Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-ttngx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-18T19:36:34.230Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Tone-driven epenthesis in Wamey

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2023

Nicholas Rolle
Affiliation:
Leibniz-Zentrum Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft, Schützenstraße 18, Berlin 10117, Germany. E-mail: rolle@leibniz-zas.de
John T. M. Merrill
Affiliation:
Program in Linguistics, Princeton University, 1-S-19 Green Hall, Princeton, New Jersey 08544, U.S.A. E-mail: j.merrill@princeton.edu

Abstract

This paper argues that tone-driven epenthesis is possible in tonal languages. In Wamey, an epenthetic [ə] is inserted to host a high tone in two contexts: first, to host a tone which would otherwise be left floating due to a restriction on rising tones (/cv̀cⒽ/ maps to [cv̀cə́] due to a ban *[cv̌c]); and second, to host a tone which is introduced by word-level morphology but is restricted from associating across a stem boundary. These patterns cannot be attributed to syllable phonotactics, which freely allow all consonants in the coda position. We assemble the evidence for tone-driven epenthesis, focusing on the distribution of final [ə] in lexical stem structure and [ə]-alternating suffixes. A simple OT analysis derives [ə]-epenthesis, utilising common constraints (e.g. *Rise, OCP(H), etc.) together with constraints against associating tone across prosodic boundaries. In total, Wamey epenthesis exemplifies the cultivation of segmental environments for the purpose of realising pitch targets.

Type
Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Akanlig-Pare, George & Kenstowicz, Michael (2002). Tone in Buli. Studies in African Linguistics 31. 5596.Google Scholar
Akumbu, Pius W., Hyman, Larry M. & Kießling, Roland (2020). The segmental and tonal structure of verb inflection in Babanki. Phonological Data and Analysis 2. 133.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Archangeli, Diana & Pulleyblank, Douglas (1994). Grounded phonology. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Baković, Eric (2007). A revised typology of opaque generalisations. Phonology 24. 217259.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bennett, Ryan (2018). Recursive prosodic words in Kaqchikel (Mayan). Glossa 3. 67 pp.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blumenfeld, Lev (2006). Constraints on phonological interactions. PhD dissertation, Stanford University.Google Scholar
Broselow, Ellen (1982). On predicting the interaction of stress and epenthesis. Glossa 16. 115132.Google Scholar
Cowell, Andrew & Moss, Alonzo Sr. (2008). The Arapaho language. Boulder, CO: University Press of Colorado.Google Scholar
Downing, Laura J. & Kadenge, Maxwell (2020). Re-placing PStem in the prosodic hierarchy. The Linguistic Review 37. 433461.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eichholzer, Erika (2010). Dictionnaire ghomálá’–français. Ms., University of Zürich. Available at http://www.lielatatomdjap.org/images/pdf/DICTIONNAIRE_GHOMALA.pdf.Google Scholar
Frajzyngier, Zygmunt (2003). Tone and vowel deletion, insertion, and syllable structure. Frankfurter Afrikanistische Blätter 15. 8398.Google Scholar
Frajzyngier, Zygmunt & Shay, Erin (2002). A grammar of Hdi. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fromkin, Victoria A. (1978). Tone: a linguistic survey. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Gleim, Daniel (2019). A feeding Duke-of-York interaction of tone and epenthesis in Arapaho. Glossa 4. 127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grice, Martine, Ridouane, Rachid & Roettger, Timo B. (2015). Tonal association in Tashlhiyt Berber: evidence from polar questions and contrastive statements. Phonology 32. 241266.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grice, Martine, Savino, Michelina & Roettger, Timo B. (2018). Word final schwa is driven by intonation—the case of Bari Italian. JASA 143. 24742486.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Guekguezian, Peter Ara (2017). Prosodic recursian and syntactic cyclicity inside the word. PhD dissertation, University of Southern California.Google Scholar
Güldemann, Tom (2018). Historical linguistics and genealogical language classification in Africa. In Tom Güldemann (ed.) The languages and linguistics of Africa, number 11 in The World of Linguistics. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 58–444.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hall, Nancy (2006). Cross-linguistic patterns of vowel insertion. Phonology 23. 387429.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hall, Nancy (2011). Vowel epenthesis. In Marc van Oostendorp, Colin J. Ewen, Elizabeth V. Hume & Keren Rice (eds.) The Blackwell companion to phonology, volume 3. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 1576–1596.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hansson, Gunnar Ólafur (2004). Tone and voicing agreement in Yabem. WCCFL 23. 318331.Google Scholar
Harry, Otelemate G. (2004). Aspects of the tonal system of Kalaḅarị-Ịjọ, Stanford Monographs in African Languages. Stanford, CA: CSLI.Google Scholar
Hellmuth, Sam (2021). Text-tune alignment in Tunisian Arabic yes-no questions. In Marisa Cruz & Sónia Frota (eds.) Prosodic variation (with)in languages: intonation, phrasing and segments, Studies in Phonetics and Phonology. Sheffield: Equinox, 9–35.Google Scholar
Hyman, Larry M. (1985). A theory of phonological weight. Dordrecht: Foris.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyman, Larry M. (2011 a). Does Gokana really have no syllables? or: what's so great about being universal? Phonology 28. 5585.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyman, Larry M. (2011 b). Tone: is it different? In John Goldsmith, Jason Riggle & Alan C. Yu (eds.) The handbook of phonological theory, 2nd edition. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 197–239.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyman, Larry M. & Schuh, Russell G. (1974). Universals of tone rules: evidence from West Africa. LI 5. 81115.Google Scholar
Hyman, Larry M. & Tadadjeu, Maurice (1976). Floating tones in Mbam-Nkam. Southern California Occasional Papers in Linguistics 3. 59111.Google Scholar
Inkelas, Sharon (2014). The interplay of morphology and phonology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Itô, Junko (1989). A prosodic theory of epenthesis. NLLT 7. 217259.Google Scholar
Ito, Junko & Mester, Armin (2021). Recursive prosody and the prosodic form of compounds. Languages 6. 65.Google Scholar
Jenkins, Susan Goddard & Amdahl, JoLynn Eller (2007). A survey of the Tenda languages in SE Senegal. SIL Electronic Survey Report 2007-011, SIL International.Google Scholar
Jeong, Sunwoo & Condoravdi, Cleo (2018). Imperatives and intonation: the case of the down-stepped level terminal contour. WCCFL 35. 214223.Google Scholar
Jurgec, Peter (2011). Feature spreading 2.0: a unified theory of assimilation. PhD dissertation, University of Tromsø.Google Scholar
Kiparsky, Paul (2015). Stratal OT: a synposis and FAQs. In Yuchau E. Hsaio & Lian-Hee Wee (eds.) Capturing phonological shades within and across languages. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2–44.Google Scholar
Kubozono, Haruo (2001). Epenthetic vowels and accent in Japanese: facts and paradoxes. In Jeroen van de Weijer & Tetsuo Nishihara (eds.) Issues in Japanese phonology and morphology, number 51 in Studies in Generative Grammar. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton, 111–140.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
de Lacy, Paul (2003). Fixed ranking and the ‘Too Many Solutions’ problem. Presented at the CASTL Kick-Off Conference, University of Tromsø.Google Scholar
de Lacy, Paul (2006). Markedness: reduction and preservation in phonology, number 112 in Cambridge Studies in Linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
de Lacy, Paul (2007). The interaction of tone, sonority and prosodic structure. In Paul de Lacy (ed.) The Cambridge handbook of phonology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 281–308.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lovestrand, Joseph (2012). The linguistic structure of Baraïn (Chadic). Master's thesis, Graduate Institute of Applied Linguistics, Dallas International University. Available at https://www.diu.edu/documents/theses/Lovestrand_Joseph-thesis.pdf.Google Scholar
Marlo, Michael R., Chacha Mwita, Leonard & Paster, Mary (2015). Problems in Kuria H tone assignment. NLLT 33. 251265.Google Scholar
Martínez-Gil, Fernando (1997). Word-final epenthesis in Galician. In Fernando Martínez-Gil & Alfonso Morales-Front (eds.) Issues in the phonology and morphology of the major Iberian languages. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 270–340.Google Scholar
Marvin, Tatjana (2002). Topics in stress and the syntax of words. PhD dissertation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.Google Scholar
McDonough, Joyce (1996). Epenthesis in Navajo. In Eloise Jelinek, Sally Midgette, Keren Rice & Leslie Saxon (eds.) Athabaskan language studies: essays in honor of Robert W. Young. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 235–257.Google Scholar
Merrill, John T. M. (2018). The historical origin of consonant mutation in the Atlantic languages. PhD dissertation, University of California Berkeley.Google Scholar
Moore-Cantwell, Claire (2016). Contexts for epenthesis in Harmonic Serialism. In John J. McCarthy & Joe Pater (eds.) Harmonic Grammar and Harmonic Serialism, Advances in Optimality Theory. Sheffield: Equinox, 236–260.Google Scholar
Morley, Rebecca L. (2015). Deletion or epenthesis? on the falsifiability of phonological universals. Lingua 154. 126.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newell, Heather, Noonan, Máire, Piggott, Glyne & Travis, Lisa (eds.) (2017). The structure of words at the interfaces. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nissim, Gabriel M. (1981). Le bamileke-ghomálá’ (parler de Bandjoun, Cameroun): phonologie, morphologie nominale, comparaison avec des parlers voisins. Paris: Société d’études linguistiques et antrhopologiques de France.Google Scholar
van Oostendorp, Marc (2007). Derived environment effects and consistency of exponence. In Sylvia Blaho, Patrik Bye & Martin Krämer (eds.) Freedom of analysis? Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 123–148.Google Scholar
van Otterloo, Karen (2011). The Kifuliiru language, volume 1: phonology, tone, and morphological derivation. Dallas, TX: SIL International.Google Scholar
Pearce, Mary (2013). The interaction of tone with voicing and foot structure: evidence from Kera phonetics and phonology. Stanford, CA: CSLI.Google Scholar
Piggott, Glyne L. (1995). Epenthesis and syllable weight. NLLT 13. 283326.Google Scholar
Pike, Kenneth L. (1945). The intonation of American English. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Pike, Kenneth L. (1948). Tone languages. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Poser, William (1981). On the directionality of the tone–voice correlation. LI 12. 483488.Google Scholar
Prince, Alan & Smolensky, Paul (2004). Optimality Theory: constraint interaction in generative grammar. Oxford: Blackwell. Originally published in 1993 as Rutgers University Center for Cognitive Science Technical Report 2.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roettger, Timo B. (2017). Tonal placement in Tashlhiyt: how an intonation system accommodates to adverse phonological environments. Berlin: Language Science Press.Google Scholar
Roettger, Timo B. & Grice, Martine (2019). The tune drives the text: competing information channels of speech shape phonological systems. Language Dynamics and Change 9. 265298.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Santos, Rosine Sachine (1996). Le mey: langue ouest-atlantique de Guinée. PhD dissertation, University of the Sorbonne.Google Scholar
Selkirk, Elisabeth (2011). The syntax–phonology interface. In John Goldsmith, Jason Riggle & Alan C. Yu (eds.) The handbook of phonological theory, 2nd edition. Oxford: Blackwell, 435–485.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sossoukpe, Jacques (2017). Effet voisant du ton bas flottant sur les obstruantes en akebou. In Firmin Ahoua & Benjamin Ohi Elugbe (eds.) Typologie et documentation des langues en Afrique de l'Ouest. Paris: Harmattan, 139–146.Google Scholar
Teo, Amos Benjamin (2009). Sumi tone: a phonological and phonetic description of a Tibeto-Burman language of Nagaland. Master's thesis, University of Melbourne.Google Scholar
Wee, Lian-Hee (2019). Phonological tone. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yip, Moira (2002). Tone. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zhang, Jie (2013). The effects of duration and sonority on contour tone distribution: a typological survey and formal analysis. New York: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Rolle and Merrill supplementary material

Rolle and Merrill supplementary material

Download Rolle and Merrill supplementary material(File)
File 397.6 KB