La lénition romane : l’héritage martinétien et sa modélisation formelle

La lénition, tant sur le plan synchronique que sur le plan diachronique (Martinet, 1955 ; Bichakjian, 1977 ; Gurevich, 2004), montre une nette tendance à maintenir des contrastes. Dans cet article, nous allons passer en revue et critiquer des approches qui postulent des contraintes du type *NoMerge ou *Neut, des approches basées sur des contraintes localement conjointes ainsi qu’une analyse basée sur le marquage comparatif. Ensuite, nous allons illustrer comment les données synchroniques romanes peuvent être analysées dans la théorie de l’Optimalité avec des chaînes de candidats et nous montrons que les données romanes en question ne permettent pas à la phonologie de se passer des contraintes de marquage.Both diachronically and synchronically, lenition shows a clear non-neutralizing tendency (Martinet, 1955 ; Bichakjian, 1977 ; Gurevich, 2004). In this article, we will critically review approaches based on constraints of the type *NoMerge or *Neut, approaches based on local constraint conjunction and a recent analysis based on comparative markedness. After that, we will illustrate how the romance facts can be analyzed with OT-CC and argue that markedness constraints are a crucial ingredient of phonological theory

Cross-level interactions in Latin : vowel shortening, vowel deletion and vowel gliding

Serial and parallel OT differ in the way they account for phonological generalizations referring to more than one level of the prosodic hierarchy. Vowel shortening in Latin is analyzed by McCarthy, Pater & Pruitt (2016) as a case in point. Vowel shortening takes place to optimize foot structure. In parallel OT, footing and shortening can be evaluated in parallel, but in serial OT footing and shortening necessarily take place in a serial derivation. In this paper, both the serial and the parallel analysis of Latin vowel shortening are critically discussed. After that, two other potential cases of cross-level interactions in Latin are addressed: vowel deletion and vowel gliding. For each of these cases, it is argued that a serial analysis has to be preferred over a parallel one.La versió paral·lela i la serial de la teoria de l'optimitat (TO) difereixen entre sí en la manera com expliquen les generalitzacions fonològiques que es refereixen a més d'un nivell de la jerarquia prosòdica. L'abreujament vocàlic en llatí ha estat analitzat per McCarthy, Pater & Pruitt (2016) com un exemple d'això. L'escurçament es produeix per tal d'optimitzar l'estructura del peu. En la primera versió la construcció dels peus i l'escurçament poden avaluar-se en paral·lel, però en la segona la construcció dels peus i l'abreujament s'han de dur a terme necessàriament en una derivació serial. En aquest article es discuteixen críticament ambdues anàlisis. Després del l'escurçament vocàlic, s'aborden altres dos casos d'interacció entre nivells en llatí: l'elisió vocàlica i la diftongació de vocals. Per a cadascun d'aquests casos, s'argumenta que és preferible una anàlisi serial a una de paral·lela

A Gestalt Theory Approach to Structure in Language

The fact that human language is highly structured and that, moreover, the way it is structured shows striking similarities in the world’s languages has been addressed from two different perspectives. The first, and more traditional, generative hypothesis is that the similarities are due to an innate language faculty. There is an inborn ‘grammar’ with universal principles that manifest themselves in each language and cross-linguistic variation arises due to a different parameter setting of universal principles. A second perspective is that there is no inborn, innate language faculty, but that instead structure emerges from language usage. This paper purports to develop and illustrate a third perspective, according to which the structural similarities in human languages are the result of the way the cognitive system works in perception. The essential claim is that structural properties follow from the limitations of human cognition in focus

Graphic loans: East Asia and beyond

The national languages of East Asia (Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese) have made extensive use of a type of linguistic borrowing sometimes referred to as a 'graphic loan'. Such loans have no place in the conventional classification of loans based on Haugen (1950) or Weinreich (1953), and research on loan word theory and phonology generally overlooks them. The classic East Asian phenomenon is discussed and a framework is proposed to describe its mechanism. It is argued that graphic loans are more than just 'spelling pronunciations', because they are a systematic and widespread process, independent of but not inferior to phonological borrowing. The framework is then expanded to cover a range of other cases of borrowing between languages to show that graphic loans are not a uniquely East Asian phenomenon, and therefore need to be considered as a major category of loan

The Change From Left Word-Edge Stress To Right Word-Edge Stress

ABSTRACT This paper presents and discusses a prosodic development shared by an impressively large number of languages in their historical evolution: a shift from main stress from the left word-edge to the right word-edge. One particular example is discussed in more detail: the evolution from Pre-classical to Classical Latin. The analysis of intermediate Early Classical Latin is contrasted in two descriptive models, putting the balance in favor of one of them. The causal factors for the change are claimed to be the indeterminacy in the data, reinforced by emerging quantity-sensitivity and pre-stressing suffixes

Rhythmic vowel deletion in OT: Syncope in Latin

Contains fulltext : 61642.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)26 p