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2009
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University of Iowa
Iowa Research Online Theses and Dissertations
2009
Treatment of vowel harmony in optimality theory Tomomasa Sasa
Recommended Citation Sasa, Tomomasa. "Treatment of vowel harmony in optimality theory." PhD diss., University of Iowa, 2009. http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/318.
This dissertation is available at Iowa Research Online: http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/318
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! TREATMENTS OF VOWEL HARMONY IN OPTIMALITY THEORY
by Tomomasa Sasa
An Abstract Of a thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in Linguistics in the Graduate College of The University of Iowa
July 2009
Thesis Supervisors: Professor Catherine Ringen Associate Professor Jill Beckman
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1! ABSTRACT From the early stage of Optimality Theory (OT) (Prince, Alan and Paul
Smolensky (1993): Optimality Theory: Constraint Interaction in Generative Grammar. [ROA: 537-0802: http://roa.rutgers.edu], McCarthy, John J. and Alan Prince (1995). Faithfulness and reduplicative identity. In Jill Beckman, Laura W. Dickey and Suzanne Urbanczyk (eds.) Papers in Optimality Theory. Amherst, MA: GLSA. 249-384), a number of analyses have been proposed to account for vowel harmony in the OT framework. However, because of the diversity of the patterns attested cross-linguistically, no consensus has been reached with regard to the OT treatment of vowel harmony. This, in turn, raises the question whether OT is a viable phonological theory to account for vowel harmony; if a theory is viable, a uniform account of the diverse patterns of vowel harmony should be possible. The main purpose of this thesis is to discuss the application of five different OT approaches to vowel harmony, and to investigate which approach offers the most comprehensive coverage of the diverse vowel harmony patterns. Three approaches are the main focus: feature linking with SPREAD (Padgett, Jaye (2002). Feature classes in phonology. Language 78. 81-110), Agreement-By-Correspondence (ABC) (Walker, Rachel (2009). Similaritysensitive blocking and transparency in Menominee. Paper presented at the 83rd Annual Meeting of the Linguistic Society of America. San Francisco), and the
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Span Theory of harmony (McCarthy, John J. (2004). Headed spans and autosegmental spreading. [ROA: 685-0904: http://roa.rutgers.edu]). The applications of these approaches in the following languages are considered: backness and roundness harmony in Turkish and in Yakut (Turkic), and ATR harmony in Pulaar (Niger-Congo). It is demonstrated that both feature linking and ABC analyses are successful in offering a uniform account of the different types of harmony processes observed in these three languages. However, Span Theory turns out to be empirically inadequate when used in the analysis of Pulaar harmony. These results lead to the conclusion that there are two approaches within OT that can offer a uniform account of the vowel harmony processes. This also suggests that OT is viable as a phonological theory.
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TREATMENTS OF VOWEL HARMONY IN OPTIMALITY THEORY
by Tomomasa Sasa
A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in Linguistics in the Graduate College of The University of Iowa
July 2009
Thesis Supervisors: Professor Catherine O. Ringen Associate Professor Jill Beckman
Graduate College The University of Iowa Iowa City, Iowa CERTIFICATE OF APPROVAL !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" " PH.D. THESIS !!!!!!!!!!!!!" " This is to certify that the Ph.D. thesis of Tomomasa Sasa has been approved by the Examining Committee for the thesis requirement for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in Linguistics at the July 2009 graduation.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Catherine O. Ringen, Thesis Co-supervisor
Thesis Committee:
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!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Jill Beckman, Thesis Co-supervisor
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To my family and friends
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS “Why are you doing phonology?” I have been asked this question a number of times during my time in graduate school. I would like to use this opportunity to answer this question; my answer, simply, is that I am a phonologist because I had the opportunities to meet and work with some fascinating people, who otherwise I would have not met. First, this thesis would never have been possible without the tremendous support of Professors Catherine Ringen and Jill Beckman; no words are sufficient for me to describe how impressive they are. I was always touched by their generous support for me throughout the thesis-writing process, and with other academic matters. Professor Jerzy Rubach taught me the excitement and reality of phonology; all of his words are deeply rooted in me, and they built up the foundation of my thinking, reasoning, and teaching in phonology. Professor William D. Davies taught me the dynamism of human languages (that is, how messy languages are), and gave me a valuable lesson that no linguistic theory is viable if we overlook the data. Professor Bob McMurray never failed to impress me with his broad and in-depth knowledge, interest, and enthusiasm. I would also like to express my thanks to my fellow graduate students in the Linguistics Department: Dr. Ivan Ivanov (Ivancho), Dr. Marta Tryzna, and Dr. Kumyoung Lee, with whom I shared both good and hard times in the past five years. I will never forget about the encouragement and support from the !
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following friends of mine: Michael Bortscheller (Borts), Lalita Dhareshwar, Lauren Eby, Jane Gressang, Zachary Harper, Sangkyun Kang (Danny), Molly Kelley, Vladimir Kulikov (Volodya), Eri Kurniawan, Jeffery Press, Lindsey Quinn-Wriedt, Jaeyoung Shim, Mano Yasuda, and Dr. Roberto Mayoral Hernández. Finally (but never least), I would like to express my very special gratitude to Professor Rachel Walker at USC, and Ms. Barbara Hermeier, the former secretary in the Linguistics Department. My research, teaching, and mentoring have been significantly influenced by Professor Walker’s; from her, I learned to be open-minded to the suggestions, critiques, and new proposals. My very special thanks also go to Ms. Hermeier; my life in the United States was impossible without her support; she always went out of her way to help me and other graduate students in the Linguistics Department. I would like to thank these above mentioned people for their support, suggestions, critiques, and encouragement, which all made this thesis possible. Nonetheless, all mistakes, including the improper usage of commas and the lack/overuse of determiners, are mine.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES............................................................................................................. vii LIST OF FIGURES.......................................................................................................... viii CHAPTER I
AN OPTIMALITY-THEORETIC TREATMENT OF VOWEL HARMONY: AN OVERVIEW...............................1
1.1 A Survey of the Harmony Patterns .............................................................3 1.2 An Optimality-Theoretic Account of Vowel Harmony...........................10 1.2.1 Feature Alignment.........................................................................10 1.2.2 Feature Linking with Spread........................................................22 1.2.3 Local Agree .....................................................................................26 1.2.4 Summary .........................................................................................31 1.3 Recent Developments: An Overview ........................................................33 1.3.1 Span Theory ...................................................................................33 1.3.2 Agreement By Correspondence (ABC)......................................38 1.4 The Organization of the Thesis ..................................................................43 CHAPTER II
TURKISH VOWEL HARMONY: A CASE STUDY .................45
2.1 Turkish Vowel Harmony.............................................................................45 2.2 The Feature Linking Analysis .....................................................................48 2.3 The ABC Analysis .........................................................................................55 2.4 The Span-Theoretic Analysis .......................................................................61 2.4.1 Span-Theoretic Constraints ..........................................................62 2.4.2 The Analysis....................................................................................69 2.5 Discussion.......................................................................................................72 2.5.1 Accounting for Two Harmony Processes ..................................72 2.5.2 Disharmonic Roots.........................................................................75 2.5.3 Summary of the Chapter ..............................................................78 CHAPTER III
HARMONY PATHOLOGIES: SOUR GRAPES IN PULAAR ATR HARMONY......................79
3.1 Pulaar Data.....................................................................................................80 3.2 Empirical Issues .............................................................................................84 3.2.1 Sour Grapes.....................................................................................85 3.2.2 Directionality...................................................................................88 3.3 Span Theory and Privative [ATR]...............................................................90 3.4 Span Theory and Binary [ATR].................................................................104 3.5 Discussion.....................................................................................................109 !
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CHAPTER IV
PULAAR ATR HARMONY: FULL ANALYSES WITH SPREAD AND ABC ......................113
4.1 Review of the Pulaar Data .........................................................................113 4.2 Analysis with Spread ..................................................................................116 4.2.1 Spread Defined .............................................................................116 4.2.2 The Analysis with Spread-Left ...................................................121 4.3 The ABC Analysis........................................................................................131 4.4 General Discussion......................................................................................145 4.4.1 Positional Faithfulness in Harmony .........................................145 4.4.2 Privative [ATR].............................................................................148 4.4.3 Summary .......................................................................................155 CHAPTER V
ROUNDNESS HARMONY REVISITED: A CASE STUDY OF YAKUT....................................................157
5.1 Yakut Roundness Harmony......................................................................157 5.2 The Analysis with Spread...........................................................................164 5.2.1 Roundness Harmony ..................................................................164 5.2.2 Backness Harmony ......................................................................174 5.3 Agreement By Correspondence ...............................................................175 5.3.1 The ABC Analysis of Yakut Roundness Harmony .................176 5.3.2 The ABC Account of Yakut Backness Harmony .....................184 5.4 Discussion.....................................................................................................189 5.4.1 Summary of the Chapter ............................................................189 5.4.2 A Residual Issue............................................................................190 CHAPTER VI
ISSUES IN THE OT TREATMENT OF VOWEL HARMONY ................................................................198
6.1 Summary ......................................................................................................198 6.2 On the Constraint Spread ..........................................................................201 6.3 Harmony Pathology Revisited .................................................................205 6.4 Conclusion....................................................................................................213 REFERENCES ................................................................................................................215
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LIST OF TABLES Table 1
Predictions under Align, Spread, and Agree.......................................32
Table 2
Turkish Vowel Inventory ......................................................................46
Table 3
Restrictions on Roundness Harmony in Turkish...............................48
Table 4
The Evaluation by the Original *A-Span [round] ..............................65
Table 5
Satisfaction and Violation of S-Parse ....................................................66
Table 6
Pulaar Vowel Inventory.........................................................................80
Table 7
The Evaluation of Id VV [ATR]...........................................................154
Table 8
Vowel Inventory of Yakut...................................................................158
Table 9
Yakut Diphthongs.................................................................................159
Table 10
Restrictions on Roundness Harmony in Yakut................................163
Table 11
Restrictions on Roundness Harmony in Kachin Khakass ..............191
Table 12
Summary of the Analyses....................................................................199
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LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1
Schematic Representations of Vowel Harmony ..................................3
Figure 2
A Gapped Configuration .......................................................................11
Figure 3
Evaluation under Agree 1......................................................................26
Figure 4
Evaluation under Agree 2......................................................................27
Figure 5
Correspondence in ABC ........................................................................39
Figure 6
ABC Ranking for Harmony ..................................................................42
Figure 7
Ranking Lattice: Turkish/Spread..........................................................54
Figure 8
Ranking Lattice: Turkish/ABC..............................................................60
Figure 9
Ranking Lattice: Turkish/Span Theory ...............................................71
Figure 10
Ranking Lattice: Pulaar/Span Theory..................................................99
Figure 11
Satisfaction and Violation of Spread 1................................................119
Figure 12
Satisfaction and Violation of Spread 2................................................120
Figure 13
Configurations of (14a) and (14b).......................................................125
Figure 14
Ranking Lattice: Pulaar/Spread..........................................................130
Figure 15
Ranking Lattice: Pulaar/ABC ..............................................................143
Figure 16
The Evaluation of *High-Low [round]...............................................169
Figure 17
Ranking Lattice: Yakut/Spread...........................................................172
Figure 18
Ranking Lattice: Yakut/ABC...............................................................182
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1! CHAPTER I AN OPTIMALITY-THEORETIC TREATMENT OF VOWEL HARMONY: AN OVERVIEW Vowel harmony, a phonological phenomenon in which vowels in a
certain domain (such as ‘a word’) agree with a certain vowel (such as ‘a vowel in the first syllable’ or ‘a vowel with a certain feature specification’) has been extensively discussed both in Optimality Theory (OT) (Prince and Smolensky 1993, McCarthy and Prince 1995) and in pre-OT frameworks. In the OT framework, several approaches have been proposed to account for the diverse patterns of vowel harmony that are found cross-linguistically. The earlier approaches include i) feature alignment (Kirchner 1993), ii) local agreement (cf. Bakovic 2000), and iii) feature spreading (Padgett 1997, 2002). Some of the more recent treatments of vowel harmony include the Span Theory of harmony (McCarthy 2004, Smolensky and Legendre 2006), and Agreement-ByCorrespondence (ABC) (Rose and Walker 2004, Walker 2009). However, a very fundamental question remains unanswered: what is the most comprehensive and uniform way to account for the diverse vowel harmony patterns observed cross-linguistically? Even though numerous studies have been proposed within different OT frameworks, there is no consensus with regard to how vowel harmony should be treated in OT. In fact, none of the previous approaches has been shown to be empirically sufficient to account for the diverse vowel harmony patterns. This leads us to address another question: is OT able to provide comprehensive analyses of vowel harmony?
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viable as a phonological theory to account for the diverse vowel harmony patterns observed cross-linguistically. To answer this question, I present an empirical comparison of the different frameworks that have been proposed to account for harmony. Second, I address the question of which framework, if any, offers the most comprehensive coverage of the attested vowel harmony patterns. In addition to these main questions, I discuss the theoretical issues that arise through the investigations of the harmony patterns and in the examination of each different approach with the attested vowel harmony data. The following five different approaches are considered in the thesis: i) feature alignment, ii) local agreement, iii) feature linking, iv) Span Theory, and v) Agreement-By-Correspondence. However, as will be demonstrated in this chapter, two of the approaches, i) feature alignment and ii) local agreement, are eliminated for theoretical or empirical reasons. Thus, this thesis mainly discusses the remaining three approaches, iii) feature linking, iv) Span Theory, and v) ABC with data from the following languages: Turkish (backness and roundness harmony), Pulaar (ATR harmony with directionality and opacity), and Yakut (backness harmony and the blocking effect in roundness harmony). The organization of this chapter is as follows; Section 1.1 is a presentation of a survey of vowel harmony patterns, and it introduces four patterns: total harmony, opacity, transparency, and dominant-recessive. In Section 1.2, the overview of three approaches, feature alignment, local agreement, and feature
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linking is presented. In Section 1.3, I present an overview of the Span-Theoretic approach and the ABC approach to vowel harmony. 1.1 A Survey of the Harmony Patterns Both in Optimality Theoretic (OT) and pre-OT frameworks, various types of harmony have been described in great detail. The schematic representations in Figure 1 present some of the harmony patterns commonly observed crosslinguistically; the pattern in (a) is referred to as total harmony, (b) is referred to as opacity, and (c) is referred to as transparency.
(a)
V1 !"! [! F]
V2 V3 !"! !"! [! F] [! F]
(b)
V1 V2 !"! !"! [! F] [" F]
V3 !"! [" F]
(c)
V1 V2 !"! !"! [! F] [" F]
V3 !"! [! F]
Figure 1. Schematic Representations of Vowel Harmony (a) Total harmony (b) Opacity (c) Transparency
There is one more commonly attested harmony pattern, namely, dominantrecessive, in addition to (a) through (c) in Figure 1. The dominant-recessive data from Diola-Fogny (Sapir 1965) are presented later in this section.
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terms trigger and target are frequently used; the term trigger refers to a vowel with which all other vowels agree in (a) certain feature(s). The term target refers to the vowel(s) which agree(s) with the trigger in a harmony domain; targets harmonize with the trigger. In the schematic representation in Figure 1, let the leftmost vowel (labeled as V1 ) be the trigger of the harmony, and let V2 and V3 be the targets of the harmony. In Figure 1, the feature [F] represents any feature (for example, backness, roundness, or [ATR]), and the Greek letters ! and " refer to different values for the feature [F]. The representation presented in (a) in Figure 1 is referred to as total harmony. In total harmony, all the vowels in a domain agree with the trigger. For example, this harmony pattern is observed in the backness harmony in Yakut, a Turkic language spoken in Siberia. (1) Yakut Backness Harmony (Krueger 1962: 72-75, 80-82) Plural
Accusative
a. kinige
kinige-ler
kinige-ni
‘book’
b. a©a
a©a-lar
a©a-nπ
‘father’
In Yakut backness harmony, all the vowels in a word agree with the root-initial vowel for backness. For example, in (1a), both the plural and the accusative suffixes contain a [-back] vowel because the first vowel in the root is [-back]. In (1b), the suffixes contain a [+back] vowel because of the [+back] vowels in the
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root. In backness harmony, all the vowels in a domain agree in backness (or share the same backness feature). One of the characteristics of total harmony, which differentiates this pattern from dominant-recessive, is that total harmony is triggered by a vowel in a privileged position; for example, in Yakut backness harmony, the vowel in the first syllable of a word triggers harmony. As will be shown, in a dominant-recessive system, a vowel with a certain specification triggers harmony regardless of the position of the vowel.1 The second type of harmony, as represented in (b) in Figure 1, contains an opaque vowel. In such a system, the vowel adjacent to the trigger (in (b) of Figure 1, the vowel labeled as V2 ) does not agree with the trigger of the harmony. In addition, in (b) of Figure 1, the final vowel, which is labeled as V3 , agrees with the intervening vowel, not the trigger of the harmony, for the feature [F]. The data in (2) illustrate the opaque behavior of the low vowel [a] in Pulaar [ATR] harmony, where the trigger of [ATR] harmony is the vowel in the final syllable of a word. That is, the directionality of the harmony is from right to left, and the harmony pattern observed in Pulaar is the mirror image of the schematic representation in (b) of Figure 1.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1 Privileged positions refer to the positions that are more prominent compared with other positions; for example, presonorant (a position before a sonorant segment) is considered to be prominent (cf. Lombardi 1999, Petrova et al. 2006), and the first syllable of a word is also assumed to be prominent (cf. Beckman 1997, 1998). Morphological roots are considered to be more prominent than affixes (McCarthy and Prince 1995).
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(2) Pulaar Low Vowel Opacity (Paradis 1992: 88, as cited in Kra‹m er 2001: 122)
cf.
a. bø…t-a…-ri
‘lunch’ (*bo…t-aa-ri)
b. pø…f-a…-li
‘breaths’ (*po…f-a…-ri)
c. nødd-a…-li
‘call’ (*nodd-a…-ri)
d. ˜ gør-a…-gu
‘courage’ (*˜ gor-a…-gu)
e) be…l-i ‘puddles-class’
b´…l-øn ‘puddles-dim.pl’
In Pulaar, the vowels [i, e] are specified as [+ATR] and [ˆ, ´, a] are specified as [-ATR]. The vowel [a] is specified as [+low, -ATR]. In Pulaar, there is no [+low, +ATR] vowel, and thus, [a] never alternates in its [ATR] specification, even when it is followed by a [+ATR] vowel. In [ATR] harmony, all the vowels in a word agree with the rightmost vowel (the vowel in the final syllable) in specification for [ATR]. In the forms in (2), since the last vowel in the word is [+ATR], all other vowels in the same word would be expected to surface as [+ATR], as in (2e). However, in (2a) through (2d), the medial vowel [a] does not agree with the word-final vowel in [ATR] specification, and the mid vowels in the first syllable of the word agree with the medial vowel [a] in [ATR] specification. As a result, the medial vowel [a] in these forms blocks the agreement or the spreading of the [ATR] specification from the final vowel in these forms. Therefore, as the data in (2) show, in Pulaar, the low vowel behaves opaquely and blocks the agreement or the spreading of the [ATR] specification from the trigger.
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transparent or neutral vowel. In the transparent system, the medial vowel (labeled as V2 ) does not agree with the trigger and the target; it does not participate in harmony. The crucial difference between opacity and transparency is that the final vowel, V3 , agrees with the trigger vowel, and it has the same feature specification as the trigger vowel. Finnish is often cited as an example of transparency. In (3a) and in (3b), the data exhibit the total harmony pattern where all the vowels in the word are identical in backness specification. However, this generalization does not hold true in the forms in (3c) and (3d). (3) Finnish Transparency and Neutral Vowel (Ringen and Heina‹m a‹ki 1999: 305 ) Root
Suffixed Form
Gloss
a. tØytæ
tØytæ-næ
‘table/table-essive’
b. pouta
pouta-na
‘fine weather/fine weather-essive’
c. koti
koti-na (*koti-næ)
‘hand/hand-essive’
d) vero
vero-lla (*vero-llæ) ‘tax-adessive’
In Finnish, the vowel in a suffix agrees in backness with the vowel(s) in the root. For example, in (3a), the suffix vowel is [æ] because the vowels in the root are all front ([-back]). Likewise, the suffix vowel in (3b) is [+back] since all the vowels in the root are [+back]. However, this generalization does not hold true when the root contains a neutral vowel, [i] or [e]. In (3c), the vowel in the suffix agrees with the vowel in the first syllable even though the vowel in the second syllable, [i], is closer. Thus,
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in this form, agreement/harmony skips over the medial neutral vowel, which behaves transparently. (3d) shows that neutral vowels do not trigger harmony, either; in (3d), there is a neutral vowel, [e], in the first syllable but the suffix vowel agrees with the vowel in the second syllable. Thus, in Finnish, the neutral vowels, [i] and [e], behave transparently if they are in a word-medial position. If they are in the first syllable of a word, they do not trigger harmony. Finally, the data in (4) illustrate the dominant-recessive case as observed in Diola-Fogny. In this language, when a root is followed by a non-alternating suffix /-ul/, which contains a [+ATR] vowel (that is, a dominant vowel), the root vowel surfaces as [+ATR]. If, on the other hand, a non-alternating suffix is not present in a word, the vowels in the root, which are underlyingly [-ATR], do not surface as [+ATR] (recessive).2 (4) Diola-Fogny dominant-recessive harmony (Sapir 1965) (Square brackets indicate the root.) - The Alternation Patterns [-ATR] (non-ATR) ˆ [(+)ATR]
i
¨
´
ø
a
u
e
o
\
- Diola-Fogny [(+)ATR] Dominance Causative ([-en]/[-´n]) Toward the speaker ([-ul])
Gloss
a.
[baj]-´n (*baj-en])
[b\j]-ul (*baj-¨l, *baj-ul)
‘have’
b.
[jitum]-en (*[jitum]-´n)
[jitum]-ul (*jitum-¨l, *jˆt¨m-¨l)
‘lead away’
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 2 The use of binary features ([+ATR] and [-ATR]) is solely for explanation purposes; nothing hinges on these notations.
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The causative suffix alternates depending on the ATR specification of the vowel(s) in the root. In (4a), the causative suffix is realized as [-´n] because the root vowel is [a], which is [-ATR] or non-ATR (so, all the vowels are recessive). In (4b), on the other hand, the same suffix is realized as [-en] because of the ATR (or [+ATR]) vowel(s) in the root. The suffix [-ul] is non-alternating. Thus, the vowel in this suffix is always [(+)ATR] regardless of the ATR specification of the vowel(s) in the root, and in fact, this suffix triggers harmony on the vowel(s) in the root. In (4a), this causative suffix changes the ATR specification of the vowel in the root, and as a result, all the vowels in the word surface as [(+)ATR]. Thus, this is a case of (+)ATR dominance. The pattern exhibited in (4b) is different from those in (a) through (c) in Figure 1. In total harmony, opacity, and transparency, the trigger of harmony is in a certain position, or more specifically, in a privileged position; for example, in Yakut, the trigger of harmony is always in the first syllable, and in Pulaar, the vowel in the last syllable always triggers harmony. However, in Diola-Fogny, it is not the position in a word that determines the trigger. Rather, the specification of a vowel determines the type of harmony. In the causative form in (4a), there are no [(+)ATR] vowels in the word, and as a result, no vowel causes (+)ATR harmony (the recessive case). In the ‘toward the speaker’ form, on the other hand, there is a dominant [(+)ATR] vowel in the suffix, and this [(+)ATR] vowel affects the ATR specification of the vowel in the root. As a result,
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this form exhibits a dominant pattern, where all the vowels surface with a dominant value. According to Steriade (1995), the dominant value in ATR harmony is language-specific. For example, Diola-Fogny and Kinande (Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994; Sasa 2004, 2006) are cited as cases of [+ATR] dominance while Archangeli and Pulleyblank cite Yoruba and Javanese as examples of [-ATR]/[RTR] dominance. Several approaches have been proposed within Optimality Theory to account for the vowel harmony patterns outlined above. In the next section, an overview of these OT treatments of vowel harmony is presented and the predictions of each account are discussed. 1.2 An Optimality-Theoretic Account of Vowel Harmony In this section, three of the OT approaches that are commonly assumed in the literature are introduced: namely, feature alignment, feature linking, and local agreement. The main purpose of this section is to discuss the theoretical and empirical problems or issues with these three traditional approaches. Some of the more recent developments are introduced in Section 1.3 of this chapter. 1.2.1 Feature Alignment One of the earliest OT approaches to harmony is feature alignment. Under this approach, families of alignment constraints are assumed for features such as [back] and [round], along with faithfulness constraints and markedness constraints. For example, in Kirchner’s (1993) account of Turkish backness and
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roundness harmony, the alignment constraints for backness and roundness are assumed to account for the harmony patterns observed in this language. The formulation of a feature alignment constraint is presented in (5).3 (5) Align [F], PrWd-R (cf: Kirchner 1993: 6) For any parsed feature [F] in morphological category MCat (=root, word), F is associated to the rightmost syllable in MCat (violations assessed in a scalar fashion). The constraint in (5) is satisfied when every instance of a feature [F] in a domain (such as ‘a word’) is associated with the rightmost vowel. Along with harmony constraints (an example of which is the alignment constraint in (5)), markedness constraints and the No Gap constraint (and the ranking of these constraints) play a role in accounting for harmony phenomena. The definition of No Gap is presented in (6). (6) No Gap (Levergood 1984; Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994; Ito, Mester, and Padgett 1995: 598; Ringen and Vago 1998: 410) Gapped configurations are prohibited. A gapped configuration is presented in Figure 2.
*V1
V2
V3
[F] Figure 2. A Gapped Configuration !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 3 Even though the actual constraint formulation or definition is different from that of alignment constraints, No Intervening constraints (Ellison 1995, Ringen and Vago 1998) yield similar effects.
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12!
In the configuration presented in Figure 2, the feature [F] is associated with V1 and V3 , skipping the medial vowel. No Gap prohibits skipping a medial segment. The tableaux in (8) through (10) present harmony patterns predicted by the alignment constraint approach. In addition to an alignment constraint, a markedness constraint and the No Gap constraint are also assumed. In addition to (5) and (6), let us assume a hypothetical markedness constraint in (7). (7) V2!"[!F] V2 may not be specified as [!F]. The markedness constraint prohibits the medial vowel V2 from being specified as [!F]. An example of such a markedness constraint is *π (no high back unrounded vowel) or *æ (no low front [+ATR] vowel). For purposes of exposition, in the following tableaux, the leftmost vowel, labeled as V1 , is assumed to be the trigger of the harmony, and it is specified as [! F]. In (8) and in the subsequent tableaux, it is assumed that in a transparent candidate (as in (8c)), where no feature is associated with V2 , a default feature is assigned to this vowel in the phonetics. In (8) and in the subsequent tableaux, for the sake of argument, let us assume that the feature [!F] is not compatible with the medial vowel V2 , but [!F] is compatible with the two vowels V1 and V3 .4
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 4 That is, associating [!F] with V2 creates some marked segment, such as a [+low, +ATR] vowel, which tends to be avoided cross-linguistically.
!
13!
(8) Total harmony is predicted: Align-R, No Gap >> Markedness /V1 V2 V3/ Align-R No Gap | [!F] !a) V1 V2 V3 | [!F] (Total) b) V1 V2 V3 | | [!F] ["F] (Opaque) c) V1 V2 V3 [!F]
V2 !"[!F]
*
*!* *!
(Transparent)
The three candidates in (8) are not the only possible candidates from the same input. An additional case with another possible candidate is discussed later in this section. In (8), candidate (8a), total harmony, is selected as optimal. Candidate (8b), the opaque case, loses because of the feature alignment constraint; in this candidate, the feature [!F], which is associated with the initial vowel, misses the right edge of the word by two vowels. Candidate (8c), the transparent candidate, satisfies the alignment constraint, but this candidate violates the No Gap constraint. Thus, as (8) shows, a feature alignment constraint accounts for total harmony when both the alignment constraint and the No Gap constraint dominate a markedness constraint. (9) shows that an alignment constraint is also capable of accounting for an opaque harmony system:
!
14!
(9) Opacity is predicted by the ranking Markedness, No Gap >> Align-R /V1 V2 V3/ No Gap Align-R V2 !"[!F] | [!F] a) V1 V2 V3 | [!F] !b) V1 V2 V3 | | [!F] ["F] c) V1 V2 V3
*! ** *!
[!F] In (9), the high-ranked markedness constraint excludes the total harmony candidate (9a); in this candidate, the medial vowel is specified as [!F], but the markedness constraint militates against such a configuration. Candidate (9c) loses because of No Gap, and as a result, candidate (9b), the opaque candidate, is selected as optimal. Feature alignment also accounts for a transparency case, as in (10). In (10), with No Gap low-ranked, the transparent candidate is selected. (10) Transparency is predicted by the ranking Align-R, Markedness >> No Gap /V1 V2 V3/ Align-R No Gap V2 !"[!F] | [!F] a) V1 V2 V3 | [!F] b) V1 V2 V3 | | [!F] ["F] !c) V1 V2 V3 [!F]
*!
*!* *
!
15!
(10c) satisfies both the alignment constraint and the markedness constraint, while (10a) violates the markedness constraint and (10b) incurs two violations of the alignment constraint. As seen in (8) through (10), the alignment approach accounts for all three attested harmony cases. However, as pointed out in McCarthy (2002), there are two issues with regard to the alignment approach to harmony; first, alignment constraints can be satisfied in multiple ways, and as a result, the analysis with alignment predicts unattested harmony patterns. Second, the analysis with alignment mischaracterizes harmony processes in general. These two points are illustrated in the tableau in (11), where candidate (11b), along with (11a), satisfies Align [F], PrWd-R. (11) Unattested pattern is predicted with Align-R, No Gap >> Markedness /V1 V2 V3/ Align-R No Gap V2 !"[!F] | [!F] a) V1 V2 V3 | [!F] !b) V1 V2 V3 | [!F]
*!
Align [F], PrWd-R is satisfied as long as the final vowel (in (11), the vowel labeled as V3 ) is specified as [!F]. The two candidates in (11) satisfy both the No Gap constraint (since a gapped configuration is not observed in either one of the two candidates) and the markedness constraint (since the medial vowel is not
!
16!
specified as [!F]). As a result, in (11), the markedness constraint (that prohibits V2 from being specified as [!F]) prefers candidate (11b) to (11a). (11) illustrates two problems with regard to the alignment analysis of harmony. First, since there are multiple possible ways to satisfy an alignment constraint, an unattested form, such as candidate (11b), can be selected as optimal. Second, the fact that (11b) wins (in which the feature [!F] moves to the (right) edge) shows that vowel harmony is characterized as a phenomenon in which a certain feature reaches to either the right or the left edge of a word, without necessarily being realized in any of the other vowels in the word. Such a characterization is, needless to say, incorrect. In (11), candidate (11b), in which the feature [!F] moves to the right edge, is selected as optimal, but such a case is not attested in any harmony languages. That is, if V1 is specified as [!F] but the following vowel V2 may not be specified as [!F], then the result is either i) only V1 is specified as [!F] but V2 blocks the spreading of [!F] to V3 , or ii) [!F], which is associated with V1 is linked to V3 while skipping V2 (that is, transparency). However, alignment constraints are satisfied as long as the feature which is targeted by the alignment constraint is aligned with the specified edge (in (11), the right edge of the word); the alignment constraint alone fails to block such an unattested pattern. It is not impossible, however, to resolve the problem described above. McCarthy (2002: 25) suggests, for example, the use of the Anchor constraint (in
!
17!
this particular case, Anchor-Left, which requires that the feature associated with the leftmost vowel in the input is present on the leftmost vowel in the output). Another possible way to rule out a candidate as in (11b) is to assume an InputOutput faithfulness constraint as in (12). The faithfulness constraint in (12) is a positional faithfulness constraint that maintains the input-output identity of the vowel in the first syllable (that is, the vowel labeled as V1 ). (12) Ident I-O [!F] (#1) (cf. Beckman 1997, 1998; Sasa 2001) Segments in the first syllable of a word in the output have the same specification as their input correspondents for the feature [!F]. The analysis with (12) is presented in the tableau in (13). (13) Total Harmony Predicted: Faith, Align-R, No Gap >> Markedness Ident I-O /V1 V2 V3/ Align-R No Gap V2 !"[!F] | [!F] (#1) [!F] !a) V1 V2 V3 | [!F] b) V1 V2 V3 | [!F]
* *!
In (13), both (13a) and (13b) satisfy the alignment constraint. However, candidate (13b) is excluded by the positional faithfulness constraint; in (13b), the input vowel V1 is specified as [!F] but its output correspondent is not identical to its input correspondent in [!F]. The same effect would be obtained by assuming an
!
18!
anchoring constraint in (13) since the feature [!F] associated with the initial vowel in the input is not anchored to the leftmost vowel in the output.5 It is true that the problem in (11) can be resolved by assuming a positional faithfulness constraint, as in (12), or by assuming an anchoring constraint as suggested by McCarthy. However, the problem in (11) is, in fact, a more fundamental one; the alignment approach mischaracterizes the harmony process. As seen in (11), alignment constraints are satisfied as long as the feature that an alignment constraint targets/refers to is associated with the vowel either at the right edge (that is, in the word-final position, or in the word-final syllable) or at the left edge. This implies that the analysis with alignment characterizes harmony as a phenomenon in which a certain feature aligns with the edge(s) of a word, for example, by moving a feature, as seen in (11b). Such a characterization is incorrect, since, as discussed earlier in this chapter, vowel harmony is a process in which vowels in a certain domain agree with a certain vowel in a certain feature. Hence, using alignment in accounting for vowel harmony is eliminated for empirical and theoretical reasons; empirically, the alignment analysis fails to block unattested harmony patterns. Theoretically, it provides a mischaracterization of the harmony phenomena.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 5 It should be noted, however, that this problem is not unique to the alignment analysis; as will be discussed in Chapter 4, other approaches (feature spreading and ABC) require positional faithfulness constraint(s) to predict the attested harmony patterns.
!
19! In addition to these, there is one more issue to be mentioned with regard
to the alignment approach, namely, gradient assessment; consider a hypothetical case in which the final vowel does not participate in harmony but harmony goes as far as it can go. The analysis of such a hypothetical case is presented in (15). In (15), along with the positional faithfulness constraint and the alignment constraint, a different markedness constraint (14) that prohibits the final vowel (labeled as V3 ) from being specified as [!F] is also included. (14) V3!"[!F] V3 may not be specified as [!F]. (15) Final vowel as a blocker: Markedness >> Align-R Ident I-O /V1 V2 V3/ Align-R V3 !"[!F] | [!F] (#1) [!F] a) V1 V2 V3 | [!F] !b) V1 V2 V3 | [!F] c) V1 V2 V3 | [!F]
*! * **!
In the hypothetical case presented in (15), the final vowel V3 does not participate in harmony; this is captured by the markedness constraint (ranked above the alignment constraint) prohibiting V3 from being specified as [!F]. In (15), the alignment constraint prefers (15b) to (15c) because in (15b), the feature [!F] misses the right edge by one vowel while in (15c), it misses the right edge by two
!
20!
vowels. In other words, in (15), the alignment constraint evaluates the candidates gradiently, in that it counts by how many vowels the feature misses the right edge. McCarthy (2002, 2003), suggests, however, that all OT constraints are categorical, meaning that they are either satisfied or violated. In other words, McCarthy claims that there should be no gradient constraints that count the number of violations.6 As stated, in (15), it is crucial to assess candidates gradiently in enforcing (more) harmony. However, if categorical assessment of the alignment constraint is assumed, the alignment constraint fails to favor the candidate with more complete harmony. This is illustrated in (16). (16) Categorical Align-R fails to favor more harmony Ident I-O /V1 V2 V3/ Align-R V3 !"[!F] | [!F] (#1) [!F] a) V1 V2 | [!F] b) V1 V2 | [!F] c) V1 V2 | [!F]
V3
*!
V3 * V3 *
In (16), both candidate (16b) and (16c) equally violate the alignment constraint if a categorical assessment is assumed. In (16b), more vowels participate in a harmony process triggered by V1 than in (16c). However, if categorical assessment is employed, there is no way to distinguish the candidates in (16b) !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 6 This problem is not apparent in the case where a feature can reach the edge of a word, as in (8) through (10).
!
21!
and (16c). It is true that the selection of the actual candidate depends on the ranking of other constraints (such as markedness constraints), but (16) illustrates that categorical alignment constraints fail to force more vowels to participate in a harmony process. McCarthy acknowledges that categorical assessment means that it is not possible to employ alignment constraints to account for vowel harmony. In fact, he further claims that in the case of (16), for example, candidate (16b) (with more harmony) should be selected not because the feature [!F] is closer to the right edge in (16b) than in (16c), but simply because more vowels participate in harmony in (16b) than in (16c). In other words, a harmony constraint should favor a candidate where more vowels participate in harmony rather than evaluate candidates depending on how close to or far away a feature is from the designated edge. To summarize, as seen in (8) through (10), it is possible to account for the attested vowel harmony patterns by employing a feature alignment constraint. However, as argued, there are three problems with the alignment approach; first, it requires categorical assessment; second, alignment constraints favor unattested forms if used without other mechanism (such as positional faithfulness, and finally, it mischaracterizes harmony processes.
!
22! 1.2.2 Feature Linking with Spread The second approach to vowel harmony is to assume multiple feature
linking/sharing with Spread as a harmony constraint. The original definition of the spreading constraint as given by Padgett (1997) is presented in (17). (17) Spread [!F] (Padgett 1997: 22) Every feature [!F] is linked to every segment (Spread (x): $x,y, x(y): x= feature, y=segment). Spread requires (multiple) feature linking, and the spreading constraint is satisfied only when the same feature is shared by all of the vowels in a particular domain. The tableaux in (18) through (20) show how Spread accounts for the three basic harmony types (total, opacity, and transparency). In (18) through (20), the positional faithfulness constraint for the initial vowel, Ident I-O [!F] (#1) in (12), is assumed to be undominated; any candidate/possible representation in which the initial vowel is not faithful to its input correspondent is excluded by this positional faithfulness constraint. (18) Total harmony with the ranking Spread [F], No Gap >> Markedness /V1 V2 V3/ Spread [!F] No Gap V2 !"[!F] | [!F] !a) V1 V2 V3 | [!F] b) V1 V2 V3 | | [!F] ["F] c) V1 V2 V3
*
*!* *(!)
[!F]
*(!)
!
23!
(18) shows that total harmony is accounted for by the ranking Spread, No Gap >> Markedness (V2 !"[!F]). In (18), candidate (18a) completely satisfies Spread [!F]; in this candidate, the feature [!F] is multiply linked to all of the vowels in the word. Candidate (18c) incurs two violations of this spreading constraint; the feature [!F], which is associated with V1 , is not linked to two of the vowels, V2 and V3 . Candidate (18b) violates the spreading constraint once for V2 , with which the feature [!F] is not associated. Tableau (18) is analogous to the tableau in (8), where an alignment constraint is assumed, in that as long as the harmony constraint (Align-R in (8) and Spread [F] in (18)) along with No Gap dominates the relevant constraint, total harmony is accounted for. (19) is the analysis of opacity with Spread. (19) shows that as long as a markedness constraint and the No Gap constraint dominate the harmony constraint, as in (10), an opacity candidate is selected as optimal when Spread is employed as a harmony constraint. (19) Opacity is predicted by the ranking Markedness, No Gap >> Spread /V1 V2 V3/ No Gap Spread [!F] V2 !"[!F] | [!F] a) V1 V2 V3 | [!F] !b) V1 V2 V3 | | [!F] ["F] c) V1 V2 V3
*! ** *!
[!F]
*
!
24!
As in (9), the markedness constraint prohibits the feature [!F] from being associated with V2 . Because of this markedness constraint, candidate (19a) is excluded from the competition. (19c) loses because of No Gap even though this candidate performs better than (19b) under Spread; in (19c), [!F] skips only one vowel while in (19b), [!F] is not linked to two of the vowels. Thus, as seen in (19), an opacity pattern is accounted for by Spread as long as this constraint, along with No Gap, dominates a markedness constraint. Thus far, both the alignment analysis and the spread analysis make the same predication; the same ranking accounts for total harmony and an opacity case in the alignment analysis and in the spreading analysis. In the transparency case, on the other hand, there is a small difference between these two approaches. This is illustrated in (20). (20) Transparency predicted by the ranking Markedness >> Spread >> No Gap /V1 V2 V3/ Spread [!F] No Gap V2 !"[!F] | [!F] a) V1 V2 V3 | [!F] b) V1 V2 V3 | | [!F] ["F] !c) V1 V2 V3
*! **! *
*
[!F] (10) in Section 1.2.1 showed that the transparency case is accounted for by the alignment constraint if the alignment constraint and a markedness constraint both dominate the No Gap constraint. In accounting for transparency with a
!
25!
feature alignment constraint, it is not necessary to establish a ranking between the alignment constraint and the markedness constraint. (20) shows, on the other hand, that it is necessary to establish the ranking Markedness (V2 !"[!F]) >> Spread if a spreading constraint is assumed to account for transparency. The difference between the analyses in (10) and (20) lies in the difference in the assessment by an alignment constraint and a spreading constraint; a transparency candidate does not violate the feature alignment constraint (and thus, total harmony and a transparent candidate tie under the alignment constraint) while as seen in (20), the transparency candidate does violate Spread. Thus, it is necessary to exclude a total harmony candidate from the competition before the spreading constraint assesses violations in the (remaining) candidates. As seen in (18) through (20), the analysis with Spread makes the same predictions as the analysis with a feature alignment constraint. The same ranking accounts for total harmony and opaque harmony under both an alignment approach and a spreading approach. The analysis with Spread is also capable of predicting transparent harmony. One small difference between the alignment analysis and the feature linking analysis is that unlike in an alignment analysis, a fixed ranking is necessary between a markedness constraint and a spreading constraint, if Spread is employed as a harmony constraint.
!
26! 1.2.3 Local Agree The third type of harmony constraint that has been widely assumed is
Agree. The definition of an agreement constraint is presented in (21). (21) Agree [!F] (cf. Bakovic 2000) Adjacent segments (vowels) agree in the feature [!F]. Two things need to be pointed out as differences between Agree and other harmony constraints, such as Align or Spread. First, with the agreement constraint, the domain of evaluation is local and the agreement constraint performs a pair-wise comparison of adjacent vowels. Figure 3 presents the evaluation by Agree for the three basic harmony patterns (total, opacity, and transparency):
/V1 V2 V3/ | [!F]! a) V1 V2 V3 | | | [! F] [! F] [! F] b) V1 V2 V3 | | | [! F] [" F] [" F] c) V1 V2 V3 | | | [! F] [" F] [! F]
Agree ! (total)! *! (opaque)! **! (transparent)!
Figure 3. Evaluation under Agree 1
In Figure 3, candidate (a), the total harmony pattern, fully satisfies the agreement constraint: in both vowel pairs, V1 -V2 "and V2 -V3 , two adjacent vowels are
!
27!
specified as [!F]. Candidate (b) violates this constraint once: the pair of vowels V2 -V3 is specified as ["F], but in the other pair, V1 -V2 , the two vowels are not specified in the same way in terms of the feature [F]. Thus, Agree assigns a violation to this V1 -V2 pair. (23c), the transparent candidate, violates this agreement constraint twice: one violation for the V1 -V2 pair, and the other violation for the V2 -V3 pair. Thus, as seen in Figure 3, Agree performs a pair-wise comparison and assigns a violation for a pair that does not agree (or in which the two vowels do not have the same specification) with regard to the feature [!F]. The other difference between Agree and Spread is that the agreement constraints are satisfied whether or not the same feature is associated with two adjacent vowels. That means that the following two configurations in Figure 4 tie under the agreement constraint.
/V1 V2/ | [!F] a) V1 V2 b) V1 | [!F]
Agree [!F]
[!F] V2 | [!F]
Figure 4. Evaluation under Agree 2
In Figure 4, the phonetic realization of the two candidates is the same. The only difference between these two candidates in Figure 4 is that in (a), the same
!
28!
feature [!F] is shared by two vowels while in (b), these vowels each have a different feature [!F]. Therefore, in the evaluation under the agreement constraint, it does not make a difference whether the same feature is shared or not. Note that the configuration in (b) violates Spread [!F] (“Every feature [!F] is linked to every segment”) twice, while both (a) and (b) satisfy the feature alignment constraint. The tableaux in (22) and (23) present the analysis with Agree. As before, Markedness (V2 !"[!F]) prohibits V2 from being specified as [!F]. Since multiple feature linking is not required for Agree, the constraint No Gap is not included in the following tableaux; in (22) and (23), total harmony and opacity are predicted, but transparency cannot be predicted by the ranking permutations of the two constraints, Agree and Markedness. (22) Agree >> Markedness prefers total harmony /V1 V2 V3/ Agree | [!F]! V1 V2 V3 ! | | | [! F] [! F] [! F] (total) b) V1 V2 V3 | | | [! F] [" F] [" F] (opaque)! c) V1 V2 V3 | | | [! F] [" F] [! F](transparent)!
V2 !"[!F]
!
! a)
#! *!! *!*!
(22) shows that when the ranking Agree >> Markedness (V2 !"[!F]) is established, total harmony is predicted; (22a) totally satisfies the agreement constraint while
!
29!
(22b) violates this constraint once (for the V1 -V2 pair) and (22c) incurs two violations. Thus, Agree is capable of accounting for total harmony as seen in (22). When the ranking between the agreement constraint and the markedness constraint is reversed, as in (23), an opaque candidate is predicted: (23) Markedness >> Agree prefers opacity /V1 V2 V3/ V2 !"[!F] | [!F]! V1 V2 V3 ! | | | [! F] [! F] [! F] (total) ! b) V1 V2 V3 | | | [! F] [" F] [" F] (opaque)! c)V1 V2 V3 | | | [! F] [" F] [! F] (transparent)
Agree
!
a)
#$!
#!
!
*
!
**!
In (23), candidate (23a) is excluded from the competition because of the markedness constraint. Between the remaining candidates, (23b) and (23c), (23b), the opaque candidate, performs better than the transparent candidate under the agreement constraint. Thus, as seen in (23), when the ranking Markedness (V2 !" [!F]) >> Agree is established, it is possible to predict an opaque pattern employing the Agree constraint. However, the analysis in (22) and (23) presents a problem; if Agree is employed as a harmony constraint, it is not possible to select a transparency candidate as optimal. (23) shows that when an agreement constraint is higherranked than the markedness constraint, then total harmony is predicted. In (22),
!
30!
the opacity pattern is selected as optimal when the markedness constraint dominates the agreement constraint. However, neither one of the ranking permutations predicts a transparency pattern. This problem has been addressed by Bakovic and Wilson (2000, 2004); as they point out, an opacity harmony pattern always performs better than a transparency pattern with regard to Agree. In other words, if Agree is employed as a harmony constraint, then it always prefers an opaque candidate to a transparency candidate. To resolve this problem, Bakovic and Wilson propose an additional OT mechanism referred to as a targeted constraint. However, there are some theoretical and empirical critiques with regard to targeted constraints. First, Finley (2008) points out that the version of targeted constraints that is presented in Bakovic and Wilson (2004) fails to predict the transparency patterns (even though their original proposal of targeted constraint successfully accounts for the transparency in Wolof). McCarthy (2008) also points out that the case of cluster simplification (which requires targeted constraints, according to Bakovic and Wilson (2004)) can be explained by other alternatives (deletion as attrition; see Chapter 6). Finally, Rubach (2004) casts strong doubt as to the existence of targeted constraints as part of the OT grammar, and claims that the analysis with targeted constraints (as proposed by Burzio (2001)) makes an incorrect prediction in accounting for the diphthongization phenomena observed in Slovak. These considerations lead us to ask one question: is the agreement approach viable, given these critiques with regard to targeted
!
31!
constraints, which the analysis with Agree crucially relies on? In other words, the analysis with Agree would be proven to be empirically inadequate if the existence of targeted constraints were to be denied in the OT grammar. As seen in (22) and (23), Agree is capable of predicting or accounting for total harmony or an opaque harmony pattern. However, the analysis with local Agree faces a challenge in accounting for transparency since, as seen in (23), Agree always prefers opacity to transparency if it is employed without any additional mechanism, such as targeted constraints that prefers transparency to opacity. Thus, it is not empirically possible to predict a pattern where a medial vowel behaves transparently in harmony if Agree with no additional mechanisms is employed as a harmony constraint. 1.2.4 Summary The predictions made by the three approaches discussed thus far are summarized in Table 1. Table 1 shows that all three approaches, alignment, spread, and agreement, are capable of accounting for total harmony. When a harmony constraint dominates a markedness constraint, total harmony is always predicted no matter which harmony constraint is employed. The opacity pattern can also be accounted for by all three approaches, as long as the ranking No Gap >> Harmony is established.
!
32!
Table 1. Predictions under Align, Spread, and Agree Total Harmony
Opaque
Transparent
Notes
Align
" Predicted (with No Gap being high-ranked)
" Predicted (with No Gap being lowranked)
Spread
" Predicted
It is crucial to assume gradient violation to enforce harmony Multiple feature linking is necessary
Agree
" Predicted
" Predicted (with Markedness and No Gap dominating Align) " Predicted (with Markedness and No Gap dominating Align) " Predicted
" Predicted (necessary to establish the ranking, Markedness >> Spread) !!not predicted (Agree always prefers opaque)!
!
The transparency case presents an interesting difference among these three approaches; first, the analysis with Agree fails to predict such a pattern, as seen in the previous section. The transparency case is accounted for by both Alignment and Spread as long as both a harmony constraint and a markedness constraint dominate No Gap. There are several possible rankings to achieve transparency with Alignment, while there is one possible ranking (Markedness >> Spread), by which transparency is predicted with Spread as a harmony constraint. Nonetheless, Spread is still capable of predicting or accounting for a transparency pattern.
!
33! The tableaux in (22) and (23) show that the analysis with Agree is not
capable of predicting a transparent pattern; (22) and (23) show that no matter what the ranking permutation of the agreement constraint and the markedness constraint is, a transparent candidate is not the winner of the competition; when the agreement constraint dominates the markedness constraint, total harmony is preferred to opacity and transparency. When the ranking is reversed (and the markedness constraint dominates the agreement constraint), then an opacity candidate is selected as optimal. Therefore, an analysis with Agree encounters difficulties when transparency is observed in harmony pattern. 1.3 Recent Developments: An Overview In addition to the approaches presented in the previous section, several novel approaches have been proposed to account for (vowel) harmony. Among them are the Span Theory of harmony (McCarthy 2004, Smolensky and Legendre 2006) and Agreement-By-Correspondence (ABC) (Rose and Walker 2004, Walker 2009). An overview of these two recent developments is presented in this section. 1.3.1 Span Theory One of the main assumptions in Span Theory is that segments in a word, or in a harmony domain, are exhaustively parsed into (a) span(s). According to McCarthy (2004: 4), a span is defined as “a constituent whose terminal nodes are segments in a contiguous string.” Both McCarthy and Smolensky and Legendre claim that each span contains a head, with the head determining the actual
!
34!
pronunciation of the segments in a given span. McCarthy (2004) summarizes the properties of a span as follows. First, there is only one head in a single span. Second, parsing of segments into spans must be exhaustive; in other words, every segment in the domain must be parsed into some span. In OT terms, GEN does not create a candidate where non-exhaustive parsing of segments is observed. Third, no overlapping spans are allowed. McCarthy suggests that the first two properties resemble the association conventions of early autosegmental phonology. For instance, the second property resembles the assumption that “every tone bearing unit is associated with some tone (Clements and Ford 1979, Goldsmith 1976),” and the third resembles the prohibition on crossing of association lines. McCarthy cites the example of nasal harmony (nasal spreading) in Johore Malay to illustrate how the proposals are implemented in actual data. In Johore Malay, if there is a nasal segment in a word, the nasality spreads to the following segments (rightward from a [+nasal] segment). Vowels, glides, and liquids can be nasalized but fricatives cannot be nasalized; they block the spreading of the [+nasal] feature. Thus, for example, an input /mawasa/ surfaces as [ma~w~a~sa], in which the fricative, [s], blocks the spreading of nasality to the following vowel. To implement the theory, McCarthy suggests the following four types of Span-Theoretic constraints. First, McCarthy proposes an anti-adjacent span constraint that enforces harmony. An example of such a constraint is presented in (24).
!
35!
(24) *A-Span [Nasal] (McCarthy 2004: 7) Assign one violation mark for every pair of adjacent spans of the feature [nasal]. (24) favors a candidate in which all the segments are parsed into a single [+nasal or [-nasal] span. If a segment is parsed into a [+nasal] span, it is realized as [+nasal]. Likewise, if a segment is parsed into a [-nasal] span, then that segment is realized as [-nasal]. (24) is analogous to Spread in the previous accounts, in that it requires that all segments are exhaustively parsed into a single span. Second, there are constraints that determine which segments block spreading. (25) Head([+Cont, -Son], [-Nasal])(McCarthy 2004: 7) Every fricative ([+continuant, -sonorant] segment) heads a [-nasal] span. The constraint in (25) requires that if there is a fricative in the output, it is the head of a [-nasal] span. (25) is violated, for example, if a fricative is parsed into a [+nasal] span. In this thesis, a constraint of the type illustrated in (25) is referred to as a headedness constraint (a constraint that designates a head segment in the output).7 The third Span-Theoretic type of constraint, as given in (26), is an inputoutput faithfulness constraint whose function is twofold; for example, (26) states that if there is a [+nasal] segment in the input, first, its output correspondent is
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 7 One might ask whether it is possible to account for blocking effects by assuming a markedness constraint (in this case, *s~ (“No nasalized fricatives”) instead of (25). As illustrated in (28) of this section, the headedness constraint in (25) is independently necessary to express the blocking effect.
!
36!
specified as [+nasal], and second, its output correspondent is the head of a [+nasal] span. (26) FaithHeadSpan[Nasal] (FthHdSp[nasal]) (adapted from McCarthy 2004: 5) If an input segment %I is [+nasal] and it has an output correspondent %0 , then %0 is the head of an [+nasal] span. Under Span Theory, the constraint in (26) is one example of the only type of faithfulness constraint, in that this constraint evaluates the faithfulness between the input segment and its output correspondent. All other types of constraints in Span Theory are markedness constraints, and they are all output-oriented. According to McCarthy (2004: 5), (26) is violated in either one of these two instances: when an input [+nasal] segment has an output correspondent but it is the head of an oral span, or when an input [+nasal] segment has an output correspondent that is not the head of any span of the feature [nasal]. This suggests that (26) is silent with respect to a candidate in which the input [+nasal] segment is deleted in the output. Finally, there are constraints that determine the position of the head, which are referred to as directionality constraints in this thesis. (27) SpanHeadLeft[Nasal] (cf. McCarthy 2004: 12) The head segment of a [+nasal] or [-nasal] span is initial in that span. Assign one violation mark for each non-conforming span. The constraint in (27) designates the location of a head in a given span. According to McCarthy, constraints as in (27) determine the directionality of feature spreading.
!
37! (28) is a Span-Theoretic account of Johore Malay nasal harmony using the
constraints in (24) through (27). In (28) (and in tableaux where a Span-Theoretic analysis is presented), I follow McCarthy’s conventions; parentheses indicate a span, and underlining indicates the head segment in a span. (28) Span-Theoretic Analysis: /mawasa/_[ma~w~a~sa] /mawasa/ SpanHeadLeft FthHdSp Head([+Cont, [Nasal] [nasal] -Son], [-Nasal]) !a) (mawa)(sa) b) (mawasa) c) (m)(awasa) d) (bawasa) e) (maw)(asa)
*A-Span [Nasal] *
*! *!
* *(!)
*(!) *!
*
In (28), candidate (28b) ([ma~w~a~sa~ ~]) loses because of the headedness constraint for fricatives; in this candidate, the fricative undergoes nasalization and fails to function as the head of a [-nasal] span. (28c), the pronunciation of which is [mawasa], fails because of the directionality constraint since the head of the [-nasal] span (the second span) is not initial. (28d) loses because of the faithfulness constraint; in (28), the input contains a [+nasal] segment and its output correspondent should be the head of a [+nasal] span. However, in (28d), the output correspondent of the input nasal is not [+nasal] and does not head a [nasal] span. Finally, candidate (28e) loses because of Head ([+cont, -son], [-nasal]); as in (28b), the fricative [s] in this candidate does not head a [-nasal] span. Notice that a markedness constraint, *s~, which prohibits nasalizaed fricatives, can exclude candidate (28b) (in which the fricative is nasalized), but the markedness constraint fails to exclude candidate (28e) (in which the fricative
!
38!
surfaces as [-nasal]). Thus, (28) shows that the headedness constraint is independently motivated to achieve the blocking effect. In (28), the ranking Head ([+cont, -son], [-nasal]) >> *A-Span [nasal] crucially needs to be established. According to McCarthy, the ranking between the headedness constraint and the anti-adjacent span constraint predicts the blocking effect; in Johore Malay, the headedness constraint for fricatives (requiring that a fricative head a [-nasal] span) dominates the anti-adjacent span constraint, and this ranking captures the blocking effect, where a fricative blocks the spreading of nasality. As mentioned, Span Theory was originally proposed to account for consonant (nasal) harmony. However, the theory has been extended to vowel harmony, and several Span-Theoretic accounts have been proposed; these include O’Keefe’s (2005) analysis of Wolof ATR harmony and Sasa’s (2007) and Kenstowicz’s (2008) analyses of Kinande ATR harmony. A detailed presentation and discussion of the application of Span Theory to vowel harmony is given in Chapters 2 and 3 in this thesis. 1.3.2 Agreement By Correspondence (ABC) Another major recent development in the OT treatment of harmony is Agreement-By-Correspondence (ABC) as proposed by Rose and Walker (2004). The essence of this approach is summarized as a ‘similarity-driven’ account of harmony; the key claim is that output segments that are similar, or more specifically, output segments that are identical for (a) certain feature(s), stand in
!
39!
an output correspondence relation. In other words, a kind of output-output correspondence, along with input-output correspondence and other kinds of output-output correspondence, such as Base-Reduplicant (B-R) correspondence (McCarthy and Prince 1995) or trans-derivational correspondence (Benua 1997), is assumed to hold among output segments. A schematic representation of the ABC-type correspondence is presented in Figure 5.
(input)
/C V C/ !!!"! ! !!!!!!!!!!!!!![!F] " " " # I-O Correspondence (output) [C x V Cx] !!"! ! !! ! !!!!"! ! ! !!!!!!!!!!!![!F] [!F] $Corr C-C correspondence% Figure 5. Correspondence in ABC Source: Rose, Sharon and Rachel Walker (2004). A typology of consonant agreement as correspondence. Language 80. 475-531.
In Figure 5, C stands for a consonant and V stands for a vowel. In ABC, subscripts, as in C x or C y, are used to indicate that segments are in output correspondence. As seen in Figure 5, the ABC-type output-output correspondence is more similar to B-R correspondence (McCarthy and Prince 1995), rather than to trans-formational/-derivational output-output correspondence (Benua 1997); ABC correspondence evaluates the identity of segments in a single output string, rather than evaluating identity between the
!
40!
base of a paradigm and other forms that belong to the same paradigm (as is proposed in Benua 1997). Whether similar segments are in correspondence depends on the ranking of the output correspondence constraint. The constraint in (29) requires that consonants in the output that are similar in [!F] are in correspondence. (29) Corr C[!F]-C[!F] (cf. Rose and Walker 2004: 491) Let S be an output string of segments and let Ci and C j be segments that share a specified feature [!F]. If C i and C j belong to S, then C i is in a relation with C j ; that is C i and C j are in correspondence with one another. The ABC approach was originally proposed for consonant harmony, but Walker (2009) presents an application of the proposal to vowel harmony. For example, Walker (2009) proposes that the opacity and transparency observed in Menominee ATR harmony are accounted for through ABC by blocking by correspondence (BBC) and by lack of correspondence (TLC: Transparency by Lack of Correspondence), respectively. To implement the theory in the treatment of vowel harmony, Walker (2009) proposes the following ABC constraints. (30) Corr V[-lo]-V[-lo] (Walker 2009) Let S be an output string of segments and let X and Y be [-consonantal, -low] segments. If X and Y belong to S, then X and Y correspond. The role of (30) is to require that output segments that are specified as [-consonantal, -low] (that is, high and mid vowels) be in correspondence. Any candidate in which there are non-low vowels which are not in correspondence violates (30) at least once. Both Rose and Walker (2004) and Walker (2009) claim
!
41!
that the correspondence relationship is restricted to segments that are identical for a certain feature or for a certain class of features. In ABC, the fact that two (or more) segments are in correspondence does not, by itself, guarantee that the segments in correspondence are identical in other features, say, the feature [+ATR] or [-ATR]. The constraint in (31) requires that segments in correspondence for a certain feature be identical for the feature [+ATR]. (31) Ident VV [+ATR] (Id VV [+ATR]) (Walker 2009) Let X be a segment in the output and Y be a correspondent of X in the output. If X is [+ATR], then Y is [+ATR]. Walker (2009) points out, citing Hansson (2006, 2007), that the evaluation of constraints such as (31) is local; that is, when there is a string of segments, [...V1x ...V2x ...V3x ...V4x ...], the output identity constraint performs a pair-wise comparison, as #V1,V2$, #V2,V3$, and #V3,V4$. The preliminary ABC approach to harmony is presented in (32); for illustration purposes, let us assume a hypothetical language where a [+ATR] feature spreads from left to right from the initial vowel and a [-low] vowel becomes [+ATR] when after a [+ATR] vowel. (32) An ABC Approach: /i-´-ø/_[i-e-o] /i-´-ø/ Corr V[-lo]-V[lo] !a) ix ex o x b) ix ´ ø c) ix ´x o x
Id VV [+ATR]
Id I-O [ATR] **
*!* *!*
*
!
42!
In (32), there are other possible candidates from the same input, such as *[ˆ-´-ø], but I assume that there are several other mechanisms/constraints that preserve the identity of the trigger (the initial vowel), such as the initial syllable faithfulness constraint in (13) above. (32b) loses because of the output correspondence constraint; there are two [-low] vowels in this candidate that are not in correspondence with the initial vowel. (32c) loses because of the Id VV [+ATR] constraint; this candidate incurs two violations of this faithfulness constraint (one each for the [i-´] pair and for the [´-o] pair). In each pair, two vowels in correspondence are not identical with respect to the feature [+ATR] (that is, one vowel is specified as [+ATR] but the other is not). (32) shows that the ranking Corr V[-lo]-V[lo], Id VV [+ATR] >> Id I-O [ATR] accounts for the ATR harmony in this hypothetical case. Walker (2009) suggests that in order for harmony to take place, the following ranking needs to be established.
Corr V-V
Ident V-V Ident I-O
Figure 6. ABC Ranking for Harmony Source: Walker, Rachel (2009). Similarity-sensitive blocking and transparency in Menominee. Paper presented at the 83rd Annual Meeting of the Linguistic Society of America. San Francisco.
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43!
The ranking in Figure 6 shows that both the output correspondence constraint and the output identity constraint dominate the input-output faithfulness constraint. This suggests that in order for harmony to take place, it is more important that output segments be in correspondence and be identical in the feature as specified by the output identity constraint than for each output segment to be faithful to its input correspondent. Walker (2009) shows that the ABC approach, even though originally proposed to account for long-distance consonant harmony, is applicable to vowel harmony. The ABC approach to vowel harmony is further investigated in this thesis; the application of ABC to other harmony languages is presented in Chapters 2 and 4. 1.4 The Organization of the Thesis In this chapter, five approaches to vowel harmony which have been proposed in the previous literature have been discussed. Two of the approaches, feature alignment and local agreement, were eliminated as discussed in Section 1.2. Therefore, for the remainder of this thesis, three approaches, i) the feature spreading analysis, ii) Span Theory, and iii) ABC (Agreement By Correspondence) are further examined with the attested harmony data. In Chapter 2, the application and the implementation of these three approaches are presented with data from Turkish (Turkic). Chapter 3 and Chapter 4 both deal with the case study of Pulaar ATR harmony; Chapter 3 concentrates on the Span-
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Theoretic analysis of Pulaar ATR harmony and Chapter 4 is a comparison and detailed discussion of the feature linking analysis and the ABC analysis with the Pulaar ATR harmony data. In Chapter 5, backness and roundness harmony is revisited but with data from a Yakut, another Turkic language.
!
45! CHAPTER II TURKISH VOWEL HARMONY: A CASE STUDY In Chapter 1, I introduced five approaches that have been proposed to
account for vowel harmony in the OT framework. Among those five approaches, the feature alignment approach can be eliminated for theoretical reasons; it requires gradient assessment and, more crucially, it mischaracterizes the phenomenon. The analysis with local agreement is empirically inadequate in that such an approach requires some additional mechanisms to fully account for the attested vowel harmony patterns. For the remainder of this thesis, the remaining three approaches, i) feature linking, ii) the Span Theory of harmony, and iii) Agreement by Correspondence (ABC), are discussed and examined with attested vowel harmony data. The main purpose of this chapter is to present a case study of Turkish vowel harmony to show that these three approaches successfully account for the attested harmony patterns in Turkish. It is demonstrated that even though ABC and Span Theory were originally proposed to account for consonant harmony, they are able to account for vowel harmony data. 2.1 Turkish Vowel Harmony !
The vowel inventory of Turkish is presented in Table 2. The Turkish
vowel inventory is completely symmetrical; all the front vowels have a [+back] counterpart and all the unrounded vowels have a [round] counterpart.
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Table 2. Turkish Vowel Inventory [-back] [+back] non-[round] [round] non-[round] [round] [+high] i y π u [-high] e Ø a o Source: Kornfilt, Jaklin (1990). Turkish and the Turkic languages. In Bernard Comrie (ed.) The World’s Major Languages. New York: Oxford University Press. 619-644.
Turkish is known for its vowel harmony, exhibiting both backness harmony and roundness harmony; the roundness and backness specifications of the suffix vowel(s) depend on the vowel(s) in the root. The data in (1) illustrate the basic backness/roundness harmony patterns. (1) Turkish harmony (Lightner 1972: 348) Root
1st sg. Possessive
Plural
Gloss
a.
Økyz
Økyz-ym
Økyz-ler (*Økyz-lØr)
‘loaf’
b.
somun
somun-um
somun-lar (*somun-lor)
‘ox’
In (1), the vowels in the suffixes agree with the root vowels in backness; in (1a), the root vowels are both [-back] and the vowel in the suffix is also [-back]. Likewise, the suffix vowels in (1b) are both [+back] because the root vowels are [+back]. Thus, in backness harmony, the backness specifications of the suffix vowels are identical to that of the vowels in the root. The roots in (1) are harmonic since all (both) of the vowels in the root are identical in backness and roundness. In addition to the harmonic roots in (1),
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47!
there are disharmonic roots in Turkish, in which not all vowels agree in their backness specification. Examples of disharmonic roots and the treatment of such roots are discussed later in this chapter, in Section 2.5. In roundness harmony, on the other hand, there is an asymmetry in the occurrence of [+high] round vowels and [-high] round vowels. In the root, any round vowels freely co-occur, as the roots in (1a) and (1b) show. In suffixes, [+high] round vowels are observed when the root contains round vowels, as seen in the 1st sg. possessive forms. The [-high, round] vowels, on the other hand, are not observed in suffixes; for instance, in (1a), the vowel in the plural suffix is [-e] even though it is preceded by round vowels in the root. The same is observed in (1b); the suffix vowel in (1b) is [-lar] even though it is preceded by [+high, round] vowels. The data in (2) show that the suffix [-high] vowels are unrounded even if they are preceded by [-high, round] vowels in the root. (2) Turkish roundness harmony: additional data (Clements and Sezer 1982: 216) Root
Genitive
Plural
Gloss
a.
kØj
kØ-yn
kØj-ler (*kØj-lØr)
‘village’
b.
son
son-un
son-lar (*son-lor)
‘end’
Thus, (1) and (2) show that non-high round vowels are not observed in suffixes in Turkish. High round vowels, on the other hand, are observed in suffixes when the root contains a round vowel; as seen in (2a) and in (2b), the high vowel in the suffix is round even when the root vowel is non-high.
!
48! Table 3 summarizes the restrictions on the occurrence of the non-high
round suffix vowels in Turkish. Table 3. Restrictions on Roundness Harmony in Turkish
Front Vowels Back Vowels
- y-e - Ø-e - u-a - o-a
Attested y-y (both [+hi]) u-u (both [+hi])
Ø-y ([-hi]>[+hi]) o-u ([-hi]> [+hi])
Unattested *Ø-Ø (both [-hi]) *o-o (both [-hi])
*y-Ø ([+hi]>[-hi]) *u-o ([+hi]>[-hi])
To summarize the data, first, the vowels in suffixes always agree with the root vowel(s) in backness specification. In roundness harmony, on the other hand, there are restrictions; high round vowels are observed in suffixes when the root contains (a) round vowel(s). Non-high round vowels, on the other hand, may not occur in suffixes, even when the root contains (a) round vowel(s). The next three sections present the analysis of Turkish harmony; the analysis with feature linking (Spread (Padgett 1997, 2002)) is presented in Section2.2. In Section 2.3, the ABC analysis is presented, and the Span-Theoretic analysis is presented in Section 2.4. 2.2 The Feature Linking Analysis The analysis with feature linking is presented in this section. The following two constraints are used to enforce two harmony processes in Turkish. (3) Spread [back] (cf. Padgett 2002: 89) If a feature [+back] or [-back] is associated with a vowel, the same backness feature is linked to all of the vowels in a word.
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(4) is the spreading constraint for roundness harmony; in the analysis, the feature [round] is assumed to be privative. (4) Spread [round] (cf. Padgett 2002: 89) If a feature [round] is associated with a vowel, the same roundness feature is linked to all of the vowels in a word. As seen in Section 2.1, there are two harmony processes in Turkish; it is necessary to assume two harmony constraints that enforce different types of harmony.1 (3) is fully satisfied when a single [+back] or [-back] feature associated with a vowel is shared by all the vowels in a word, Likewise, (4) is fully satisfied when all the vowels in a word share the same [round] feature. In Turkish, both backness and roundness harmony are root-controlled. Thus, it is necessary to assume a mechanism that preserves the input-output identity of the trigger in the root. The positional faithfulness constraint in (5) preserves the input-output (I-O) identity of the trigger with respect to backness. (5) Ident I-O [back] (Root) (Id (root) [back]) (cf. Beckman 1997, 1998) Segments in the root have the same specification as their input correspondents for the feature [back]. The positional faithfulness constraint in (6) is also necessary to preserve the I-O identity of the trigger with respect to roundness.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! "!Padgett (2002) presents a similar analysis of Turkish with Spread [color] (instead of assuming two separate spreading constraints), making different assumptions with regard to feature organization. The consequences of this different assumption by Padgett are discussed in detail in McCarthy (2003). See also Chapter 6 for a demonstration of Spread [color].!
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50!
(6) Ident I-O [round] (Root) (Id (root) [round]) (cf. Beckman 1997, 1998) Segments in the root have the same specification as their input correspondents for the feature [round]. I assume root faithfulness rather than initial syllable faithfulness (requiring that the vowel in the first syllable of a word is identical to its input correspondent in backness/roundness) because of disharmonic roots. Initial syllable faithfulness predicts that there are no disharmonic roots, which is not the case in Turkish (An analysis of Yakut backness /roundness harmony with initial syllable faithfulness is presented in Chapter 5.) In Turkish, non-high round vowels are not observed in suffixes. The markedness constraint in (7) restricts the occurrence of [-high, round] vowels. (7) *o/Ø (cf. Kaun 1995) Non-high [round] vowels are prohibited. Finally, the following three general faithfulness constraints preserve the input-output identity of the vowels. (8) Ident I-O [high] (McCarthy and Prince 1995) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [high]. In Turkish, changing the vowel height is not attested as a means of achieving (more) complete roundness harmony. The faithfulness constraint in (8), which must dominate Spread [round], blocks such an unattested change, and preserves the input-output identity of the height specification. (9) Ident I-O [back] (Id [back]) (McCarthy and Prince 1995) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [back].
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(10) Ident I-O [round] (Id [round]) (McCarthy and Prince 1995) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [round]. The analysis for total roundness harmony is presented in (11). The actual output form is (11a), in which all of the vowels agree both in backness and roundness; the suffix high vowel becomes round because of the preceding round vowels in the root. (11) Total harmony: /somun-im/_[somun-um] /somun-im/ Id (root) Spread *o/ Spread [Round] [back] Ø [round] !a) somun-um ! [round] b) somun-im ! [round] c) samπn-πm d) somun-ym #! [round]
* *(!)**
*
*!* *!**
*
Id [round]
Id [back]
*
*
**
*
*(!)
*
Both (11b) and (11d) incur three violations for Spread [back]; in these candidates, the vowels in the root share the same backness feature [+back], but this feature misses the vowel in the suffix (one violation). A [-back] feature is associated with the suffix vowel, but this [-back] feature is not linked to the two vowels in the root (two additional violations). In addition to Spread [back], (11b) also violates Spread [round] since the [round] feature associated with the vowels in the root is not linked to the vowel in the suffix. (In (11d), on the other hand, Spread [round] is obeyed, since all the vowels share the same [round] specification.) (11c)
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satisfies the spreading constraints for roundness and backness, but this candidate fails because of the root faithfulness constraint. (11) shows the following two ranking arguments; first, the two spreading constraints dominate the two general faithfulness constraints for backness and roundness: Spread [round], Spread [back] >> Ident [back], Ident [round]; second, Ident (root) [round] dominates the markedness constraint (Ident (root) [round] >> *o/Ø). The analysis for partial harmony is presented in (12). Since the suffix contains a non-high vowel in (12), the suffix vowel surfaces as unrounded. (12) Partial harmony I: non-high target does not participate in harmony /somun-ler/ Id (root) Spread *o Spread Id Id [rd] [back] /Ø [rd] [back] [rd] ! a) somun-lar ! !!!!!!!!"$%&'()! b) somun-lor ! !!!!!!!*$%&'()! c) samπn-lar d) somun-ler [round]
*
*
**! *!* *!**
*
* *
*
*
**
*
In (12), candidate (12b) loses because of the markedness constraint for non-high round vowels; all of the candidates in (12) except for (12c) violate this markedness constraint due to the [o] in the root. However, (12b) incurs one more violation of this constraint because of the non-high round vowel in the suffix. (12c) satisfies both of the spreading constraints and the markedness constraint, but this candidate is excluded by the root faithfulness constraint. (12d)
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loses because of the spreading constraint, since this candidate is worse than the actual form under either one of the spreading constraints. (12) shows three ranking arguments. First the markedness constraint (*o/Ø) dominates the spreading constraint: *o/Ø >> Spread [round]; second, the root faithfulness constraint dominates the spreading constraint for roundness, Ident (root) [round] >> Spread [round]; and finally, Ident [high] >> Spread [round].2 (13) shows that the rankings established in (11) and (12) account for the data in which a root contains a non-high round vowel. (13) Partial harmony II: non-high target does not participate in harmony /son-ler/ Id (root) Spread *o/Ø Spread Id Id [round] [back] [round] [back] [round] ! a) son-lar ! !!!!!!!!"$%&'()! b) son-lor ! !!!!!!!*$%&'()! c) san-lar d) son-ler [round]
*
*
**! *! *!*
*
* *
*
*
*
*
Candidate (13b) loses because of the markedness constraint, and (13d) loses because of the spreading constraint for backness. (13c) satisfies both of these
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! +!In (12), there is another possible candidate, *[somun-lur], in which a height change is observed in the suffix vowel. Even though this candidate satisfies Spread [round], it is excluded by the faithfulness constraint Ident [high] (that is, the ranking Ident [high] >> Spread [round] blocks such an unattested height change).
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constraints, but this candidate is ruled out by the root faithfulness constraint. (13) shows the ranking Ident (root) [round] >> *o/Ø. Figure 7 presents the ranking summary of the spreading analysis of Turkish harmony. Ident I-O (root) [round]
Spread [back]
*0/Ø #! Spread [round] Ident I-O [back]
Ident I-O [round]
Figure 7. Ranking Lattice: Turkish/Spread
First, the ranking Spread [back], Spread [round] >> Ident I-O [round], Ident I-O [back] guarantees that harmony takes place. As seen in (11), if the ranking of these constraints is reversed, no harmony will be observed and the fully faithful candidate will be selected as optimal. Second, in Turkish, backness harmony is unrestricted; the vowel in the suffix always agrees with the root vowel(s) in backness specification. This is captured by the undominated constraint Spread [back]; that is, no markedness constraints block the spreading of the backness feature, and as long as root faithfulness is satisfied, the spreading constraint enforces backness harmony. Roundness harmony, on the other hand, is restricted, and this restriction is
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captured by the ranking *o/Ø >> Spread [round]. In other words, unlike backness harmony, the spreading of the roundness feature is restricted so as not to create any additional marked segments. As seen in this section, an analysis with Spread successfully accounts for the attested Turkish data. I demonstrated that the blocking of the spreading of [round], that is, the ‘blocking effect,’ is captured by ranking the markedness constraint above the spreading constraint. In the next section, the ABC analysis of Turkish is presented; I demonstrate how ABC accounts for the blocking effect observed in Turkish. 2.3 The ABC Analysis The second approach to harmony to be examined in this section is Agreement-By-Correspondence (ABC), as proposed by Rose and Walker (2004) and Walker (2009). The theoretical assumptions of ABC are summarized in two points. First, output segments that are similar in certain phonetic characteristic(s) can be in correspondence. Second, there is an additional family of correspondent faithfulness constraints, in addition to other standard OT faithfulness constraints (such as a family of Ident I-O constraints), that requires that the segments in correspondence be identical with respect to a feature [F]. The first assumption, that similar output segments can form a correspondence relationship, is implemented in Turkish by the following ABC constraint.
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56!
(14) Correspond V-V (Corr V-V) (cf. Rose and Walker 2004: 491) Let S be an output string of segments and let X and Y be [-consonantal]. If X and Y belong to S, then X and Y correspond. (14) requires that segments that are similar, in that they are identical in the feature [-consonantal] (that is, vowels), are in correspondence. (14) is violated when a vowel is not in correspondence with other vowels in the output. In ABC, whether segments in an output string are in correspondence depends on the ranking of the correspond constraints, as in (14). In the analysis that follows, I use subscripts (Vx ...Vx ) to show that vowels are in correspondence. (That is, vowels with same subscript are in correspondence.) In ABC, the mere fact that two or more vowels are in correspondence does not guarantee that these vowels are identical in the feature [F]. There is another ABC mechanism, more specifically, family of output correspondent faithfulness constraints, that requires that the vowels (or segments) in correspondence be identical in the feature [F]. The following two output identity constraints require that vowels in correspondence are identical in backness and roundness. (15) Ident VV [round] (Id VV [round]) (cf. Rose and Walker 2004: 492, Walker 2009) Let X be a segment in the output and Y be a correspondent of X. If X is [round], then Y is [round]. As stated, even if X and Y are in correspondence (and X and Y are vowels), this alone does not guarantee that both X and Y are realized (or surface) with identical [round] features. So, for example, if (15) dominates the input-output
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faithfulness constraint, Ident [round], then it is predicted that harmony is possible. If, on the other hand, (15) is dominated by the input-output faithfulness constraint for roundness, then it is predicted that harmony will not take place. (16) is another output correspondent faithfulness constraint requiring that output correspondents be identical with respect to the feature [back]. (16) Ident VV [back] (Id VV [back]) (cf. Rose and Walker 2004: 492, Walker 2009) Let X be a segment in the output and Y be a correspondent of X. If X is [+back], then Y is [+back]. If X is [-back], then Y is [-back]. In addition to the ABC constraints listed in (14) through (16), the following OT constraints, which were introduced in the spreading analysis above, are also necessary for an ABC analysis; they are listed under (17), and they are repeated from the previous section. (17)
a.
Ident I-O [high] Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [high].
b.
Ident I-O [round] (root) (Id (root) [round]) Correspondent input and output segments in the root have the same specification for the feature [round].
c.
Ident I-O [back] (root) (Id (root) [back]) Correspondent input and output segments in the root have the same specification for the feature [back].
d.
Ident I-O [round] (Id [round]) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [round].
e.
Ident I-O [back] (Id [back]) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [back].
!
58! f.
*o/Ø Non-high [round] vowels are prohibited.
The ABC analysis for the total harmony is presented in (18).3 (18) Total harmony 1: Trigger and target both [+high] /somun-im/ Id (root) Corr V-V Id VV [round] [round] !a) so x mux n-ux m b) so x mux n-im c) sax mπx n-πx m d) so x mux n-πx m
Id [round]
Id [back]
*
*
**
*
*! *!* *!
In candidate (18a), all the vowels are in correspondence and thus, Corr VV is satisfied. All the vowels in (18c) are also in correspondence, but this candidate loses because of the root faithfulness constraint. (18b) violates Corr VV because in this candidate, not all vowels are in correspondence. (18d) satisfies the correspondence constraint, but this candidate is ruled out because of the Ident VV [round] constraint; in (18d), not all the vowels in correspondence are identical in the feature [round]. (18) shows that Corr V-V dominates the general faithfulness constraint for [round] (Corr VV >> Ident I-O [round]), and the correspondent identity constraint is ranked above the I-O faithfulness constraint for the roundness feature (Ident VV [round] >> Ident [round]). The analysis for partial harmony is presented in (19). In (19), I assume the ranking Ident (root) [round] >> *o/Ø, as established in the spreading analysis; if !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ,!In (18), there is another possible candidate, *[so mu n-u m], in which all the x x x vowels are in correspondence but not all vowels are identical in backness. Such a candidate, however, is excluded by another output identity constraint, Ident VV [back], which is not included in (18) due to space limitations. !
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the ranking of these two constraints is reversed, it is predicted that [-high, r0und] vowels are not observed in the root, which is incorrect in Turkish. (This ranking is established in (20) below.) (19) Partial harmony I: Non-high vowel in the suffix /somun-ler/ Id(root) Corr *o/ IdVV Id VV [rd] V-V Ø [Rd] [back] !a) so x mux n-lax r b) so x mux n-lo x r c) so x mux n-ler d) so x mux n-lex r
*!
* **! * *
Id [round]
Id [back]
*
* *
*
*
*!
In (19), all the candidates satisfy the Corr V-V constraint except for (19c), in which the vowel in the suffix is not in correspondence with other vowels. Among the remaining candidates, (19b) loses because of the markedness constraint, and (19d) loses because of the output identity constraint for backness. (19) shows that the markedness constraint dominates the output identity constraint for roundness: *o/Ø >> Ident VV [round].4 Finally, (20) is the analysis of a case where there is a non-high round vowel in the root; candidate (20c) satisfies the markedness constraint, but this candidate violates the positional faithfulness constraint for the root. (20b) is worse than (20a) with respect to the markedness constraint. Between the !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! -!In (19), there are more possible candidates from the same input; for example, such candidates as *[sax mπx n-lax r] or *[sex mix n-lex r]. These candidates satisfy all the output identity constraints and the markedness constraint. However, such candidates are excluded by the undominated positional faithfulness constraint for the root. Another logically possible candidate in (19) is *[so x mux n-lo x r], in which the suffix vowel changes to [+high]. However, the undominated height faithfulness constraint excludes such a candidate. !
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remaining candidates, (20a), the actual form, and (20d), Ident VV [back] selects the actual form. (20) shows that the root faithfulness constraint needs to dominate the markedness constraint: Ident (root) [round] >> *o/Ø. (20) Partial harmony III: Non-high vowel in the root /son-ler/ Id(root) Corr *o/ IdVV Id VV [rd] V-V Ø [Rd] [back] !a) so x n-lax r b) so x -lo x r c) sax n-lax r d) so x n-lex r
* **! *! *
Id [round]
Id [back]
*
* * *
* * *
*!
Figure 8 presents a summary of the analysis.
Ident (root) [round]
Corr V-V
*o/Ø Ident VV [round], Ident VV [back] Ident I-O [round]
Ident I-O [back]
Figure 8. Ranking Lattice: Turkish/ABC
The ranking lattice presented as Figure 8 shows the following two points; first, the ranking in Turkish follows Walker’s (2009) claim that in order for harmony to take place, the output identity constraint needs to dominate the input-output identity constraint(s). As seen in Figure 8, the Turkish ranking Ident VV [round] >> Ident I-O [round], for example, is analogous to Walker’s claim.
!
61! Second, the ranking *o/Ø >> Ident VV [round] is analogous to the ranking
from the analysis with Spread, that is, *o/Ø >> Spread [round]. In the last section, I suggested that the constraint enforcing harmony needs to be dominated by the markedness constraint to capture the blocking effect in Turkish. In ABC, the output identity constraint enforces harmony, by requiring correspondent vowels to be identical in a certain feature; as seen in (19), the output identity constraint is dominated by the markedness constraint. Thus, the blocking effect is expressed in a similar fashion in the spreading analysis and in the ABC analysis; it is expressed by the ranking between the markedness constraint and the harmony constraint. In both analyses, the markedness constraint and its ranking play a role in expressing the blocking effect. In the next section, the third approach to harmony, Span Theory, is discussed. I demonstrate that Span Theory is also capable of handling the Turkish data, and it employs a similar mechanism to explain the blocking effect. 2.4 The Span-Theoretic Analysis The Span Theory of harmony was originally proposed by McCarthy (2004) to account for the consonant (nasal) harmony in Johore Malay (Onn 1976), where the harmony feature, [nasal], is binary. Sasa (2008) proposes the application of Span Theory to vowel harmony, where some of the harmony features are assumed to be privative, and suggests that some of the SpanTheoretic mechanisms need to be revised so that the theory is applicable to harmony with the assumption of privative features.
!
62! The organization of this section is as follows; in Section 2.4.1, the Span-
Theoretic mechanisms are introduced, and in the following section, the analysis of Turkish roundness harmony is presented with the Span-Theoretic mechanisms. 2.4.1 Span-Theoretic Constraints As stated in Chapter 1, the original proposal of Span Theory is characterized by the following two assumptions; first, all segments are exhaustively parsed into spans. Second, each span contains a head which determines the actual pronunciation of the segments in a given span. For example, in nasal harmony in Johore Malay, nasality spreads to the right from a [+nasal] segment, and vowels, glides, and liquids undergo nasal harmony. However, fricatives do not participate in harmony; they block the spreading of the [+nasal] feature. Thus, the input /mawasa/ surfaces as [ma~w~a~sa], where the nasality from the initial nasal spreads to the following vowels and glide, but the fricative [s] blocks spreading. In the Span-Theoretic representation, the actual form is represented as [(mawa)(sa)]. Parentheses are used to indicate a span, and underlining indicates a head segment. Thus, in the notation [(mawa)], [m],[a],[w], and [a] are in a single span, and the underlined segment [m] is the head of this span. In this example, [(mawa)(sa)], there are two spans that differ in nasality. The first (left) span is a [+nasal] span since the [+nasal] sound, that is [m], is designated as the head of the span, and all the segments in this span agree with
!
63!
the head in the feature [+nasal]. Thus, the vowels and the glide in this span are all realized as [+nasal], surfacing as [a~w~a~]. Likewise, in the second, or the right, span, where the head of the span is designated as [s], the sounds in this span are realized as [-nasal] (thus, [sa]). The original proposal of Span Theory requires that all the segments are exhaustively parsed into (a) span(s), and all the segments in a span share the same feature with the head, or agree with the head for a certain feature (such as [$nasal]). In order to enforce harmony, or more specifically, to force all the segments in a certain domain into a single span, McCarthy (2004) proposes the following Span-Theoretic constraint. (21) !*A-Span [nasal] (McCarthy 2004: 7) Assign one violation mark for every pair of adjacent spans of the feature [nasal]. (21) is satisfied when all the segments in a harmony domain are exhaustively parsed into a single [+nasal] or [-nasal] span. For example, [(mawasa)] (=[ma~w~a~s~a~]) or [bawasa] (=[bawasa])) satisfies (21) while [(mawa)(sa)] incurs one violation of (26) for the pair of adjacent spans observed in this representation. If these proposals are applied in Turkish roundness harmony, the SpanTheoretic representation of the form [somun-lar] is [(somun)(-lar)]. In this representation, there are two spans, which differ in roundness; in the first, or the left span, the head is the high [round] vowel [u] and another high vowel following the head in the same span, [u], shares a [round] specification with the head segment. The vowel in the suffix, that is, the vowel [a], is also parsed into a
!
64!
span, since parsing of the segments is assumed to be exhaustive; GEN does not create a candidate with a segment that is not parsed into a span. However, if the feature [round] is assumed to be privative, two questions arise; first, what motivates unrounded vowels (which lacks the feature [round]) to form a span? Second, what causes the violation of the constraint in (21) when there are two spans that differ in roundness? To examine these two questions, let us consider two candidates, [(somun-um)] and *[(somun)(-πm)]. In Turkish, the occurrence of high [round] vowels in suffixes is unrestricted; the first form is the attested form. According to Steriade (1995: 148), “the absence [of a feature] cannot spread and repeated absence does not violate the OCP...” In the unattested form, *[(somun)(-πm)], it is clear that in the first (left) span, two vowels share the feature [round]; they agree with each other in the feature [round]. However, in the second (right) span, it is not clear what motivates the unrounded vowel to form its own span because if privative [round] is assumed, unrounded vowels are specified as ‘zero round,’ and as pointed out by Steriade, zero cannot spread or be shared. Therefore, under the assumption of privative [round], it is not clear how a span is assigned to unrounded vowels. Second, even granting that unrounded vowels can form their own span, the constraint in (21) fails to enforce harmony. In the competition between [(somun-um)] and *[(somun)(-πm)], these candidates equally satisfy the
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constraint in (21), since even in *[(somun)(-πm)], where the second span lacks the [round] feature, there are no adjacent [round] spans.
Table 4. The Evaluation by the Original *A-Span [round] /somun-πm/ a) (somun-um) (total harmony: attested) b) (somun)(-πm) (partial harmony: unattested)
*A-Span [round] " "
The form (a) in Table 4 satisfies the anti-adjacent span constraint for the feature [round]; in this form, all the vowels are parsed into a single [round] span. (b) also satisfies this constraint. In this form, there are two adjacent spans but they are not adjacent spans of the feature [round]; the span (somun) is a [round] span but the span (πm) lacks the feature [round]. (In effect, there is a zero span.) Therefore, the forms in Table 4 tie under the original *A-Span [round] constraint, and as a result, *A-Span [round] fails to favor total harmony over partial harmony. Sasa (2008) suggests a revision of one of the assumptions in Span Theory as an answer to this question, and proposes, first, that the assumption that segment parsing is exhaustive needs to be revised; that is, GEN should allow candidates where there are unparsed segments. More specifically, let us assume that in roundness harmony, round vowels are parsed into a [round] span while unrounded vowels are not parsed into any span. (22) presents the proposed output forms for [somun-lar] and *[somun-πm].
!
66!
(22) The output representations for [somun-lar] and *[somun-πm] a) [somun-lar] = [(somun)-lar] (the unrounded vowel [a] is unparsed) b) *[somun-πm] = [(somun)-πm] (the unrounded vowel [π] is unparsed) Second, let us assume that it is a property of CON whether a candidate with exhaustive segment parsing wins or not. We can assume that the constraint in (23), which can be ranked and violable in a grammar, is a replacement of antiadjacent span constraints such as the one listed in (21). (23) Segment Parse [F] (S-Parse [F]) There exists a single span for all vowels such that all the vowels in a domain are parsed into it. (Definition: !(x)"(y) (Vy _Pxy)) Table 5 illustrates the violation and satisfaction of the constraint in (23). As seen in (23), this S-Parse constraint prefers a candidate in which all of the segments are exhaustively parsed into a single span. Thus, this constraint enforces (full) harmony and replaces McCarthy’s original Span-Theoretic constraint *A-Span.
Table 5. Satisfaction and Violation of S-Parse a) [(V V V)] (total harmony) satisfied - All of the vowels are parsed into a single span. b) [V V V] (no span) violated once - The statement in (30) is false because there is no span. c) [(V) V V] (partial harmony) violated once - There is one span but this span does not contain all of the vowels. d) [(V) V (V)] (two non-exhaustive spans) violated twice - There are two spans, neither of which contains all the vowels.
!
67! In (23), the feature [F] can be any feature in harmony. Thus, for example,
in roundness harmony, the relevant feature is [round]. In backness harmony, the relevant feature is [back]. In accounting for roundness harmony, the S-Parse constraint in (24) enforces total rounding harmony. (24) S-Parse [round] There exists a single [round] span for all vowels such that all the vowels in a domain are parsed into it. In addition to the harmony constraint in (24), the following constraints are necessary to account for the Turkish roundness harmony data. First, it is necessary to assume a faithfulness constraint that maintains the input-output identity of the output head segment, as given in (25). (25) HeadFaith [round] The output head segment is identical to its input correspondent with respect to the feature [round]. The constraint in (25) is a revision of McCarthy’s original FaithHead constraint (FaithHead [#F]: “If an input segment SI is [#F] and it has an output correspondent So, then So is a head of an [#F] span” (McCarthy 2004: 5)). The role of the constraint in (25) is to guarantee that an output head segment (which is determined by other Span-Theoretic mechanisms) is identical to its input correspondent in the roundness feature. Thus, for example, if an output head segment is specified as [round] and its input correspondent is also specified as [round], then (25) is satisfied. On the other hand, if an output head segment is specified as [round] but its input correspondent is not specified as [round], or
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68!
when an output head segment is not specified as [round], but its input correspondent is [round], then this head faithfulness constraint is violated. The directionality of roundness harmony in Turkish is rightward. Thus, a directionality constraint which designates the leftmost vowel in a span as a head is also necessary. (26) SpanHead [round]-L (Span Head-L) (cf. McCarthy 2004: 4) The head of a [round] span is initial in that span. In addition to the Span-Theoretic constraints introduced thus far, the following OT constraints also play a crucial role in accounting for the roundness harmony in Turkish; they are listed in (27). (27)
a.
Ident I-O [round] (root) (Id (root) [round]) Correspondent input and output segments in the root have the same specification for the feature [round].
b.
Ident I-O [back] (root) (Id (root) [back]) Correspondent input and output segments in the root have the same specification for the feature [back].
c.
Ident I-O [round] (Id [round]) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [round].
d.
Ident I-O [back] (Id [back]) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [back].
e.
*o/Ø Non-high [round] vowels are prohibited.
The positional faithfulness constraints in (27a) and (27b) guarantee the rootcontrolled pattern. As will be demonstrated, both the directionality constraint in
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69!
(26) and the positional faithfulness constraints are required to capture the rootcontrolled pattern observed in Turkish. 2.4.2 The Analysis First, the tableau in (28) shows the analysis of total roundness harmony. (28) Total harmony Id (root) .somun-πm.! [rd] !a) (somun-um)! b) (somun)-πm c) samπn-πm d) (somun-um)
!
Head Faith [rd]
Span Head-L
*o/ Ø
S-Parse [rd]
Id [Rd]
!
!
/! *
! *! *
/!
*!* *(!)
*(!)
** *
*
In (28), candidate (28d) loses because of either the head faith constraint or the directionality constraint; in (28d), the head of the [r0und] span is not the initial vowel in a word, and the roundness specification of the head segment in the output is not identical to its input correspondent. (28c) violates the root faithfulness constraint. The remaining two candidates tie under the markedness constraint, and the segment parsing constraint prefers (28a), the actual form; in (28a), a single span contains all the vowels while in (28d), there is a span but not all the vowels are parsed into this span exhaustively. (28) motivates the ranking Ident [round] (root) >> *o/Ø >> Ident [round]. The analysis of the non-high vowel blocking is shown in (29). (29) Non-high vowel in the suffix I Id (root) Head Faith .somun-lar.! [rd] [rd] !a) (somun)-lar! b) (somun-lor) c) samπn-lar
! ! /0/!
! ! !
Span Head-L
*o/ Ø
S-Parse [rd]
Id [Rd]
! ! !
/! //0! !
/! ! /!
! /! //!
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70!
Candidate (29c) violates the root faithfulness constraint. The remaining two candidates satisfy both the directionality constraint and the head faithfulness constraint. In (29), the markedness constraint is the tie-breaker; *o/Ø prefers the actual form in (29a) to its competitor, which contains a non-high round vowel in the suffix. (29) shows that the markedness constraint dominates the segment parsing constraint: *o/Ø >> S-Parse [round]. (30) gives an additional analysis of the same pattern, but in (30), there is a non-high round vowel in the suffix in the input. This tableau shows that the ranking established in (29) predicts the same pattern even when the input is different. (30) Non-high vowel in the suffix II Id (root) Head Faith .somun-lor.! [rd] [rd] !a) (somun)-lar! b) (somun-lor) c) samπn-lar d) (somun-lor)
! ! /0/! !
Span Head-L
*o/ Ø
S-Parse [rd]
Id [Rd]
! ! ! /0!
/! //0! ! //!
/! ! /! !
/! ! ///! !
! ! ! !
In (30), the positional faithfulness constraint rules out (30c), and (30b) loses because of the markedness constraint. Candidate (30d) satisfies both the root faithfulness constraint and the head faithfulness constraint; in (30d), the head of the [round] span is identical to its input correspondent in the roundness specification. However, this candidate is excluded because of the directionality constraint. As a result, the actual form in (30a) is selected even when there is a non-high round vowel in the suffix in the input.
!
71! Finally, in (31), both of the vowels are non-high in the root and in the
suffix. (31) Non-high vowel in the suffix III Id (root) Head Faith .son-lar.! [rd] [rd] ! ! /0!
!a) (son)-lar! b) (son-lor) c) san-lar
Span Head-L
*o/ Ø
S-Parse [rd]
Id [Rd]
! ! !
/! //0! !
/! ! /!
! /! /!
! ! !
(31c) loses because of the root faithfulness constraint. (31) shows that the ranking *o/Ø >> S-Parse [round] successfully selects the attested form in (31a) over (31b). The ranking summary for the Span-Theoretic analysis is given in Figure 9.
Ident (root) [round]
SpanHead-R
Head Faith [round]
*o/Ø S-Parse [round] Ident [round] Figure 9. Ranking Lattice: Turkish/Span Theory Figure 9 shows that the blocking effect is expressed in a similar way as in the feature linking and in the ABC analyses; the ranking *o/Ø >> S-Parse [round] is analogous to the ranking in which the markedness constraint dominates the harmony constraint (Spread in the feature linking analysis, and Ident VV [round] in the ABC analysis).
!
72! To summarize, as far as roundness harmony is concerned, Span Theory is
capable of predicting the attested patterns in Turkish, as the other approaches do. However, as mentioned, in Turkish, there is not only roundness harmony but also backness harmony. In the next section, I present a Span-Theoretic treatment of both backness and roundness harmony. 2.5 Discussion 2.5.1 Accounting for Two Harmony Processes Thus far, I have demonstrated that all three approaches examined in this chapter successfully predict the attested patterns in roundness harmony. It has been also shown that both the feature linking analysis and the ABC analysis successfully account for both roundness harmony and backness harmony. However, the Span-Theoretic mechanisms established in the previous section are not sufficient to account for both of the harmony processes. This is illustrated in (32), where the faithfulness constraints for backness are included instead of those for roundness. (In (32) and subsequent tableaux, the figure ! designates an actual surface form which, however, loses in a competition. A bomb (") designates a candidate which is incorrectly selected as a winner.) (32) Roundness AND backness harmony Id (root) Head Faith .son-ler.! [back] [round] !a) (son)-lar! b) (son-lor) "c) (son)-ler
! ! !
! ! !
Span Head-L
*o /Ø
S-Parse [round]
Id [back]
! ! !
/! //0! /!
/! ! /!
/0! /! !
!
73!
(32b) loses because of the markedness constraint *o/Ø, even though segment parsing in this candidate is exhaustive. The difference between the remaining candidates is that (32a) contains a [+back] vowel in the suffix, while in (32c), the suffix vowel is [-back]. These two candidates tie under the segment parsing constraint, for in both of the candidates, the span does not contain all the vowels. The faithfulness constraint, then, prefers (32c) to (32a). As a result, the mechanism established thus far fails to account for backness harmony. I suggest that this problem in (32) can be resolved if we assume multiple spans, as illustrated in (33). (33) Multiple span representations: candidate (32a) and (32c) in (32) (32a)
((son)r-lar)b
(32c)
((son)r)b-ler
In (33) and throughout, the subscript r is used to indicate a [round] span and b is used to indicate a [+back] span. The representation in (32a) indicates that the [+back] span contains both the root vowel and the suffix vowel. Therefore, both of the vowels are [+back]. The [round] span, however, does not contain the suffix vowel. (32c), on the other hand, indicates that neither the backness span nor the [round] span contains the suffix vowel. As a result, the suffix vowel is not identical to the root vowel either in backness or in roundness. However, a question arises; is it possible to assume representations such as (32a)? McCarthy claims that GEN does not create overlapping spans, and one might claim that both in (32a) and in (32b), two spans, one for roundness and the
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other for backness, are overlapping. It is true that McCarthy assumes that overlapping spans of the same distinctive feature are not allowed. At the same time, however, McCarthy (2004:3) also claims that “there are different spans for each distinctive feature,” which suggests that the representations presented in (32a) are possible in Span Theory; there are two spans in (32a) and in (32b), but these spans are for different features. Therefore, I assume that the representations as in (32a) are permissible in Span Theory, and the SpanTheoretic constraint in (34) enforces complete backness harmony in Turkish. (34) S-Parse [back] There exists a single [$back] span for all vowels such that contains all the vowels in a domain are parsed into it. (35) illustrates the analysis incorporating (34). (In (35) and subsequent tableaux, the figure # designates an actual surface form that wins as a result of introducing new constraints or mechanisms (that is, problem solved).) (35) Roundness AND backness harmony S-Parse Head Faith .son-ler.! [back] [rd]
Span Head-L
*o /Ø
S-Parse [rd]
Id [back]
#a) ((son)r-lar)b! ! ! ! /! /! /0! b) ((son-lor))rb ! ! ! //0! ! /! c) ((son)r)b(-ler)b /0/! ! ! /! /! ! (In (35), the root faithfulness constraint is not included due to space limitations.) In (35b), two spans completely overlap, and thus, this candidate satisfies both of the segment parsing constraints. However, this candidate is excluded because of the markedness constraint *o/Ø. (35c) violates the segment parsing constraint because there are two backness spans that do not contain all the vowels. (35a), in
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which all the vowels are exhaustively parsed into a single [+back] span, satisfies *S-Parse [back]. Thus, Span Theory is capable of accounting for both backness and roundness harmony in Turkish. Let us now turn to a discussion of disharmonic roots, which is presented in the next section. 2.5.2 Disharmonic Roots In Turkish, there are disharmonic roots, in which not all of the vowels agree in backness. Examples of disharmonic roots are given in (36). (36) Disharmonic Roots (Clements and Sezer 1982: 223, Kirchner 1993: 2) a. kudret
‘power’
b. anne
‘mother’
c. fiat
‘price’
d. mezat
‘auction’
In (36a) and (36b), the vowel in the first syllable of the word is [+back], but the vowel in the second syllable is [-back]. In (36c) and (36d), the vowel in the first syllable is [-back] while the following vowel is [+back]. According to Kirchner (1993), the vowels in suffixes agree with the last vowel in the root when they are attached to a disharmonic root. That is, when a suffix is attached to the root in (36a) and (36b), the suffix vowel is [-back]. The suffix vowel is [+back] when a suffix is attached to a root in (36c) and in (36d). The existence of the disharmonic roots does not affect the analysis of Turkish presented thus far; the Span-Theoretic analysis is presented in (37).
!
76!
(37) The Span-Theoretic analysis /kudret-a/ Id (root) [back] !a) ((ku))rb(dret-e) b b) ((ku))rb(dre) b(ta) b c) ((ku)rdra-ta) b d) (kπdrata) b
*! *!
S-parse [back]
S-parse [round]
Id [back]
** ***!
* * *
* * **
Candidates (37c) and (37d) satisfy the segment parsing constraint for backness; in these candidates, all the vowels are parsed into a single [+back] span. However, these candidates lose because of the root faithfulness constraint. The fully faithful candidate in (37b) incurs more violations of S-Parse [back] than the actual form in (37a); there are two non-exhaustive backness spans in (37a), while (37b) contains three non-exhaustive backness spans. Thus, the ranking Ident (root) [back] >> SParse [back] selects the attested form in the Span-Theoretic analysis. The analysis with Spread [back] is presented in (38). In (38), (38c) loses because of the high-ranked positional faithfulness constraint for the root. Under the spreading constraint (38a), the actual form, is preferred to (38b); (38a) incurs three violations for Spread [back]: two violations for the [+back] feature of the initial vowel missing two following vowels (two violations) and the [-back] feature missing the initial vowel (one violation). (38b) incurs six violations for this spreading constraint; each backness feature fails to link to two vowels, which gives rise to six violations (3 features x 2 unlinked vowels). Thus, (38) shows that the ranking presented in (16) accounts for the harmony pattern when a suffix is attached to a disharmonic root.
!
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(38) Disharmonic root: /kudret-a/_[kudret-e] /kudret-a/ Id [back] (root) Spread [back] !a) k u dret-e # [+back] [-back] b) kudret-a #!!!!!!#!!!!#! *+bk] [-bk][+bk] c) kurat-a
***
Id [back] *
****!**
*!
[+back]
*
Finally, the ABC analysis of disharmonic roots is presented in (39). (39) Disharmonic roots: ABC Analysis /kudret-a/ Id [back] Corr V-V (root) !a) kux drex t-ex b) kux drex t-ax c) kux drax t-ax d) kux dret-ax
Id VV [back]
Id [back]
* **!
*
*!
* *!
(39c) loses because of the root faithfulness constraint, and (39d) loses because of the correspondence constraint; in this candidate, the medial vowel [e] is not in correspondence with the other vowels. The Ident VV [back] constraint favors (39a), the actual form, over its competitor (39b). (39a) violates this output identity constraint once for the [ux ...ex ] pair. (39b), on the other hand, incurs two violations for this identity constraint for the [ux ...ex ] pair and the [ex ...ax ] pair. Hence, the actual form (39a) better satisfies Ident VV [round] and as a result, this candidate is selected as optimal.
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78! 2.5.3 Summary of the Chapter As seen in this chapter, all three of the approaches considered, feature
linking, Span Theory, and ABC, successfully account for the attested harmony patterns in Turkish. This suggests that both Span Theory and ABC are the possible ways to account for vowel harmony, even though these two approaches were originally proposed to account for consonant harmony. Then, the next question is whether all of these approaches can successfully account for other harmony patterns. To investigate this question, another case study, but with data from Pulaar ATR harmony, is presented in the following two chapters. Both spreading and ABC are able to correctly account for the attested backness and harmony patterns observed in Turkish. As seen in this chapter, no revision or modification is necessary for these approaches. The comparison between these two approaches is also discussed in Chapter 4 and 5. Span Theory is also capable of accounting for the Turkish pattern, but as I showed in this chapter, some revisions of the theory are necessary to achieve this result. The main focus of Chapter 3 is an examination of Pulaar ATR harmony in Span Theory. The same revised mechanisms are assumed in presenting the analysis of Pulaar ATR harmony. I will show, however, that Span Theory encounters a problem when it is applied in Pulaar ATR harmony.
!
79! CHAPTER III HARMONY PATHOLOGIES: SOUR GRAPES IN PULAAR ATR HARMONY In Chapter 2, I demonstrated that three approaches, feature linking, Span
Theory, and ABC, successfully account for the data from Turkish backness and roundness harmony. The main purpose of this chapter and the next chapter is to investigate whether these three approaches account for a different type of harmony, that is, data from Pulaar (Niger-Congo) ATR1 harmony; this chapter concentrates on the Span-Theoretic treatment of Pulaar ATR harmony. I present the Span-Theoretic account of Pulaar with emphasis on directionality and harmony pathologies. The data from Pulaar ATR harmony are difficult to handle because of two empirical problems: directionality and Sour Grapes. The latter, Sour Grapes, pointed out by Padgett (1997), has come to the attention of those investigating vowel or consonant harmony. It is included as one of the harmony pathologies discussed by Wilson (2006). The term ‘harmony pathology’ "#$#"%!to a situation in which unwanted or unwelcomed harmony patterns are predicted by the constraints and/or ranking permutations in Optimality Theory. In this chapter, the directionality problem and the Sour Grapes problem are illustrated with data from Pulaar ATR harmony.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1 Advanced Tongue Root (Ladefoged 1964, Lindau 1975)
!
80! The organization of this chapter is as follows; in Section 3.1, the Pulaar
ATR data are presented. In Section 3.2, the Sour Grapes and directionality problems are illustrated using data from Pulaar. The Span-Theoretic analysis of Pulaar ATR harmony is presented in Sections 3.3 and 3.4. 2 3.1 Pulaar Data Pulaar (also known as Fula or Fulfulde) is a Niger-Congo language spoken in Senegal, Gambia, (east) Nigeria and (west) Cameroon (McIntosh 1984: 1). Pulaar is known for its [ATR] harmony, where the rightmost vowel (the vowel in the last syllable) determines the [ATR] specification of the other vowels in a word. The vowel inventory of Pulaar is presented in Table 6.
Table 6. Pulaar Vowel Inventory Front ([-back]) i e ´
Back ([+back]) High [+ATR] u Mid [+ATR] o ø [-ATR] Low [-ATR] a Source: Paradis, Carole (1992). Lexical Phonology and Morphology: The Nominal Classes in Fula. New York: Garland Publishing, Inc.
In Table 6, and in the explanation of the data, I employ the labels [+ATR] and [ATR]. However, the use of a binary feature is solely for explanatory purposes.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 2 The same problems with Span Theory are also discussed in Finley (2008), but in a different fashion (that is, not with data from Pulaar (or from any other natural language)).
!
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The issue of [ATR] privativity or binarity is discussed later in this chapter (where the Span-Theoretic analyses are presented) and in Chapter 4. As seen in the inventory in Table 6, in Pulaar, high vowels are always [+ATR]; in addition, there are no [+ATR] low vowels in the inventory. Only mid vowels change their ATR specification depending on the [ATR] specification of the following vowel. Pulaar ATR harmony exhibits two patterns: leftward directionality and low vowel opacity. The full analysis of Pulaar ATR harmony, including the analysis of opacity, is presented in Chapter 4. In this chapter, I concentrate on the analysis of leftward directionality. The data in (1) show the basic harmony pattern. (In the presentation of the data, I follow the transcription system which is employed in Paradis (1992) except for long vowels, for which I use the long vowel diacritic instead.) In each form in (1), a root is followed by different suffixes in the +ATR form and in the -ATR form. (1) Basic [ATR] Harmony Pattern in Pulaar (Total Leftward) (Paradis 1992: 87) ! ! &ATR form -ATR form Gloss a.
ser-du
s´r-øn
‘rifle butt-sg.’ / ‘rifle buttdim.pl.’
b.
pe…c-i
p´…c-øn
‘slits-class’ / ‘slits-dim.pl.’
c.
dog-o…-ru
døg-ø-wøn
'runner-ag.nom.-class’ / ‘runnernom.-dim.pl.’
In (1), in both the +ATR and -ATR forms, all the vowels in a word exhibit the same [ATR] specification. The ATR specification of the vowel(s) in the root or in
!
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the medial suffix (as in (1c)) depends on the ATR specification of the vowel in the word-final suffix; in +ATR forms, since the vowel in the word-final suffix contains a [+ATR] vowel, all the vowels in a word surface as [+ATR]. Likewise, in -ATR forms, all the vowels in a word surface as [-ATR] because of the [-ATR] vowel in the word-final suffix. In addition to total harmony, partial harmony is also observed in Pulaar. The examples in (2) illustrate the partial leftward harmony pattern. (2) Leftward Directionality 1 (Paradis 1992: 87) !
!
-ATR form
+ATR form
a.
ı´t-d´
ıet-ir-d´ '()!*#+,-.!/!'()!*#+,-!*+(-.! (*ı´t-ir-d´, *ıet-ir-de)
b.
h´l-d´
hel-ir-d´ ‘to break’ / ‘to break with’ (*h´l-ir-d´, *hel-ir-de)
c.
àøkk-ø
àokk-ià-à´ ‘one-eyed person’/’to become one-eyed’ (*àøkk-ià-à´,* àokk-ià-àe)
d.
f´y’y’-a
fey’y’-u-d´ ‘to fell (imperfect)’/’to fell’ (*f´y’y’-u-d´, *fey’y’-u-de)
!
Gloss
In (2), there are high [+ATR] vowels word-medially, and these high vowels affect the ATR specification of the preceding mid vowel.3 In -ATR forms, a root is followed by a suffix that contains a [-ATR] vowel, while in the [+ATR] forms, a root is followed by two suffixes. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 3 In the data in (2), the symbol y’ represents a voiced palatal implosive (Paradis 1992: 103).
!
83! The root vowel in the +ATR forms surfaces as [+ATR] because of the
[+ATR] vowel in the medial suffix (/-ir-/ in (2a) and (2b), /-id-/ in (2c), and /-u-/ in (2d)). However, the [+ATR] vowel in the medial suffix does not change the [ATR] specification of the vowel in the word-final suffix; in (2), the word-final suffix contains a [-ATR] vowel. Thus, (2) shows that directionality of ATR harmony is only leftward, and the medial vowel, which is specified as [+ATR], does not affect the ATR specification of the vowel in the word-final suffix. Another set of examples illustrating leftward directionality in Pulaar is presented in (3); in (3), the trigger of harmony is the final vowel of the word. (3) Leftward Directionality 2 (Paradis 1992: 94, 218) ! a. binnd-ø…-wø (*binnd-o…-wo, *binnd-o…-wø)
‘writer’
b.
baro…-di
(*barø…-di)
‘lion’
c.
baro-gel
(*barø-g´l, *barø-gel)
‘lion-dim’!
!
In (3), the word-medial mid vowel agrees with the following vowel in [ATR] specification; in (3a), for example, the word-medial mid vowel surfaces as [-ATR] because the vowel in the word-final suffix contains a [-ATR] vowel. Likewise, the mid vowels in (3b) and (3c) surface as [+ATR] because the following vowel is specified as [+ATR]. In all of the forms in (3), the preceding vowel does not affect the [ATR] specification of the medial mid vowel. Thus, the examples in (3) also show leftward directionality in harmony; if there is a medial mid vowel, which can change its [ATR] specification, it is always the following vowel that determines that medial vowel’s [ATR] specification.
!
84! To summarize, in Pulaar, only mid vowels change their ATR specification.
The high vowels are always [+ATR] and the low vowel is always [-ATR]; these specifications never change. Second, the ATR specification of the mid vowels is predictable expect in word-final position. Finally, the ATR specification of the non-final mid vowels depends on the ATR specification of the following vowel; that is, mid vowels surface as [+ATR] when they are followed by a [+ATR] vowel, and they surface as [-ATR] if they are followed by a [-ATR] vowel. The Pulaar data presented thus far present one empirical problem for the existing approaches of harmony, namely, directionality, and none of the current theories or frameworks, as originally proposed, can successfully handle this problem. The next section illustrates the directionality problem in Pulaar along with the Sour Grapes problem, using the data from Pulaar ATR harmony. 3.2 Empirical Issues !
As discussed in Chapter 1, several approaches have been proposed to
account for the harmony facts observed cross-linguistically, but none of them in the original form, is empirically sufficient to provide analyses of the diverse harmony patterns found in languages of the world. The data from Pulaar ATR harmony are especially challenging since the existing frameworks encounter two empirical problems: Sour Grapes and directionality. The main purpose of this section is to illustrate these two problems using Pulaar data (to show that these problems do exist in actual languages). For explanation and demonstration purposes, I use Spread [ATR], and assume binary [ATR]. The solutions to the
!
85!
problems are presented as follows; the Span-Theoretic treatments of these problems are developed in Section 3.3 of this chapter. The solutions by spreading and ABC are presented in Chapter 4. 3.2.1 Sour Grapes The Sour Grapes problem refers to the situation in which harmony or assimilation is predicted to be either all or nothing. More specifically, when all the segments in a domain can participate in harmony or an assimilatory process, harmony is total. If, on the other hand, there is a blocker in a domain, a candidate with no harmony at all is selected as optimal. In other words, when there is a blocker of harmony present, candidates with partial harmony lose to the candidate with no harmony. To illustrate this problem with Pulaar data, I present a preliminary analysis with the harmony constraint Spread [ATR]. The spreading constraint is given in (4). In this section, the feature ATR is assumed to be binary, but only for the sake of presentation and illustration. (4) Spread [ATR] (cf. Padgett 1997, 2002) If a feature [+ATR] or [-ATR] is associated with a vowel, the same [ATR] feature is linked to all of the vowels in a word. In addition to (4), the following two constraints are also included in the analysis; (5) is a markedness constraint that bans [+high, -ATR] vowels, which are not observed in Pulaar.
!
86!
(5) *ˆ/¨ (Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994, Bakovic 2000, Kr0mer 2001)! High vowels are [ATR]. (6) is a faithfulness constraint requiring that input-output correspondents have the same specification for [ATR]. (6) Ident [ATR] (Id [ATR]) (McCarthy and Prince 1995) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [ATR]. The analysis with (4) through (6) is presented in (7). In (7), there are no blockers, and all or both vowels surface as [ATR]. (7) Total harmony: NO blocker /s´r-du/ *ˆ/¨
Spread [ATR]
! a) ser-du [+ATR] b) s´r-du 1!!!!!!1! [-ATR][+ATR] c) s´r-d¨ 2!!/! [-ATR]
Id [ATR] *
*!* *!
*
In (7), candidate (7a), the attested form, wins over (7b), where ATR harmony is not observed. (7) shows that the ranking Spread [ATR] >> Ident [ATR] selects the candidate with harmony. However, in (8), the system established in (7) fails to select the actual form. In (8), there is a blocker, [a], which does not participate in the harmony.4 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 4 There is another possible candidate in (8), which is *[bæro…di], in which all the vowels are [+ATR]. This totally satisfies the agreement constraint, but I assume that such a candidate is excluded by the markedness constraint *æ (no [+low, ATR] vowels), which is undominated in Pulaar.
!
87!
(8) No harmony: Blocker /barø…-di/
*ˆ/¨
Spread [ATR]
Id [ATR]
***
*!
!a) baro:-di [-ATR] [+ATR] " b) barø…-di [-ATR] [+ATR] c) barø…-dˆ [-ATR]
***
*!
*
In (8), candidate (8c) loses because of the markedness constraint. The remaining two candidates, (8a) and (8b), tie under Spread [ATR], and the faithfulness constraint prefers (8b). As a result, an unattested candidate with no [+ATR] harmony/spreading is selected as optimal in (8).5 (7) and (8) show that the analysis with Spread predicts all or nothing: if there is no blocker (that is, all the vowels participate in harmony, as in (7)), Spread prefers a candidate with (more) complete harmony. However, if there is a blocker, as in (8), Spread fails to enforce harmony and to discriminate between a candidate with more harmony, that is (8a), and a candidate with no harmony, namely (8b). As a result, the candidate with nothing (no harmony) is preferred because of the faithfulness constraint.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 5 In (7) and (8), I used the markedness constraint to exclude a candidate with a high non-ATR vowel. However, the same result can be achieved with a positional faithfulness constraint for the vowel in the final syllable. The wordfinal faithfulness constraint is introduced in (9).
!
88! 3.2.2 Directionality The other major empirical problem presented by the Pulaar data is
directionality. In previous literature, it is often argued that directionality can be attributed to other independent phonological phenomena, such as positional faithfulness. I suggest that such a claim is true in the sense that positional faithfulness plays a crucial role in accounting for harmony by preserving the input-output identity of the trigger. The data from Pulaar show, however, that it is not possible to attribute directionality entirely to positional faithfulness, thereby abandoning directionality completely. To investigate this issue, another (preliminary) case study of Pulaar is presented with Spread. In Pulaar, the positional faithfulness constraint in (9) is assumed to preserve the input-output identity of the trigger, which is the vowel in the final syllable of the word (or the final vowel in the word). (9) Ident I-O [ATR] Word-Final (Id [ATR] (Fin)) (Petrova et al. 2000, 2006: 17; Kr03#" 2001; Walker 2001) A vowel in the final syllable of a word has the same specification for the feature [ATR] as does its input correspondent. The analysis with (9) and the constraints in (4) through (6) is presented in (10). Binary [ATR] is assumed in this section as well. In (10), the actual surface form is (10a). However, there is no way to successfully select this candidate over the candidate in (10b).
!
89!
(10) /binnd-o…-wø/_ [binnd-ø…-wø]4 Spread fails to predict leftward directionality /binnd-o…-wø/ *ˆ/¨ Ident [ATR] Spread Id [ATR] (fin) [ATR] !a) binnd-ø…-wø
***
[+ATR] [-ATR] "b) binnd-o…-wø
***
[+ATR] [-ATR] c) binnd-o…-wo [+ATR] d) bˆn d-ø…-wø
*!
*!
*
n
[-ATR]
*!
**
! In candidate (10c), where all the vowels surface as [+ATR], is excluded by the positional faithfulness constraint for the vowel in the final syllable. (10d), where all the vowels surface as [-ATR], loses because of the markedness constraint against [+high –ATR] vowels. The remaining candidates are (10a) and (10b), and the crucial difference between these two candidates is the directionality of harmony. In (10a), the actual surface form, leftward directionality is observed, and the medial mid vowel surfaces as [-ATR]. In (10b), the directionality is rightward and the medial vowel surfaces as [+ATR], agreeing with the preceding [+ATR] vowel in the root. However, the spreading constraint fails to discriminate rightward and leftward directionality, and in fact, (10a) loses because of the general faithfulness constraint for the [ATR] feature, Ident [ATR].
!
90! Notice that in (10), both (10a), the actual surface form, and (10b) satisfy the
positional faithfulness constraint. Thus, the positional faithfulness constraint is silent with regard to these candidates, and therefore, fails to function as a tiebreaker between (10a) and (10b). Thus, (10) suggests that directionality cannot simply be attributed to other phonological phenomena, such as positional faithfulness. If the positional faithfulness constraint is satisfied, a non-directional harmony constraint, such as Spread [ATR], fails to discriminate between different directionalities. To summarize the discussion up to this point, the data from Pulaar ATR harmony present two challenges: Sour Grapes and directionality. This suggests that it is necessary to assume that the existing theory must be supplemented with some additional mechanisms, or to introduce a new theory to handle these problems as observed in Pulaar. In the next section, I present the Span-Theoretic analysis, and show how Span Theory handles these problems. It is demonstrated that Span Theory can handle the attested Pulaar data, but only with the assumption of privative [ATR]. 3.3 Span Theory and Privative [ATR] In the previous section, I outlined the empirical challenges that the data from Pulaar present for analyses using the existing theories. This section and the next section consider whether the Span Theory of harmony can deal with these two challenges presented by Pulaar. First, in this section, I present the SpanTheoretic analysis assuming privative [ATR], and in the next section (Section 3.4),
!
91!
I discuss the Span-Theoretic approach to Pulaar harmony under the assumption of binary ATR. In Chapter 2, I presented a modification of Span Theory so that it can be applicable to vowel harmony, where some features are assumed to be privative. In this section, I adopt the modification proposed in Chapter 2, and employ the revised version of Span Theory. One of the modifications of the theory introduced in Chapter 2 is that the theory allows unparsed vowels; this means that with privative [ATR], vowels that are not parsed into an ATR span surface and are realized as non-ATR. Following this modification, I introduce the following Span-Theoretic constraint to enforce harmony. (11) Segment Parse [ATR] (S-Parse [ATR]) (Sasa 2008) There exists a single [ATR] span for all vowels such that all the vowels in a domain are parsed into it. Definition: !(x)"(y) (Vy_Pxy): x=span, y=vowel “There exists a single x (x is a span) for all y (y is a vowel) such that all y are parsed.” The S-Parse constraint is satisfied when all the vowels in a domain are parsed into a single span. The assessment of (11) is presented in Table 5 in Chapter 2. (12) is the Span-Theoretic faithfulness constraint which maintains the input-output identity of the output head segment. (12) Head Faith [ATR] (Sasa 2008) The output head segment is identical to its input correspondent with respect to the feature [ATR]. The function of (12) is similar to that of positional faithfulness constraints in that it requires that if a vowel is designated as a head of a span, the input [ATR]
!
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specification of that head vowel must be maintained. The constraint in (12) is a revision of McCarthy’s original FaithHead [F] constraint (“If an input segment SI is specified as [F] and it has an output correspondent SO , then SO is the head of an [F] span” (McCarthy 2004: 5)). The necessity of the revision is discussed later in this section. The constraint in (13) determines the location of the head within a span. (13) SpanHeadR[ATR] (Head-R) (McCarthy 2004: 12) The head segment of an [ATR] span is final in that span. In addition to the Span-Theoretic constraints in (11) through (13), the following markedness and faithfulness constraints are also assumed to account for the data. (14) *ˆ/¨ (Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994, Bakovic 2000, Kr0mer 2001) ! High vowels are [ATR]. The markedness constraint in (14) excludes a candidate that contains high nonATR vowels, which are not observed in this language. (15) *e/o (cf. Bakovic 2000)6 No [ATR] mid vowels. The role of (15) is to prohibit mid [ATR] vowels when [ATR] harmony does not take place (cf. (17) and (21)). (16) Ident [ATR] (Id [ATR]) (cf. McCarthy and Prince 1995) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [ATR]. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 6 Bakovic (2000) assumes the markedness constraint *[+ATR] to prohibit mid [ATR] vowels in unattested positions.
!
93! The tableau in (17) shows the analysis of the case in which the word-final
vowel is non-ATR and the preceding mid vowel also surfaces as non-ATR. In (17) and in subsequent tableaux, it is assumed that when a vowel is not parsed into a span, such a vowel surfaces as non-ATR. (In this section, the feature [ATR] is assumed to be privative.) (17) All non-ATR: /ser-øn/ _ [s´r-øn] /ser-øn/ Head- Head Faith [ATR] R !a) s´r-øn b) (ser-on) c) (ser-on) d) (ser)-øn
S-Parse [ATR]
*e/o
* *! *! *
** ** *!
Id [ATR] * * *
In (17), candidate (17b) loses because of the directionality constraint; in this candidate, the head of the span is not the rightmost vowel. Candidate (17c) loses because of the Head Faith [ATR] constraint; in this candidate, the ATR mid vowel [o] heads an ATR span. The remaining two candidates, (17a), the actual form, and (17d), both satisfy the segment parsing constraint, but (17d) loses because of the markedness constraint against mid ATR vowels. (17) shows the following ranking arguments: Head-R, FaithHead >> S-Parse [ATR], and *e/o >> Ident [ATR].7
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 7 One might ask the following question with regard to the ranking *e/o >> Ident [ATR]: how would the system generate ATR mid vowels with the ranking presented in (17) when there are [ATR] mid vowels in the input? There are several possible ways to preserve the input mid [ATR] vowels; there are two faithfulness constraints for the final vowel and for the output head segment, and in addition to this, S-Parse [ATR] prefers [(e)] to [´].
!
94! The analysis of full harmony is presented in (18). In (18), the word-final
vowel is [+high], which always surfaces as ATR, and all of the vowels surface as [ATR]. (18) S-Parse enforces full harmony /s´r-du/ Head-R *ˆ/¨
Head Faith [ATR]
S-Parse [ATR]
*e/o
Id [ATR]
!a) (ser-du) * * b) s´r(-du) *! c) s´r-d¨ *! * * ! In (18), candidate (18a) is the actual form; the harmony is triggered by the wordfinal [ATR] vowel [u], and the vowel in the root undergoes the harmony. (18b) is the fully faithful candidate, where the final [ATR] vowel forms a span while the non-ATR vowel in the root is not parsed into an ATR span. There are no spans in candidate (18c); none of the vowels is parsed into a span in this candidate and all the vowels in this candidate surface as non-ATR. Candidate (18c) is excluded either by the markedness constraint against high non-ATR vowels or by the S-parse constraint. (18b) loses because of the SParse constraint because segment parsing in this candidate is not exhaustive. (18) shows the following ranking: *ˆ/¨, S-Parse [ATR] >> *e/o, Ident [ATR]. (The ranking between Head Faith [ATR] and S-Parse [ATR] is established in (17).) The tableau in (19) presents the analysis of the same case (total harmony), but there is a non-ATR high vowel in the trigger position in the input.
!
95!
(19) Headedness and S-parse guarantee that harmony takes place /s´r-d¨/! Head-R *ˆ/¨ Head Faith S-Parse *e/o [ATR] [ATR]
Id [ATR]
!a) (ser-du)! ! ! 5! ! 5! 55! b) s´r(-du) * *! * c) s´r-d¨ *! * ! (19c) loses because of the markedness constraint *ˆ/¨. Candidates (19a) and (19b) tie under the head faithfulness constraint, and the S-Parse [ATR] constraint prefers candidate (19a), the actual form. (19) presents the following ranking argument: *ˆ/¨ >> Head Faith [ATR]. In the following tableaux in (20) and (21), the analyses for the wordmedial mid vowel case are presented. In (20) and (21), there is a mid vowel word-medially, preceding a word-final non-ATR mid vowel and following a high ATR vowel. The medial vowel surfaces as non-ATR. As a result, total harmony is not observed in this case. (Once again, [ATR] is assumed to be privative in this section.) (20) Directionality and headedness constraints block total harmony /bind-o…-wø/ *ˆ/¨ Head-R Head Faith S-Parse *e/o [ATR] [ATR]
Id [ATR]
!a) (bind)-ø…-wø * * b) (bind-o…-wo) *! ** * c) (bind-o…-wo) *! ** * d) bˆnd-ø…-wø *! * ** ! In (20), four candidates are evaluated; (20a) is the actual form, where the high ATR vowel forms its own span and the rest of the vowels are unparsed. (20b) and (20c) are the candidates with total ATR harmony, where all the vowels surface as [ATR]. The difference between these two candidates is the location of
!
96!
the head; in (20b), the initial (or the leftmost) vowel is the head and in (20c), the final (or the rightmost) vowel is the head. Finally, (20d) is another total harmony candidate (in that all of the vowels surface as non-ATR) but in this candidate, none of the vowels is parsed into an ATR span. (20b) loses because of the directionality constraint; in this candidate, the head of the span is not the rightmost vowel in the span. (20d) is excluded by the markedness constraint prohibiting high non-ATR vowels. One of the remaining candidates, (20c), is excluded because of the head faithfulness constraint, and as a result, the actual surface form is selected as optimal in (20). Thus, in this wordmedial mid vowel case, total harmony is unattainable; candidates with total harmony are blocked either by the directionality constraint or by the head faithfulness constraint. Another analysis of the same input is presented in (21), but with a different candidate set. (21) Headedness and directionality select the attested directionality /bind-o…-wø/ Head-R *ˆ/¨ Head Faith S-Parse *e/o [ATR] [ATR]
Id [ATR]
!a) (bind)-ø…-wø * * b) (bind-o…)-wø *! * * c) (bind-o…)-wø * *! d) (bind)(o…-wo) *! ** ** * ! The analysis in (21) shows that in the medial mid vowel case, it is not possible to parse all the vowels into a single span. In (21), segment parsing is not exhaustive in any one of the candidates; (21a) is the actual form with two unparsed non-ATR
!
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vowels. Both (21b) and (21c) are realized in the same way but in these two candidates, the location of the head is different. In (21d), all the vowels are parsed into spans (and thus, are realized as ATR), but there are two non-exhaustive spans. Candidates (21b) and (21d) are excluded by the directionality constraint and the head faithfulness constraint respectively; in (21b), the location of the head is not final in the span, and in (21), even though it satisfies the directionality constraint, the input specification of the [ATR] feature is not maintained in the output head segment. The remaining two candidates, (21a) and (21c), satisfy all of *ˆ/¨, Head-R, and Head Faith [ATR], and they tie under the segment parsing constraint. However, the markedness constraint *e/o excludes candidate (21c). Both (20) and (21) show that Head [ATR]-R and Head Faith [ATR] play a crucial role in predicting the attested directionality. These two constraints also block the candidate with total harmony in the word-medial mid vowel case. Finally, the analysis of the word-medial trigger case is presented in (22). (22) shows, however, that the mechanism that has been established thus far fails to account for this case. (22) Word medial trigger : /h´l-ir-d´/_[hel-ir-d´] /h´l-ir-d´/ Head Faith Head-R *ˆ/¨ [ATR] !a) (hel-ir)-d´ b) h´l(-ir-de) c) h´l-ˆr-d´ "d) h´l-´r-d´
*! *!
S-Parse [ATR]
*e/o
Id [ATR]
* * * *
*! *
* * * *
!
98!
In (22), the actual surface form is (22a), in which the mid vowel surfaces as [ATR] because of the following [ATR] high vowel. In (22b), rightward directionality is observed, and the word-medial [ATR] vowel triggers the harmony to the following vowel. In (22c), all of the vowels surface as non-ATR. All of the vowels surface as non-ATR in (22d) as well, but in this candidate, vowel lowering is observed and the word-medial surfaces as non-high. Candidate (22b) loses because of the directionality constraint, and (22c) loses because of the markedness constraint *ˆ/¨. Both of the remaining candidates, (22a) and (22d), equally violate the segment parsing constraint, and the markedness constraint *e/o is the tie-breaker. As a result, (22d) is wrongly selected as optimal because of the markedness constraint. The problem with (22d) is that vowel lowering is observed to satisfy the headedness constraint for high vowels. However, such a change is not observed in Pulaar; to block such an unattested change, I suggest the faithfulness constraint in (23). (23) Ident [high] (Id [high]) (McCarthy and Prince 1995) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [high]. The solution with (23) is presented in (24); (24) shows that the faithfulness constraint for vowel height must dominate the markedness constraint *e/o.8
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 8 In (24), there is one more possible candidate, *[h´l(-ir)-d´]. This candidate satisfies the directionality, markedness, and head faithfulness constraints, and in fact, the markedness constraint favors this candidate over the actual form. I
!
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(24) Word medial trigger : /h´l-ir-d´/_[hel-ir-d´] /h´l-ir-d´/ Head-R *ˆ/¨ S-Parse [ATR] !a) (hel-ir)-d´ b) h´l(-ir-de) c) h´l-ˆr-d´ d) h´l-´r-d´
* * * *
*! *!
Id [high]
*!
*e/o
Id [ATR]
* *
* * * *
Figure 10 shows the summary of the rankings established thus far. As indicated in Figure 10, in Pulaar, the Head [ATR]-R and Head Faith [ATR] constraints, both of which are ranked above S-Parse [ATR], are active in the grammar; that is, unless the directionality and head faithfulness constraints are satisfied, total harmony is unattainable in Pulaar.
!
*ˆ/¨
Head [ATR]-R
! Head Faith
S-Parse [ATR]
Ident [high]
*e/o Ident [ATR] Figure 10. Ranking Lattice: Pulaar/Span Theory
The directionality constraint bans the candidate in which unattested rightward directionality is observed. Along with the directionality constraint, the head faithfulness constraint is also active to prohibit unattested harmony; harmony is !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! assume, however, that this candidate is excluded by another segment parsing constraint, *Unparse. This constraint is introduced in (29) in this section.
!
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observed only when the input-output identity of the [ATR] specification is maintained in the output head segment. This reformulated head faithfulness constraint plays a crucial role to guarantee the attested harmony pattern. Thus far, Span Theory successfully accounts for the attested data in Pulaar with the assumption of privative ATR. There are, however, two residual issues. First, in the analysis, the revised version of McCarthy’s FaithHead constraint was used. (25) presents the original formulation of FaithHead, when it is applied to ATR harmony. (25) FaithHead [ATR] (cf. McCarthy 2004: 5) If an input segment SI is specified as [ATR] and it has an output correspondent SO , then SO is the head of an [ATR] span. (26) illustrates the analysis of the case with no harmony with this original FaithHead constraint. (26) /s´r-øn/ _ [s´r-øn]: No ATR vowel, all non-ATR *ˆ/¨ Head-R FaithHead /s´r-øn/ [ATR]
S-Parse [ATR]
*e/o
*! # !a) s´r-øn *! ** # b) (ser-on) ** # "c) (ser-on) ! In (26), both (26a) and (26b) satisfy FaithHead [ATR] if privative ATR is assumed; the original formulation in (25) states that if an input vowel is specified as ATR, then, its output correspondent is ATR (and heads an ATR span). However, in (26), none of the vowels in the input is specified as ATR, so (25) is vacuously satisfied. (26a), the actual form, violates the segment parsing constraint while (26c) satisfies this constraint. Under the markedness constraint, (26c) is worse
!
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than (26a), but as discussed, the ranking S-Parse [ATR] >> *e/o must be established. Thus, it appears that the revised Head Faith constraint is a necessary revision to the theory so that the identity of the head segment is guaranteed even when a privative ATR feature is assumed. Second, even with the established system and the revision of the theory, the Sour Grapes problem is not resolved in Span Theory. This is illustrated in (28), where the form in (27) below is examined: (27) Leftward Directionality (Repeated from (3c)) (Paradis 1992: 94, 218) baro-gel
(*barø-g´l, *barø-gel)
‘lion-dim’
In the form in (27), there is a mid vowel word-medially ([o]), and this mid vowel agrees with the following mid vowel [e] in its ATR specification. The preceding low vowel does not participate in the harmony, nor does it affect the ATR specification of the word-medial mid vowel. Recall that in Pulaar, a low vowel is always non-ATR, and there are no [+low, ATR] vowels. This is enforced by the markedness constraint *æ (no [+low, ATR] vowels), which is included in (28). (28) Sour Grapes4!/67"ø8,#9/!_!:67")8,#9;! /barø-gel/ *æ Head-R Head Faith [ATR]
S-Parse [ATR]
Id [ATR]
* *! !a) ba(ro-gel) b) barø-g´l * *! * "c) barø(-gel) d) (bæro-gel) *! ! The analysis presented in (28) exhibits the Sour Grapes problem; (28a), which exhibits more complete harmony, loses to (28b), where no harmony is observed.
!
102!
Notice that there is a blocker in the domain, namely, the low vowel [a]. (28) shows that Span Theory still encounters the Sour Grapes problem, and the established system still fails to enforce partial harmony when there is a vowel that does not participate in harmony. Sasa (2008) presents the constraint in (29) as a solution to this problem. (29) *Unparse (Sasa 2008) A vowel is parsed into some span. Assign one violation mark for each non-conforming vowel (“No unparsed vowel”). Definition: "(x)!(y) ([Parse]y,x]): “For all vowels, there is a span such that a vowel is parsed into it.” The parsing constraint in (29) prohibits an unparsed vowel, and it is fully satisfied when there are no unparsed vowels in a harmony domain. As the definition of (29) shows, the quantification of (29) is the reverse of that of the S-parse [ATR] constraint. The solution to the Sour Grapes problem is presented in (30). (30) Sour Grapes solved: /barø-gel/ _ [baro-gel] /barø-gel/ *æ Head-R Head Faith S-Parse [ATR] [ATR] $a) ba(ro-gel) b) barø-g´l c) barø(-gel)
* * *
*Unparse
Id [ATR]
* **!* **!
* *
In (30), all the candidates violate the *Unparse constraint; however, the actual form in (30a) satisfies this parsing constraint better than the competitors; (30b), where there is no harmony at all, incurs three violations for three unparsed vowels, and (30c) incurs two violations for two unparsed vowels.
!
103! *Unparse is also necessary in the case in which there is a trigger word-
medially. (31) Word-medial trigger: /h´l-ir-d´/_[hel-ir-d´] /h´l-ir-d´/ Head-R Head Faith S-Parse [ATR] [ATR] ! a) (hel-ir)-d´ b) h´l (-ir-de) c) h´l(-ir)-d´ d) (hel-ir-de)
* * *
*! *!
*Unparse
Id [ATR]
* * **!
* * **
In (31), candidate (31b) loses because of the directionality constraint. (31d) is excluded by the head faithfulness constraint, since the head segment is not faithful to its input correspondent with respect to [ATR]. (31a) and (31c) tie under the directionality, headedness, and S-Parse [ATR] constraints, and *Unparse functions as a tie-breaker; in (31a), there is one unparsed vowel while (31c) contains two unparsed vowels. Thus, (31a) is selected as optimal because of *Unparse. To summarize this section, first, the Span-Theoretic analysis successfully resolves two empirical challenges with Pulaar ATR harmony: directionality and Sour Grapes. The attested directionality is correctly predicted by i) requiring a head segment (vowel) to be faithful to its input correspondent with respect to the [ATR] specification, and ii) designating the rightmost vowel in a span as a head. This is achieved by two Span-Theoretic mechanisms, the revised head faithfulness constraint and the directionality constraint. Second, the Sour Grapes problem is resolved by introducing another type of segment parsing constraint,
!
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as in (29); this segment parsing constraint prohibits any unparsed vowels and achieves more harmony by forcing more vowels to be parsed into (a) span(s). Therefore, we can conclude that Span Theory can avoid those empirical problems in Pulaar if the feature [ATR] is assumed to be privative; notice that the effect of *Unparse is visible only when a feature is assumed to be privative, that is, when there are unparsed vowels observed in a candidate. This raises another question: can Span Theory handle these problems even when a feature is assumed to be binary? The next section discusses this question by presenting another Span-Theoretic analysis of Pulaar harmony, but with the assumption of binary [ATR]. 3.4 Span Theory and Binary [ATR] The question that is addressed in this section is, can Span Theory still avoid the directionality problem and the Sour Grapes problem if the feature [ATR] is assumed to be binary? To investigate this question, the same data from Pulaar are analyzed under the assumption of binary [ATR]. Even though this assumption is different, the same Span Theoretic mechanisms introduced in the previous section are assumed in the analysis. However, the following two assumptions are different under binary [ATR]. First, if binary [ATR] is assumed, [-ATR] vowels are also assumed to form their own spans; that is, the vowels parsed into a [+ATR] span are realized as [+ATR] and likewise, the vowels parsed into a [-ATR] span are realized as [-ATR]. Second, if features are binary, there should be no unparsed vowels, as is proposed in McCarthy’s original
!
105!
presentation of the Span Theory. Therefore, I assume that, if [ATR] is binary, the parsing constraint in (29) is either not part of the grammar (since McCarthy claims that GEN does not create candidates with unparsed vowels/segments), or is undominated in the constraint hierarchy so that it prohibits any candidates with unparsed segments. The analysis in (32) is the implementation of these assumptions.9 (32) No [ATR] harmony: /ser-øn/ _ [s´r-øn] /ser-øn/ Head-R Head Faith S-Parse [ATR] [ATR] !a) (s´r-øn) b) (ser-on) c) (ser-on) d) (ser)(-øn)
*! *! **!
*e/o
** ** *
Id [ATR] * * *
In (32), the actual form contains a [-ATR] span that contains all the vowels in the output. Candidate (32b) loses because of the directionality constraint, and (32c) is excluded because of the faithfulness constraint for the head segment. (32a), the actual form, better satisfies the segment parsing constraint than (32d), since in (32a), all the vowels are exhaustively parsed into a single [-ATR] span while in (32d), there are two non-exhaustive spans. (32) shows the ranking *e/0 >> Ident [ATR]. (33) presents another analysis of total [+ATR] harmony; (33) presents the ranking S-Parse [ATR] >> *e/o. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 9 Since the purpose of this section is to start laying out another analysis with a different fundamental assumption (that is, [ATR] is binary), the rankings established in Section 3.3 are discarded in this section.
!
106!
(33) S-Parse enforces full harmony /s´r-du/ Head-R *ˆ/¨
Head Faith [ATR]
S-Parse [ATR]
*e/o
Id [ATR]
!a) (ser-du) * * b) (s´r)(-du) *!* c) (s´r-d¨) *(!) *(!) * ! (33c) loses because of the markedness constraint against [+high, -ATR] vowels. (33b) loses because of the segment parsing constraint. (34) presents the directionality case. In (34), the attested leftward directionality is still correctly predicted even under the assumption of binary ATR (that is, the spreading of the [-ATR] feature of the word-final vowel to the media mid vowel). (34) Leftward directionality /bind-o…-wø/ Head-R
*ˆ/¨
Head Faith [ATR]
S-Parse [ATR]
*e/o
Id [ATR]
* * !a) (bind)(-ø…-wø) *! * ** * b) (bind-o…)(-wø) * *!* * c) (bind-o…)(-wø) *! ** * d) (bind)(o…-wo) ! In candidate (34b), the location of the head of the first span is not final in that
span, and this candidate violates the directionality constraint. The head faithfulness constraint excludes (34d). (34c) satisfies the directionality constraint and the head faithfulness constraint, but this candidate is ruled out because of the markedness constraint *e/o. Thus, (34) shows that even with the assumption of binary [ATR,] Span Theory still successfully predicts the attested directionality with the same mechanisms (the head faithfulness constraint and the directionality constraint). (34) also shows that the Sour Grapes problem is
!
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avoided in the example presented in (34); the analysis predicts leftward [-ATR] spreading from the final vowel, as seen in (34a). Notice that there is a blocker in (34), and the high vowel in the first syllable does not participate in harmony. However, (35) shows that the Sour Grapes problem is not fully solved. The analysis presented in (32) through (34) fails to enforce harmony when there is a low vowel blocker; in (35), the ranking Head Faith [ATR] >> S-Parse [ATR] is established so that (35b) is excluded. (35) Sour Grapes4!/67"ø8,#9/!_!:67")8,#9;!(cf. (28) and (30)) /barø-gel/ *æ Head-R Head Faith S-Parse [ATR] [ATR] !a) (ba)(ro-gel) b) (barø-g´l) "c) (barø)(-gel) d) (bæro-gel)
Id [ATR]
** *!
*! *
** *!
**
In (35), candidate (35d) loses because of the markedness constraint against [+low, +ATR] vowels, and (35b) loses because of the head faithfulness constraint; in this candidate, the word-final vowel, which is the head of the span, is not identical to its input correspondent in the [ATR] specification The remaining two candidates, (35a), the actual form, and (35c) both equally violate the segment parsing constraint. The competition, then, goes down to the general faithfulness constraint, and as a result, (35c), the Sour Grapes candidate is selected over the actual form. This problem cannot be resolved even if McCarthy’s original *A-Span [ATR] (“Assign one violation for a pair of adjacent ATR spans.”) and FaithHead [ATR] (“If an input segment SI is
!
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specified as [!ATR] and it has an output correspondent SO, then SO is the head of an [!ATR] span: cf. (25) of this chapter) are assumed; both of these candidates contain two adjacent spans, and they both equally incur one violation of the *ASpan [ATR] constraint. The (original) FaithHead [ATR] is also obeyed both in (35a) and in (35c); in both, the output correspondent of an input [-ATR] vowel is a head of a [-ATR] span, and the output correspondent of an input [+ATR] vowel is a head of a [+ATR] span. In (30), where the same case is examined but under a different assumption, namely, privative ATR, the key to the solution was the *Unparse constraint, which prohibits unparsed segments. If binary ATR is assumed, however, all the vowels are necessarily parsed into either a [+ATR] span or a [-ATR] span. In other words, the effect of *Unparse is invisible under binary ATR (or any binary feature) since either GEN does not create a candidate with unparsed segments, or *Unparse is undominated so that any candidate with unparsed segments will never be selected as optimal. Therefore, the analysis presented in (35) suggests that the Span Theory of harmony does not allow a uniform account of the diverse patterns of vowel harmony because if binarity is assumed for ATR, it fails to account for the attested data of Pulaar; more specifically, it fails to resolve the Sour Grapes problem. To summarize, first, Span Theory successfully avoids the directionality problem and the Sour Grapes problem as demonstrated in Section 3.2 in this chapter, if the feature ATR is assumed to be privative. As seen in this section,
!
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Span Theory still successfully predicts the attested directionality in Pulaar even under the assumption of binary ATR, but as seen in (35), it fails to resolve the Sour Grapes problem if ATR is assumed to be binary. The discussion of the privativity/binarity of the features in harmony continues into the next section based on the observations from the Span-Theoretic analysis. 3.5 Discussion In Section 3.4, I showed that Span Theory crucially requires the assumption that the feature ATR is privative; as seen in Section 3.4, if ATR is assumed to be binary, Span Theory fails to resolve the Sour Grapes problem. This observation leads us to one question: can all the harmonic features be privative? If all of the harmonic features can be privative, Span Theory can be a viable theory to account for vowel harmony; as seen in this chapter, Span Theory successfully solves two empirical problems with the assumption of privative [ATR]. If, on the other hand, not all harmonic features are be privative, then Span Theory will encounter a similar problem, as are observed in Pulaar, when applied in other harmony languages. This, in turn, means that if there are any harmony patterns that require binary features, Span Theory, which requires the assumption of privative features, cannot be a viable theory to be used to account for the diverse vowel harmony patterns. The question of whether a certain feature is privative or binary hinges on two factors: i) which value, say, [+ATR] or [-ATR], is more marked, and ii) which feature is active in harmony/assimilation. For example, in vowel harmony, the
!
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feature [round] is assumed to privative, since numerous previous studies, including Steriade (1995), show that in roundness harmony, the only active feature is [(+) round], and for non-high vowels (especially, [-back] vowels), [round] vowels are more marked than unrounded vowels. For example, in Turkish (presented in Chapter 2), the occurrence of non-high rounded vowels is more restricted than that of high rounded vowels. However, such a clear-cut observation cannot be made for all of the features involved in vowel harmony processes. For example, for the feature [ATR], it has been widely argued that only [(+) ATR] or [(-) ATR]/[RTR] (Retracted Tongue Root), but not both, is active in harmony in a single language (cf. Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994). However, this does not necessarily mean that there are no languages where both [+ATR] and [-ATR] are active; for example, Steriade (1995) points out that Kalenjin (Hall et al. 1974, Ringen 1989) is one of the languages where both [+ATR] and [-ATR] are required; I suggest in the next chapter that Pulaar is another language where both [+ATR] and [-ATR] must be active.10 The feature [back] is even more controversial; if the feature [back] is assumed to be privative, then which value is more marked or assumed to be active in harmony? Steriade (1995) mentions that assuming privative [back] will !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 10 It appears that the preliminary analysis presented in Section 3.2 suggests that assuming binary ATR does not solve the directionality and the Sour Grapes problems in Pulaar. However, the solution to these problems is presented in Chapter 4 with the assumption of binary ATR.
!
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result in a better analysis of the data in Finnish vowel harmony, where neutral vowels (vowels that do not participate in harmony; see Chapter 1) are [-back]; Steriade also points out that in Chamorro (Chung 1983), [-back] is the active feature. Thus, the issue of the privativity or binarity of the feature [back] has not yet been fully settled. These observations lead us to conclude that it is not possible to claim that all harmonic features can be privative. This further suggests that Span Theory, which crucially relies on the assumption of privative features, cannot be empirically adequate as a theory to account for vowel harmony; as seen in Pulaar, Span Theory requires the assumption of privative [ATR] to avoid Sour Grapes. However, once again, the assumption that all harmonic/assimilating features are privative cannot be maintained. If Span Theory crucially relies on the assumption of privative features, then it is predicted that Span Theory will encounter a similar problem in other languages if a harmony feature is assumed to be binary. Hence, on the basis of the discussions presented in this chapter, it is concluded that Span Theory cannot be a uniform way of accounting for the diverse harmony patterns in world’s languages (unless all of the harmonic features can be uniformly privative). Thus, for the remainder of this thesis, I concentrate on the two remaining approaches: spreading and ABC. In Chapter 4, I present the spreading and ABC analyses of the Pulaar harmony, and in Chapter
! 5, I present another case study with different harmony processes using data from Yakut.
112!
!
113! CHAPTER IV PULAAR ATR HARMONY: FULL ANALYSES WITH SPREAD AND ABC This chapter presents full analysis of Pulaar ATR harmony in two
approaches: feature linking with Spread and Agreement-By-Correspondence (ABC). As demonstrated, both feature linking and ABC successfully account for the Pulaar data, but these two analyses make different predictions for the data; the analysis with feature linking suggests that in Pulaar, both [+ATR] and [-ATR] are active, while for the ABC analysis, such an assumption is not necessary. In addition to the comparison between two analyses, the role of positional faithfulness (Beckman 1997, 1998) in harmony is discussed in this chapter. The organization of this chapter is as follows; Section 4.1 is a review of the Pulaar harmony data with the addition of data illustrating low vowel opacity. The full analysis of the data with feature linking with Spread is presented in Section 4.2, and the ABC analysis is presented in Section 4.3. Section 4.4 is a general discussion of these two different approaches. 4.1 Review of the Pulaar Data Some of the Pulaar data presented in Chapter 3 are repeated in (1) through (3). (The vowel inventory of Pulaar is presented in Table 6 in Chapter 3.) I use binary [ATR] in the presentation of the data, but the privativity or binarity of the feature [ATR] is revisited later in this chapter.
!
114!
(1) Basic [ATR] Harmony Pattern in Pulaar (Total Leftward) (Paradis 1992: 87) ! ! "ATR form -ATR form Gloss a.
ser-du
s´r-øn
‘rifle butt-sg.’ / ‘rifle buttdim.pl.’
b.
pe…c-i
p´…c-øn
‘slits-class’ / ‘slits-dim.pl.’
c.
dog-o…-ru
døg-ø-wøn
'runner-ag.nom.-class’ / ‘runnernom.-dim.pl.’
(2) Leftward Directionality 1 (Paradis 1992: 87) !
!
-ATR form
+ATR form
Gloss
a.
ı´t-d´
ıet-ir-d´ #$%!&'()*+!,!#$%!&'()*!&($*+! (*ı´t-ir-d´, *ıet-ir-de)
b.
h´l-d´
hel-ir-d´ ‘to break’ / ‘to break with’ (*h´l-ir-d´, *hel-ir-de)
(3) Leftward Directionality 2 (Paradis 1992: 94, 218) ! a. binnd-ø…-wø (*binnd-o…-wo, *binnd-o…-wø)
‘writer’
b.
baro…-di
(*barø…-di)
‘lion’
c.
baro-gel
(*barø-g´l, *barø-gel)
‘lion-dim’
In Pulaar, mid vowels agree with the following vowel in ATR specification. In (1), the same root is realized differently depending on the ATR specification of the vowel in the suffix; when the suffix contains a [+ATR] vowel, the vowel in the root is realized as [+ATR], and the root vowel is realized as [-ATR] when the suffix contains a vowel that is [-ATR]. Clear directionality is another characteristic of Pulaar harmony; in the [+ATR] form in (2a), the medial [+ATR] high vowel
!
115!
affects the ATR specification of the preceding mid vowel. However, the final vowel is not affected by the ATR specification of the preceding vowel; it surfaces as [-ATR]. Likewise, in (3a), the word-medial mid vowel surfaces as [-ATR] because of the [-ATR] word-final vowel, but the preceding [-ATR] low vowel does not affect the ATR specification of the medial mid vowel. Another major characteristic of Pulaar ATR harmony is low vowel opacity. As seen in (4), the low vowel behaves opaquely. (4) Opacity (Paradis 1992: 88, Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994: 136) a.
bø…t-a…-ri
‘lunch’ (*bo…t-a…-ri, *bo…t-æ…ri)
b.
pø…f-a…ri
‘breaths’ (*po…f-a…-ri, *po…f-æ…ri)
c.
ø…n~an-˜ gel
‘torsion-dim’ (*go…ıan-˜ gel, *go…ıæn-˜ gel)
d.
k´lan-˜ gel
‘cassure-dim’ (*kelan-˜ gel, *kelæn-˜ gel)!
As mentioned in Chapter 3, the low vowel [a], which is specified as [-ATR], lacks a [+ATR] counterpart, and always surfaces as [-ATR]. In (4a), for example, the word-final vowel is a [+high, +ATR] vowel but the spreading of the [+ATR] feature is blocked by the word-medial low vowel [a], which lacks a [+ATR] counterpart. As a result, the mid vowel in the root surfaces as [-ATR], agreeing with the word-medial low vowel, rather than with the word-final [+ATR] vowel, in [ATR] specification. As seen in (4), vowel length does not affect the opaque behavior of the low vowel; that is, the low vowel behaves opaquely whether it is long, as in (4a) and (4b), or short, as in (4c) and (4d).
!
116! The next two sections present full analyses of the Pulaar ATR harmony
with feature spreading (using Spread) and with ABC. The next section, Section 4.2, presents the feature linking analysis. As shown in Chapter 3, the feature linking analysis with Spread encounters two problems: Sour Grapes and directionality. The solutions to these problems are presented in Section 4.2.2. 4.2 Analysis with Spread 4.2.1 Spread Defined This section (4.2.1) and the next section (4.2.2) present the full feature linking analysis of Pulaar assuming Spread as a harmony constraint. The OT constraint Spread [F] was first introduced by Padgett (1997). The original formulation of Spread [F] in Padgett (1997) is presented in (5). (5) Spread [F] (cf Padgett 1997: 22) Every feature [F] is linked to every segment. (Spread(x): !xy, x(y) (x; feature, y: segment) (in some domain)) The spreading constraint is satisfied only when all the segments in a domain (for example, ‘a word’) share the same feature [F]. As demonstrated, however, there are two major problems with the original formulation of Spread. First, as seen in the Pulaar directionality case, this non-directional spreading constraint fails to discriminate among candidates that exhibit different spreading directionalities; for example, in Pulaar, the attested directionality is leftward, but Spread without specified directionality fails to favor the candidate with the attested directionality over the unattested one with the rightward directionality.
!
117! This problem with directionality gives rise to the second problem, namely,
the Sour Grapes problem. To illustrate this, the analysis presented in (10) in Chapter 3 is repeated in (6). (6) /binnd-o…-wø/_ [binnd-ø…-wø] (repeated from (9) in Chapter 3) /binnd-o…-wø/ *ˆ/¨ Id [ATR] (fin) Id [ATR] Spread [-ATR] !a) binnd-ø…-wø | | [+ATR] [-ATR] "b) binnd-o…-wø | | [+ATR] [-ATR]
***
*!
***
The analysis above was presented to illustrate the directionality problem, but this also can be seen as the Sour Grapes problem; in (6), where binary ATR is assumed, the [-ATR] feature associated with the final vowel should also be associated with the medial vowel. However, in (6), the candidate with no [-ATR] harmony, namely (6b), is selected if there is a blocker that cannot participate in [-ATR] harmony. (6) shows that the analysis using Spread in its original formulation fails to enforce (more) complete harmony if there is a blocker in a domain; more specifically, where there is a [-ATR] vowel at the end of a word, which triggers [-ATR] harmony to a preceding word-medial (alternating) vowel, and a high vowel (which cannot change to [-ATR]) as an initial vowel, the analysis with Spread predicts that the medial vowel surfaces as [+ATR]. In other words, if the original spreading constraint, as in (5), is employed in the analysis, this spreading constraint fails to enforce harmony if there is a blocker in the domain.
!
118! These two issues, directionality and Sour Grapes, appear not to be related
(or have not been discussed as related problems previously); directionality refers to the direction in which a certain feature spreads, while Sour Grapes is a question of whether harmony takes place when there is a blocker. However, I suggest that these two issues are actually related because, as (6) shows, if it is possible to achieve the attested leftward directionality, then the Sour Grapes problem is also resolved. Notice that (6a) exhibits not only the attested directionality but also more complete [-ATR] harmony, since the medial mid vowel participates in the harmony triggered by the word-final [-ATR] vowel. Hence, I suggest that once directionality is specified in the spreading constraint itself, these two issues can be resolved at the same time. In order to implement this proposal, I suggest the following two revised Spread constraints. (7) Spread [F]-Left (Spread [F]-L) (Sasa 2006) If a feature [F] is associated with a vowel, the same feature [F] is associated with all the vowels to the left. (7) enforces leftward spreading of a feature, without requiring rightward spreading of the same feature. Likewise, (8) requires a feature to spread rightward, but without (necessarily) forcing leftward spreading. (8) Spread [F]-Right (Spread [F]-R) If a feature [F] is associated with a vowel, the same feature [F] is associated with all the vowels to the right. Figure 11 shows some of the satisfaction and violation patterns of Spread [F], Spread [F]-L, and Spread [F]-R; all of these spreading constraints are
!
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markedness constraints, and they evaluate candidates when a targeted feature [F] is associated with a vowel in the output. (In other words, input representations do not make any difference in the evaluation by the spreading constraints.)
a) V1
V2
b) V1
[F] V2
V3 V3
Spread [F] Satisfied
Spread [F]-L Satisfied
Spread [F]-R Satisfied
*
Satisfied
*
*
*
Satisfied
[F] c) V1
V2
V3 [F]
Figure 11. Satisfaction and Violation of Spread 1
The configuration in (a) in Figure 11 satisfies Spread [F], Spread [F]-L, and Spread [F]-R. In this configuration, all the vowels share the same feature [F] (or the same feature [F] is linked to all the vowels). (b) violates both Spread and Spread [F]-R; in (b), the feature [F] is not linked to the vowel, V3 , and since Spread [F] requires that a feature is linked to all the vowels, (b) incurs one violation of this constraint. (b) also violates Spread [F]-R; there is a feature associated with V2 in this form, and this feature is not linked to V3 , which is to the right of V2 . Thus, (b) violates Spread [F]-R for V3 . Spread [F]-L, on the other hand, is satisfied in (b); the feature [F] associated with V2 is also associated with V1 , and there is no preceding vowel
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for V1 . Thus, Spread [F]-L is completely satisfied by (b). (c) violates both Spread and Spread [F]-L but satisfies Spread [F]-R; the feature [F] associated with V2 is also associated with the following vowel V3 . Figure 12 shows additional satisfaction and violation patterns of these three spreading constraints.
a) V1 V2 .! !!!!/01! b) V1 V2
V3
V3 .! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!/01! c) V1 V2 V3
Spread [F] **
Spread [F]-L Satisfied
Spread [F]-R **
**
**
Satisfied
*
*
*
[F] Figure 12. Satisfaction and Violation of Spread 2
(a) in Figure 12 incurs two violations for Spread and Spread [F]-R since the feature [F] associated with V1 is not linked to two vowel which are to the right of V1 . However, this configuration satisfies Spread [F]-L since there are no vowels to the left of V1 . (b) is the mirror image of (a), violating both Spread and Spread [F]-L twice. However, Spread [F]-R is satisfied by this configuration because there is no vowel to the right of V3 which [F] could spread to. Finally, an interesting case is (c), a transparency case; this configuration satisfies none of the family of the spreading constraints. Spread [F] is violated, since [F] skips or fails
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to be linked to the medial vowel. Spread [F]-L is violated because the feature associated with V3 is not linked to V2 , which is to the left of V3 . Likewise, Spread [F]-R is violated, too, since [F] is associated with V1 but the same [F] is not associated with V2 , which is to the right of V1. In the next section, I demonstrate how the spreading constraint with specified directionality accounts for the Pulaar data which Span Theory failed to account for. More specifically, I show that the analysis with Spread [ATR]-L resolves two problems in Pulaar, namely, the directionality problem and the Sour Grapes problem. 4.2.2 The Analysis with Spread-Left This section presents the full analysis of Pulaar with the harmony constraint proposed in (7). In the analysis, I assume that the feature [ATR] is binary, that is, I assume that both [+ATR] and [-ATR] are active, but this assumption is explored fully in Section 4.4. The harmony constraint in (9) enforces harmony. (9) Spread [ATR]-Left (Spread [ATR]-L) (Sasa 2006) If a feature [ATR] is associated with a vowel, the same feature [ATR] is associated with all the vowels to the left. Since I assume that ATR is binary in this section, in (9), the notation [ATR] refers to both [+ATR] and [-ATR]. Second, the following faithfulness constraints are assumed.
! (10)
122! a.
Ident I-O [ATR] Word-Final (Id [ATR] (Fin)) (Petrova et al. 2000, 2006: 17; Kr23'4 2001; Walker 2001) A vowel in the final syllable of a word has the same specification for the feature [ATR] as does its input correspondent.
b.
Ident I-O [ATR] (root) (Id (root) [ATR]) (cf. Beckman 1997, 1998) Correspondent input and output segments in the root have the same specification for the feature [ATR].
c.
Ident [ATR] (Id [ATR]) (cf. McCarthy and Prince 1995) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [ATR].
In Pulaar, the vowel in the final syllable of a word either triggers harmony or resists harmony. The positional faithfulness constraint in (10a) captures this generalization; it functions to preserve input-output identity with regard to the [ATR] specification of the word-final vowel. In Pulaar, there are no [+high, -ATR] vowels and no [+low, +ATR] vowels. The markedness constraints in (11) and (12) prohibit the occurrence of the unattested vowels; (11) prohibits [+high, -ATR] vowels. (11) No [+High, -ATR] (*ˆ/¨) (Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994, Bakovic 2000, Kra‹m er 2001) High [-ATR] vowels are prohibited. (12) prohibits [+low, +ATR] vowels. (12) No [+Low, +ATR] (*æ) (Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994, Bakovic 2000, Kra‹m er 2001) Low [+ATR] vowels are prohibited. As seen in Chapter 3, these two markedness constraints are highly ranked in Pulaar to prohibit the occurrence of unattested vowels. I assume that the two markedness constraints in (11) and (12) are also undominated in the analysis; any
!
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candidate containing unattested vowels loses to other candidates due to these markedness constraints. It also needs to be noted that the faithfulness constraints with regard to vowel height, that is, Ident I-O [hi] (“input-output correspondents are identical with regard to the feature [high]”) and Ident I-O [low] (“input-output correspondents are identical with regard to the feature [low]”) are undominated in Pulaar. As pointed out in Chapter 3, changing vowel height is not an attested pattern to achieve a (more) harmonic form in Pulaar. That is, vowel lowering, as observed in *[h´l-´r-d´] from an input /h´l-ir-d´/ is not an attested pattern. Likewise, vowel raising, as in *[bo…te…ri] from the input /bo…ta…ri/, is not attested, either. I assume that the undominated faithfulness constraints for vowel height (Ident I-O [hi] and Ident I-O [low]) exclude candidates in which vowel lowering or raising is observed. The analysis of total harmony is presented in the tableau in (13). (13) /søf-ru/_ [sof-ru] (basic total leftward harmony) /søf-ru/! *ˆ/*¨ Id [ATR] Spread (fin) [ATR]-L !
Id (root) [ATR]
Id [ATR]
* * !56!sof-ru! *! 76!søf-ru! *(!) *(!) * 86!søf-r¨! ! In (13), candidate (13c) loses because of either the markedness constraint or the positional faithfulness constraint for the final vowel. In this candidate, the wordfinal vowel changes its ATR specification and surfaces as a [-ATR] high vowel, which is not observed in this language. (13b) loses because of the directional
!
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spreading constraint. In (13b), the word-final vowel is specified as [+ATR] but its [+ATR] feature is not linked to the vowel in the root (which is located to the left of the word-final vowel). As a result, (13b) loses to (13a), which satisfies the spreading constraint.1 (14) shows the analysis for the case where there is a mid vowel (which can change its ATR specification) in the word-medial position. (14) Interaction of Word-Final Faith and Spread [ATR]-L ,binnd-o…-wø/_ [binnd-ø…-wø] /binnd-o…-wø/ *ˆ/*¨! Id [ATR] Spread Id (root) (fin) [ATR]-L [ATR]
Id [ATR]
!!56!binnd-ø…-wø ! ! !!!!!!9! ! !!!!!!!!9! (Partial Left)! b) binnd-o:-wø !!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!99:! ! !!!!!!!!! (Partial Right) 86!7(;;=&%! ! !!!!!!!!!9:! ! ! !!!!!!!!9! ?@%$5A!B()*$6! d) bˆnnd-ø…-wø 9:! ! ! !!!!!!!!!!9! !!!!!!!!99! (Total Left)! ! In (14), candidate (14d) loses because of the markedness constraint against high [-ATR] vowels, and (14c) loses because of the word-final faithfulness constraint. The two remaining candidates in (14), that is, (14a), the actual form, and (14b) with unattested rightward directionality, are evaluated under Spread [ATR]-L. The representations in Figure 13 show the configurations of these two !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1 (13) does not show the ranking *ˆ/¨ >> Ident [ATR] (fin), but this ranking must be established; for example, in (13), there is a possible input (because of Richness of the Base) /søf-r¨/, which surfaces as [sof-ru]. However, if the ranking is reversed, and Ident [ATR] (fin) dominates the markedness constraint, an unattested form *[søf-r¨] will win. Thus, throughout this section, I assume the ranking i) *ˆ/¨ >> Ident [ATR] (fin), and ii) *æ >> Ident [ATR] (fin).
!
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candidates; (14a) violates Spread [ATR]-L once; in this candidate, the [-ATR] feature associated with the final vowel is linked to the medial mid vowel but not to the initial vowel in the root. Thus, this candidate incurs one violation for Spread [ATR]-L for the initial vowel (the vowel in the root) for not sharing the same [-ATR] feature. (14b), on the other hand, violates this spreading constraint twice; as in (14a), there is a [-ATR] feature associated with the final vowel. However, this [-ATR] feature is not linked to both the medial mid vowel and the high vowel in the root. As a result, (14a) satisfies Spread [ATR]-L better than (14b), and is selected as optimal in (14). Notice that non-directional Spread fails to resolve the tie in the word-medial mid vowel case, as illustrated in Chapter 3.
14a)
14b)
i [+ATR]
ø…
ø [-ATR]
Spread [ATR]-L: * ([-ATR] not linked to [i]) (violated once)
i [+ATR]
o…
ø [-ATR]
** ([-ATR] not linked to [i] /[o]) (violated twice)
Figure 13. Configurations of (14a) and (14b)
(14) also shows that the Sour Grapes problem is solved by assuming the directional spreading constraint. The following analysis in (15) confirms this suggestion; in (15), the spreading constraint not only correctly predicts the attested directionality, but also avoids Sour Grapes.
!
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(15) [barø…-di]_[baro…-di]: harmony with a blocker, no Sour Grapes /barø…-di/ *æ Id [ATR] Spread Id (Root) (fin) [ATR]-L [ATR] !a) b a r o… d i !!!!!!!!!!!.!!!!!!!!!!!!!.! [-ATR] [+ATR] b) b a r ø… d i .!!!!!!!!!!!!.! [-ATR] [+ATR] c) b æ r o… d i ! [+ATR]
Id [ATR]
*
*
**! *!
*
In (15), the low vowel in the root [a] is a blocker of the harmony since this vowel cannot change its ATR specification. (15c) loses because of the markedness constraint prohibiting [+low, +ATR] vowels. As seen in the analysis in (9) in Chapter 3, the non-directional spreading constraint will fail to discriminate between (15a) and (15b), and as a result, the Sour Grapes problem arises. As seen in (15), however, this problem can be avoided by enforcing leftward harmony by specifying directionality in the harmony/spreading constraint. Given (14) and (15), I suggest that directionality and the Sour Grapes problems are related. Even though these problems appear to be independent of each other, as (14) and (15) show, if an analysis correctly predicts the attested directionality, the Sour Grapes problem is also resolved. I suggest that specifying the directionality is the key to the solution to both of these issues because the spreading constraint with specified directionality correctly predicts the attested directionality and as a result, enforces more complete harmony.
!
127! The following two tableaux show two more cases observed in Pulaar;
first, (16) is the analysis of another Sour Grapes case. This confirms the claims made above. Second, (17) is the analysis of another directionality case in which there is a trigger in the word medial position. (16) [barø…-gel]_[baro…-gel]: harmony with a blocker, no Sour Grapes /barø…-gel/ *æ Id [ATR] (fin) Spread Id (Root) [ATR]-L [ATR] !a) b a r o… -gel b) b a r ø… -gel c) b a r ø… -g´l d) bæro…-gel
Id [ATR]
* **!
*
*! *!
*
* **
Candidate (16c) loses because of the positional faithfulness constraint for the vowel in the final syllable, and (16d) is excluded by the markedness constraint against a [+low, +ATR] vowel. The actual surface form in (16a) is selected over its competitor (16b) by the spreading constraint. Thus, the Sour Grapes case in (16) is resolved by the same mechanism observed in (15). (17) shows another case of leftward directionality. In (17), there is a trigger word-medially, and the trigger affects the ATR specification of the preceding vowel, but not of the following vowel. (17b) loses because of the word-final faithfulness constraint and (17c) loses because of the markedness constraint. The remaining two candidates, (17a) and (17d), are evaluated under Spread [ATR]-L, and this constraint prefers (17a), the actual form; (17a) violates the spreading constraint twice because the [-ATR] feature associated with the word-final vowel is not linked to two vowels. (17d) incurs three violations of the spreading
!
128!
constraint; the [-ATR] feature of the final vowel is not associated with two preceding vowels and the [+ATR] feature of the word-medial vowel is not associated with the preceding vowel (one additional violation). As a result, Spread [ATR]-L prefers (17a) to (17d).2 (17)!/h´l-ir-d´/_[hel-ir-d´] (word-medial trigger case) /h´l-ir-d´/ *ˆ/*¨! Id [ATR] Spread (fin) [ATR]-L !a) hel-ir-d´ !" [+ATR] [-ATR] b) h´l-ir-de !" [-ATR] [+ATR] c) h´l-ˆr-d´ [-ATR] d) h´l-ir-d´ """""""!"""!"""""!" [-] [+] [-]
Id (root) [ATR]
Id [ATR]
!
!
! 99!
! 9!
! 9!
!
! 9:!
! 9!
!
! 9!
! 9:!
!
!
!
! 9!
!
!
! 99:9!
!
!
Thus far, I have demonstrated that the directional spreading constraint correctly predicts the attested leftward directionality. (18) shows that the same mechanism also correctly predicts the opaque behavior of the low vowel. (18) Low Vowel Opacity /bo…t-a…-ri/ *æ !a) bø…t-a…-ri b) bo…t-a…-ri c) bo…t-æ…-ri d) bø…t-a…-rˆ
Id [ATR] (fin)
Spread [ATR]-L
Id (root)
Id [ATR]
** ***!
*
*
*
* **
*! *!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! C!In (17), I use the notation [+] to indicate a [+ATR] feature and [-] for [-ATR] in candidate (17c) due to space limitations.
!
129!
Candidate (18c) loses because of the markedness constraint against a [+low, +ATR] vowel, and (18d) loses because of the word-final faithfulness constraint (or because of *ˆ/¨, which is not included in (18) because of space limitations). (18a) satisfies Spread [ATR]-L better than (18b); in (18a), the two [-ATR] vowels do not share the same [+ATR] specification associated with the word-final vowel and thus, this candidate incurs two violations. (18b) incurs three violations of this constraint because the [+ATR] feature of the word-final vowel is not shared by two of the preceding vowels (two violations) and the [-ATR] specification is not linked to the preceding mid [+ATR] vowel (one violation). As a result, Spread [ATR]-L prefers the actual form in (18a) to its competitor (18b). There is one note to be added to the analysis in (17) and (18). I assumed that in (17d), *[h´l-ir-d´], there are two independent [-ATR] features associated with two [-ATR] vowels. Likewise, I assumed that there are two separate [+ATR] features that are independently associated with two [+ATR] vowels in (18b), *[bo…ta…ri]. However, another possible representation for these candidates is a gapped configuration, where the same [-ATR] feature (in (17)) or the same [+ATR] feature (in (18)), is associated both with the final vowel and with the initial vowel, skipping the medial vowel. Since the feature skips the medial vowel, this vowel surfaces as a ‘default’ vowel, as designated by the markedness constraints: in (17), as a [+ATR] vowel and in (18), as a [-ATR] vowel.
!
130! Such candidates actually violate or satisfy the spreading constraint equally
as well as does the actual form, since in a gapped configuration, the feature is not linked to only one vowel, as in the actual candidates (17a) and (18b). However, since there are no reasons in Pulaar to assume gapped configurations, the markedness constraint prohibiting such configurations, namely No Gap in (7) in chapter 1, is assumed to be undominated in this language. The ranking lattice for Pulaar ATR harmony is presented in Figure 14.
*ˆ/¨, *æ ! Ident [ATR] (fin) !" Spread [ATR]-L Ident (root) Figure 14.
Ident [ATR]
Ranking Lattice: Pulaar/Spread
In Pulaar, the ranking Ident [ATR] (word final) >> Spread [ATR]-L is crucially established to correctly predict the attested directionality. As seen in (14), the word-final faithfulness constraint excludes the candidate (14c) that exhibits unattested directionality; (14) shows that if this positional faithfulness constraint were dominated by the spreading constraint, then (14c) would be selected over the attested form in (14a). (14) also shows that the positional faithfulness constraint alone is not sufficient to predict the attested directionality; two
!
131!
candidates (14a: partial leftward) and (14b: partial rightward) tie under the positional faithfulness constraint; the directional spreading constraint functions as a tie-breaker. Thus, the analysis in (14) suggests that directionality effects cannot simply be attributed to positional faithfulness; to reiterate, when two candidates with different spreading directionalities satisfy the positional faithfulness constraint, it is the directional spreading (or harmony) constraint that breaks the tie between such candidates. (14), along with (15), also suggests that specifying directionality solves the Sour Grapes problem, which the original non-directional spreading constraint fails to resolve. As (14) and (15) show, two problems, which appear to be independent of each other, are, in fact, related; specifying directionality in the spreading constraint is the single key to solving both problems. The analyses presented in this section, hence, suggest that Spread successfully avoids the problems that the data from Pulaar presents, even though the original proposal needs some modifications, as discussed in Section 4.2.1. In the next section, Section 4.3, I present a different approach to Pulaar harmony, namely, an ABC approach, and investigate how ABC accounts for the directionality problem observed in Pulaar. 4.3 The ABC Analysis As stated in Chapter 2, the key assumption of ABC (Agreement-ByCorrespondence) is that segments that are similar correspond (Rose and Walker 2004, Walker 2009). The ABC analysis was originally proposed for consonant
!
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harmony, or more accurately, long-distance consonant agreement with intervening segments, but Walker (2009), for example, presents an analysis for the ATR harmony observed in Menominee, assuming that the feature ATR is binary. In this section, I present the ABC analysis of Pulaar assuming binary ATR so that the ABC analysis can be compared with the spreading analysis on the same grounds. However, I will reconsider the issue of binary ATR in Section 4.4 of this chapter. To implement one of the ABC assumptions that similar segments correspond in Pulaar, I propose the following output correspondence constraints; (19) states that [-high] vowels, that is, mid vowels and low vowels, correspond. (19) Corr [-Hi]-[-Hi] (Corr [-hi]) (cf. Walker 2009) Let S be an output string of segments and let X and Y be [-consonantal, -high] segments. If X and Y belong to S, then X and Y correspond. (20) states that high and mid vowels are in correspondence. (20) Corr [-Lo]-[-Lo] (Corr [-lo]) (cf. Walker 2009) Let S be an output string of segments, and let X and Y be [-consonantal, -low] segments. If X and Y belong to S, then X and Y correspond. I suggest that the key similarity feature in Pulaar ATR harmony is vowel height, rather than, say, backness; for example, non-low vowels agree in the [+ATR] feature, or in ABC terms, are identical in the [+ATR] feature, if the trigger is [+ATR]. Likewise, if a trigger is [+low, -ATR], non-high vowels are identical in the [-ATR] feature. Thus, I propose that it is reasonable to group vowels with regard to the similarity in height, rather than other vowel features. In addition to
!
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the height-specific correspondence constraints as in (19) and (20), the general correspondence constraint for vowels of any height is also assumed to be operative in the grammar. The correspondence constraint in (21) requires that vowels of any height be in correspondence. (21) Corr V-V (Corr V-V) (cf. Walker 2009) Let S be an output string of segments and let X and Y be [-consonantal] segments. If X and Y belong to S, then X and Y correspond. In ABC, the fact that segments are in correspondence does not mean that they are identical with respect to a certain feature. In other words, even if two vowels are in correspondence, that does not mean that these two vowels are necessarily identical in their ATR specifications. The correspondence identity constraints, such as in (24), require that the segments in correspondence be identical with regard to a certain feature. (22) Ident VV [ATR] (Id VV [ATR]) (Walker 2009) Let X be a segment in the output and Y be a correspondent of X in the output; i) if X is [+ATR], then Y is [+ATR] ii) if X is [-ATR], then Y is [-ATR]. (22) states that if two (or more) vowels are in correspondence, these vowels are identical in [ATR] specification. In addition to (19) through (22), the following constraints are also necessary to account for the Pulaar data. (23)
a.
Ident I-O [ATR] Word-Final (Id [ATR] (Fin)) (Petrova et al. 2000, 2006: 17; Kr23'4 2001; Walker 2001) A vowel in the final syllable of a word has the same specification for the feature [ATR] as does its input correspondent.
!
134! b.
Ident [ATR] (Id [ATR]) (cf. McCarthy and Prince 1995) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [ATR].
c.
No [+High, -ATR] (*ˆ/¨) (Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994, Bakovic 2000, Kra‹m er 2001) High [-ATR] vowels are prohibited.
d.
No [+Low, +ATR] (*æ) (Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994, Bakovic 2000, Kra‹m er 2001) Low [+ATR] vowels are prohibited.
As in the analysis with Spread, it is necessary to maintain the identity of the trigger of the harmony. (23a) functions to preserve the input specification of the word-final vowel, which is the trigger of harmony. In addition to the faithfulness constraints in (23b) and (23c), the markedness constraints prohibiting the unattested segments are also necessary to predict the actual forms. In addition to the constraints listed in (23), I assume that the faithfulness constraints Ident [hi]/Ident [low] (that militate against any change in the height specification) are undominated; any candidates in which vowels change their height specifications are excluded by these height faithfulness constraints.3 The ABC analysis of the basic ATR harmony pattern is presented in tableau (24). In the following tableaux, I use subscripts to indicate correspondence.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 3 In the feature linking analysis, I assumed that another markedness constraint, No Gap, is also undominated in Pulaar. In the ABC account, a different approach is taken to prohibit gapped configurations. The ABC solution to gapped configurations is presented in (31) of this section.
!
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(24) Basic harmony /s´r-du/ *ˆ/¨ !sex r-dux b) s´r-du c) s´x r-dux d) s´x r-d¨x
Id (Fin)
Id VV [ATR]
Corr [-hi]
Corr [-lo]
Corr VV
Id [ATR] *
*!
*
*! *(!)
*(!)
*
In (24a), both of the vowels are in correspondence and they are identical in their [+ATR] features. (24b) is a fully faithful candidate, in which neither one of the vowels is in correspondence. In (24c), both vowels are in correspondence but they are not identical in ATR, and in (24d), both of the vowels are in correspondence, as in (24a), but they are both [-ATR]. In (24), candidate (24d) loses either because of the markedness constraint or because of the word-final faithfulness constraint. (24b) loses because two nonlow vowels in the output do not correspond, that is, this candidate violates Corr [-Lo]. Candidate (24c) loses because of Ident V-V [ATR] since the two vowels in correspondence are not identical in their [ATR] specifications. (24) shows the ranking Corr [-lo], Ident VV [ATR] >> Ident I-O [ATR]. This ranking is the ranking for harmony languages, as pointed out in Walker (2009) (cf. Figure 5 in Chapter 1). The tableau in (25) gives the analysis for partial harmony. In (25), there is a mid vowel word-medially, and this mid vowel is identical to the following mid vowel in the last syllable. However, the high vowel in the first syllable remains [+ATR]. Thus, the directionality effect is observed in this case.
!
136!
(25) Partial harmony/leftward directionality 1 ([+high] vowel as a blocker) /binndo…wø/_ [binndø…wø] /i-o-ø/ *ˆ/¨ Id Id VV Corr Corr Corr Id (Fin) [ATR] [-hi] [-lo] V-V I-O [ATR] !a) i-øx -øx b) ix -o x -ø c) ˆx -øx -øx d) ix -o x -o x
*!
* *
* *
*! *!
* * *
In (25), (25c) loses because of the markedness constraint, and (25d) loses because of the positional faithfulness constraint for the final vowel. Corr [-hi] prefers (25a) to (25b); in (25a), two [-high] vowels are in correspondence while in (25b), the medial vowel corresponds to the preceding high [+ATR] vowel but does not correspond to the following mid vowel. As a result, the correspondence constraint for non-high vowels prefers (25a) to (25b). (25) shows the ranking *ˆ/¨, Ident (Fin) >> Corr [-lo], Corr V-V. (25) shows that in ABC, the directionality of harmony can be accounted for by lack of correspondence. Candidates (25a) and (25b) exhibit different directionalities (in (25a), the attested leftward and in (25b), unattested rightward). The difference in directionality is captured by the different correspondence relationships in these two candidates; in (25a), leftward directionality is attributed to the fact that the initial high [ATR] vowel is not in correspondence, and in (25b), rightward directionality is attributed to the fact the word-final mid non-ATR is not in correspondence. As seen in (25), the output correspondence constraint, Corr [-hi], favors the candidate in which both of the mid vowels are in correspondence. Thus, on the basis of the observation in (25), I propose DLC,
!
137!
namely, ‘Directionality by Lack of Correspondence,’ and suggest that directionality effects are accounted for through DLC in the ABC approach.4 Now, let us consider another issue in Pulaar, namely, Sour Grapes. (26) shows the analysis of the Sour Grapes case. (26) Sour Grapes resolved: /barø-gel/ _ [baro-gel] /a-ø-e/ Id Id VV Corr Corr Corr V-V (Fin) [ATR] [-hi] [-lo] !a) a-o x -ex b) ax -øx -e c) a-øx -ex d) ax -øx -´x
* *
*!
Id [ATR]
* *
*! *!
* ** *
In (26), the actual surface form is (26a), and (26b) is the Sour Grapes competitor. Candidate (26d) loses because of the positional faithfulness constraint. Candidate (26c) is excluded by the Ident VV [ATR] constraint, since the vowels in correspondence are not identical with respect to [ATR] specification in this candidate. The remaining two candidates equally violate the correspondence constraints for non-high vowels; in (26a), the low vowel [a] is not in correspondence with the other non-high vowels and in (26b), the final mid vowel [e] does not correspond with other non-high vowels. The competition goes to the next correspondence constraint, Corr [-Lo], which prefers the actual form; in (26a), two non-low vowels are in correspondence, while in (26b), one of the nonlow vowels, the final [e], does not correspond with the other non-low vowel. As !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 4 One might ask, however, what if all the vowels are in correspondence; more specifically, what result will be obtained in (25), if an additional candidate, [ix-øxøx], is considered. The answer to this question is addressed in (28) of this section.
!
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a result, the actual form is successfully selected as optimal. (26) shows the ranking *æ, Ident (Fin) >> Corr [-hi]. Both in (25) and in (26), the winner is the candidate that contains a vowel that is not in correspondence with the other vowels in a word. I suggested that the ranking Ident VV [ATR] >> Corr [-lo] must be established. This ranking predicts the attested form, as seen in (27); in (27), all of the vowels are in correspondence in each candidate except in candidate (27a). (27) Partial harmony/leftward directionality 2 ([+high] vowel as a blocker) /binndo…wø/_ [binndø…wø] /i-o-ø/ *ˆ/¨ Id Id VV Corr Corr Corr Id (Fin) [ATR] [-hi] [-lo] V-V [ATR] !a) i-øx -øx b) ix -o x -øx c) ix -øx -øx d) ix -o x -o x
*
*
*! *! *!
* * *
The realization of candidate (27c) is the same as that of (27a); the difference between these candidates is that in (27a), the final vowel is not in correspondence with the other vowels while in (27c), all of the vowels are in correspondence. In (27), the positional faithfulness constraint for the word-final vowel excludes candidate (27d). The correspondence identity constraint with regard to [ATR] excludes (27b) and (27c). As a result, candidate (27a) is selected as optimal even though one of the vowels in this candidate is not in correspondence. However, one might raise a question with regard to the ranking established in (27); that is, why should (27a) be the winner, rather than (27c)? As mentioned, the realization of these candidates is the same, and in both of the
!
139!
candidates, the attested directionality is observed. To investigate this question, let us reverse the ranking established in (25), and assume that the Ident VV [ATR] constraint is dominated by the output correspondence constraints. This is illustrated in the tableau in (28). In (28), the reverse ranking is assumed so that (28c) would be selected over (28a) (see (27); the ranking Ident VV [ATR] >> Corr [-hi], Corr V-V selects (27a) over (27c)). (28) Reverse ranking fails: /binndo…wø/_ [binndø…wø] /i-o-ø/ *ˆ/¨ Id Corr Corr Corr V-V (Fin) [-hi] [-lo] !a) i-øx -øx "b) ix -o x -øx !c) ix -øx -øx
*(!)
Id VV [ATR]
*(!)
Id [ATR] *
* *
*!
In (28), the winner should be either (28a) or (28c). Because of the ranking Corr [-Lo], Corr V-V >> Ident VV [ATR], (28a) loses, but (28c) is still in the competition. However, the problem with this ranking is that, if the remaining candidates are (28b) with rightward directionality and (28c) with leftward directionality, Ident VV [ATR] fails to discriminate between these two candidates. As pointed out in Rose and Walker (2004) and Walker (2009), the Ident VV [ATR] constraint performs a pair-wise comparison; (28c) incurs one violation of this faithfulness constraint for the [ox ...øx ] pair. Likewise, (28b) also incurs one violation of this constraint for the [ix ...øx ] pair. Thus, these two candidates equally violate the Ident VV [ATR] constraint. As a result, the competition goes to the general faithfulness constraint, and Ident I-O [ATR] prefers (28b).
!
140! The same problem is observed in (29). In (29), the same case as in (26) is
examined, but with the ranking assumed in (28). (29) Sour Grapes: /barø-gel/ _ [baro-gel] /a-ø-e/ Id Corr Corr Corr V-V (Fin) [-hi] [-lo] a) a-o x -ex "b) ax -øx -eX !c) ax -o x -ex
*(!)
Id V-V [ATR]
*(!)
Id [ATR] *
* *
*!
In (29), candidate (29a) loses because of the correspondence constraints, but (29c) is still in the competition. (29c) and (29b), both of which satisfy the correspondence constraints, tie under the output correspondence faithfulness constraint. As in (21), the general faithfulness constraint is the tie-breaker in (29), and as a result, (29b) is wrongly selected as the winner. The cases in (28) and (29) show that if all of the vowels are in correspondence, Ident VV [ATR] fails to resolve the tie; that is, the directionality effects (which are related to Sour Grapes, as seen in (29)) cannot be attributed to output correspondent faithfulness. I argue, therefore, that the ranking in (26), Ident VV [ATR] >> Corr [-lo], Corr V-V, must be established to avoid this problem. If all of the vowels are in correspondence, the faithfulness constraint for the output correspondents fails to prefer the candidate with the attested directionality of harmony. This suggests that in ABC, directionality is achieved, or more specifically, the unattested directionality is blocked (as seen in (26b)), by the lack of correspondence between the preceding high vowel and the following mid vowel. Thus, I propose
!
141!
that in ABC, directionality is achieved or unattested directionality is blocked by DLC, Directionality by Lack of Correspondence. The analysis in (26) (in which the case of/barø-gel/_[baro-gel] was considered) shows that establishing correspondence between non-high vowels is the key to the solution to the Sour Grapes problem. (30) shows, however, that establishing a correspondence relationship between non-high vowels predicts an unattested pattern. (30) Problematic correspondence: /h´l-ir-d´/_[hel-ir-d´] /´-i-´/ Id Id VV Corr Corr Corr V-V (Fin) [ATR] [-hi] [-lo] !a) ex -ix -´ "b) ´x -i-´x c) ex -ix -´x d) ex -ix -ex
*(!) *! *!
*(!) *
* *
Id [ATR] * * **
In (30), (30c) and (30d) are excluded from the competition because of the Ident VV [ATR] constraint and the word-final faithfulness constraint, respectively. Between the remaining candidates, Corr [-hi] prefers (30b), where two nonadjacent mid vowels are identical in their ATR specification. In (30a), the actual form, on the other hand, the medial high vowel and the preceding mid vowel are in correspondence but the final mid vowel is not in correspondence at all. As a result, (30a) violates Corr [-hi]. (26) shows that the key to the solution to Sour Grapes is to establish correspondence. In (30), on the other hand, this key assumption predicts an unattested harmony pattern by establishing an unwanted correspondence.
!
142! In laying out the typology of nasal agreement, Rose and Walker (2004)
point out that proximity plays another important role. For example, in two languages with nasal agreement, Kikongo and Ndonga, nasal agreement fails in Ndonga if the consonants are not in adjacent syllables, while in Kikongo, nasal agreement is observed even if the segments are not in adjacent syllables (Rose and Walker 2004: 494). To differentiate these two types, Rose and Walker (2004) suggests the locality constraint as in (31). (31) Proximity (Prox) (Rose and Walker 2004: 494) Correspondent segments are located in adjacent syllables. I suggest (31) as a solution to the problem in (30); in Pulaar, since there are no reasons to assume a gapped configuration, I assume that (31) is an undominated constraint in the grammar. The solution with (31) is presented in (32). (32) Locality in correspondence: /h´l-ir-d´/_[hel-ir-d´] /´-i-´/ Prox Corr Corr Id VV Corr V-V [-hi] [-lo] [ATR]
Id [ATR]
* * * * #a) ex -ix -´ b) ´x -i-´x *! * * (32b) violates Proximity because the two segments in correspondence are not adjacent. (There is an intervening vowel which does not correspond to either flanking vowel.) (32a), on the other hand, satisfies this markedness constraint because the two vowels in correspondence are adjacent; there are no intervening segments between the two vowels in correspondence. As mentioned, the Proximity constraint is assumed to be high-ranked in this language, and in fact, (32) shows the ranking Proximity >> Corr [-hi].
!
143! Finally, (33) presents the solution to the opacity case. (33) shows that the
solution to opacity is similar to the solution presented in (32); Prox excludes the candidate in (33d) in which vowels in correspondence are not adjacent. (33) Opacity: /bo…ta…ri/_[bø…ta…ri] /o-a-i/ Id Prox Id VV (Fin) [ATR] !a) øx -ax -i b) o-a-i c) o x -ax -ix d) o x -a-ix
Corr [-hi]
Corr [-lo]
Corr V-V
Id [ATR]
* **(!)*
*
*(!)*
* **(!)
*!* *!
*
*
In (33), candidate (33d) is ruled out because of the proximity constraint, and (33c) is excluded by the output correspondent faithfulness constraint. Candidate (33b), where none of the vowels is in correspondence, is ruled out by either one of the output correspondence constraints. (33) shows the ranking Prox >> Corr [-lo]. Figure 15 presents the summary of the ranking arguments.
Prox
*æ, *ˆ/¨
Ident (fin) !" Ident VV [ATR] .! Corr [-hi], Corr [-lo], Corr V-V! .! Ident I-O [ATR] Figure 15. Ranking Lattice: Pulaar/ABC
!
144!
I assume that the ranking *ˆ/¨, *æ >> Ident (fin) must be established in the ABC analysis as well; if these markedness constraints do not dominate the word-final faithfulness constraint, candidates with an unattested vowel (such as [+high, ATR] vowels) will be selected as a winner. In ABC, the directionality of harmony is explained through lack of correspondence. As demonstrated, the Ident VV [ATR] constraint cannot resolve the tie between two candidates with different directionalities of harmony. Rather, directionality is attributed to the fact that there is a vowel in a candidate that is not in correspondence; the correspondence constraints, then, select the candidate that exhibits the attested directionality. As stated above, the directionality and Sour Grapes problems are related, and as seen in this section, the Sour Grapes problem is resolved by the same mechanism. However, the mechanism required for directionality and Sour Grapes over-generates unattested patterns. That is, the system predicts some unwanted correspondence relationships. To prohibit such unwanted results, I suggested a solution using another ABC constraint, Proximity, so that the segments in correspondence are located in adjacent syllables. Thus far, I have demonstrated that both feature linking and ABC successfully account for the attested data. The next section presents the similarities and differences between these two approaches; in Section 4.4.1, I refer to the role of positional faithfulness as observed in these approaches, and in Section 4.4.2, I discuss the differences between these two approaches.
!
145! 4.4 General Discussion 4.4.1 Positional Faithfulness in Harmony In Chapter 3, I mentioned that directionality effects cannot be simply
attributed to other phonological phenomena, such as positional faithfulness (Beckman 1997, 1998). The preliminary analyses of Pulaar as presented in Chapter 3 with non-directional Spread illustrate this point; positional faithfulness by itself cannot resolve the tie between two candidates which exhibit different spreading directionalities. To resolve this problem, in Section 4.2, I proposed an analysis with the directional Spread [ATR]-L to correctly achieve the attested directionality. The analysis showed, however, that this does not mean that positional faithfulness is unnecessary to account for harmony; one might claim that it is redundant to assume two mechanisms to achieve attested directionality: specifying directionality in harmony (spreading) constraints and positional faithfulness. As discussed in this chapter, however, such a claim is incorrect. First, it needs to be made clear that the role of positional faithfulness, in the larger context of OT phonology, is not limited to guaranteeing the inputoutput identity of a harmony trigger. For example, positional faithfulness plays a crucial role in accounting for positional asymmetries, say, in obstruent voicing; for example, in a language where voiced obstruents are prohibited in word-final position but they freely appear elsewhere, the ranking Ident (pre-sonorant) [voice] >> *Voice >> Ident [voice] predicts that voiced obstruents are allowed in pre-sonorant positions while they are prohibited elsewhere (cf. Petrova et al.
!
146!
2006). Therefore, positional faithfulness is independently motivated as part of the OT grammar; it is true that positional faithfulness functions to preserve the input-output identity of the trigger in harmony, but its role is not limited to this. Second, even if a revision of the theory is introduced, positional faithfulness is indispensable. This is illustrated in (34); the directionality example as presented in (14) above is repeated. (34) Interaction of Word-Final Faith and Spread [ATR]-L ,binnd-o…-wø/_ [binnd-ø…-wø] /binnd-o…-wø/ Ident [ATR] Spread Id (root) (fin) [ATR]-L [ATR]
Id [ATR]
!!56!binnd-ø…-wø ! !!!!!!9! ! !!!!!!!!9! (Partial Left)! b) binnd-o:-wø !!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!99:! ! !!!!!!!!! (Partial Right) 86!7(;;=&%! !!!!!!!!!9:! ! ! !!!!!!!!9! ?@%$5A!B()*$6! ! In (34), binary ATR is assumed. I suggested that in a case such as in (34), the directional spreading constraint breaks the tie between (34a) and (34b). It is true that these candidates both satisfy the positional faithfulness constraint for the word-final vowel. However, if the word-final faithfulness constraint is not in the tableau, neither (34a) nor (34b) wins. In fact, (34c), which exhibits an unattested spreading directionality from the first vowel to the right, is selected as optimal. The analysis repeated in (34) suggests that spreading constraints with specified directionality and positional faithfulness constraints (such as Ident [ATR] (Final)) complement each other to achieve the attested directionality. The positional faithfulness constraint can exclude one of the candidates with
!
147!
unattested directionality. However, in some cases, as illustrated in (34), positional faithfulness is silent. If positional faithfulness is silent, then the directional spreading constraint breaks the tie. Thus, both positional faithfulness and the harmony/spreading constraint with specified directionality function together to achieve the attested directionality, or to block the unattested directionality. The same is true with the ABC analysis. As mentioned, directionality is correctly predicted, or more accurately, the unattested directionality is blocked, by the DLC (Directionality by Lack of Correspondence) effect. As (35) shows, however, DLC is not possible without the positional faithfulness constraint. (35) Partial harmony ([+high] vowel as a blocker) (cf. (26)) /binndo…wø/_ [binndø…wø] /i-o-ø/ *ˆ/¨ Id Corr Corr Id V-V (Fin) [-hi] [-Lo] [ATR] !a) i-øx -øx b) ix -o x -ø c) ˆx -øx -øx d) ix -o x -o x
*!
* *
Corr V-V
Id [ATR]
* *
*
*! *!
* *
As discussed, candidate (35a), the actual form, is achieved through the lack of correspondence of the initial vowel [i]. As (35d) shows, this is achieved because of the word-final faithfulness constraint prohibiting /ø/ from becoming [+ATR]. Without this positional faithfulness constraint, (35d) would win over (35a) since (35d) satisfies both of the output correspondence constraints. Therefore, obtaining attested directionality, or blocking unattested directionality, is not achieved by the directional spreading constraint or by the output correspondence constraint alone. These two approaches both require
!
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positional faithfulness; in the ABC analysis, positional faithfulness is crucial in blocking correspondence, and in the analysis with directional Spread, the directionality in the spreading constraint itself is not sufficient to block an unattested directionality. Thus, both feature linking and ABC crucially rely on positional faithfulness in predicting the attested directionality correctly. 4.4.2 Privative [ATR] In sections 4.2 and 4.3, I presented the spreading and ABC analyses assuming that the feature [ATR] is binary. The question addressed in this section, then, is what if the feature [ATR] is privative? To investigate this question, first, the analysis with Spread [ATR]-L is presented. If privative ATR is assumed, that means that the active feature in harmony is only ATR. In other words, [-ATR] is assumed to be inactive and assumed not to spread. The spreading constraint in (36) is used to enforce harmony under privative ATR. The analysis with (36) is presented in (37). (36) Spread [ATR]-Left (Spread [ATR]-L) (cf. Sasa 2006) If a feature [ATR] is associated with a vowel, the same feature [ATR] is associated with all the vowels to the left. (37) /søf-ru/ _ [sof-ru] (basic total leftward harmony) /søf-ru/! *ˆ/*¨ Id [ATR] Spread (fin) [ATR]-L !
Id (root) [ATR]
Id [ATR]
*
*
!56!sof-ru [ATR]! 76!søf-ru .! [ATR] 86!søf-r¨!
*! *(!)
*(!)
*
!
149!
In (37a), there is an [ATR] feature associated with the final vowel and it is also associated with the first vowel. In (37b), the [ATR] feature of the final vowel is not associated with the vowel in the first syllable, and thus, it violates the spreading constraint. In (37c), there are no [ATR] features and the spreading constraint is vacuously satisfied. However, this candidate is ruled out either by the undominated markedness constraint against [+high] non-ATR vowels, or by the positional faithfulness constraint. (37) shows that Spread [ATR]-L successfully enforces harmony in the correct direction, even with the assumption of privative [ATR]. (38) shows that Sour Grapes is not a problem under the assumption of privative ATR. (38) [barø…-di]_[baro…-di]: Harmony with a blocker, no Sour Grapes /barø…-di/ Id [ATR] Spread Id (Root) Id (fin) [ATR]-L [ATR] [ATR] !a) b a r o… d i !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.! [ATR] b) b a r ø… d i !!!!!!!!!!!!!.! [ATR] c) b a r ø… d ˆ
*
*
**! *!
*
In (38), there is a low vowel blocker which cannot change to [ATR]. Still, the analysis with privative ATR successfully avoids the Sour Grape candidate in (38b). In (38a), the spreading of [ATR] is more complete than in (38b), and as a result, Spread [ATR]-L still resolves the tie between (38a) and (38b).
!
150! However, (39) shows that the analysis with Spread [ATR]-L fails to predict
leftward directionality. In (39), all the candidates satisfy Spread [ATR]-L; as illustrated in Figures 11 and 12, Spread [ATR]-L is silent on rightward spreading. (39) Leftward fails (cf. (14)): ,binnd-o…-wø/_ [binnd-ø…-wø] /binnd-o…-wø/ Id [ATR] Spread Id (root) (fin) [ATR]-L [ATR] !56!binnd-ø…-wø .! [ATR] " b) binnd-o:-wø | [ATR] 86!7(;;=&%! ! [ATR] n d) bˆn d-ø…-wø
Id [ATR]
!
!!!!!!!
!
!!!!!!!!9!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!
!
!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!9:!
!
!
!!!!!!!!9!
!
!
!!!!!!!!!!9!
!!!!!!!!99!
The problem in (39) is that candidates (39a) and (39b) equally satisfy the positional faithfulness constraint, the spreading constraint, and the root faithfulness constraint. These candidates are evaluated by the general faithfulness constraint for the ATR feature, and this faithfulness constraint prefers candidate (39b). Thus, if ATR is assumed to be privative, the directional spreading constraint is silent and as a result, it fails to resolve the tie between leftward (39a) and rightward (39b). It seems, however, that the problem in (39) can be resolved if privative RTR (Retracted Tongue Root) is assumed, instead of privative ATR; that is, suppose that we assume that Pulaar exhibits RTR, rather than ATR, harmony.
!
151!
The spreading constraint for RTR harmony is presented in (40). The analysis with (40) is presented in (41). (40) Spread [RTR]-Left (Spread [RTR]-L) If a feature [RTR] is associated with a vowel, the same feature [RTR] is associated with all the vowels to the left. (41) Problem solved? (cf. (39)): ,binnd-o…-wø/_ [binnd-ø…-wø] /binnd-o…-wø/ *ˆ/*¨! Id [RTR] Spread Id (root) (fin) [RTR]-L [RTR]
Id [RTR]
#56!binnd-ø…-wø ! ! ! ! !!!!!!!!9! 9! .! [RTR] n b) bin d-o:-wø ! ! ! ! !!!!!!!!! 99:! | [RTR] 86!bˆnnd=ø>=&ø ! ! ! ! !!!!!!!!9! 9:! ! [RTR] d) binnd-o…-wo ! 9:! ! !!!!!!!!!!9! !!!!!!!!99! ! In (41), all the constraints remain the same as in (39), except that the faithfulness constraints evaluate the [RTR] feature. In (41), candidates (41c) and (41d) lose because of the undominated markedness constraint and the word-final faithfulness constraint, respectively. The remaining candidates are evaluated by Spread [RTR]-L; (41a) violates this spreading constraint once since the feature [RTR] in this candidate is not linked to one vowel. (41b), on the other hand, incurs two violations because the [RTR] feature is not associated with two vowels. Thus, (41) shows that the problem in (39) can be solved if privative [RTR] is assumed.
!
152! However, assuming [RTR] actually cannot be the solution. In fact, such an
assumption is problematic in Pulaar. First, cases such as (13) (/søf-ru/ _ [sof-ru]) cannot be explained if privative RTR is assumed; in this case, there is an [(+)ATR] vowel word-finally, and this [(+)ATR] feature spreads to the preceding vowel. However, if [sof-ru] competes with *[søf-ru], no mechanism selects the actual form if [RTR] spreading is assumed; that is, the Spread [RTR]-L constraint which is assumed in (41) is silent with respect to these two forms/candidates. (42) presents an even more serious problem. (42) shows that Sour Grapes arises if privative RTR is assumed; in (42), the actual surface form is (42a), where the final and the medial vowel both surface as [(+)ATR]. However, the analysis with privative RTR prefers (42b), where the medial vowel is identical to the preceding vowel in the RTR/ATR specification. If privative ATR is assumed, the case as in (41) is not a problem, but the assumption of privative RTR gives rise to a problem in (42). ‘Removing’ directionality from the RTR-spreading constraint makes the problem even worse since such a constraint prefers (42b), where the spreading of RTR is more complete, than the actual form in (42a). Thus, (42) suggests that assuming privative RTR cannot be the solution in Pulaar since the wrong form is predicted under privative RTR.
!
153!
(42) [barø…-di]_[baro…-di]: blocker (cf. (15)) /barø…-di/ Ident [ATR] Spread (fin) [RTR]-L
Id (Root) [RTR]
!a) b a r o… d i !!!!!!!!!!!.!!!!!!!!!!!!!! [RTR] "b) b a r ø… d i .!!!!!!!!!!!!! [RTR]
Id [RTR] *!
In fact, the analyses presented in (39) and (42) suggest that it is not possible to assume privative ATR/RTR in Pulaar if Spread is employed as a harmony constraint; as seen in (39), if privative ATR is assumed, the candidate with the attested leftward directionality fails. If, on the other hand, privative RTR is assumed, then the Sour Grapes problem arises as in (42). It appears that, in analyzing the Pulaar harmony data, it is necessary to assume that the feature ATR is binary. This further suggests that Pulaar is one of the languages where both [+ATR] and [-ATR] are active in harmony. For the analysis with ABC, however, the assumption that ATR is necessarily binary is not required; as seen in Chapter 2, ABC accounts for the Turkish roundness harmony data even when the feature [round] is assumed to be privative. In Pulaar ATR harmony, the following constraint in (43) accounts for the harmony data under the assumption of privative ATR. (43) Ident VV [ATR] (cf. Walker 2009) Let X be a segment in the output and Y be a correspondent of X in the output; i) if X is [ATR], then Y is [ATR] ii) if X lacks the [ATR] feature, then Y lacks the [ATR] feature.
!
154!
Table 7 presents the evaluation of the Id VV [ATR] constraint under binary ATR.
Table 7. The Evaluation of Id VV [ATR] Ident VV [ATR] a) a
o x ix .!!!!!!!.! !!!!!!!![ATR] [ATR] b) ax ox ix .!!!!!!!!!!.! [ATR] [ATR] c) ax øx ´x
$ (Satisfied) * (Violated for the pair [ax -o x ]) $ (Satisfied)
The configuration in (a) in Table 7 satisfies (48) because the two vowels in correspondence are identical in the [ATR] feature; [o] is specified as [ATR] and [i] is also specified as [ATR]. (c) also satisfies (48) since all the vowels in correspondence lack the [ATR] feature (or, none of the vowels in correspondence is specified as [ATR]). (b), on the other hand, incurs one violation for Ident VV [ATR]; in this configuration, all the vowels are in correspondence, and the pair [o x -ix ] is identical in [ATR] specification. The [ax -o x ] pair, however, violates this faithfulness constraint since [o] is specified as [ATR] while [e] lacks the ATR feature (thus, the [ATR] specifications of these vowels are not identical). To summarize, for ABC, it does not make any difference whether the feature [ATR] is assumed to be privative or binary. The analysis with Spread, on the other hand, relies on the assumption of binary [ATR]; this further means that the analysis with Spread predicts that Pulaar is a language where both [+ATR]
!
155!
and [-ATR] are active. One might argue that this is an unwanted prediction, since in the majority of ATR harmony languages, there is only one active feature, either [+ATR] or [-ATR] (or [RTR]) (cf. Archangeli and Pulleyblank 1994). I suggest, however, that this prediction by the spreading analysis is not necessarily problematic because, first, the Pulaar system is not dominant-recessive (note that the claim of a single active feature is made for dominant-recessive systems), and as pointed out, Kalenjin is also considered to be such a language. Thus, I conclude that even though the predictions with respect to the active value of [ATR] are different, both ABC and spreading can successfully account for the attested harmony patterns observed in Pulaar. 4.4.3 Summary In this chapter, I presented another case study comparing feature linking and ABC. As demonstrated, these two approaches successfully resolve the two empirical problems in Pulaar, namely, directionality and Sour Grapes. The analysis presented in this chapter shows that there are two advantages of ABC analysis; first, directionality can be accounted for with lack of correspondence (DLC), and furthermore, the ABC analysis does not require any revisions or the addition of any extra mechanisms. Second, ABC does not require the assumption of binary ATR. The analysis with feature linking, on the other hand, requires specified directionality in the spreading constraint, and the analysis crucially relies on binary ATR. These facts, it seems, favor ABC as a comprehensive apparatus for vowel harmony.
!
156! However, this does not necessarily mean that Spread should be
eliminated from the OT grammar as a means of accounting for harmony. Rose and Walker (2004) suggest that some cases of consonant harmony are more appropriately viewed as spreading rather than long-distance agreement. If this observation is correct, the mechanism that enforces spreading is still part of the OT grammar. Second, it is true that the spreading analysis of ATR harmony in Pulaar requires the assumption of binary ATR, but the universality of privative ATR is still in question. In fact, Pulaar is not the only language in which both [+ATR] and [-ATR] are active; as pointed out in Chapter 3, Kalenjin is also claimed to be such a language. Hence, it is not a very wise decision to eliminate the feature linking approach to harmony simply because of the directionality problem and the fact that it requires binary ATR. Rather, the aim of the remainder of this thesis, more specifically, Chapter 5, is to investigate whether ABC is actually superior to the spreading analysis as a theory to lay out uniform and comprehensive analyses of vowel harmony. To explore this question, roundness/backness harmony is revisited in Chapter 5. I have shown that ABC successfully accounts for the backness and roundness harmony in Turkish, but Chapter 5 examines the harmony processes in Yakut, another Turkic language which is slightly different from Turkish when it comes to roundness harmony.
!
157! CHAPTER V ROUNDNESS HARMONY REVISITED: A CASE STUDY OF YAKUT Thus far, I have presented two case studies, Turkish roundness/backness
harmony and Pulaar ATR harmony, and I have demonstrated that both feature linking and ABC are capable of predicting the patterns attested in these two languages. This leads us to ask whether both of these two approaches are equally able to account for vowel harmony. To explore this question, in this chapter, roundness and backness harmony are revisited via a case study of Yakut; although the difference between Turkish and Yakut is minimal, the same additional mechanism (an additional markedness constraint) is required in both of these approaches to restrict the occurrence of two vowels that differ in height. The organization of this chapter is as follows; in Section 5.1, the Yakut backness and roundness harmony data are presented, and in Section 5.2, the feature linking analysis is presented. The ABC analysis is presented in Section 5.3, and a general discussion is presented in Section 5.4. 5.1 Yakut Roundness Harmony Yakut (also known as Sakha) is a Northern Turkic language spoken in the northern part of Siberia. It is estimated to have 363,000 speakers in the basin along the River Lena. The major city in the Yakut-speaking region is Yakutsk (Lewis 2009).
!
158! As with other members of the Turkic family, vowel harmony, both
backness and roundness, is one of the major characteristics of Yakut. This section presents the data from Yakut roundness harmony. !
The vowel inventory of Yakut is shown in Table 8. In addition to the short
vowels as presented in Table 8, there are long vowels in Yakut, and vowel length is contrastive (Krueger 1962: 36-37). However, in vowel harmony, vowel length does not affect the behavior of the vowels.
Table 8. Vowel Inventory of Yakut Front ([-Back]) Back ([+Back]) Non-Round Round Non-Round High ([+hi]) i y π Non-High ([-hi]) e Ø a Source: Krueger, John (1962). Yakut Manual (Uralic and Altaic Series). Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Publication.
Round u o
The vowel inventory of Yakut is completely symmetrical; all the unrounded vowels have [round] counterparts. In addition to the monophthongs listed in Table 8, there are four diphthongs. These diphthongs agree in backness, but the two vowels in a diphthong do not agree in height. In roundness harmony, the diphthongs behave as if they were high monophthongs. The four diphthongs in Yakut are shown in Table 9.
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Table 9. Yakut Diphthongs Front Unround Front Round Back Unround Back Round ie yØ πa uo Source: Krueger, John (1962). Yakut Manual (Uralic and Altaic Series). Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Publication.
The data in (1) illustrate total harmony, where all the vowels in a word agree in roundness. In (1), the vowel in the accusative suffix agrees with the preceding vowel(s) in the root not only for roundness, but also for backness because of backness harmony. (The Yakut data presented in this chapter are transcribed in the IPA transcription system.) (1) Yakut Roundness Harmony: Total Harmony (Krueger 1962: 82-84) Root
Accusative1
Gloss
a.
tynnyk-
tynnyk-y
‘window’
b.
kinige-
kinige-ni
‘book’
c.
murum-
murum-u
‘nose’
d.
bØrØ-
bØrØ-ny
‘wolf’
e.
o©o-
o©o-nu
‘child’
f.
a©a-
a©a-nπ
‘father’
Yakut roundness harmony is root-controlled; that is, when a root contains (a) round vowel(s), the vowel(s) in the suffix also become(s) round. For example, in !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1 The accusative suffix begins with [n] when following vowel-final roots; the [n] is absent when this suffix follows a consonant-final root (Krueger 1962: 80).
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(1a), the accusative suffix is realized as [-y] because of the round vowel in the root, while in (1b), the same suffix is realized as [-(n)i] because of the unrounded vowels in the root. Likewise, in (1e), where the root contains [-high, round] vowels, the accusative suffix is [-(n)u], while in (1f), the accusative suffix is [-(n)π] since the root does not contain any [round] vowels. The data in (1) show that [+high, round] vowels freely follow both [+high] and [-high] round vowels. In other words, there are no restrictions for the high round vowels in suffixes; they are freely observed as long as the vowels in the root are [round] (regardless of the height of the root vowels). The harmony pattern exhibited in (1) is the same as the roundness harmony pattern in Turkish (see Chapter 2). Both in Yakut and in Turkish, [+high, round] vowels are observed in the suffix when a root contains a round vowel. However, there are restrictions on the occurrence of [-high, round] vowels in the suffixes in Yakut. As (2) shows, the [-high] vowel in the suffix is unrounded when the closest vowel in the root is [+high] (even when the closest vowel is round). (2) Partial Roundness Harmony (Kaun 1995:23, Krueger 1962: 84-85) a. tynnyk- (root)
tynnyk-ler (*tynnyk-lØr)
‘window-plural’
b. tobuk- (root)
tobuk-ka (*tobuk-ko)
‘knee-dative’
c. ojum- (root)
ojum-tan (*ojum-ton)
‘shaman-ablative’
d. y…t- (root)
y…t-yen (*y…t-yØn)
‘milk-instrumental’
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In Yakut, non-high round vowels occur in suffixes only when they are preceded by other non-high round vowels. Thus, in (2a), for example, the vowel in the suffix is not round because the vowels in the root are high vowels. Likewise, in the form in (2b), the suffix vowel is unrounded because the vowel directly preceding the suffix vowel is high. To summarize, a [-high, round] vowel is prohibited in harmony when the trigger is [+high]. This restriction is also observed in Turkish; thus, (2) shows that both in Yakut, and in Turkish non-high round vowels are not observed in suffixes when the root contains (a) high round vowel(s). The examples in (3) show that in Yakut, diphthongs behave as if they were high vowels, and as a result, in (3), the non-high vowel in the suffix surfaces as unrounded. (3) Diphthongs in Roundness Harmony (Krueger 1962: 77-81) Root
Accusative
Dative 2
Gloss
a.
yØr-
yØr-y
yØr-ge (*yØr-gØ)
‘herd’
b.
kyØl-
kyØl-y
kyØl-ge (*kyØl-gØ)
‘lake’
c.
uol-
uol-u
uol-ga (*uol-go)
‘son’
d.
muos-
muos-u
muos-ka (*muos-ko)
‘horn’
e.
πal-
πal-π
πal-ga
‘neighbor’
f.
bie-
bie-ni
bie-©e
‘mare’
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! "!The initial consonant of the dative suffix has three variants: [-©], [-g], and [-k] (Krueger 1962: 81).
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As stated, high round vowels freely occur in suffixes as long as the vowels in the roots are [round]. Thus, in the accusative forms in (3a) through (3d), the high vowel in the suffix is [round]. In the dative forms, where the suffix contains a non-high vowel, on the other hand, the vowel in the suffix is unrounded in (3a) through (3d). Thus, the data in (3) show that the diphthongs in Yakut function in the same way as high vowels, and if there is a non-high vowel in a suffix, then that vowel surfaces as unrounded. In other words, a non-high round vowel may not follow a diphthong in Yakut. The data in (2) and (3) show that in Yakut and in Turkish, a similar restriction is observed in the occurrence of non-high round vowels. The data in (4) show, however, a roundness harmony pattern which is attested in Yakut but not in Turkish. (4) A Non-high Round Vowel in a Suffix (Krueger 1962: 72-75) a. o©o- (root)
o©o-lor (*o©o-lar)
‘child-plural’
b. bØrØ- (root)
bØrØ-lØr (*bØrØ-ler)
‘wolf-plural’
c. Øj- (root)
Øj-tØn (*Øj-ten)
‘reason-ablative’
d. o©o- (root)
o©o-non (*o©o-nan)
‘child-ablative’
In Yakut, the non-high vowel in the suffix is round when it is preceded by another non-high round vowel in the root. Thus, in (4a), the plural suffix contains a non-high round vowel because of another non-high round vowel in the root. Notice that this pattern is not attested in Turkish, as seen in the data in (5) (repeated from (2) in Chapter 2)
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(5) Turkish Roundness Harmony (Clements and Sezer 1982: 216) Root
Genitive
Plural
Gloss
a.
kØj
kØ-yn
kØj-ler (*kØj-lØr)
‘village’
b.
son
son-un
son-lar (*son-lor)
‘end’
(4) and (5) show the difference between Yakut and Turkish. Unlike Yakut, Turkish does not allow any roundness harmony pattern in which a non-high round vowel is observed in a suffix. In Yakut, on the other hand, non-high round vowels can be observed in suffixes when preceded by a [-high, round] root vowel. Table 10 summarizes the attested and the prohibited roundness harmony patterns in Yakut roundness harmony.
Table 10. Restrictions on Roundness Harmony in Yakut
Front Vowels
Back Vowels
-y-y (both [+hi]) - y-e -u-u (both [+hi]) - u-a
Attested Ø-y ([-hi] > [+hi])
Ø-Ø (both [-hi])
Not Attested *y-Ø ([+hi] >[-hi])
o-u ([-hi ] >[+hi])
o-o (both [-hi])
*u-o ([+hi] > [-hi])
The next two sections consider how feature linking and ABC account for the harmony patterns observed in Yakut roundness harmony. I assume that the feature [round] is privative, as assumed in Chapter 2 and in other previous accounts of roundness harmony.
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164! 5.2 The Analysis with Spread 5.2.1 Roundness Harmony First, this section presents the feature-linking analysis of Yakut roundness
harmony. The harmony constraint in (6) is used. (6) Spread [Round] (cf. Padgett 1997, 2002; Sasa 2001) If a feature [round] is associated with a vowel, the same roundness feature is linked to all of the vowels in a word. The constraint in (6) is satisfied when all the vowels in the output share the same roundness feature. As seen in the data, Yakut roundness harmony is root-controlled. Thus, the positional faithfulness constraint in (7) preserves the identity of the trigger. (7) Ident I-O [round] (!1) (Id (!1) [round]) (cf. Beckman 1997, 1998; Sasa 2001) Segments in the initial syllable of a word in the output have the same specification as their input correspondents for the feature [round]. The same effect would be achieved by a root faithfulness constraint, but since there are no disharmonic roots in Yakut, I assume the initial syllable faithfulness constraint in (7) to preserve the input identity of the trigger. In addition to the positional faithfulness constraint for roundness, the general faithfulness constraint for the roundness feature in (8) is also part of the grammar.3
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! #!In addition to (8), I assume that another faithfulness constraint, Ident [hi], is undominated in Yakut, since changing vowel height is not attested to achieve complete harmony.
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(8) Ident [round] (Id [round]) (McCarthy and Prince 1995) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [round]. As seen in the data, there are restrictions on the occurrence of the [-high, round] vowels. The markedness constraint in (9) is also active in accounting for the attested data in Yakut.4 (9) *o/Ø (cf. Kaun 1995) Non-high [round] vowels are prohibited. The analysis for total roundness harmony is presented in (10).! ! (10) Total harmony: both trigger and target are [+high] /tynnyk-i/ Id (!1) [Round] Spread [round] Id [round] !a) tynnyk-y ! [round] b) tynnyk-i ! [round] c) tinnik-i d) tynnik-i $! [round]
* *! *!
** *!*
*
In (10), candidate (10c) is ruled out because of the positional faithfulness constraint. In (10b), the [round] feature is associated with two vowels in the root, but this [round] feature is not linked to the vowel in the suffix. As a result, this !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! %!One might ask, given the markedness constraint in (9), how it is possible to observe [-high] round vowel in Yakut. It is possible for non-high round vowels to appear when i) they occur in the initial syllable of a word (protected by (7), if an input contains a [-high, round] vowel in that position) or ii) when the spreading of the [round] feature to non-high vowels in other positions (for example, in suffixes) is not blocked by another markedness constraint (*H-L [round] in (15) below).
!
166!
candidate incurs one violation for Spread [round]. Likewise, even though (10d) satisfies the positional faithfulness constraint for the first syllable, this candidate is ruled out because of the spreading constraint. Candidate (10a), the actual form, satisfies both the positional faithfulness constraint and the spreading constraint, but violates the general faithfulness constraint for the roundness feature.5 The tableau in (11) illustrates the analysis of another case of total harmony, where the trigger and the target of the harmony are [-high]. In (11), the markedness constraint prohibiting [-high, round] vowels is also included in the tableau. (11) Total harmony 2: trigger and target both are [-high] /o©o-lar/ Id (!1) [round] Spread [round] !a) o©o-lor !!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!![round] b) o©o-lar ! [round] c) a©a-lar
*! *!
*o/Ø
Id [round]
***
*
** **
(11c) is excluded because of initial syllable faithfulness. (11b) incurs one violation for the spreading constraint while (11a), the actual form, fully satisfies this constraint. Thus, Spread [round] prefers (11a) to (11b).
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! &!In (10), there are other possible candidates from the same input. For example, *[tynnyk-u] is a logically possible candidate. However, Spread [back] excludes such a candidate. The discussion of backness harmony with spreading is presented in Section 5.2.2. !
!
167! In (12), the third case of total harmony, where the trigger is a [-high]
vowel and the target is a [+high] vowel, is presented. In Yakut, high round vowels freely occur in suffixes even when the root contains a [-high, round] vowel. Therefore, the actual form contains a high round vowel in the suffix in (12) even though the vowels in the root are [-high] round vowels. The initial syllable faithfulness constraint excludes (12c), and the spreading constraint prefers (12a) to (12b). (12) Total harmony 3: trigger is [-high] and target is [-high] /o©o-nπ/ Id (!1) [round] Spread [round] !a) o©o-nu ! [round] b) o©o-nπ ! !!!'()*+,-! c) a©a-nπ
*! *!
*o/Ø
Id [round]
**
*
** **
(13) shows the summary of the ranking arguments presented in the analyses in (10) through (12). (13) Ranking Argument 1 - Spread [round] >> Ident [round] (from (10)) - Spread [round] >> *o/Ø (from (11)) - Ident (!1) >> *o/Ø (from (12)) The analysis with Spread [round] successfully accounts for total harmony. However, as seen in (14), the analysis presented thus far fails to account for the partial harmony case, that is, the pattern where the trigger is [+high] and the target is [-high]; in (14), the spreading constraint prefers (14c), in which the non-
!
168!
high vowel in the suffix undergoes harmony when the vowel in the root is [+high, round]. However, such a pattern is not observed in Yakut. (14) Partial harmony: [-high] suffix vowel does not participate in the harmony /tynnyk-ler/ Id (!1) [round] Spread [round] *o/Ø Id [round] !a) tynnyk-ler ! !!!!!!!!!!!'()*+,-! b) tinnik-ler "c) tynnyk-lØr ! !!!!!!!!!!!!'()*+,-!
*! *!
** *
*
Candidate (14b) is excluded because of the initial syllable faithfulness constraint. Candidate (14a), the actual form, loses because of Spread [round]; there is a [round] feature associated with the vowels in the root, but this [round] feature is not linked to the vowel in the suffix. (14c) completely satisfies this harmony constraint, and as a result, (14c) is wrongly selected as the optimal candidate. As shown in (11), it is not possible to reverse the ranking for Spread [round], *o/Ø, and Ident [round]. As (11) shows, the markedness constraint against non-high round vowels must be dominated by the spreading constraint, and Spread [round] also must dominate the general faithfulness constraint for the roundness feature, as shown in (10). To resolve this issue in Yakut, Sasa (2001) proposes a markedness constraint which prohibits the multiple linking of the [round] feature to vowels that are different in height. This proposed markedness constraint is presented in (15).
!
169!
(15) *High-Low [round] (*H-L [round]) (Sasa 2001: 277) If the feature [round] is linked to a high vowel, the same [round] feature is not linked to a following non-high vowel. Figure 16 illustrates the satisfaction and violation patterns of (15). The configuration in (a) in Figure 16 does not violate *H-L [round] because the two vowels (V1 and V2 ) do not differ in height. (b) also satisfies this constraint because the precedence relationship in this configuration does not match the description given in the definition of this constraint; that is, if the first vowel in a pair is [-high], the constraint in (15) is silent on such a configuration. This is true even if two vowels are different in height but still share the same [round] feature. (c) violates *H-L [round]; in this configuration, the first vowel, V1 , is specified as [+high], and the following vowel, V2 , is specified as [-high]. The markedness constraint in (15) prohibits the sharing of the same [round] feature if two vowels are in this particular precedence relationship.
a)
b) [-high] [-high] V1
V2
[round] # (Satisfied)
c) [-high] [+high] V1
V2
[round] # (Satisfied)
Figure 16. The Evaluation of *High-Low [round]
[+high] [-high] V1
V2
[round] * (Violated)
!
170! Sasa (2001) suggests that the markedness constraint in (15) is half of the
following constraint in (16). (16) Uniformity Round (cf. Kaun 1995) [round] may not be multiply linked to slots if slots are different in height. (16) prohibits the configurations in (b) and (c) of Figure 16, where the same [round] feature is associated with two vowels of different heights. However, in Yakut, it is true that the configuration in (c) in Figure 16 is not attested, but that in (20b) is an attested pattern. Therefore, Sasa suggests that (16) should be split into two, one half prohibiting (20b), and the other half prohibiting (20c). Sasa suggests that *H-L [round], which prohibits only (c) in Figure 16, is active in the grammar of Yakut.6 The analysis with (15) is presented in the tableau in (17). (17) Partial harmony: non-high target does not participate in harmony (when the trigger is [+high]) /tynnyk-ler/ Id (!1) *H-L Spread *o/Ø Id [round] [round] [round] [round] $ a) tynnyk-ler ! !!!!!!!!"()*+,-! b) tynnyk-lØr ! !!!!!!!'()*+,-! c) tinnik-ler d) tynnyk-lØr $ [round][round]
*
*!
*
*!
* **
**!*
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! .!This issue is discussed further in Section 5.4.2 of this chapter.
*
*
!
171!
(17c) loses because of the positional faithfulness constraint for the initial syllable. (17b) loses because of the *H-L [round] constraint; in this candidate, the [round] feature associated with the preceding high vowels is simultaneously associated with the following non-high vowel. In (17d), on the other hand, the [round] feature associated with the high vowels is not simultaneously associated with a non-high vowel; instead, a different [round] feature is associated with the nonhigh vowel in the suffix. Thus, (17d) does not violate *H-L [round]. However, (17d) loses because of the spreading constraint since the [round] feature associated with the high vowels in the root is not associated with the vowel in the suffix (one violation) and the roundness feature associated with the non-high vowel in the suffix is not linked to the vowels in the root (two violations). (17d) incurs three violations for *H-L [round] in total, and as a result, (17a), the actual form, is selected as optimal. Another analysis of partial harmony is presented in (18). In (18), the input contains a round vowel in the suffix. (18) Partial harmony 2: input with a non-high round vowel in the suffix /tynnyk-lØr/ Id (!1) *H-L Spread *o/Ø Id [round] [round] [round] [round] !a) tynnyk-ler !!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!'()*+,-! b) tynnyk-lØr ! !!!!!!!!!'()*+,-! c) tynnyk-lØr !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!$! '()*+,-!!'()*+,-!
* *!
* *
**!*
*
!
172!
In (18), all the candidates satisfy the initial syllable faithfulness constraint. (18b) violates the *H-L [round] constraint; in this candidate, the same [round] feature is associated with vowels of different heights, and [+high] vowels precede the nonhigh vowel. Candidate (18c) satisfies *H-L [round] (although the phonetic realization of this candidate is the same as that of (18b)); it is true that the nonhigh vowel in the suffix is specified as [round], but the suffix vowel in this candidate does not share the [round] feature associated with the preceding high vowels. This candidate, however, incurs three violations of Spread [round]. As a result, the spreading constraint prefers the actual form to the candidate in (18c). The summary of the constraint ranking that accounts for Yakut roundness harmony is presented in Figure 17.
Ident (!1) [round]
*H-L [round] Spread [round] !
! !
!
!
!
!/o/Ø
Ident [round]
Figure 17. Ranking Lattice: Yakut/Spread
In Yakut, the ranking Spread [round] >> Ident [round] enforces harmony. However, changing the roundness specification of the root vowels is not an attested method of satisfying Spread [round]. This is expressed by the ranking where the initial syllable faithfulness constraint dominates the spreading
!
173!
constraint. These two mechanisms are the same in Turkish as well, except that root faithfulness, rather than initial syllable faithfulness, is assumed in Turkish. The crucial difference between Yakut and Turkish is the ranking of the markedness constraint: (19) Ranking for Yakut and Turkish a) Turkish: Ident (root) [round] >> *o/Ø >> Spread [round]
b) Yakut: Ident (!1) [round] >> Spread [round] >> *o/Ø In Turkish, the suffix vowel is always unrounded if it is non-high; this is captured by the ranking in which the markedness constraint dominates the spreading constraint. In Yakut, on the other hand, the non-high vowel in the suffix can be round when the vowel(s) in the root is/are also [-high].7 As (19) shows, therefore, the markedness constraint cannot dominate the spreading constraint, or else the suffix non-high vowel would be always unrounded. However, if the spreading constraint dominates the markedness constraint, such a ranking predicts that all the suffix vowels become round when there is a round vowel in the root. This is not the pattern observed in Yakut. Thus, another ranking, *H-L [round] >> Spread [round], also must be established so that total roundness harmony is achieved in two cases: i) both the trigger and the target agree in height, or ii) the trigger is non-high and the target is high. The analysis presented in this section suggests that assuming a markedness !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 0!Except when the root contains a diphthong.
!
174!
constraint prohibiting feature-sharing (that is, *H-L [round]) plays a crucial role in accounting for the blocking effect in harmony, where certain vowels do not participate in the harmony process.8 5.2.2 Backness Harmony To account for backness harmony, which is observed in Yakut in addition to roundness harmony, another spreading constraint, as in (20), is necessary.9 (20) Spread [back] (cf. Padgett 2002: 89) If a feature [+back] or [-back] is associated with a vowel, the same backness feature is linked to all the vowels in a word. The analysis with (20) is presented in (21). In (21), candidate (21c) loses because of the Spread [back] constraint; the [-back] feature associated with the root vowels is not associated with the suffix vowel (one violation) and the [-back] feature of the suffix vowel is not linked to two vowels in the root (additional two violations). Candidate (21d) satisfies the spreading constraint for the backness feature, but this candidate loses because of the initial syllable faithfulness constraint. The remaining two candidates satisfy both the positional faithfulness
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1!Kaun (1995) presents an analysis of Yakut roundness harmony with the constraints Extend [round] if [-high] (“[round] must be associated with all available vocalic positions within a word when simultaneously associated with [-high]”) and Uniform [round] (listed in (16)), instead of assuming *H-L [round]. Sasa (2001) points out, however, that the analysis with these two constraints encounters a ranking paradox in Yakut. 2!It is also possible to achieve both roundness and backness harmony by assuming i) the feature class [color] (which contains [back] and [round] features as a terminal node), and ii) the spreading constraint Spread [color] (Padgett 2002: 89). The harmony constraint Spread [color] is discussed in Chapter 6.
!
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constraint and the spreading constraint for backness, but *H-L [round] prefers the actual form. (21) Backness harmony: no disharmonic forms /tynnyk-lar/ Id (!1) Spread *H-L [back] [back] [round] !a) tynnyk-ler !!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!'34567-! b) tynnyk-lØr ! !!!!!!!!!'34567-! c) tynnyk-lar !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!$! '34567-!!'84567-! d) tπnnπk-lar [+back]
Spread [round]
*o/ Ø
Id [back]
* *! *!**
* *
*
*
*
*!
**
It has been demonstrated that the spreading analysis is capable of accounting for the attested patterns of roundness harmony and backness harmony in Yakut. Section 5.3 illustrates the ABC analysis of Yakut, and discusses the challenge that an ABC analysis encounters in the Yakut harmony processes. 5.3 Agreement By Correspondence The focus of Section 5.3 is a discussion of the ABC treatment of Yakut roundness harmony and backness harmony. The ABC analysis faces one issue in accounting for roundness and backness harmony in Yakut; the mechanism necessary to account for roundness harmony is problematic in accounting for backness harmony. The mechanism (more specifically, the constraint ranking necessary for backness harmony) selects the wrong form as a winner. In other
!
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words, a ranking paradox is observed in the ABC analysis of Yakut. However, I demonstrate that this ranking paradox can be resolved by assuming *H-L [round] (which accounts for the restriction on the occurrence of the [-high, round] vowels in the spreading analysis). The organization of this section is as follows; the full ABC analysis of roundness harmony is presented in Section 5.3.1; Section 5.3.2 gives a presentation of the ABC analysis of backness harmony and the problems with the ABC account of Yakut harmony. 5.3.1 The ABC Analysis of Yakut Roundness Harmony The pattern in Yakut roundness harmony is slightly more complicated than the Turkish pattern in that it is possible to observe non-high round vowels in suffixes (when the trigger is non-high), which is not attested in Turkish. The following output correspondence constraints need to be assumed to allow nonhigh vowels to be round in some cases, while prohibiting them from being round in other cases. The necessity of (22a) and (22b), independently of (22c), is shown in the analyses in (27) and (28). (22)
a.
Correspond [+high]-[+high] (Corr [+hi]) (cf. Walker 2009) Let S be an output string of segments and let X and Y be [consonantal, +high] segments. If X and Y belong to S, then X and Y correspond.
b.
Correspond [-high]-[-high] (Corr [-hi]) (cf. Walker 2009) Let S be an output string of segments and let X and Y be [consonantal, -high] segments. If X and Y belong to S, then X and Y correspond.
!
177! c.
Correspond V-V (Corr V-V) (cf. Rose and Walker 2004: 491) Let S be an output string of segments and let X and Y be [consonantal]. If X and Y belong to S, then X and Y correspond.
The output identity constraint in (23) requires that segments in correspondence be identical in roundness. (23) Ident VV [round] (Id VV [round]) (cf. Rose and Walker 2004: 492, Walker 2009) Let X be a segment in the output and Y be a correspondence of X. If X is [round], then Y is [round]. In addition to the ABC constraints listed in (22) and (23), the following OT constraints, which were introduced in the spreading analysis, are also necessary for an ABC analysis. (24)
a.
Ident I-O [round] (!1) (Id (!1) [round]) Segments in the initial syllable of a word in the output have the same specification as their input correspondents for the feature [round].
b.
Ident [round] (Id [round]) Correspondent input and output segments have the same specification for the feature [round].
c.
*o/Ø Non-high [round] vowels are prohibited.
The tableau in (25) presents the ABC analysis for the total harmony pattern, where both the trigger and the target are [+high]. (25) Total harmony 1: trigger and target are both [+high] /tynnyk-i/ Id (!1) Corr [+hi] Id VV [round] [round] !a) tyx nnyx k-yx b) tyx nnyx k-i c) tix nnix k-ix d) tyx nnyx k-ix
Id I-O [round] *
*! *!
** *!
!
178! In candidate (25a), all the vowels are in correspondence and thus, Corr
[+hi] is satisfied. All the vowels in (25c) are also in correspondence, but this candidate loses because of the initial syllable faithfulness constraint. (25b) violates Corr +Hi because in this candidate, not all high vowels are in correspondence. More specifically, the high vowel in the suffix and the high vowels in the root do not correspond. Finally, the candidate in (25d) satisfies the correspondence constraint, but this candidate is ruled out because of the Ident VV constraint; in (25d), not all the vowels in correspondence are identical with respect to the feature [round]. (25) shows that Corr [+hi] dominates the general faithfulness constraint for [round] (Corr [+hi] >> Ident I-O [round]), and also that the correspondent identity constraint is ranked above the I-O faithfulness constraint for the roundness feature (Ident V-V [round] >> Ident [round]).10 (26) shows the analysis of another total harmony case, in which both the trigger and the target are [-high]. (26) Total harmony 2: trigger and target are [-high] /o©o-lar/ Id (!1) Corr Corr Id VV [round] [+hi] [-hi] [round] !a) o x ©o x -lo x r b) o x ©o x -lar c) o x ©o x -lax r
*! *!
*o/Ø
Id [round]
*** ** **
*
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 9:!In (25), there is another logically possible candidate from the same input, [tyx nnyx k-ux ]. I assume that these candidates are excluded by the Ident VV [back] constraint. A detailed discussion is presented in Section 5.3.2. !
!
179!
All of the non-high vowels in (26a) are in correspondence. In (26b), the vowel in the suffix is not in correspondence with the non-high vowels in the root, and thus, this candidate violates Corr [-hi]. (26c), on the other hand, satisfies the correspondence constraint for non-high vowels since all the vowels in this candidate are in correspondence. However, this candidate loses because of the Ident VV [round] constraint; in this candidate, it is true that all the vowels are in correspondence, but the vowels in correspondence are not identical in the [round] feature. As a result, both Corr [-hi] and Ident VV [round] select the actual form in (26a), where all the non-high vowels surface as [round]. (26) shows that both Corr [-hi] and Ident VV [round] dominate the markedness constraint, *o/Ø (Corr -Hi, Ident VV [round] >> *o/Ø). (27) shows another analysis for total harmony, but in (27), the trigger and the target do not agree in height. (27) Total harmony 3: trigger is [-high], target is [+high] /o©o-nπ/ Id(!1) Corr Corr Id VV *o/Ø [round] [+hi] [-Hi] [Rd] !a) o x ©o x -nux b) o x ©o x -nπ c) ax ©ax -nπx d) o x ©o x -nπx
** **
Corr V-V
Id [round] *
*!
*!
** *!
**
(27) shows that the established ranking Ident VV [round] >> *o/Ø functions to select the attested form in (27a) over one of the unattested forms/candidates, which is in (27d). Candidate (27d) satisfies the initial syllable faithfulness constraint and all the correspondence constraints, as does the actual form (27a),
!
180!
but (27d) loses because of the identity constraint for segments in output correspondence; in (27d), all the vowels are in correspondence but the suffix vowel is not identical to the rest of the correspondent vowels in roundness specification. Ident VV [round] excludes (27d). Even though (27c) satisfies all the correspondence constraints and the markedness constraint, it loses because of the initial syllable faithfulness constraint. Candidate (27b), the remaining competitor, also satisfies both Corr [+hi] and Corr [-hi], and (27b) and (27a) tie under the markedness constraint. However, (27b) loses because of Corr V-V (which requires that all the vowels be in correspondence regardless of height), since in this candidate, not all vowels are in correspondence, while (27a) satisfies this correspondence constraint. Thus, as seen in (25) through (27), the analysis with ABC is capable of predicting the total harmony pattern in Yakut roundness harmony. As seen in (27), ABC correctly predicts total harmony even when trigger and target do not agree in height. Finally, the analysis of partial harmony is presented in (28). (28) Partial harmony: Ident VV, *o/Ø >> Corr V-V blocks the unattested patterns /tynnyk-lØr/ Id(!1) Corr Corr IdVV *o/Ø Corr Id [round] [+hi] [-Hi] [Rd] V-V [round] !a) tyx nnyx kler b) tyx nnyx k-lØx r c) tyx nnyx k-lØr d) tyx nnyx k-lex r
* *! *!
*
*
*!
In (28), candidate (28a) contains one vowel in the suffix which is not in correspondence with other vowels. In (28b) and (28d), all the vowels are in
*
!
181!
correspondence. In (28c), the suffix vowel is not in correspondence but in this candidate, unlike (28a), the suffix vowel is [round]. (28d) loses because of Ident V-V since not all the vowels in correspondence are identical in the [round] feature. Both (28b) and (28c) satisfy all of Corr +Hi, Corr -Hi, and Ident V-V, but these candidates are excluded by the markedness constraint for the non-high [round] vowels. (The markedness constraint *o/Ø assigns violations to a candidate which contains these vowels; it does not any make difference whether the non-high round vowels are in correspondence with other vowels or not.) As a result, candidate (28a) is selected as optimal even though not all vowels are in correspondence in this candidate (that is, Corr V-V is violated). (28) shows that the markedness constraint, *o/Ø, dominates Corr V-V and the general faithfulness constraint for roundness. In (28), the non-participating vowel does not correspond to other vowels in the word. In other words, the correspondence relation is absent between the participating vowels and the non-participating vowel. This is expressed by the ranking *o/Ø >> Corr V-V, which states that avoiding marked vowels is more important than all the vowels being in correspondence. The blocking effect in roundness harmony, as a result, is explained through the lack of correspondence that results from this ranking. I suggest that in roundness harmony, the blocking effect (that is, certain vowel(s) do/does not participate in harmony) is accounted for by Blocking by Lack of Correspondence (BLC).
!
182! Figure 18 provides the ranking lattice for the ABC analysis. The
established ranking correctly predicts the occurrence of the non-high round vowels in Yakut; [-high, round] vowels freely occur in roots, and this is captured by the high-ranked initial syllable faithfulness constraint.
Corr [+hi]
Corr [-hi]
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
*o/Ø $! !!!!!!!!!!!Corr V-V $! ! Ident I-O [round]
Figure 18
Ident (!1) [round] Ident V-V [round]
Ranking Lattice: Yakut/ABC
A similar restriction is observed in Turkish as well, but the difference between Yakut and Turkish is that in suffixes, non-high round vowels are allowed only when the trigger (that is, the round vowel in the root) is also non-high in Yakut. This difference is captured by the ranking of the markedness, output correspondence and output identity constraints, as shown in (29). (29) Ranking in Yakut and Turkish (ABC analysis) a) Turkish: Ident (root) [round] >> *o/Ø >> Ident VV [round]
b) Yakut: Ident (!1) [round] >> Ident VV [round] >> *o/Ø
!
183!
The ranking Ident (root) [round] >> *o/Ø in Turkish correctly captures the fact that non-high round vowels are prohibited except in the root. The ranking Ident VV [round] >> *o/Ø in Yakut predicts that non-high round vowels are allowed in suffixes only when they are in correspondence with the vowels in the root. As seen in the analysis, this prediction is true. To exclude the unattested combination of round vowels, output correspondence constraints specific to height need to be assumed (and high-ranked) in addition to the general correspondence constraint, Corr V-V. The key claim made in this section is that the blocking effect in roundness harmony can be explained through Blocking by Lack of Correspondence (BLC). This mechanism in the ABC analysis is totally different from the mechanism in the spreading analysis; the spreading analysis crucially relies on the markedness constraint, *H-L [round]. In the ABC analysis, on the other hand, the blocking effect can be accounted for without this markedness constraint when it comes only to roundness harmony. Thus, it seems that the ABC analysis is superior to the Spread account because it does not require such a markedness constraint. However, as seen in the next section, BLC cannot account for both roundness harmony and backness harmony. The problem with BLC is discussed in the next section; I suggest, as a solution to the BLC problem, that the effect of *H-L [round] is the key to solving the problem.
!
184! 5.3.2 The ABC Account of Backness Harmony As seen in the case study of Turkish, the output identity constraint for the
backness feature requires that vowels in correspondence be identical in backness, and thus, enforces harmony. The output identity constraint for the backness feature is presented in (30). (30) Ident VV [back] (Id VV [back]) (cf. Rose and Walker 2004: 492, Walker 2009) Let X be a segment in the output and Y be a correspondent of X. If X is [+back], then Y is [+back]. If X is [-back], then Y is [-back]. The analysis with (30) is presented in (31). In (31), the faithfulness constraints, both for input-output and for output correspondence, refer to backness rather than roundness. (31) Backness harmony 1 /tynnyk-u/ Id (!1) [back] !a) tyx nnyx k-yx b) tyx nnyx k-u c) tπx nnπx k-πx d) tyx nnyx k-ux
Corr [+hi]
Id VV [back]
Id [back] *
*! *!
** *!
In (31), the initial syllable faithfulness constraint excludes (31c) from the competition. Candidates (31b) and (31d), in which the suffix vowel is not identical to the root vowels in backness, are excluded by Corr [+hi] and the output identity constraint for backness, respectively. As a result, the actual form in (31a) is selected as a winner, since all the vowels are in correspondence and are identical with respect to backness.
!
185! (31) shows that the Ident VV [back] constraint plays a crucial role in
selecting a candidate in which all the vowels agree in backness. However, the effects of the output identity constraints are visible only when vowels are in correspondence. This point is illustrated in (32). In (32), for the sake of argument, the input vowel in the suffix, /A/, is unspecified for backness and roundness and it is assumed that the I-O faithfulness constraint is violated if an output correspondent is specified either for backness or roundness.11 In (32), the initial syllable faithfulness constraint is not included in the tableau because of space limitations, but all the candidates satisfy this positional faithfulness constraint. (32) Roundness AND backness harmony /tynnyk-lAr/ Id VV Corr Corr [back] [+hi] [-hi] ! a) tyx nnyx k-ler b) tyx nnyx k-lØx r c) tyx nnyx k-lar d) tyx nnyx k-lax r
IdV-V [Rd]
*o/Ø
Corr V-V
Id [back]
*
* * * *
*! * *(!)
*(!)
The actual surface form in (32) is (32a), in which all the vowels are [-back] (and the suffix vowel is unrounded) but (32a) and (32c) tie in this evaluation. Candidate (32b) loses because of the markedness constraint, and the Ident VV [back] constraint excludes (32d), in which all the vowels are in correspondence but not identical in backness. Ident VV [back], however, is silent with respect to candidate (32c) because the suffix vowel is not in correspondence and the root vowels, which are in correspondence, are identical in backness. (32a) and (32c) !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 99!Once again, nothing hinges on this assumption.
!
186!
both violate Corr V-V and they both violate the input-output faithfulness constraint for backness. As a result, neither one of these candidates is selected as optimal in (32). One might suggest the re-ranking Corr V-V to exclude a candidate such as in (32c) (since in (32a), not all of the vowels are in correspondence); this solution is investigated in (33), in which Corr V-V now dominates Ident VV [round] and the markedness constraint. It is true that re-ranking of Corr V-V does succeed in excluding a candidate such as (33c), but this cannot solve the whole problem in (32); as seen in (33), the established ranking Ident VV [Rd] >> *o/Ø still prefers (33b) to the actual form in (33a). (33) Roundness AND backness harmony: ranking paradox /tynnyk-lAr/ Id VV Corr Corr Corr Id VV [back] +Hi Hi V-V [Rd] !a) tyx nnyx k-lex r "b) tyx nnyx k-lØx r c) tyx nnyx k-lar d) tyx nnyx k-lax r
*o/Ø Id[back]
*! * *! *!
* * * *
% & Ranking Paradox orz (cf.(26))
In (33), two constraints, Ident VV [back] and Corr V-V, eliminate the candidates in which backness harmony is not observed; (33c) is ruled out because of the correspondence constraint, and (33d) is excluded because of the output correspondent identity constraint. However, the ranking Ident VV [round] >> *o/Ø prefers candidate (33b), where the suffix vowel undergoes harmony. The actual form, (33a), violates the
!
187!
Ident VV [round] constraint because the vowels in correspondence are not identical with regard to roundness in this candidate. Candidate (33b), on the other hand, satisfies this faithfulness constraint since all the vowels in correspondence are identical in roundness.12 As seen in (26) above, the markedness constraint prohibiting [-high, round] vowels needs to be ranked lower than the Ident VV [round] constraint. In (33), the reverse ranking (*o/Ø >> Ident VV [round]) is required to select the actual form. Thus, (33) shows that forcing vowels to be in correspondence cannot provide the complete solution to backness harmony, and in fact, if vowels are in correspondence, a ranking paradox is observed; to account for backness harmony, the markedness constraint needs to dominate the output faithfulness constraint. In accounting for roundness harmony, on the other hand, the markedness constraint needs to be dominated by the output faithfulness constraint. The problem with the candidate in (33b) is that an illicit combination of the round vowels is observed in this candidate. I suggest that this problem can be solved by assuming the markedness constraint in (34). (34) *High-Low [round] (*H-L [round]) (repeated from (15)) If the feature [round] is linked to a high vowel, the same [round] feature is not linked to a following non-high vowel. However, in ABC, feature linking is not necessarily assumed. Thus, the original formulation of *H-L [round] in (34) does not resolve the issue. (That is, (34) is a !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 9"!Even if the feature class [color] (cf. Padgett 2002) and Id VV [color] (which requires that correspondent vowels be identical in backness and roundness) are assumed in (33), candidate (33b) is still preferred to the actual form in (33a).
!
188!
valid solution when feature linking is assumed, as in the spreading analysis.) Thus, I suggest the revised markedness constraint in (35). (35) *High-Low [round] (*H-L [round]) (revised) In a sequence of two round vowels, if the first is [+high], the second is also [+high]. (A high round vowel may not be followed by a non-high round vowel.) A solution, adopting (35), is presented in (36). 13 (In (36), some of the constraints included in (33) are not included due to space limitations.) (36) Roundness AND backness harmony /tynnyk-lAr/ Id VV *H-L Corr [back] [round] V-V a) tyx nnyx k-lex r b) tyx nnyx k-lØx r c) tyx nnyx k-lØr d) tyx nnyx k-lax r
IdVV [Rd]
*o/Ø
* *! *(!)
* *(!)
*!
Id [back] * * * *
In (36), the ranking *H-L [round] >> Id VV [round] selects the attested form. Candidate (36d) loses because of the correspondence identity constraint for backness. Both (36b) (in which all the vowels are in correspondence) and (36c) (in which the suffix vowel is not in correspondence) lose because of the *H-L [round] constraint; in these, two [round] vowels are not identical in height when the preceding vowel, namely, the vowel in the root, is [+high]. As a result, the attested surface form is selected as optimal (as mentioned, it does not make a difference whether a non-high round vowel is in correspondence in the assessment of a markedness constraint such as *H-L [round]). !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 9#!The Uniformity [round] constraint presented in (16) cannot be the solution in (33); in Yakut, the sequence of [-high]-[+high] round vowels is permissible, and it is not always the case that two round vowels are identical in height.
!
189! 5.4 Discussion 5.4.1 Summary of the Chapter Thus far, I have demonstrated that both spreading and ABC are able to
handle the data in Yakut backness and roundness harmony. I pointed out that both of these two approaches crucially rely on some version of a *H-L [round] constraint. In the feature linking analysis, this markedness constraint is indispensable in accounting for roundness harmony. In the ABC analysis, on the other hand, it seemed as though such a constraint was unnecessary; as seen in Section 5.3.1, the blocking effect in roundness harmony can be attributed to a lack of correspondence. However, *H-L [round] is actually required in the ABC account of backness harmony in Yakut. This suggests two points. First, in Yakut, in which the markedness constraint *o/Ø cannot dominate the spreading constraint or the ID VV [round] constraint, an additional markedness constraint is necessary to restrict the occurrence of non-high [round] vowels in suffixes. In other words, without a constraint that refers to the height of round vowels, both ABC and the spreading analysis fail to account for the restrictions on the occurrence of nonhigh vowels. This further suggests that there may be some (universal) tendency to avoid sequences of round vowels if they are not identical in height. Kaun (1995), for example, presents a typological analysis of roundness harmony using Uniformity [round] (cf. (16)). In Section 5.2.1, however, I argued that this
!
190!
uniformity constraint should be split into two separate markedness constraints. As seen in Section 5.2.1, one half of the uniformity constraint,*H-L [round] (or its revised version), is active in Yakut. Provided this, one may ask an additional question: are there any languages where the other half of the uniformity constraint is active? This question is examined in the next section. 5.4.2 A Residual Issue In Section 5.2, I suggested that Uniformity [round] should be split into two separate constraints: one that prohibits the combination of high-low (non-high) round vowels and another that prohibits a sequence of low-high round vowels. This leads us to ask whether there are any languages where the other half of Uniformity [round], namely, the constraint in (37), is active. (37) *Low-High [round] (*L-H [round]) If the feature [round] is linked to a non-high vowel, the same [round] feature is not linked to a following high vowel. If there are languages that require the constraint in (37), that would give additional support to the analyses of Yakut presented in this chapter, since the existence of such languages suggests that the uniformity constraint must be split into two separate constraints. I suggest that Kachin Khakass (northern Turkic, Korn 1969) appears to be an example of such a language, and I present both spreading and ABC analyses of Kachin Khakass in this section. The roundness harmony patterns in Kachin Khakass are summarized in Table 11, and the data are presented in (38) and in (39); as Korn (1969) points out, Kachin Khakass exhibits both backness and roundness harmony (as in other
!
191!
Turkic languages), and the forms in (38) and (39) also show that the vowel in the suffix agrees with the root vowel in backness.14 Table 11. Restrictions on Roundness Harmony in Kachin Khakass
Front Vowels Back Vowels
Attested y-y (both [+hi]) u-u (both [+hi])
*Ø-y ([-hi] >[+hi]) *o-u ([-hi] >[+hi])
Not Attested *Ø-Ø (both [-hi]) *o-o (both [-hi])
*y-Ø ([+hi] > [-hi]) *u-o ([+hi] > [-hi])
(38) Kachin Khakass Roundness Harmony 1 (Korn 1969: 102) a.
kuß-tu˜ (*kuß-tπ˜)
‘of the bird’
b.
kyn-ny (*kyn-ni)
‘day-accusative’
c.
ok-tπ˜ (*ok-tu˜)
‘of the arrow’
d.
ÿØr-zip (*ÿØr-zyp)
‘having gone’
(38a) and (38b) show that the high vowel in the suffix agrees with the root vowel in roundness, if the root vowel is [+high, round]. However, as seen in (38c) and in (38d), the high vowel in the suffix is unrounded when the root vowel is round but non-high. As in Turkish, a round non-high vowel is not observed in suffixes even when a root contains a round vowel.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 9%!Korn (1969), however, uses the term ‘palatal harmony,’ rather than backness harmony in his description of Kachin Khakass.
!
192!
(39) No [-high] round vowels in suffixes (Korn 1969: 102) a.
pol-za (*pol-zo)
‘if he is’
b.
ÿØr-gæn (*ÿØr-gØn)
‘who went’
c.
kuzuk-ta (*kuzuk-to)
in the nut’
d.
kyn-gæ (*kyn-gØ)
‘to the day’
The spreading analysis in (40) shows that the restriction on the occurrence of non-high round vowels is captured by the same mechanism as is assumed in Turkish, namely, the markedness constraint (*o/Ø) dominating the spreading constraint. I assume that in (40) and in subsequent tableaux, either the root faithfulness constraint or the initial syllable faithfulness constraint preserves the identity of the trigger. Thus, in (40), a candidate such as *[pal-za] is excluded by these positional faithfulness constraints. (40) No [-high, round] vowel in the suffix /pol-zo/ *o/Ø Spread [round] !a) pol-za $! [round] b) pol-zo $! [round]
*
Id [round]
*
*
**!
However, the ranking in (40) is not sufficient to rule out a candidate in which the root vowel is [-high, round], and the suffix contains a high round vowel. This is shown in (41); (41) shows the difference between Kachin Khakass and Turkish with respect to the restriction on roundness harmony.
!
193!
(41) [+high, round] vowel in the suffix: /ok-tu˜/_[ok-tπ˜] /ok-tu˜/ *o/Ø Spread [round] !a) ok-tπ˜ $! [round] b) ok-tu˜ $! [round]
*
Id IO [round]
*!
*
*
In Turkish, the actual form would be (41b) since a high round vowel is observed in suffixes even when the root vowel is non-high round. In Kachin Khakass, on the other hand, the high vowel in suffixes can be round only when the root vowel is [+high]. The markedness constraint *y/u (prohibiting high round vowels) alone cannot be the solution, since high round vowels appear in suffixes as in (38a) and (38b). The solution is presented in (42) with the constraint in (41); in (42), an additional markedness constraint, *y/u, is also included. (42) [+high, round] vowel in the suffix: /ok-tu˜/_[ok-tπ˜] /ok-tu˜/ *L-H *o/Ø Spread *y/u [round] [round] $ a) ok-tπ˜ $! [round] b) ok-tu˜ $! [round]
*
*!
*
*
Id [round] *
*
In (42b), the [round] feature associated with a non-high vowel is also associated with the following high vowel. *L-H [round] prohibits such a configuration. As seen in (42), the ranking *L-H [round] >> Spread [round] predicts the pattern in which a high vowel does not undergo harmony when the trigger is non-high.
!
194! The analysis of the case with two [+high] vowels is presented in (43); (43)
shows that the ranking Spread [round] >> *y/u must be established. (43) [+high, round] vowel in the suffix 2: /kuß-tπ˜/_[kuß-tu˜] /kuß-tπ˜/ *L-H *o/Ø Spread *y/u [round] [round] !a) kuß-tu˜ $! [round] b) kuß-tπ˜ $! [round]
Ident IO [round]
** *!
*
*
Candidate (43a), in which the spreading of [round] is observed, obeys *L-H [round]; since both of the round vowels in this candidate are [+high], this constraint is silent with respect to this candidate. In (43), the spreading constraint breaks the tie, and it selects the actual form over (43b), in which the spreading of [round] is not observed. Thus, the spreading analysis in (42) shows that the markedness constraint *L-H [round] is active in Kachin Khakass. The following analyses show that ABC is able to account for the Kachin Khakass patterns with the *L-H [round] constraint; (44) is the ABC analysis of the case in which the high vowel in the suffix undergoes the harmony. In (44), the following three constraints are included in the tableau: Corr [+hi] (that requires that high vowels be in correspondence), Ident VV [round] (requiring that the vowels in correspondence be identical with respect to roundness), and the markedness constraint *u/y (prohibiting [+high] round vowels).
!
195!
(44) High vowel in the suffix becomes [round] /kuß-tπ˜/ Corr [+hi] Ident VV [round] !a) kux ß-tux ˜ b) kux ß-tπx ˜ c) kux ß-tπ˜
*u/y ** * *
*! *!
In (44), candidate (44b) loses because of the output correspondent faithfulness constraint; in this candidate, two vowels in correspondence are not identical with respect to the roundness feature. (44c) loses because of Corr [+hi], since two high vowels in the word are not in correspondence. (44) shows the ranking Corr [+hi], Ident VV [round] >> *u/y. (45) shows that the same ranking in (44) accounts for the case where a high vowel does not undergo harmony when the trigger is non-high. (45) High vowel in the suffix surfaces as unrounded /ok-tu˜/ Corr [+hi] Ident VV [round] !a) o x k-tπ˜ b) o x k-tux ˜ c) o x -tπx ˜
*u/y *!
*!
In candidate (45a), the [+high] unrounded vowel in the suffix is not in correspondence while in (45b) and in (45c), the suffix vowel is in correspondence with the vowel in the root. (45c) is excluded by the output correspondent identity constraint for roundness, and (45b) loses because of the markedness constraint prohibiting high round vowels. However, the same problem arises in Kachin Khakass when backness harmony is considered; in (46), candidate (46c) contains a suffix vowel which
!
196!
does not agree with the root vowel in backness. If (46c) is the competitor, then we observed the same problem as observed in Yakut. (46) High vowel in the suffix surfaces as unrounded /ok-tu˜/ Corr [+hi] Ident VV [round] a) o x k-tπ˜ b) o x k-tux ˜ c) o x -ti˜
*u/y *!
In (46), candidate (46b) loses because of the markedness constraint. However, the remaining two candidates, (46a) and (46c), tie in this evaluation; they both satisfy the correspondence constraint, the output correspondent identity constraint, and the markedness constraint. In Yakut, this problem is resolved by three additional constraints: Corr VV (requiring that all of the vowels in the word be in correspondence), Ident VV [back] (requiring that vowels in correspondence be identical with regard to backness), and *H-L [round]. I suggest the same solution for Kachin Khakass, except I use the markedness constraint *L-H [round]. This solution is presented in (47). In (47), some additional candidates are added to the evaluation. In (47), candidates (47c) and (47e) lose because of the output correlation constraint (the suffix vowel is not in correspondence), and (47d) loses because of the Ident VV [back] constraint. The markedness constraint *L-H [round] is the tie breaker between (47a) and (47b), and this markedness
!
197!
constraint prefers the actual surface form (47a). (47) shows the ranking *L-H [round] >> Ident VV [round].15 (47) High vowel in the suffix surfaces as unrounded /ok-tu˜/ Corr V-V Id VV *L-H Corr [back] [round] [+hi] a) o x k-tπx ˜ b) o x k-tux ˜ c) o x k-tπ˜ d) o x k-tix ˜ e) o x k-ti˜
Id VV [round]
*u/y
* *!
*!
*! *!
*
*!
The case study presented in this section shows that there are languages in which *L-H [round] is active, and thus, the Uniformity [round] constraint can be split without over-generating unattested roundness harmony patterns. This, in turn, gives additional support to the claim that Kaun’s Uniformity constraint is actually two constraints.16 This also gives additional support to the ABC and spreading analyses of Yakut, in which the other half of the uniformity constraint is necessary to correctly predict the attested harmony processes.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 9&!One might ask whether the markedness constraint *y/u can replace *L-H [round] in (51). However, this cannot be the solution because, as seen in (46), the markedness constraint *y/u must be dominated by Ident VV [round]. 9.!Kaun (1995: 123) analyzes the restrictions on roundness harmony, as observed in languages such as Kachin Khakass, by the constraints, *o/Ø, Uniformity [round], and Extend [round] (the effect of which is the same as that of Spread [round]). Kaun suggests that the ranking *o/Ø, Uniformity [round] >> Extend [round] accounts for the restrictions that are observed in Kachin Khakass.
!
198! CHAPTER VI ISSUES IN THE OT TREATMENT OF VOWEL HARMONY Thus far, case studies of three different languages have been discussed. I
have demonstrated that both the feature linking approach and the ABC approach are successful in accounting for the data from Pulaar ATR harmony, as well as the backness/roundness harmony observed in Turkish and in Yakut. This chapter provides a summary of the analyses that have been presented in this thesis. There are three purposes of this chapter: first, to provide a summary of the discussions that have been presented thus far; second, to discuss the remaining issues with regard to the OT treatment of vowel harmony; and finally, to present a general conclusion for the thesis. The organization of this chapter is as follows; a summary of the analyses is presented in Section 6.1. In Section 6.2, two remaining issues with the constraint Spread are discussed. Section 6.3 contains a discussion of another harmony pathology, the ‘too many solutions problem’ in OT, and a general conclusion for the thesis is presented in Section 6.4. 6.1 Summary In Chapter 1, I have presented five approaches that have been proposed to account for vowel harmony within the OT framework. However, as discussed in Chapter 1, two of the approaches, feature alignment and local agreement, have been eliminated for theoretical and empirical reasons. Thus, in this thesis, three approaches, i) feature linking, ii) Span Theory, and iii) ABC, have been
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discussed; as seen in Chapter 2 (in the case study of Turkish), all three approaches are applicable to vowel harmony, even though two of the approaches, Span Theory and ABC, were originally proposed to account for consonant harmony. A summary of the analyses is presented in (1). As discussed in Chapter 4, the directionality problem and the Sour Grapes problem can be resolved by a single mechanism both in spreading and in ABC; that is, I suggested that these two problems are related, and if one can be resolved (by one mechanism), the other can be also resolved (by the same mechanism).
Table 12. Summary of the Analyses Directionality Feature linking (spreading)
ABC Span Theory
Sour Grapes
!Yes, with specified directionality in Spread (Ch4) - However, it requires the assumption of binary features !Yes, through lack of correspondence (Ch4) !Yes "No, if features are assumed to be binary (Ch3)
Roundness and backness harmony ! Yes, with two separate Spread constraints (Ch2,5) !Yes, with *H-L [round] (Ch5)1 !Yes, by assuming two spans for different features (Ch2)
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! "!As far as roundness harmony is concerned, lack of correspondence accounts for the blocking effect in Yakut.
!
200! One of the theoretical questions addressed in Chapters 3 and 4 is the issue
of the privativity or binarity of the feature [ATR]. As discussed in Chapter 3, Span Theory crucially relies on the assumption of privative ATR; if binary ATR is assumed, Span Theory fails to resolve the Sour Grapes problems. The assumption of privative features cannot be maintained with all of the features that participate in harmony cross-linguistically, and thus, I concluded that Span Theory is not a viable theory to be used in accounting for vowel harmony. Both spreading and ABC successfully account for the attested directionality observed in Pulaar. However, these two approaches use different mechanisms to account for the same data; in ABC, directionality is attributed to the lack of correspondence (DLC) while in the spreading analysis, it is necessary to specify directionality in the spreading constraint. These two approaches resolve the Sour Grapes problem equally well, except that the spreading analysis requires the assumption of binary [ATR] while for ABC, such an assumption is unnecessary. The case study of Yakut, which is presented in Chapter 5, shows that both the spreading analysis and the ABC analysis require an additional markedness constraint, *H-L [round]; without such a constraint, the ABC analysis encounters a ranking paradox, and fails to account for both the roundness and backness harmony observed in Yakut. The analysis with Spread also relies on this markedness constraint; without this markedness constraint, a candidate that exhibits an unattested combination of the round vowels wins.
!
201! Therefore, to conclude, there are two viable approaches in OT to account
for harmony processes: spreading and ABC. However, as pointed out, spreading constraints need some revision to fully account for the diverse vowel harmony patterns attested cross-linguistically. Some discussion of the spreading constraints is given in the next section. 6.2 On the Constraint Spread As demonstrated in this thesis, one of the ways to approach vowel harmony is to assume feature linking/spreading with the harmony constraint Spread. However, there are two issues to be discussed about this constraint: the directionality of harmony and the feature class node, [color]. The spreading constraint was originally proposed in Padgett (1997, 2002). Padgett (2002) presents an analysis of Turkish vowel harmony using the following spreading constraint. (1) Spread (Color, PrWd) (Padgett 2002: 89) For all color features f in a prosodic word, if f is linked to any segment, it is linked to all segments. As mentioned throughout this thesis, the constraint in (2) is fully satisfied when all the segments (vowels) in a domain (such as a word) share the same feature for [back] and [round] features, both of which are dominated by the class node, color. Padgett raises two points with regard to the spreading constraint. First, he claims that spreading constraints are non-directional. (That is, it is not necessary to specify the directionality of harmony in the spreading constraint.) Specifically,
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Padgett (2002) claims that directionality can be attributed to other phonological phenomena, and thus, he assumes Spread in his analysis, rather than alignment constraints, which are inherently directional. Second, Padgett (2002) suggests that the spreading constraint in (2) targets a feature class/node, rather than individual features, when it is used in languages such as Turkish and Yakut. I have shown that the first point about directionality is not true in Pulaar, and shown that it is necessary to specify the directionality of harmony. The Pulaar case shows, however, that the directionality specified in the spreading constraint determines the directionality of harmony when positional faithfulness constraints are silent. In Chapter 4, I argued that it is necessary to specify directionality in the spreading constraint itself to select the candidate with the attested directionality.2 Padgett’s second point, that spreading constraints target feature classes (when used in Turkish or Yakut), requires some explanation. The term [color] (Odden 1991; Selkirk 1991) refers to a node/class in feature geometry; this class contains two harmonic features, [back] and [round]. According to Padgett, these two features are in (s0me kind of) structural relationship, since in many harmony languages (for example, the majority of the Turkic languages, including Turkish and Yakut), backness and roundness harmony occur together (cf. Archangeli !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! #!Sasa (2004) also points out that the analysis of Kinande dominant-recessive ATR harmony also requires Spread [+ATR]-L; the leftward directionality in Kinande cannot be attributed to root faithfulness since the vowel(s) in roots undergo harmony (underlying [-ATR] vowels in the root become [+ATR] when there is a [+ATR] vowel in a suffix).
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1985). Padgett further suggests, provided this fact, that a better analysis results if a harmony constraint targets a feature class (more specifically, the class node [color]) rather than each individual feature, with respect to simplicity and naturalness. (That is, a simpler rule or constraint corresponds to more natural (or more common) phenomena.) In other words, Padgett (2002) claims that the analysis with Spread [color] offers a better (simpler) analysis than the analysis with two separate spreading constraints in accounting for a language with backness and roundness harmony. One might ask, however, how Spread (color) can achieve the pattern observed in Turkish or in Yakut (that is, the pattern in which all the vowels in a word participate in backness harmony, but some vowels do not participate in roundness harmony); as stated, Spread (Color) is satisfied only when all the vowels agree both in backness and roundness. Padgett suggests that such a pattern can be accounted for as partial class behavior through the gradient assessment of the candidates by the spreading constraint. To illustrate this, the analysis of Yakut roundness/backness harmony with (1) is presented in (2). In (2), I use Padgett’s convention of using two different brackets to show feature linking, rather than using association lines; [ ]B and ( )R indicate that the segments in these brackets share the same backness feature and roundness feature, respectively.
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(2) Yakut roundness/backness harmony with Spread [color] /tynnyk-ler/ *H-L [round] Spread [color] !a) [(tynnyk)R-ler]B b) [(tynnyk-lØr)R]B c) [(tynnyk)R]B[-lar]B
Ident [color]
* *! **!
* *
Candidate (2b) completely satisfies Spread [color], since all the vowels (segments) share the same [round] and [back] features.3 However, this candidate is excluded by *H-L [round]. The candidates in (2a) and (2c) satisfy this markedness constraint, so in (2), Spread [color] is the tie-breaker. Under this spreading constraint, candidate (2a) is better than (2c); candidate (2a) incurs one violation for the spreading constraint because the [round] feature is not linked to the suffix vowel, but the [-back] feature is shared by all of the vowels. (2c), on the other hand, incurs two violations for the vowel in the suffix; neither the [round] feature nor the [-back] feature is linked to the vowel in the suffix, which gives rise to two violations for Spread [color]. Thus, the same results are achieved by assuming Spread [color], rather than assuming two separate spreading constraints. However, the use of Spread [color] hinges on the assumption of a different organization of the features: namely, the feature class, color.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! $!I follow Padgett in counting the violation(s) of the spreading constraint; that is, “for simplicity, IDENT and SPREAD violations are counted only with respect to vowels” (Padgett 2002: 91).
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205! 6.3 Harmony Pathology Revisited In chapters 3 and 4, I discussed one of the pathologies, Sour Grapes, and in
Chapter 4, I demonstrated how the analysis with spreading resolves this problem. According to Wilson (2006), however, Sour Grapes is not the only pathology. Another pathological case pointed out by Wilson is the so-called ‘too many solutions problem’; in short, there are multiple ways to satisfy a certain constraint, and depending on the ranking of the constraints, unwanted results cannot be blocked. To see what the problem is, let us assume the ranking permutation of Max (“No deletion”) and (some of) the constraints that were used in Chapter 5 to account for Yakut roundness harmony. In (3), I assume the same ranking of the constraints as is assumed for Yakut, and Max dominates all other constraints. (In (3), the blank column means that Max dominates all other constraints, but it does not necessarily mean that Max is ranked right above the positional faithfulness constraint.) (3) The effect of Max /tynnyk-lØr/ Max ! a) tynnyk-ler b) tynnyk-lØr c) tinnik-ler d) tynnyk
Id !1 [rd]
*H-L [rd]
Spread [rd]
Id [rd]
*
*
*! *!
***
*!**
(3) shows that there are three possible ways to satisfy Spread [round]; spreading the [round] feature to the suffix vowel as in (3b) (even though in (3), such a candidate is eliminated by the markedness constraint), deleting the [round]
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feature from the output as in (3c), or deleting the suffix (vowel) as in (3d). These unattested ways to satisfy Spread [round] are blocked either by the markedness constraint, which excludes (3b), by the positional faithfulness constraint, which excludes (3c), or by Max, which excludes (3d). However, one of the core assumptions of the OT grammar is ranking permutation. For example, as seen in Chapter 2 and Chapter 5, the different rankings between the markedness constraint *o/Ø (prohibiting non-high round vowels) and the spreading constraint explain the difference between Yakut and Turkish in roundness harmony. (4) presents another ranking permutation, in which Max is dominated by all other constraints. As a result, candidate (4d), the deletion candidate, is selected as optimal. (In (4) and in subsequent tableaux, the blank column means that Max is dominated by all other constraints, but it is not ranked right below Ident [round].) (4) Too many solutions 1 /tynnyk-lØr/ Id !1 [rd] a) tynnyk-ler b) tynnyk-lØr c) tinnik-ler ! d) tynnyk
*H-L [rd]
Spread [rd]
Ident [rd]
*!
*
Max
*! *!
*** ***
Candidate (4c) still loses because of the positional faithfulness constraint, and (4b) loses because of the markedness constraint. The spreading constraint is the tiebreaker in (4), and it favors (4d), the deletion candidate, over candidate (4a). Here, the problem is not that a different candidate is selected by the different ranking, since such a result is predicted in the OT grammar. The real problem is,
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however, that the ranking in (4) predicts an unattested pattern, where complete spreading is achieved by deleting segments. The analysis in (5) presents another problem; in (5), the same ranking as in (4) is assumed, but the input is different. (5) Too many solutions 2 /o©o-nu/ Id !1 [rd] ! a) o©o-nu b) o©o-nπ c) a©a-nπ d) o©o
*H-L [rd]
Spread [rd]
Ident [rd]
*!
* ***
*!
Max
*!*
In (5), Max is dominated by other constraints as in (4), but a different result is predicted. Unlike (4), both (5a), the spreading candidate, and (5d), the deletion candidate, satisfy the spreading constraint. Max is the tie-breaker in (5), and this faithfulness constraint favors (5a) over the deletion candidate. The problem presented thus far is summarized as follows: the grammar in (4) and (5) exhibits a pattern in which i) roundness harmony is complete when all the vowels can participate in harmony (as in (5)), but ii) if there is a vowel that cannot participate in harmony, as in (4), the vowel is deleted to achieve complete harmony. As stated, deletion is not an attested pattern in harmony to achieve complete harmony. That is, this implies that the grammar established in this thesis would collapse because such a system would over-generate patterns which are not attested in any harmony language at all. As seen in (6) and (7), ABC cannot solve this problem, either; in (6) and in (7), two of the ABC constraints, Corr V-V (requiring vowels to be in
!
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correspondence), and Ident VV [round] (requiring correspondent vowels to be identical with respect to roundness) are included along with the constraints that were assumed in (4) and (5). (6) Deletion with a blocker /tynnyk-lØr/ Id !1 [rd] a) tyx nnyx k-ler b) tyx nnyx k-lex r c) tyx nnyx k-lØx r d) tix nnix k-lex r ! e) tyx nnyx k
*H-L [rd]
Id VV [rd]
Max
*! *! *! *! ***
(7) No deletion without a blocker /o©o-nu/ Id !1 [rd] *H-L [rd] ! a) o x ©o x -nux b) o x ©o x -nπ c) ax ©ax -nπx d) o x ©o x
Corr V-V
Corr V-V
Id VV [rd]
Max
*! *!*
(6) shows that the deletion candidate (6e) is selected as optimal in ABC as well. The difference between (6a) and (6b) is that the suffix vowel is not in correspondence in (6a) while in (6b), all of the vowels are in correspondence. (6a) and (6b) are excluded because of the correlation constraint and the correspondent identity constraint, respectively. (6c) violates *H-L [round] and (6d) violates the initial syllable faithfulness constraint, and as a result, the deletion candidate is selected as optimal. In (7), on the other hand, the deletion candidate (7d) loses because of Max. In (7a), all of the vowels are in correspondence, and they are all identical in roundness. Thus, (6) and (7) show that the same prediction results even in the ABC analysis; no deletion is observed when there are no blockers. If there is a
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blocker, complete harmony is achieved by deletion. Thus, ABC also fails to block the unattested/unwanted pattern when the effects of Max are not visible. There are two important observations to be made here, however. First, the ‘too many solutions problem’ is not limited to vowel harmony, and second, a variety of solutions to this problem have been proposed. As noted, the ‘too many solutions’ problem arises in accounting for other phonological phenomena, such as voice assimilation. Cross-linguistically, a voice assimilation process in which a pair of adjacent obstruents agrees in voicing is commonly observed. Russian, for example, is one such language; in Russian, in a pair of adjacent obstruents, the rightmost one triggers regressive voice assimilation (for example, pro[s’]it’ ‘to beg’ vs. pro[z’b]a ‘request’ (Petrova et al. 2006: 5)). The same problem arises in such a voice assimilation case, as well, if Max is dominated by other constraints; that is, it is not possible to block an unattested pattern in which the requirement of voice assimilation is satisfied by deletion rather than by making adjacent obstruents agree in voicing, if the effects of Max are invisible. This illustrated in (8). (8) Too many solutions in voice assimilation (cf. Petrova et al. 2006: 6) pro/s’b/a Agree (lar) Id preson [voi] *voi "a) pro[z’b]a b) pro[s’b]a c) pro[s’p]a #d) pro[s’]a
Max
*!* *
*! *!
*
In (8), in addition to Max, the following three constraints from Petrova et al. (2006) are assumed: Agree (lar) (“Obstruents in a cluster must agree in laryngeal
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specifications”), Id presonorant [voi] (“An obstruent in presonorant position must be faithful to the input specification for voice”), and *voi (“Voiced obstruents are prohibited”). In (8), (8b) loses because of the agreement constraint, and the positional faithfulness constraint excludes candidate (8c). As stated, the actual form in Russian is (8a). However, if the effects of Max are not visible (that is, if Max is low-ranked), the actual form loses to the deletion candidate (8d). The problem illustrated in (8) is that, as in vowel harmony, deletion is not attested to achieve voice assimilation. In other words, if this ranking permutation is permitted (in fact, no standard OT assumptions prohibit such a ranking permutation), no mechanism can block such an unattested pattern from surfacing or being selected in voice assimilation, either. Thus, I suggest that the ‘too many solutions’ problem is, in fact, a problem with the theory as a whole, and is not limited to vowel harmony. If we cannot remedy this problem, the whole theory of Optimality Theory will be in jeopardy, since OT fails to predict the attested patterns, and only the attested patterns, in accounting for a common phonological phenomenon as harmony or assimilation. There are several approaches that have been proposed as a solution to this problem, however. These solutions include Targeted Constraints (Bakovic and Wilson 2004), the Turbidity (Goldrick 2001) analysis as proposed by Finley (2008), and Harmonic Serialism, proposed by McCarthy (2009). All of these approaches involve modifications of the theory; targeted constraints specify the
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methods of repair for voice assimilation (Bakovic and Wilson 2004), while Turbidity assumes enriched output representations. The rest of this section describes the one of the solutions, Harmonic Serialism.4 Harmonic Serialism is a version of OT in which GEN is allowed to make one change at a time. The evaluation of the candidates is referred to as a pass through GEN and EVAL, and the evaluations are conducted serially until the optimal candidate converges on the input. The analysis in (9) is the implementation of McCarthy’s proposal in Yakut roundness harmony with the harmony constraint Spread. (9) Serialism analysis: first pass /tynnyk-lØr/ Id !1 [rd] *H-L [rd] !a) tynnyk-ler b) tynnyk-lØr c) tinnyk-ler
Spread [rd]
Ident [rd]
*
*
*
**
Max
*! *!
One might ask why a deletion candidate is not included as a possible candidate in (9). McCarthy claims that GEN will not create a deletion candidate [tynnyk], since deletion of a segment involves multiple changes of the input. According to McCarthy (2008, 2009), deletion is viewed as ‘a gradual process of attrition.’ For example, the deletion of [Ø] involves the deletion of the feature [round], the deletion of the feature [-back], the deletion of the feature [-high], !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! %!The full analysis with Turbidity (with two different kinds of Max, operating in two different levels of representations) is presented in Finley (2008). As discussed in Chapter 1, there are existing critiques of (the existence) of targeted constraints in the literature, and thus, I do not present a detailed discussion of the solution with targeted constraints in this section.
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and so on. In Harmonic Serialism, only the deletion of a single feature is allowed because GEN is limited to making one change at a time (or in a single pass). Thus, in (9), GEN creates a candidate [tynnyk-lØr] (no change), [tynnyk-ler] (one change: the deletion of [round]), or [tinnyk-lØr] (changing the roundness feature of the vowel in the first syllable), but not [tynnyk], which involves the deletion of multiple features. In (10), the optimal form does not converge with the input (that is, evaluations are performed until the input and the winning candidate become identical). Thus, another evaluation is performed with the optimal candidate of the first pass being the input of the second pass.5 (10) Serialism analysis: second pass /tynnyk-ler/ Id !1 [rd] *H-L [rd] !a) tynnyk-ler b) tynnyk-lØr c) tinnyk-ler
Spread [rd]
Ident [rd]
Max
* *! *!
*
*
In (10), the winner of the first pass is the input, and the optimal candidate converges with the input. Therefore, the ‘derivation’ is completed, that is, a third pass is unnecessary; even if the third pass were to be examined, the result would be the same. Both in (9) and in (10), a deletion candidate cannot be a competitor,
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! &!In this sense, Harmonic Serialism is similar to Serial OT or Derivational OT (cf. Rubach 1997, 2003). However, the crucial difference is that constraint re-ranking is not part of the mechanism in Harmonic Serialism.
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since GEN does not create such a candidate in either pass, and there is no need for any more passes.6 As seen in (9) and in (10), Harmonic Serialism, along with other two proposed solutions, can resolve one of the pathologies, the too many solutions problem. The solutions mentioned in this section (targeted constraints and Turbidity, along with Harmonic Serialism) all require some modification to the theory. In other words, there are some controversial issues that arise with all of these proposals, and consequently, no general consensus has thus far been achieved as to the solution to the problem. Nonetheless, let me point out that new developments of the theory have been made so that the new proposals save OT from jeopardy. Therefore, I conclude that OT is a viable theory to account for vowel harmony even though the theory will need some further development. 6.4 Conclusion There are two main questions that have been addressed in this thesis: first, can OT handle vowel harmony, and second, if so, then what is the mechanism that can offer a unified analysis of the diverse patterns in vowel harmony? The answer to the first question is that it is possible to analyze vowel harmony in OT. As demonstrated, there are two possible approaches to vowel harmony within the OT framework: feature spreading and ABC. Therefore, we can conclude that !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! '!One might ask, then, what if deletion actually takes place? The answer will be that more passes are examined until the deletion candidate is selected as optimal, and converges with the input.
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OT can handle at least the vowel harmony patterns presented here, even though both spreading and ABC requires some modifications of their theoretical assumptions, or some additional mechanisms. One might ask, then, which approach, spreading or ABC, presents the more comprehensive accounts of vowel harmony? The answer is that both of them are valid approaches to vowel harmony. In other words, it is not straightforward to determine which approach is superior to the other; as we have seen, in some cases (for example, in Pulaar ATR harmony), the ABC approach is better in that, unlike the spreading approach, it does not require any additional mechanisms (such as specifying directionality in spreading), or any particular assumptions (such as the assumption of binary [ATR], which the spreading analysis crucially relies upon). In Yakut harmony, on the other hand, it is true that both spreading and ABC are capable of accounting for the attested data, but no factor in Yakut favors either one of these approaches (that is, both of these approaches require *H-L [round] to fully account for the data). In this thesis, I have considered diverse vowel harmony systems (both roundness and backness harmony in two languages, ATR harmony, and directionality), but there are still other types of harmony that must be considered. Therefore, further comparison between the spreading analysis and the ABC analysis will determine how well these two alternative approaches handle other cases of vowel harmony.
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