Re: Ustekkli: a new project (longish)

At 4:27 AM +0000 02/08/02, And Rosta wrote:
>Dirk:
>>  >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.
>>
>>  Yes, but which do you have underlyingly? Input VV implies that vowel
>>  length is the distinctive opposition, while input CC implies that
>>  consonant length is the distinctive opposition. Marking both
>>  introduces redundancy in inputs, since vowel length and consonant
>>  gemination are in complementary distribution in stressed syllables. I
>>  don't think that either opposition is basic; hence my introduction of
>>  syllable contact.
>
>Huh? They're not in complementary distribution: they're contrastive.
>nikkra versus niikra.
You're right; poor choice of terms.

>They can't cooccur,
This is what I meant.

>but that can be captured
>as a constraint on syllable-structure: stressed sylls have bimoraic
>rimes and unstressed have unimoraic.
Yes. And for me, this is the nub of the problem. Stressed syllables
must be bimoraic; if this is the only requirement on stressed
syllables, how do you determine whether a geminate consonant or a
long vowel is basic as a syllable expansion type? One solution would
pick one arbitrarily and let the expansion types follow from that. I
say "arbitrarily", because there is no evidence that I can see which
will decide the issue of whether geminate consonants or long vowels
should be in URs.

You could also choose to have both geminates and long vowels in URs.
But that introduces redundancy; if you choose gemination, vowel
lengthening follows; if you choose vowel lengthening, gemination
follows. There's no reason to have both.

Since including both is redundant, and since the choice of one or the
other appears to be arbitrary, I proposed a third way; syllable
contact prosody. It may prove to be an untenable distinction (or at
best, a redundant one), but I feel it's worth pursuing.

>  > >(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.)
>>
>>  Hey. That reminds me. You promised me a copy of the description of
>>  current Livagian phonology ...
>
>Did I? Well I'm halfway through a new improved version, so I'll hold
>off until it's done. (My birthday treat to myself was to stay up all
>night writing the first half.)
Well, Happy Birthday!

Dirk
--
Dirk Elzinga                                            Dirk_Elzinga@byu.edu

"Speech is human, silence is divine, yet also brutish and dead;
therefore we must learn both arts."
- Thomas Carlyle