction. Candidate (b), however, has two back vowels. This does not
conform to the OCP on backness. Since the candidate has failed to satisfy
the other three constraints as well, the fourth violation is the last one
needed for the conjunction to count as violated. This is not mere counting
of violation marks since potentially a candidate could violate one of the involved constraints four or more times without an effect on the conjunction
as long as it satisfies at least one of the other constraints.
The general question arising in the context of this analysis is where the
upper limit of constraint coordinations lies. What is the maximal number of
conjoinable constraints?
In the literature there have also been proposals to limit the number of
coordinated constraints to two. Such a limitation has no justification at all,
since the number of interacting constraints is not limited in the interaction
by ranking as well. So why should constraint interaction obey different restrictions in these two dimensions?
Moreover, the more constraints are coordinated to one macro- or complex constraint in a grammar the less likely it is that this constraint shows
any effect at all. This is because it is fully sufficient to satisfy only one of
the conjoined constraints to render the whole conjunction satisfied, i.e.,
irrelevant. With an increasing number of participating constraints also the
probability of candidates to satisfy one of them increases.
Furthermore, it should be noted that all conjoined constraints have to
share an argument, and that the whole construction applies only to the
narrowest defined local domain, which is the most well-defined of its
shared arguments.
To summarise these considerations, a huge number of conjoined constraints runs danger to be effectless and the grammar itself is likely to have
problems in providing enough constraints which all refer to the same argu-
Yawelmani opacity
231
232
straint conjunction is composed. They simply end up with a grammar without this complex constraint. The effect is harmony of low affix vowels with
lowered root vowels in apparent surface height sensitivity, as shown in
tableau (300) above. Thus, the historical change that has occurred in
Yawelmani during the last decades supports the analysis provided here for
pre-1940 Yawelmani.
An alternative analysis of height uniformity sensitive to underlying
height is sketched in Hyman (to appear). Hyman examines the harmony
pattern of Klo1, a Bantu language, which displays frontness and roundness
harmony triggered by underlying height harmony. He proposes harmony
constraints on frontness and rounding which check the input for height harmony and are vacuous in case the requirement is not met by the input
('F[ront] (if input O[pen])'). However, this proposal implies the existence of syntagmatic constraints on inputs or underlying forms. It remains
an open question how inputs are evaluated against such constraints at all.
Furthermore it is questionable whether such complex requirements referring to both, input and output, are primitives of grammar or complex constraints composed from several simplex ones. Moreover, the historical
change manifest in Yawelmani could not be accounted for as straightforwardly as in the current proposal if Hyman's constraints were adopted for
Yawelmani.
So far we have seen how the interaction of lowering (and shortening)
with height-uniform harmony can be explained with least theoretical effort.
To complete the discussion of opacity in Yawelmani, we still have to deal
with the interaction of epenthesis with shortening as well as with the rest of
the grammar developed so far. Even though this issue is not directly linked
to the discussion of Trojan vowels it is of central theoretical interest,
because an analysis which claims to solve the Yawelmani puzzle without
reference to intermediate or failed representations should be exhaustive.
6.4.3 Yawelmani epenthesis and shortening
Epenthesis can be regarded as evidence for rule ordering in a derivational
account. Since the epenthesised vowel is sensitive to harmony, insertion
has to apply before the harmony rule.
According to Cole and Kisseberth (1995), a high vowel is inserted
whenever a consonant cluster would emerge in an onset or coda. The
maximal syllable is CVC or CV. The epenthetic vowel agrees with other
Yawelmani opacity
233
amlit
mo6lit
VenW'it
wowlut
'help'
'grow old'
'smell'
'stand up'
If a form has two low vowels underlyingly, and these two vowels are
separated by the epenthesised high vowel in the surface representation,
harmony is blocked, see forms (306c,d).
(306) Blocking of harmony by epenthesis in Yawelmani
precative gerundial
a. ilik-as
'sings'
b. utuy-as
'drinks'
c. logiw-as
'pulverizes'
d. pait-as
'fights'
(Cole and Kisseberth 1995: 3)
In the framework developed here this is not unexpected, since the two low
vowels are in fact not adjacent. An account which assumes that harmony is
an effect of constraints on surface forms correctly predicts that epenthetic
vowels behave as opaque elements when height uniformity is not given
with the neighbour to the left. In a serialist approach, the active behaviour
of epenthetic vowels is astonishing if harmony is stipulated to take place at
an early level of derivation (because of the subsequent lowering) where
epenthesis is expected to have not yet taken place.
I assume that epenthesis is triggered by a high ranking constraint
against complex onsets and complex codas, which are both unattested in
Yawelmani, i.e. *COMPLEX.
(307) *COMPLEX: 'No complex onset, no complex coda!'
234
IO-ID
(lo)
logwhin
logowhin
loguwhun
logiwhin
*COMPL
*[+lo]
*!
*
**!
*
*
UNIFORM
VH
IO-ID
*[+bk]
(bk)
*
**
**!*
*
logwas
logowas
logiwos
logiwas
IO-ID
(lo)
*COMPL
*[+lo]
*!
**
***!
**
**
UNIFORM
VH
IO-ID
(bk)
*[+bk]
*
*
**!
*
Yawelmani opacity
iliknit
logiwnit
dubitative
ilel
cuyol
hoyol
panal
235
gloss
'expose to wind'
'urinate'
'name'
'arrive'
ilkal
'sing'
logwol
'pulverize'
(Goldsmith 1993: 38f)
ilkit
logwit
Vowel shortening occurs to avoid syllables with more than two moras, as
was shown and analysed already above. In the forms wowulhun and
wowlut which are the aorist and passive aorist forms, respectively, of
/wuwl/ 'stand up' (305b), we observe epenthesis in the first and shortening
in the second form. The ranking *[], *COMPLEX >> MAX >> DEP,
UNIFORMITY accounts for both, the appearance of epenthesis as well as
deletion in the same grammar.
(311) Yawelmani shortening and epenthesis
i.
/wuwl+hn/ *[] *COMPL MAX
a. wowlhn
*!
*
b. won
*!
***
c. won
***
d. wolhun
*!
e. wowlhun
*!
) f. wowulhun
ii.
a.
b.
c.
d.
) e.
f.
/wuwl+t/
wowlt
wot
wot
wolut
wowlut
wowulut
*[]
*COMPL
*!
*!
MAX
**
*!*
*!
DEP
UNIFORMITY
*
*
*
**
DEP
UNIFORMITY
*
*
*
**!
236
UNIFORMITY
DEP
IO-ID(lo)&lS-Id(bk)
IO-ID(lo)&l*[+lo, +bk]
&l*S-ID(lo)&l*S-ID(bk)
*[-lo]&lUNIF
*[hi,long]
MAX
*!
UNIFORMVH
wuwlt
wuwlit
wowlit
wowlut
IO-ID(lo)
a.
b.
c.
) d.
*COMPLEX
/wuwl+t/
*[]
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*!
*!
ilial
ilial
ile l
ilel
ilal
ilil
ilel
*[hi,
long]
*[]
*[-lo]&l
UNIFORMITY
MAX
MAXUNIFORMITY
IO
*!
*!
*!
*!
*!
*
*
*
*!
*
*
*
*
This completes the analysis of Yawelmani vowel alternations. To summarise, the aspects of the Yawelmani grammar dealt with here are given in
Yawelmani opacity
237
(314). I will not go into the details of the motivations for the constraint
ranking anymore, since the ranking as such is not of major concern here.
(314) Yawelmani ranking
ROBA, *COMPLEX, *[hi, long], *[]
>> MAX, MAX-IO,
IO-ID(lo)&l*[+lo, +bk]&l*S-ID(lo)&l*S-ID(bk)
>> IO-ID(lo)&S-ID(bk), *[-lo]&lUNIFORMITY
>> IO-ID(lo) >> *[+lo] >> UNIFORMVH >> IO-ID(bk)
>> *[+bk], S-ID(bk), *S-ID(lo), *S-ID(bk), DEP, UNIFORMITY
The grammar which is proposed here is fairly complex, but this is no valid
argument against this analysis since it is a basic assumption of OT that all
constraints are present universally and that all these constraints interact
with each other in the grammars of the world's languages. From this
perspective, it is only expected that we find languages with rich constraint
interaction effects. Extending the view on all relevant constraints gives rise
to the insight that the whole assumption of derivational opacity, be it as
derivational rule interaction or as sympathetic candidate evaluation is
superfluous in the case of Yawelmani harmony, epenthesis, lowering, and
shortening interaction. At least the analysis of Yawelmani shows no need to
refer to psycho-linguistically questionable representations which never surface, be it as intermediate representations or as failed candidates in sympathetic correspondence. The only abstract, i.e., non-surface-true, representations which have to be referred to are the underlying representations.
6.4.4 Previous approaches to Yawelmani opacity
In previous analyses, it was assumed that the active harmonic feature in
Yawelmani is roundness, as for instance by Cole and Kisseberth (1995) or
Goldsmith (1993). Usually, only features determine harmony which also
play a role in the phonemic system of the respective language. Roundness
harmony is observed in languages with front rounded vowels as well as
back rounded vowels (see Kaun 1994 on roundness harmony). ATR harmony applies in languages in which this feature also provides a phonemic
contrast (see for instance the general survey on African vowel harmony
systems in Hall et al 1974). In Yawelmani, roundness is completely predictable, while backness is contrastive.
238
Yawelmani opacity
239
240
Yawelmani opacity
241
242
Previous analyses
243
244
The former assumption would not be too problematic if the Alignment were
simply treated as instances of Anchoring, i.e., as faithfulness constraints.
This should then extend to the word alignment constraints as well, which is
not feasible, since they refer to both lexical as well as inserted material.
Inserted material does not correspond to underlying material and should
therefore not be affected by these constraints. Apart from this inconsistency
the assumption of four different directional harmony constraints alone
proves quite expensive.
The last analysis to be reviewed is that proposed by Bakovi (2000) for
the Trojan vowels of Yoruba. Bakovi's account has already been shown to
be insufficient in the analysis of Yoruba low and mid vowel patterns.
However, to account for the fact that prefixes are consistently disharmonic
with some roots containing a high vowel he assumes underlyingly retracted
high vowels for these roots as well.
Technically the analysis rests on a Sympathy relation among the actual
output and a failed candidate. For a form like omu 'drinker' (/O-m8/
nom+drink), the scenario is the following: the output depends on the failed
completely harmonic and root-faithful candidate *om8. This candidate has
no chance to be chosen as the output because it contains the banned vowel
*8. The candidate which resembles the failed candidate *om8 most is the
one which differs only in that it satisfies the markedness constraint against
8. This candidate omu is chosen then in favour of harmonic *omu for its
better faithfulness to the losing candidate *om8. The other losing candidate
*omu has changed the ATR specification of both vowels with regard to
sympathetic *om8. This analysis must be rejected on the same grounds as
McCarthy's Sympathy account of Yawelmani opacity.
6.6
Conclusion
Conclusion
245
246
to see the technical parallel between the behaviour of balanced vowels and
height-uniform harmony. Recall that the analysis of balance crucially rests
on the conjunction of *S-IDENT(F) with S-IDENT(F), while the height-uniform pattern is an effect of a conjunction of the same constraints, referring
to different features, i.e., *S-IDENT(lo) and S-IDENT(bk). Any other proposal made so far did not bring these seemingly unrelated patterns together so
closely.
Chapter 7
General conclusion
7.1
Overall summary
248
General conclusion
result in connection with the analysis of vowel harmony derived here is that
the 'pathological ranking' in the view of McCarthy and Prince, that of affix
faithfulness (i.e., INTEGRITYAffix) above root faithfulness (i.e., INTEGRITYRoot), is rather the rule than the exception. Most of the languages displaying vowel harmony have root controlled harmony. Affix control must
be seen as a rare exception.
This faithfulness paradoxon was motivated in this book over the
functional task of the root~affix asymmetry. Usually faithfulness serves the
retrieval of lexical as well as grammatical information on the side of the
listener. A language in which the information in affixes can easily be identified by listeners while the lexical information is undetectable is quite dysfunctional. It does not properly serve communication. Thus, faithfulness to
lexical material has to be more important than faithfulness to functional
elements. The INTEGRITY constraints, in contrast, militate against prominence maximisation. If a root extends its features over the whole word by
assimilation, it maximises its prominence. The ranking of INTEGRITYAffix
above INTEGRITYRoot, thus, more severely restricts prominence maximisation of affixes relative to prominence maximisation of roots.
The apparent absence of harmony triggering prefixes from the languages
of the world reported so far, is accounted for in the current proposal by an
asymmetry of edge-faithfulness constraints. While suffixes might be subject
to a right-word-edge faithfulness constraint demanding identity to the
underlying form at that word margin, the mirror-image constraint, i.e., IOIDENTLeftmost, or IO-IDENT-1, seems to be absent from Universal Grammar. Dominant left-edge faithfulness effects, such as a greater wealth of
allowed feature combinations and triggering of harmony by the vowel in
the leftmost syllable, are observed only with root material in predominantly
suffixing languages. This is attributable to a logical constraint conjunction
of the Left-Anchoring constraint on roots and prosodic words with IOIdentity. The former demands the mapping of the left root edge with the left
word edge and the latter enforces Input-Output faithfulness for the vowel in
this position. The mirror image constraint coordination, i.e., that of RANCHOR and IO-Identity, accounts for the mirror image pattern, with prefixation only and stronger faithfulness at the right word edge than anywhere
else. This was manifested in potential target vowels at the right word edge
resisting assimilation to potential triggers preceding them in the prefixing
language Yoruba.
Overall summary
249
*[F1]&lS-IDENT(F2)&l*S-IDENT(F2)
*[F1]&lIO-IDENT(F2)&l*S-IDENT(F2)
250
General conclusion
c. Uniform Harmony:
*S-IDENT(F1)&lS-IDENT(F2)
In all these conjunctions, violation of the first, or the two first constraints
functions as the triggering environment for the last constraint.54 By this
logic balance (or vowel transparency; 321a) and the pattern of Trojan
vowels (or phonological opacity in vowel harmony; 321b) can both be seen
as conspiratory OCP effects. Height uniform harmony (321c) is different in
that harmony is triggered by a violation of an OCP constraint.
All in all, the controversial issues of cyclicity and phonological opacity
in the context of vowel harmony are reduced to the interaction of only a
handful of universal constraints via ranking and via constraint coordination.
In the following I will first discuss the prevailing issue of phonological
opacity and serialism in more detail and then change the perspective to
touch upon topics which have found only a marginal place in this book.
7.2
The main part of this book was concerned with the question whether we
need to incorporate a notion of cyclicity and phonological opacity in whatever form in the conception of generative grammar to analyse apparently
cyclic and opaque aspects of vowel harmony patterns. In a nutshell, cyclicity is given when a rule reapplies several times within the course of derivation (if not conceived of naively as an iteratively applied directional rule,
root-controlled harmony could be imagined as reapplication of a harmony
rule after each level of affixation). Phonological opacity (Kiparsky 1971,
1973) is at stake when an element is obviously affected by a given rule but
the triggering condition is not detectable anymore. In this case it is assumed
that the trigger existed in an earlier stage of derivation, but was altered by a
subsequent rule which applied to the trigger after it has served its triggering
function for the other rule (as in vowel transparency). This type of opacity
is schematised in (322a,c).
(322) Phonological opacity
a. Non-surface-apparent or counterbleeding opacity
B D/_C
ABC ADC#
C E/_#
ADC ADE#
251
252
General conclusion
253
254
General conclusion
Throughout this book almost all underlying forms were given as fully
specified strings. Underspecification was assumed only where all diagnostics failed to detect the underlying feature specification and where it really
did not matter. Inkelas (1994) surveys the consequences of Lexicon Optimization for underlying structures and comes to the conclusion that
Lexicon Optimization favours underlying representations which are fully
specified.
The reasoning is that with respect to anti-insertion and other faithfulness
constraints fully specified underlying forms produce less constraint violations than underspecified items would. The grammar is supposed to store
items in the way which causes the least amount of friction, which means
that constraint violations have to be minimised.
With regard to the selection of optimal forms, the same principle holds
for the choice of underlying forms as for surface forms: the most harmonic
candidate wins. Alternating material, such as the suffix vowels in a language displaying root-controlled harmony, however, has to be stored as underspecified according to this reasoning. In case an alternating Turkish suffix like di / d / dy / du (PAST) were stored as, say, /di/ in the lexicon,
every instance of the other three allomorphs would violate faithfulness. If
255
256
General conclusion
257
258
General conclusion
Outlook
7.5
259
Outlook
This book dealt only with a subset of the theoretical issues arising in the
context of vowel harmony. If we broaden the scope again after it was
narrowed down to the discussion of serialism a range of questions arises.
One such question might be why only certain features harmonise in isolation. For instance, the feature roundness is not very prone to be a harmonic feature. Roundness harmony occurs only accompanying backness
harmony. Warlpiri, an Australian language illustrates this. In Warlpiri, suffixes agree with their lexical host in terms of roundness and backness, as
shown in (324a,b).
(324) Warlpiri harmony
a. kurdu-kurlu-rlu-lku-ju-lu
'child-Prop-Erg-then-me-they'
b. maliki-kirli-rli-lki-ji-li
'dog-Prop-Erg-then-me-they'
c. minija-kurlu-rlu-lku-ju-lu
'cat-Prop-Erg-then-me-they'
(Nash 1986: 86; cit. op. Inkelas 1994: 291)
260
General conclusion
son and Kaun's (2000) work on word games in harmony languages clearly
shows that harmony is an active part of the grammar and not a lexicalised
historical artefact.
Possible functional motivations of vowel harmony go in four directions.
Harmony might serve to facilitate the identification of word boundaries in
speech. Another motivation might lie in ease of articulation. If vowels
within a word resemble each other, the articulators do not have to be moved
as much as when adjacent vowels maximally diverge from each other. The
latter finds its precipitation in the assumption that harmony is in fact
neutralisation and, in OT terms, reduces violations of markedness constraints, as in the proposal by Beckman (1995, 1997). The markedness/neutralisation approach, however, has no answer to the question why in most
cases harmony is limited to the domain of the word. If vowel harmony
serves a word-identifying function, this is in accordance with the assumption made here that disruptions of harmony, as with balanced and Trojan
vowels, facilitate the maintenance and detection of phonemic contrasts. The
fourth possible functional motivation for harmony may lie in the reduction
of the complexity of stored items. If a contrast with respect to a certain
feature is neutralised in most positions of the word, the non-contrastive
vowels might bear any feature specification or none. It simply doesn't
matter. If non-specification results in higher mnemonic economy, this
should be the preferred underlying form of vowels which are harmonic with
their contrastively specified neighbour.
The assumption that vowel harmony serves a domain-identifying
function is compromised by the subtle differences the scope a harmony
requirement might have in different languages. As noted in the introduction, the harmonic domain includes the root plus all affixes in Finnish,
while all proclitics are excluded. In fast speech, however, proclitics undergo harmony, triggered by the next (i.e., first) vowel of their host. In Turkish, enclitics regularly participate as targets in the vowel harmony pattern,
while some affixes are excluded. In Somali, the scope of harmony covers
the whole clause. It remains to be examined in future research whether the
Somali grammar treats as one word what we would call a clause traditionally. Future research also has to shed light on the structural differences in
the clitic phonology of languages such as Turkish and Finnish. For the moment the notion of 'word' to be referred to when talking about the domain of
harmony is neither completely consistent with that of the prosodic or
phonological word nor with a morphological understanding of this term.
Outlook
261
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Note that the term 'disharmony' is used here, as in most of the literature, as
denoting the absence of harmony, which does not imply active dissimilation
of phonological features.
Here we run already into the first problem: Do feature bearers actually share a
feature or do they just have to be equal? The autosegmental representation in
(1b) is meant to leave room for both options.
For a further development of an articulator based theory of phonological
features see Halle, Vaux and Wolfe (2000).
However, the IPA vowel chart does not take tongue root position into consideration, which is to be transcribed by a subscript cross under the vowel for
tongue root advancement and a subscript horizontal bar for retraction. In the
following I will depart from this convention by simply using distinct symbols
from the vowel chart to transcribe vowels differing in tongue root position
(such as ( for the retracted and e for the advanced unrounded mid front
vowel, or the pair , / i, etc.).
The vowel harmony pattern of Yawelmani has been described as roundness
harmony by most phonologists (Archangeli 1985, Cole and Kisseberth 1995,
Goldsmith 1993, Kisseberth 1969, Kuroda 1967, McCarthy 1999). In the next
section and in chapter 6, I will give some arguments why this pattern should
rather be regarded as affecting the feature backness instead of roundness.
The fact that some languages with an impoverished vowel inventory, such as
Warlpiri, which has three vowels only, show vowel harmony (Nash 1980:
65), while some languages with an impressively overcrowded vowel system,
such as Alsacian German for example which has 21 vowels (Lass 1988), do
not even show a remnant of harmony, runs counter to Kaun's (1994, 1995)
generalisation on harmony and vowel systems. Kaun (1994: 86) suggests that
'where a particular contrast is perceptually difficult, that difficulty has as its
direct grammatical correlate a constraint of the "Bad Vowels Spread" family.'
As an effect, languages with crowded vowel systems should display harmony,
those with simple systems should not.
There are cases of rounded vowels in affixes, but these do not alternate in
assimilation to an adjacent rounded or unrounded vowel, see part II, chapter
4.3 for a detailed discussion of Turkish.
The text in round brackets has been added by the author to facilitate
comparison with the Wolof case of transparency.
264
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
Notes
However, low vowels do not always behave as blockers when they are
excluded from alternation. This can be illustrated with the harmony pattern of
Kinande (Schlindwein 1987). Kinande has an ATR harmony pattern. The
only vowel which cannot alternate with regard to ATR is the low vowel a,
because it lacks a [+ATR] counterpart. In Kinande, the low vowel exhibits the
same transparent pattern as do high vowels in Wolof.
The terminology is a bit confusing at this point. An opaque vowel is one
which does not agree in a certain feature specification with its neighbour to
one side and which starts a new harmony domain to the other side. It is
phonologically transparent in that there is no different intermediate representation to be assumed which triggers assimilation of the one neighbour or
resistance to assimilation to the other during the derivation. A transparent
vowel is transparent because the harmony span proceeds through this vowel
even though it has an antagonistic feature specification. Such a transparent
vowel behaves as phonologically opaque in that an abstract intermediate state
of this vowel can be assumed which triggers featural change in the neighbour
to its one side. Phonological opacity arises, then, by setting back the feature
specification of the transparent vowel to its original state. Thus, the meaning
of the labels transparency and opacity depends on the perspective from which
the respective vowel is seen.
Eastern Cheremis, a Uralic language, displays backness and roundness harmony, and the vowel is transparent to both processes, while the low vowel D
behaves opaquely (see the data in Odden, 1991).
The only other language I am aware of which displays consistently suffix
controlled (height) harmony is the Australian language Jingulu (Pensalfini,
2002). However, in this language only some affixes behave as triggers, while
others do not. Stem vowels never cause harmony in adjacent vowels. Pensalfini argues that this must be due to the morpho-syntactic properties of the
former affixes.
Walker (2002), however, reports that in some words the vowel preceding the
stressed vowel is raised as well, as in momnto 'moment' mumnti
'moments'. That is, the dialect is probably on the border between umlaut or
metaphony and harmony.
In some cases the process affects the two last low vowels, but never all
vowels of a word. The reader may be referred to Grijzenhout (1990) for more
details and a prosodic analysis.
One might argue, of course, that the umlauting affixes underlyingly contain
the umlaut feature specification but cannot realise it themselves due to markedness conditions on affix vowels. This would match the basic idea of Walker's analysis of the vowel alternations found in Veneto Italian. For an analysis of Umlaut in Optimality Theory see also Klein (1995).
Notes
265
16. Dutch, for instance, allows onsetless syllables, as in the word [(;t]
'real/really', while German requires glottal stop epenthesis in the same environment, compare German [(&t] 'real/really'.
17. In the tableaux (43, 44), epenthesised segmental material is indicated by .
Consonantal or vocalic quality is determined in maximal satisfaction of the
constraint H-NUC and markedness constraints, yielding schwa, e, i in the nucleus position as optimal in most languages and glottal stop or t in onset position as the optimal epenthetic segments.
18. However, the fact that languages with more crowded vowel systems are more
prone to introducing front rounded than back unrounded nonlow vowels gives
us a hint that maybe we need to assume two distinct constraints *[+round,
-back] as well as *[-round, +back] than rather only one which generally outrules vowels with differing feature specifications for roundness and backness.
19. Butska (1998) argues on the basis of data from Ukrainian for an account of
voicing assimilation in terms of MAX and DEP feature constraints rather than
Identity. Krmer (2000) shows that such an analysis is not appropriate for the
voicing phenomena found in Breton.
20. See in this respect as well the discussion in It and Mester (1999) and their
notion of Crisp Edge.
21. PCat = Prosodic Category, GCat = Grammatical Category
22. In fact Goad assumes the reason for this to lie outside of grammar.
23. The Shona pattern is slightly more complicated. Since the example only
serves the general understanding of Beckman's basic idea here, these complications are irrelevant in the current context.
24. Tunen, a Bantu language spoken in Cameroon, reportedly has prefixes that
trigger harmony in their following host. The language has dominant-recessive
ATR harmony. However, prefixes only trigger agreement in following
closed-class items, such as pronouns and numerals. With nouns and verbs
prefixes always behave as targets rather than triggers (Mous 1986).
25. In a series of experiments on speech segmentation, Vroomen, Tuomainen and
de Gelder (1998) found that Finnish listeners use word stress as well as vowel
harmony (i.e., instances of changes from back to non-back spans) as cues to
determine word boundaries.
26. An interesting point here is that even though Pulleyblank (1997) proposes
Identical Cluster Constraints (ICC), i.e. something very similar to Faithfulness constraints, to handle consonantal assimilation, he formalises assimilation between vowels as featural Alignment. (See section 2.4.1 for a discussion of the Alignment approach to vowel harmony.)
27. In Krmer (1998, 1999), Syntagmatic Identity was labelled 'Surface Identity'.
This was ambiguous since Output-Output Correspondence is also a kind of
'surface' relation, though a paradigmatic one. The term 'Syntagmatic Identity'
is more appropriate and less confusing.
266
Notes
28. For an exception to the strict segmental locality of voicing assimilation, see
the case studies in Walker (2000).
29. The problem is circumvented, of course, under the assumption that the harmonic features are privative. Under this view, nasality can spread from the
first underlying element in (69) to all other targets ignoring the absence of
nasality in intervening underlying elements.
30. The ban of such a configuration was also referred to as the condition against
discontinuous association in Archangeli and Pulleyblank (1987, 1994), van
der Hulst and Smith (1986). Odden (1994) proposes two adjacency parameters: syllable adjacency, which requires interacting material to be in adjacent syllables, and root node adjacency, which requires trigger and target of
a rule to be in adjacent root nodes.
31. The subscript italic l following the & sign in the definition stands for the local
domain, such as 'segment' or 'syllable' etc.
32. For a case study on Diyari see Crowhurst and Hewitt (1997).
33. Note that the implicational coordination does not promote constraint A. It
says just that in case A is satisfied, B has to be satisfied as well. In case of
violation of A the constraint coordination is not affected at all. Thus, implication does not prefer co-patterns of two distinct phenomena as logical conjunction does.
34. The ranking of INTEGRITYAffix above S-IDENT, whith the latter ranking
higher than INTEGRITYStem predicts a pattern in which stems trigger assimilation while affixes fail to do so. This pattern can be found in Yucatec Maya
(see Krmer 2001).
35. In (102), o, e, n belong to the [+ATR] set, and (, o, D are their [-ATR]
counterparts.
36. Clements is actually very careful in his formulation. Contrasting dominantrecessive and root controlled systems he states "[i]n dominant harmony
systems, dominant vowels occur in both roots and suffixes (but rarely in
prefixes, at least in Africa)." (Clements, 2000:135)
37. The high vowels in Yoruba and Futankoore Pulaar have no retracted counterpart. Nevertheless they behave as opaque rather than transparent. A closer
examination reveals a similar picture for Hungarian. See below in part II on
all three cases.
38. For an alternative proposal to formalise the OCP in OT see Alderete (1997).
For a similar proposal, i.e., the OCP as discorrespondence see Plag (1998).
39. According to van der Hulst and van de Weijer (1991), the suffix is -va:ri with
an invariant disharmonic front i. This poses no problem to the current analysis, since as an Arabic loan, and as a derivational, i.e., stem-forming, affix
with potential 'stem' status this morpheme has to be analysed like the other
disharmonic loans. See below in this section.
Notes
267
40. Affix glosses in the Pulaar examples are provided by the author and they are
to be interpreted as follows. CLASS = noun class marker, AG.NOM = agentive
nominaliser, DIM = diminutive, DIM.PL = diminutive plural. Note that Futankoore Pulaar has 21 noun class markers. To save the reader from complete
confusion these distinctions are not reflected in the glosses. See Paradis
(1992) on the noun class marking system of Futankoore Pulaar. For a survey
on Fula morphology see also Breedveld (1995).
41. Instead of being conceived of as a primitve constraint this constraint can also
be formalised as a logical implication, such as R-ANCHOR(affix, pwd)IOIDENT(F), which demands that whenever the Anchoring constraint mapping
the right edge of affixes with the right edge of a prosodic word is satisfied the
Identity constraint has to be satisfied for the affected affix as well.
42. There are alone eight faithfulness constraints of the MAX/DEP type referring
to tongue root position: MAXATR, MAXRTR, DEPATR, DEPRTR, MAXPATHATR, MAXPATHRTR, DEPPATHATR, DEPPATHRTR. For other features
which are suspected to be privative, such as rounding, of course the same
crowded constraint inventory has to be assumed in such an account. Binary
features, such as height, have at least an IO-Identity(F) constraint.
43. These data have been provided by Tuulikki Virta, a native speaker of Finnish.
Thank you!
44. The presence of disharmonic stems like verolla 'tax-adessive' is an argument
to include IO-IDENTstem above the harmony constraint and the BALANCE
constraint in the Finnish grammar. Since it does not contribute any insight
into the current discussion I skipped this detail in the tableaux to avoid unnecessary complexity; but see Ringen and Heinmki (1999) or Krmer (2002)
for further details of the analysis of disharmonic stems.
45. Finnish confirms this prediction. Compare the data below.
i. vrttin-ll-ni-hn
'with spinning wheel, as you know'
ii. palttina-lla-ni-han
'with linen cloth, as you know'
(van der Hulst and van de Weijer 1995: 499)
46. The symbol indicates the constraint which finally decides between the last
two candidates, i.e. the targeted constraint.
47. Walker (1998) proposes a Sympathy account of transparency in nasal
harmony, which is extended here to transparency in vowel harmony for the
sake of illustration. The acount given here differs from her approach technically in that I assume harmony to be an effect of a correspondence constraint
rather than an alignment constraint, and in that I denote the selector constraint
as well. She does not explicitly assign selector status to the harmony constraint, but the intercandidate faithfulness constraint is violated by candidates'
deviation from the candidate which fares best on the harmony constraint.
48. I would like to thank Thomas Gamerschlag for coming up with this metaphor.
268
Notes
49. The whole issue seems to be more complicated, however. In an informal investigation, I gave disharmonic words which are not yet loans in Hungarian to
three native speakers. They had to choose among two inflected forms with a
harmonising affix, one form showing the transparent pattern (i.e., back vowel
front vowel back affix vowel), one the opaque pattern (i.e., back vowel
front vowel front affix vowel). The result was that the speakers didn't really
know which form to choose. When I presented the same set of pairs to two of
them two weeks later, they had even changed their minds about some forms
which had been judged clearly before. One person told me that when confronted with an unknown word she searched for a known word that looked
similar, to find out what to do with the new one. If she didn't find any she was
in trouble. A more principled and controlled survey among native speakers is
necessary to find out what they do with new words. As long as this is not
done I will stick to the analysis developed here on theoretical grounds and on
the data available so far.
50. See http://www.uidaho.edu/nezperce/neemepoo.htm. Nevertheless I will refer
to the language as Nez Perce here. I will apply the same policy to Yawelmani,
which should be properly referred to as Yowlumne.
51. The variety of Yawelmani, or Yowlumne, analysed here and in most of the
literature is that reported by Newman (1944). Fieldwork by Hansson (1998)
has revealed that present day Yowlumne slightly differs with respect to the
harmony patterns.
52. Cole and Kisseberth motivate their constraint on lowering (LOWER: V
[low]) as strengthening of an element in one dimension (i.e. sonority), which
is already strong in another dimension (i.e., weight).
53. Hansson and Sprouse (1999) discuss the variety described by Newman (1944)
and Kuroda (1967) in comparison to the Yawelmani as it is spoken today by
the last remaining speakers. Interestingly, they have altered exactly this complicated part of the grammar. The result is that harmony has become sensitive
to output height for some low vowel affixes rather than input height, while in
other low vowel affixes alternation has ceased. This is not surprising since the
lack of harmony among lowered stem vowels and low affix vowels constitutes the most complicated part of the Yawelmani harmony grammar. See
below.
54. Note, though, that it is not inherent to the local conjunction which constraint
acts as the trigger and which one has to be satisfied. These properties are determined by the ranking of other constraints with respect to the local conjunction and with respect to each other. In an implicational constraint coordination, however, satisfaction of constraint number one enforces satisfaction of
constraint number two. Here the different functions of the participating constraints are determined by the architecture of the coordination.
Notes
269
55. See Kiparsky (1993), Inkelas (1994, 2000) and Inkelas, Orgun and Zoll
(1997) on this notion of underspecification and structural immunity.
56. Even though Prince and Smolensky (1993) also consider a serialist version of
Optimality Theory. See the discussion in McCarthy (1999) on this issue.
57. See the proposal in Krmer (1998). He defines the anti-insertion constraint
DEP(F) in a rather broad sense, demanding any correspondence relation, not
particularly IO correspondence for each feature specification in an output.
This allows for feature specifications to be supported exclusively by the syntagmatic correspondence relation. The effect is that it is more economic for
epenthesised vowels to take over the feature specifications of the neighbour
than to be supplied with the least marked feature specifications 'out of the
blue.'
58. This kind of underspecification must be kept strictly separate from cases
where underspecification of individual lexical entries (rather than classes of
morphemes) is explored by a grammar to establish a three-way phonemic
contrast of a binary feature (see, e.g. Krmer 2000).
Appendix I: Constraints
In this appendix, the constraints are listed which are relevant in the analysis
of vowel harmony provided in this work.
Faithfulness constraints
{Right, Left}-ANCHOR(S1, S2) (McCarthy and Prince 1999)
Any element at the designated periphery of S1 has a correspondent at
the designated periphery of S2.
Let Edge(X, {L,R}) = the element standing at the Edge = L,R of X.
RIGHT-ANCHOR. If x = Edge(S1, R) and y = Edge(S2, R) then x
y.
LEFT-ANCHOR. Likewise, mutatis mutandis.
R/L-ANCHOR(root, pwd): Any element at the right/left edge of the root has
a correspondent at the right/left edge of the prosodic word.
DEP: 'A segment in the output has a correspondent in the input.'
IO-IDENT(F):
Let be a segment in S1 and be any correspondent of in S2.
If is [F] then is [F].
('Correspondent segments are identical in feature F.')
a. IO-IDENT(ATR) 'Correspondent segments in input and output are
identical in their specification of [ATR].'
b. IO-IDENT(bk) 'Correspondent segments in input and output are
identical in their specification of [back].'
c. IO-IDENT(hi) 'Correspondent segments in input and output are
identical in their specification of [high].'
272
Appendix I: Constraints
Appendix I: Constraints
273
274
Appendix I: Constraints
Appendix I: Constraints
275
276
Appendix I: Constraints
low
retracted
a
Diola Fogni
(4.5)
278
Finnish
(5.1)
Finno-Ugric language
root controlled backness harmony;
suffixation;
asymmetric vowel system:
no backness contrast in unrounded nonlow vowels;
these vowels show balanced behaviour
Finnish vowels
high
mid
low
front
unrounded
rounded
i
y
e
back
unrounded
rounded
u
o
a
Futankoore
Pulaar
(4.6)
Hungarian
(6.1)
Finno-Ugric language
root controlled backness harmony;
suffixation;
asymmetric vowel system:
backness contrast of unrounded high vowel underlyingly
only
279
back
unrounded
rounded
short long short long
u [u] [u:]
o [o] [o:]
[a:] a [o]
Nez Perce
(6.3)
Pulaar
Turkish
(4.3)
Turkic language
root controlled backness and roundness harmony;
suffixation;
completely symmetric vowel system;
o, only in leftmost stem syllable (except for loan words);
e,a opaque to rounding harmony in noninitial position
Turkish vowels
front back
i
[]
high
round
y
u
e
a
low
round
Wolof
(5.2)
Niger-Congo, Senegal
root controlled ATR harmony;
suffixation;
asymmetric vowel system:
high vowels are advanced only;
high vowels are balanced
280
advanced
retracted
advanced
retracted
advanced
retracted
front
i
back
u
e
(
o
o
Yawelmani
(6.4)
(Yowlumne)
Valley Yokuts language, southern California
root controlled height-uniform backness harmony;
suffixation;
asymmetric vowel system: no length contrast in high
vowels;
underlyingly long high vowels are lowered;
harmony sensitive to underlying height
The Yawelmani vowel system
front
back
high
i, i:(e:)
u, u:(o:)
(mid)
(e)
low
a, a:
o, o:
Yoruba
(4.2, 6.2)
Niger-Congo, Nigeria
root controlled ATR harmony;
prefixation;
only mid vowels are symmetric with regard to ATR;
high and low vowels are opaque;
in rightmost root syllable, mid vowels are immune to
neighbouring high, low vowels;
high vowels are symmetric with regard to ATR
underlyingly only;
Underlying ATR contrast in high vowels is restricted to
rightmost root syllable
advanced
retracted
advanced
retracted
advanced
retracted
front
i
back
u
e
(
o
o
a
281
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Index
acquisition 19497, 242
affix control 35, 38, 42, 13747,
247
generalized 57
Altai 16
anchoring 58, 83, 90, 96104, 113,
11523, 133, 140, 206, 248
Anderson, J. 8
Anderson, S. R. 3, 29, 35, 41
Antell, S. 8, 18, 19, 24, 237
Aoki, H. 37, 211
Archangeli, D. 4, 8, 23, 28, 30, 37,
71, 116, 117, 146, 147, 205, 255
archephonemic
underspecification 38
articulation 20, 21, 24, 26
asymmetric cooccurrence pattern
96
Cahill, M. 25
Calabrese, A. 29, 43
Campbell, L. 43, 165, 166
Canclini, E. 224, 243
Castilian Spanish 41
Chadic 8
Chamorro 6
Cherono, G. 8, 18, 19, 24, 237
Chomsky, N. 5, 6, 150, 211
Chulym Tatar 16
Chumburung 11
300
Index
Dell, F. 4
derived environment effect 82,
253
faithfulness 55
feature
binary 36, 37, 43, 56, 267, 269
floating 34, 45, 47, 89, 145, 187,
189, 243
non-equipolent 48
privative 36, 37, 43, 56, 68, 146,
183, 243
ternary 43
unary 37, 44, 47
feature geometry 6, 17, 23, 24, 71,
76
Fry, C. 80
final devoicing 59, 61, 8082, 86
Index
301
Gafos, D. 66
Gelder, B. de 26, 43, 265
German 3, 57, 59, 60, 61, 80, 81,
82, 86, 263, 265
Golston, C. 72
Grijzenhout, J. 40, 63, 64, 129,
194, 264
grounded phonology 71
Hall, B. 8, 18, 19, 24, 189, 209,
211, 237
Hall, R. 8, 18, 19, 24, 189, 209,
211, 237
Halle, M. 5, 6, 29, 43, 150, 211,
263
Hansson, G. 231, 268
Harrison, K. 38, 147, 255, 256,
260
height harmony 8, 11, 17, 20, 41,
61, 66, 148, 232
Icelandic 40, 41
Igbo 11
implication 77, 85, 220, 267
Inkelas, S. 9, 38, 62, 141, 142, 254,
259, 269
Jacobsen, W. 211
Jiang-King, P. 62, 133
Jingulu 264
Joppen, S. 194
302
Index
Ka, O. 29
Kabak, B. 25, 75, 127, 128, 130
Kachin 16
Kager, R. 58, 252, 253
Klo1 17, 232
Kalabari 17
Kalenjin 8, 36, 135
Karakalpak 16
Karvonen, D. 160
Kaun, A. 7, 16, 21, 38, 62, 108,
219, 237, 247, 255, 256, 260, 263
Kaye, J. 6, 37, 44, 132
Kenstowicz, M. 4, 58, 252
Khalkha-Mongolian 7
Kikongo 17, 72
Kikuyu 7
Kim, C. 211
Kimatuumbi 12, 13, 17
Kinande 107, 264
Kiparsky, P. 6, 7, 29, 31, 32, 77,
160, 162, 166, 170, 211, 218,
250, 269
Kirchner, R. 43, 62, 63, 89, 121,
131, 253
Kirghiz-B 16
Kisseberth 4
Kisseberth, C. 9, 15, 29, 62, 75,
89, 216, 217, 218, 232, 233, 237,
238, 239, 240, 242, 263, 268
Klao 13
Klein, T. 264
Kordofanian 278
Krmer, M. 14, 23, 43, 62, 63, 64,
69, 71, 74, 76, 80, 93, 105, 125,
129, 224, 247, 265, 266, 267, 269
Kuroda, S-Y. 4, 11, 218, 223, 233,
263, 268
Kspert, K.-C. 40
Kyzyl Khakass 16
Lakoff, G. 4
Lamba 72
Lamontagne, G. 92, 96
Leben, W. 45, 105
Leitch, M. 62, 133
levels of representation 44, 77,
218, 238
Lowenstamm, J. 6, 37, 44
lowering 4, 22, 177, 204, 216, 218,
219, 222, 225, 226, 234, 236,
237, 240, 241
ubowicz, A. 80, 82, 83, 84, 87,
98, 253
Luo 8
Maasai 8
markedness 54
McCarthy, J. 4, 31, 35, 41, 45, 54,
55, 56, 57, 58, 62, 70, 89, 92,
105, 114, 124, 125, 142, 154,
185, 216, 218, 223, 224, 240,
241, 242, 244, 247, 248, 251,
252, 253, 263, 269, 271, 273
Mester, A. 60, 65, 75, 78, 80, 265
Index
Nilo-Saharan 8
non-surface-apparent opacity 240
non-surface-true opacity 240
Noske, M. 35
Noske, R. 4
Obligatory Contour Principle See
OCP
OCP 45, 46, 105, 163, 168, 170,
172, 178, 190, 193, 199, 200,
203, 204, 218, 219, 227, 229,
230, 249
Odden, D. 6, 11, 13, 16, 17, 21, 23,
43, 65, 71, 76, 264, 266
Ola, N. 62, 133
Olsson, M. 34, 192, 196, 198, 199
opaque vowel 26, 27, 30, 32, 34,
35, 44, 46, 48, 90, 91, 92, 97,
113, 114, 120, 149, 154, 162,
303
Pkot 8
palatal harmony See backness
harmony
Pam, M. 8, 18, 19, 24, 237
Paradis, C. 35, 38, 39, 137, 138,
139, 145, 146, 267
Pasiego Montaes 41
pathological ranking 154, 248
Paulian, C. 13
Pensalfini, R. 264
Rice, K. 92, 96
304
Index
Rigsby, B. 211
Ringen, C. 7, 29, 34, 62, 89, 159,
166, 182, 186, 188, 189, 243, 267
root control 247
roundness harmony 7, 10, 11, 13,
15, 17, 18, 20, 108, 113, 12033,
215, 219, 232, 237, 238, 279
Sagey, E. 9
Sahaptian 279
Schlindwein, D. 107, 264
selector 185, 241
Sezer, E. 10, 22, 63, 64, 122, 126
shared argument criterion 85, 87
Shona 7, 8, 17, 61, 66, 67, 96, 102,
113, 148, 265
Silverstein, M. 211
Skousen, R. 25
Smith, N. 9, 30, 37, 43, 44, 45, 46,
68, 266
Stem-Affixed-Form-Faithfulness
42, 90, 124, 253
Suzuki, K. 4
syllable 3, 23, 40, 47, 51, 59, 62,
72, 73, 75, 109, 117, 148, 167,
216, 218, 225
sympathy 31, 89, 157, 185, 202,
216, 240, 241, 242, 244, 253
syntagmatic correspondence 70,
71, 73
Tamil 96
Tangale 8, 27, 28, 32
targeted constraint 31, 90, 18385,
186, 211, 215
Tesar, B. 194
tone sandhi 24
tongue root harmony See ATR
harmony
Touretzky, D. 4
transparent vowel 29, 48
Trojan vowel 26, 34, 44, 46, 48,
1078, 172, 187237, 242, 249,
259, 261
Tsou 16
Tunen 265
Tungusic 16
Tunica 11, 16, 23
Tuomainen, J 26, 43, 265
Turkana 35, 38, 253
Turkic 6, 7, 10, 96, 279
Turkish 7, 10, 11, 15, 16, 17, 18,
19, 22, 25, 32, 63, 64, 68, 69, 75,
96, 113, 114, 12033, 141, 149,
152, 153, 161, 190, 200, 252,
253, 254, 255, 260, 263, 279
underspecification, contrastive
255
Vlimaa-Blum, R. 166
Vaux, B. 29, 43, 263
Veneto Italian 39
Vergnaud, J. 6, 37, 44
Index
305
Yakut 16
Yawelmani 4, 6, 9, 11, 15, 34, 89,
Zwicky, A. 211