Re: Ustekkli: a new project (longish)

Dirk:
> At 2:21 AM +0000 02/01/02, And Rosta wrote:
> >Dirk:
> >
> >I presume that close v. loose contact makes lexical contrasts? But
> >what is the rationale for the analysis in terms of syllable contact?
> >Why not see the oatt:oat contrast as a VCC:VVC contrast that is
> >neutralized if the syllable loses stress? Is it because there are
> >morphological alterations that can toggle a single stem between close
> >and loose, or something like that? If that happens, then the process
> >looks to me like the morphologically-conditioned alternations of the
> >CV template that are famous from Semitic.
>
> Yes; syllable contact will make lexcial contrasts. Here's how I see
> the Problem. A stressed syllable must be heavy. Since both vowel
> length and consonant gemination are dependent on stress (in the sense
> that they only show up in stressed syllables), a plausible
> interpretation of their function is that they represent two
> alternative ways of expanding a light, stressed syllable. This
> implies that neither vowel length nor geminated consonants should be
> present in the input.
>
> If stress can be assigned independently of syllable weight, then
> vowel length and gemination should be assigned after stress. Marking
> vowel length or gemination would be equivalent to prespecifying
> stress.
I don't get this. If the stress rules ignore weight in the input,
then you can have double VV and CC in the input, and then reduce
them to V and C in unstressed syllables.

> For non-alternating forms, this would represent redundancy;
> for alternating forms, the prespecified lexical stress would need to
> be overwritten by the stress assigned by rule. So stress shouldn't be
> marked in underlying forms.
Okay.

> So what is marked in underlying form? It isn't stress placement,
> since stress is assigned by rule. It isn't vowel length or
> gemination, since these are dependent on stress. The expansion type
> (vowel lengthening or consonant gemination) does have to be marked,
> since there are potential lexical contrasts between words like <nikr>
> ["ni:.k=r] and <nikkr> ["nIk.k=r] which depend solely on the
> expansion type of the stressed syllable. This is the role that I'm
> imagining syllable contact to play. If <nikr> is characterized by
> loose contact, that determines that the expansion type is vowel
> lengthening, which then doesn't need to be encoded in UR. Likewise,
> if <nikkr> is characterized by close contact, that determines that
> the expansion type under stress will be gemination, so gemination
> doesn't need to be encoded in UR either.
Your analysis

1. Add a phonological feature CLOSE/LOOSE. Underlying forms don't
allow double VV or CC
2. In stressed sylls, change CLOSE VC to VCC and LOOSE VC to VVC

My analysis

1. Allow double VV and CC in URs.
2. VV and CC > V and C in unstressed sylls

Absent further evidence, I prefer my analysis, because it avoids
mention of the features CLOSE/LOOSE. The only compelling evidence
for those features that I can think of offhand would be some
kind of harmony (e.g. all stressed sylls within a given domain
must be all CLOSE or all LOOSE) or antiharmony/OCP effects.

> (Of course, if the analyst isn't bothered by redundancy in URs, this
> whole discussion is moot. I'm not sure that I'm bothered by it;
> current phonological theory (i.e., Optimality Theory) certainly
> allows for redundant URs.)
I think it depends on one's philosophical position. If phonology
is grounded in psychology then redundancy is unlikely to be
problematic. Personally, though I would eschew redundancy.

> Part of my goal for Ustekkli is to explore the consequences of this
> kind of prosody. I haven't seen it in a conlang before, and I thought
> it'd be interesting to try it out.
It's entertaining to have a phonology sufficiently explicit and
orderly for it to be susceptible to alternative analyses among
which it is possible to decide, and it's also entertaining to have
certain overriding principles to which the phonology must conform,
and to pursue the ramifications of those principles.

(E.g. Livagian phonology must conform to the principles that word
boundaries can be derived by rule from phonological strings and
that the phonology be analysable as a combinatorial system of
phonotactically unconstrained units.)

--And.

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