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C:\Documents and Settings\lproctor\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\OLK8\Copyright - thesis (2).doc Moraic Onsets Ioanna Topintzi Department of Phonetics and Linguistics University College London Thesis submitted to the University of London in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy J u n e 2 0 0 6 UMI Number: U592441 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Dissertation Publishing UMI U592441 Published by ProQuest LLC 2013. Copyright in the Dissertation held by the Author. Microform Edition © ProQuest LLC. All rights reserved. This work is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. ProQuest LLC 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 Signed declaration This dissertation is the result of my own work, unless stated otherwise in the text or footnotes. 2 Abstract This thesis examines the status of onsets and their effects on stress and prosody. I argue that moraic onsets exist, a claim that contradicts standard phonological models (Hyman 1 9 8 5 , Hayes 1 9 8 9 , Gordon 1999 , Mor 6n 1999 ) which assume that onsets are not moraic, given that in the overwhelming majority of languages onsets are inert for prosodic processes. Using data from Piraha, Karo and Arabela stress, I show that weightful onsets actively participate in weight-sensitive stress assignment. Moreover, I point out that if onsets can be moraic, a host of other weight-based phenomena, should also be able to utilize them. This is exactly right, as verified by word minimality in Bella Coola, Samothraki Greek compensatory lengthening (CL), onset geminates in Pattani Malay, Trukese and Marshallese and a variety of other data, e.g. Trique CL, Bellonese reduplication. Crucially, this is not a prediction shared by previous prominence-based analyses of similar facts (Hayes 1995 , Gordon 2 0 0 5 , Smith 2 0 0 5 ). Prominence is inherently designed to account only for stress, not for other weight-based phenomena. If one were to entertain a prominence account, then most of the data above would remain unexplained. However, not all onsets can be moraic. The proposed model is restrictive in admitting only two kinds of moraic onsets: those which are underlying, i.e. emerging as geminates, and those which are derived in the output and serve for stress purposes. While the former can be of any featural content (since they are lexically specified and thus unpredictable), for the latter ones, I claim that only voiceless onsets can be moraic, whereas voiced ones are never moraic. This relates to a well-known generalisation affecting a different prosodic phenomenon, namely tone. Voiceless onsets raise the pitch of the following vowel, voiced ones lower it. In many languages such pitch perturbation is interpreted as tone. My proposal is that in some other languages, this pitch perturbation is instead interpreted as stress and is formally represented by means of moras, which are only assigned to the stress-attracting voiceless onsets. Piraha, Karo and Arabela data empirically confirm this finding. 3 Acknowledgements Rarely things work ideally in life, but having Moira Yip as a supervisor certainly has. Moira’s fascinating knowledge of just about everything phonological, her expertise and her incredibly quick mind are truly remarkable. I have benefited immeasurably from her sharp comments and from challenging my ideas and thoughts from day one. Thanks for devoting so much time and energy to me. I hope this thesis can somehow compensate for both. It has been a privilege to work with you and for being allowed to see, as time progressed, what a truly alluring person you are outside of linguistics too. Many people have also helped me by providing suggestions, comments or making papers and material available to me. I gratefully acknowledge: Juliette Blevins, Lev Blumenfeld, Emily Curtis, Mark Donohue, Paloma Garcia-Bellido, Spike Gildea, Rob Goedemans, Carolina Gonzalez, Beverley Goodman, Matt Gordon, Carlos Gussenhoven, John Hajek, Bruce Hayes, Ben Hermans, Wouter Jansen, Brian Jose, Dasha Kavitskaya, Yen-Hwei Lin, Bruce Mordn, Elliott Moreton, David Nash, Roland Rich, Curt Rice, Keren Rice, Jen Smith, Paul Smolensky, Donca Steriade, Marc van Oostendorp, Yi Xu and Hideki Zamma. Special thanks to Mary Ruth Wise for bringing Arabela to my attention and Debbie Koop at SIL Peru for making relevant material accessible to me. Thanks to Eleftheria Giakoumaki and Angelos Afroudakis at the Kevrpov Epeuvrjg tcov NeoeAAqviKcbv A io Aektcov k cu ISicopdicov - I.A.N.E for granting me access to older Samothraki Greek sources. Dan Everett’s work on Piraha has inspired me to write a thesis on this topic. Thanks for answering all my - occasionally silly - questions about the language in lightning speed. At UCL, thanks to my fellow-students for making life at the PhD room, and sporadically outside of it, enjoyable: Nick Allott, Eric Carlson, Ana Carrera-Hemandez, Alison Hall, Vikki Janke, Eirini Sanoudaki, Hitoshi Shiraki, Marco Tamburelli, Rob Truswell, Hiroyuki Uchida, Rosa Vega-Moreno and Reiko Vermeulen. Special thanks to Steve Nevard and those of you who happily offered to participate as subjects in my experiment, to Molly Bennett for being so helpful and efficient in all things practical, to Stavroula Kousta for invaluable help regarding statistics, to Gloria Malambe and Mary Pearce for their friendship, but also to Mary for collaboration in phonology and editing. I am grateful to Neil Smith and Valerie Hazan for being there to assist with any practical or funding problems, and to John Harris for being keen to discuss my work. 4 My stay in England and the completion of my thesis have been greatly facilitated by grants from the AHRC, the A.G. Leventis Foundation, the British Federation of Women Graduates and the UCL Friends. Thanks to the UCL Graduate School and the Department of Phonetics and Linguistics for partially funding my conference trips. I gratefully acknowledge their financial support. To the following fellow Greek linguists: Elena Anagnostopoulou, Maiy Baltazani, Ioanna Kappa, Marika Lekakou, Angeliki Malikouti-Drachman, Marianna Margariti-Ronga, Dimitris Papazachariou, Angeliki Ralli, Anthi Revithiadou and Marina Tzakosta, oaq euxapiorco 7ioXu oXouq for your help, comments and friendship. On a more personal level, I wish to thank Marika Lekakou for being a close companion over the past two years. I am grateful to you for sharing thoughts, for liking the fact that I can be ‘difficult’, for discussions about life and linguistics, but above all for a cucumber eye-treatment I will never forget. Choosing to do linguistics in the first place was Elena Anagnostopoulou’s ‘fault’. Thank you for that. And thanks for teaching me syntax and for forgiving me for not doing syntax. Your trust in me from the very beginning as well as your friendship, have always been precious. Exov MapK cuio xo avaxoXuco x^pio, thanks for your drawings, your baby Greek and for all the things you know and more. We are still on the path, and you know it too. To my Greek friends in London: Stavros Fatouros, Elena Giouroukou, Georgia Iliopoulou, Eftihia Karadimitri, Konstantinos Lasithiotakis, Dimitris Makris (aka Jim Long), Tania Vasileiadou, thank you all and each and every one for enriching my life in so many ways, for challenging me to try new things, for the best Easter ever, for overeating evenings in Enfield pubs and Diyarbakir and for singing tcx xpayouSia xrjg 7iapea§ every now and then. Thanks to all my friends in Greece, and particularly to my lifelong friends: Elisavet Kokkoni, Giouli Kommata, and ‘my brother’ Kostas Simatos, for only needing a split second to ‘warm up’ every time we meet and for meeting up every time I’m there. To Konstantina Hourdaki, thanks for being my biennial ‘therapist’ and for listening.