.SIGN AND SIGNAL DERIVING LINGUISTIC GENERALIZATIONS FROM INFORMATION UTILITY A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE DEPARTMENT OF LINGUISTICS AND THE COMMITTEE ON GRADUATE STUDIES OF STANFORD UNIVERSITY IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Uriel Cohen Priva August 2012 © 2012 by Uriel Cohen Priva. All Rights Reserved. Re-distributed by Stanford University under license with the author. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution- Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/ This dissertation is online at: http://purl.stanford.edu/wg646gh4444 ii I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Daniel Jurafsky, Primary Adviser I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Arto Anttila I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Paul Kiparsky I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Christopher Manning I certify that I have read this dissertation and that, in my opinion, it is fully adequate in scope and quality as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Meghan Sumner Approved for the Stanford University Committee on Graduate Studies. Patricia J. Gumport, Vice Provost Graduate Education This signature page was generated electronically upon submission of this dissertation in electronic format. An original signed hard copy of the signature page is on file in University Archives. iii Abstract Why do languages have such different phonological processes even though all speakers share the same cognitive, articulatory and perceptual constraints? American English preserves sounds such as /p/ and /g/ even though they are absent from the sound systems of many of the world's languages, but reduces sounds such as /t/ even though it is one of the most frequently used sounds cross-linguistically. In contrast, Romance languages reduce /s/, which American English preserves. What makes American English have this particular set of phonological processes and not processes that affect other languages? I show that by assuming that speakers attempt to maximize the amount of infor- mation they transmit while minimizing the amount of effort required to transmit that information, it is possible to determine which sounds are more likely to be affected by reduction processes and which sounds are more likely to be preserved in each lan- guage. Unlike cognitive, perceptual and articulatory constraints, which are the same for speakers of all languages, the amount of information languages assign to linguistic elements, such as individual sounds, varies markedly. The more information a sound carries, the more effort speakers are willing to expend to transmit it faithfully to listeners. The trade-off between maximizing information and minimizing effort forms the basis for a new framework I call MULE (Most information Utility, Least Effort). MULE predicts preservation and reduction patterns in English and Arabic at the levels of performance, competence and change, thereby providing a partial answer to the actuation problem (Weinreich et al. 1968). MULE also predicts cross-linguistic generalizations. I show that in American English, Egyptian Arabic and Spanish, highly informative sounds are more likely to benefit from the perceptual prominence iv of the onsets of stressed syllables. Similarly the balance between effort and informa- tion successfully predicts cross-linguistic asymmetries between the frequencies of less effortful sounds and more effortful sounds. As such, MULE enhances the explanatory power of linguistic theory, and provides a disciplined way to integrate phonetics and information theoretic considerations. v To my parents vi Acknowledgments There are no single authors in academic research. New research builds on previous work and on the authors' interaction with others: those who taught them how to do research, and if they are lucky, those who taught them how to become better people. I was fortunate to be a graduate student at Stanford Linguistics for the past few years, the most collaborative, inspiring, and nurturing academic environment I know. I owe many thanks to my professors, colleagues, administrative staff and friends at Stanford for helping me overcome the perils of being an expatriate in an American graduate school. I am grateful to my committee for their intellectual support and patience. Each of them has had an important role in my development as a graduate student. One of the greatest benefits of going to Stanford was a chance to work with my adviser, Dan Jurafsky. Dan's curiosity, intellect and inherent dislike for pretheoretical consid- erations are responsible for the most rapid exchanges of ideas that I have ever had. Dan's trust in me and his willingness to support me and to keep me on the right track never ceased to astonish me. My graduate school experience and my work would have suffered greatly if it were not for Dan's intellectual influence and personal example. Paul Kiparsky, a true Renaissance man, introduced me to many of the theoretical concepts and challenges that have ultimately shaped my work. Our long conversa- tions about linguistics, politics and life's mysteries never took a predictable course, and every turn revealed new insights, problems and solutions. Arto Anttila's precise approach to research encouraged me to better ground my arguments. Arto read the greatest number of versions of any of my manuscripts, and I can see the effect of his detailed feedback in almost every page. Chris Manning's ability to understand immediately any topic I wished to discuss and to provide me with useful input and vii criticism is admirable. Even more admirable is his ability to teach me not only how to argue for my ideas, but more importantly how not to argue for them. Finally, Meghan Sumner showed me the beauty of phonetics and is responsible for my desire to ground phonological arguments in phonetics. Meghan sets herself as an example at the academic and personal level. In doing so she inspires others to follow. Thank you! One of the things I am most grateful for in my experience as a graduate student is the sense of having an adoptive family, of a home away from home. While many took part in making the department warm and welcoming, a few deserve special thanks. Beth Levin's door was always open for students to wander in, and I often sought her counsel. Beth would listen, advise and help in whichever way she could. The fact that she did all that and at the same time made sure I met every necessary deadline is remarkable. Penny Eckert listened, encouraged, and offered advice. I made many more random trips to the departmental kitchen in hope of catching a word with her. Ivan Sag made sure I remained inspired and provided humor-infused theoretical and personal insights. Vera Gribanova made post-graduation work seem reachable, and provided more support than I dared to wish for. I remember and appreciate your support. I thank my many friends at Stanford for helping me survive graduate school with a smile on my face. I had a wonderful and supportive cohort. Matthew Adams has been my fellow phonologist, counselor and friend from my first weeks at Stanford, and shared with me the ups and downs of graduate school. Roey Gafter miraculously managed to know how I feel and what I was about to do well before I did. I consider myself fortunate to have you two as my friends. Inbal Arnon, Elisabeth Norcliffe and Hal Tily successfully lured me into San Francisco to prove that there's life that does not involve Stanford even if it does involve linguistics (and the sounds of a band playing at Revolution). I would not have known Laura Smith and Fabian Goppelsroeder had I not gone to Stanford, and that would have been a terrible thing indeed. To my Israeli friends, thank you for making sure you were just a phone call away. Ariela Raviv has unwittingly undertaken the task of standing for sanity and com- mon sense in my life through graduate school, a task she managed with ease, equipped viii with wickedly sharp humor, a down-to-earth approach and very little patience for delusions of any sort. She proposed once that by doing so she put me through med school even though I am not a real doctor. She has a point there, and there is a few years' worth of chat history to prove that. For all of her support and for her stout belief in me, I am grateful. Finally, I dedicate this thesis to my parents, who wanted me to go abroad and pursue what was good for me, even when it was clearly hard for them that I was away. I am grateful for their encouragement to keep challenging myself, and for always being happier with my accomplishments than anyone else. ix Contents Abstract iv Acknowledgments vii 1 Introduction1 1.1 Explaining the phonology of a language.................1 1.2 Language specific patterns........................2 1.3 Predicting language-specific patterns..................3 1.4 Balancing effort and information: MULE................5 1.5 Sign and signal..............................5 1.6 Cross-linguistic generalizations......................8 1.7 The explanatory power of MULE....................9 2 Information content affects performance 10 2.1 Introduction................................ 10 2.2 Stop deletion and duration paradox..................