UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SANTA CRUZ MINIMAL REDUPLICATION A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in LINGUISTICS by Jesse Saba Kirchner June 2010 The Dissertation of Jesse Saba Kirchner is approved: Professor Armin Mester, Chair Professor Jaye Padgett Professor Junko Ito Tyrus Miller Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies Copyright © by Jesse Saba Kirchner 2010 Some rights reserved: see Appendix E. Contents Abstract vi Dedication viii Acknowledgments ix 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Structureofthethesis ...... ....... ....... ....... ........ 2 1.2 Overviewofthetheory...... ....... ....... ....... .. ....... 2 1.2.1 GoalsofMR ..................................... 3 1.2.2 Assumptionsandpredictions. ....... 7 1.3 MorphologicalReduplication . .......... 10 1.3.1 Fixedsize..................................... ... 11 1.3.2 Phonologicalopacity. ...... 17 1.3.3 Prominentmaterialpreferentiallycopied . ............ 22 1.3.4 Localityofreduplication. ........ 24 1.3.5 Iconicity ..................................... ... 24 1.4 Syntacticreduplication. .......... 26 2 Morphological reduplication 30 2.1 Casestudy:Kwak’wala ...... ....... ....... ....... .. ....... 31 2.2 Data............................................ ... 33 2.2.1 Phonology ..................................... .. 33 2.2.2 Morphophonology ............................... ... 40 2.2.3 -mut’ .......................................... 40 2.3 Analysis........................................ ..... 48 2.3.1 Lengtheningandreduplication. ........ 48 2.3.2 Subpatternsofreduplication . ........ 52 2.4 An alternativeanalysis: ExistentialFaithfulness . .................. 57 2.5 Conclusions ..................................... ..... 62 iii 2.5.1 ImplicationsforKwak’wala . ....... 62 2.5.2 ImplicationsforWakashan . ...... 64 2.5.3 Generalimplications. ...... 66 3 Syntactic reduplication 68 3.1 Analysisofsyntacticreduplication . ............. 69 3.2 Distinctive propertiesof syntactic reduplication . .................. 77 3.2.1 Arbitraryphonologicalsize . ........ 78 3.2.2 Targetisasyntacticconstituent . ......... 79 3.2.3 Limitedinteractionwithmorphophonology . .......... 83 3.2.4 Occurrenceofnon-optimizingoverwriting . ........... 84 3.2.5 Identityavoidance .... ....... ....... ....... .... ..... 87 3.2.6 Locationdeterminedbysyntax . ....... 91 3.3 Casestudy:Tamil ................................. ...... 93 3.3.1 Reduplicationtypes . ..... 94 3.3.2 Echoreduplication . ..... 95 3.3.3 AnalysisofTamilER ............................. .... 97 3.4 Otheraccountsofsyntacticreduplication. .............. 99 3.4.1 Morphological Fixed Segmentism: Alderete et al. ................ 99 3.4.2 CONTROL:Orgun&Sprouse.............................102 3.4.3 Anti-faithfulness: Ghaniabadi; Nevins and Wagner . .............103 4 Theoreticalcontext 107 4.1 Othertheoriesofreduplication . ...........107 4.1.1 Mainstream OT: Base-Reduplicant Correspondence Theory..........108 4.1.2 MorphemeRealization. .118 4.1.3 MorphologicalDoublingTheory . .......121 4.1.4 Reduplication as readjustment of precedence structures............132 4.2 Casestudy:Samala ................................ ......137 4.2.1 Languagebackground . .138 4.2.2 ReduplicationinSamala. ......139 4.2.3 AMinimalReduplicationanalysis . ........147 4.2.4 Alternativeanalyses . ......158 4.3 Summary......................................... 164 5 Conclusion 166 5.1 Mainclaims ...................................... .166 5.2 Consequences.................................... .167 5.3 Futureresearch .................................. ......168 Appendix A: -mut’ Words 173 Appendix B: Language Maps 184 Appendix C: Constraints in this Thesis 188 iv Appendix D: Orthography and Transcription 194 Appendix E: Creative Commons License 195 Language Index 203 Bibliography 205 v Abstract Minimal Reduplication by Jesse Saba Kirchner This dissertation introduces Minimal Reduplication, a new theory and framework within generative grammar for analyzing reduplication in human language. I argue that reduplication is an emergent property in multiple components of the grammar. In particular, reduplication occurs independently in the phonology and syntax components, and in both cases it occurs due to the ordinary workings and independently-motivated properties of those components. Therefore, no special theoretical machinery is necessary in order to analyze reduplication. Phonological and syntactic reduplication both have distinct properties, which I lay out and explore in some depth. In cases of phonological reduplication (which includes morphologi- cal reduplication), reduplication occurs as a phonological repair process. These reduplication constructions are minimal in phonological size, they exhibit TETU, and they interact normally with morphophonology. No RED morpheme or constituents like “base” and “reduplicant” are needed to analyze them successfully. Syntactic reduplication occurs when a syntactic constituent is copied and merged with an- other morpheme, creating a complex constituent with two daughters below X0. These cases are not limited in phonological size and do not exhibit TETU. They are restricted in their interac- tion with morphophonology. In addition, due to the nature of the merged constituent, these constructions sometimes exhibit phonological behavior which appears to be non-optimizing. Case studies are presented with data from Kwak’wala, Tamil and Samala, with supporting evidence from many other languages. The text of this document is substantively identical to that of the version filed with the Uni- versity of California, Santa Cruz in May 2010. However, some changes in formatting and other changes to correct minor errors or omissions have been made. This is version 1.0, released on May 14, 2010. The most current version of this document should remain available on the author’s website. For Daniel Bartlett viii Acknowledgments As I sit and write these words, with my dissertation a fait accompli, it is all too easy to imagine that it was always destined to be thus. But it was not so: in fact, on more than one occasion the idea of finishing this project seemed unlikely or impossible. It is therefore fitting to acknowledge the many people whose contributionswere the essential preconditionsfor this work to ever see the light of day. Thanks are of course due above all to my dissertation committee. Linguistics students at UCSC suffer from an embarrassment of riches in the quality of our faculty members, and I think that those of us on the phonological side are especially embarrassed in this regard. My chair, Armin Mester, guided this work over the course of years, and he cannot be commended too highly for his boundless patient and insightful advice along the way. Junko Ito and Jaye Padgett offered assistance and guidance as well despite continents and oceans that sometimes intervened. This thesis is immeasurably richer and more complete because of their generous support and thoughtful, challenging questions and ideas at each step in this journey. A project of this magnitude requires support that is not only intellectual but social as well. The other members of my PhD cohort, Justin Nuger and Vera Gribanova, have shouldered more than their share of this responsibility, but they have not been alone. Among the serried ranks of other students in the UCSC graduate program, Noah Constant and Ember Van Allen provided extraordinary support while managing to make better life decisions for themselves. Ryan Ben- nett, Anie Thompson, Boris Harizanov, Matt Tucker, Dave Teeple, Andrew Dowd, Paul Willis, both Kaplans and Jeremy O’Brien all offered ideas and criticisms which helped me shape up this project. My classmates at the InField 2008 Kwak’wala field methods course were tremen- dously fun while inspiring me with their intelligence and dedication. Emily Elfner in particular continued to offer useful input on this project, and my discussion of Kwak’wala is enriched by her contributions. The instructor of our InField course, Pat Shaw, merits inestimable thanks as well. In the final analysis, all linguistic work rests on fieldwork and other means of gathering pri- mary data from the speakers of the world’s languages. Our work can onlybeas goodas thegen- erosity, integrity and insight of those speakers allow. As I worked on this thesis I experienced the great privilege of working with speakers who must be counted among the most generous, insightful and characterized by integrity. These include two native speakers of Kwak’wala and three native speakers of Tamil. I thank them all from the bottom of my heart and can only hope that my contributionsto the linguisticscholarship on their languages should approach the high level of quality of the information that they offered to me. My fieldwork on Tamil is drawn on directly in this thesis. Unfortunately my fieldwork on Kwak’wala could not be reported on or discussed in this thesis due to cultural and privacy considerations. Nevertheless I am grateful for the truly remarkable opportunity that I had to work with those speakers and for the ways in which that experience enriched my own understanding of Kwak’wala in general. I offer pro- found thanks again to all of my informants. The intellectualatmosphere at UCSC has allowed me the opportunityto learn from and col- laborate with many great linguists who have visited our department, and with faculty from out- side of our department and even outside our field. Among these estimable individuals are Lev Blumenfeld and Melissa Frazier