UNIVERSITY OF CALGARY Syllable Cut, Moras, and Quantity Change in Dutch by Rachel Jocelyn Klippenstein A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS DEPARTMENT OF LINGUISTICS CALGARY, ALBERTA AUGUST, 2006 Rachel Jocelyn Klippenstein 2006 Abstract Most research on the prosodic phenomenon of syllable cut to date has been restricted to German. Syllable cut has also failed thus far to receive an adequate account within moraic theory, which has led some syllable cut theorists (e.g., Vennemann 1994) to reject moraic theory in favour of alternate prosodic theories. This thesis provides a moraic account of syllable cut based on mora-sharing along the lines of Broselow et al. 1997, thus rendering alternate theories unnecessary. It also shows that syllable cut is present in Dutch, and argues that the quantity changes of Middle Dutch represent a transition from a quantity system to a syllable cut system as proposed for German and English by Vennemann (2000) and Murray (2000, in press). iii Acknowledgements I would like to thank the many people who have been important in various ways to the completion of my Master’s degree and thesis. First I would like to thank my supervisor, Robert Murray. In addition to his knowledge of the field, he proved to be very good both at instilling calmness and confidence whenever I was nervous about my thesis or its progress, and at prompting me to make progress on my work in a timely fashion—all excellent qualities in a supervisor, and the more so in combination. Working with him has been a very pleasant experience. I would also like to thank Darin Howe and Amanda Pounder for their willingness to be on my thesis committee, and Suzanne Curtin for being the neutral chair at my defense. Thanks also to the other linguistics professors that I have learnt from here at the University of Calgary, whether through courses I took from them, or through their willingness to answer the sometimes rather random questions I brought to their offices. I also appreciate the amiableness of my fellow graduate students and of the members of the undergraduate linguistics club Verbatim, and would like to thank them all for their role in making the department a pleasant place to work. I would especially like to thank Corey Telfer among the graduate students and Scott Moisik among the Verbatim members for many hours of stimulating linguistic (and non-linguistic) discussion. Thanks also to the executive of Verbatim for welcoming me into the club office and even going so far as to let me have a key, thus giving me easy access at all hours both to the department library housed there, and to the couch which is in my opinion the most comfortable spot in the department. iv I would also like to thank Linda Toth, the department secretary, for the indispensable work she does in keeping everything running smoothly. Many thanks to my family for their help and support in everything, and especially for encouraging me along in the wonderful adventure of lifelong learning. Thanks to Dad in particular for his part in starting me off in this field of study: for having the right books in the bookcase to spark an interest in historical linguistics and the Germanic languages, and for encouraging me to recognize when I started university that linguistics was the field where I belonged, and not to be daunted by technical-sounding descriptions of upper-level courses. Thanks to all my friends for helping me keep sane during the thesis-writing process by providing necessary breaks, diversions, and human contact. Thanks in particular to Heather Ramsay for brightening so many of my evenings with her friendship, and to Matt Root for putting up with my thesis-related gripings and grumblings and helping me keep it all in perspective (‘It’s not your dissertation’). Funding for this work from various sources deserves acknowledgement. Thanks to Robert Murray for providing me with research assistant funding from his grant #410– 2001–1597 from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada also provided me with a Canada Graduate Scholarship Master’s award, #766–2004–0620. The Government of Alberta provided me with a Province of Alberta Graduate Scholarship and an Alberta Government Graduate Scholarship. And finally, thanks be to God, on whom everything else rests. v Table of Contents Approval Page ................................................................................................................... ii Abstract......................................................................................................................... iii Acknowledgements ....................................................................................................... iv Table of Contents .......................................................................................................... vi List of Abbreviations, Constraints, and Symbols.............................................................x Chapter One: Introduction...............................................................................................1 1. Overview ..............................................................................................................2 1.1 Chapter one.....................................................................................................2 1.2 Chapter two ....................................................................................................2 1.3 Chapter three ..................................................................................................2 1.4 Chapter four....................................................................................................3 1.5 Chapter five ....................................................................................................3 1.6 Chapter six......................................................................................................3 Chapter Two: Syllable cut and quantity...........................................................................5 0. Introduction ..........................................................................................................5 1. Quantity................................................................................................................5 2. Syllable cut...........................................................................................................6 2.1 Phonetic properties .........................................................................................7 2.2 Phonological properties.................................................................................12 2.3 Syllable cut and schwa..................................................................................16 2.4 History of syllable cut theory........................................................................18 vi Chapter Three: The representation of syllable cut .........................................................20 0. Introduction ........................................................................................................20 1. The problem of moraic representation of syllable cut.........................................20 1.1 The elements of moraic theory......................................................................20 1.2 Moraic theory and syllable cut: unsuccessful accounts ................................23 2. Nonmoraic systems of representation .................................................................25 2.1 Becker’s syllable with implosion position.....................................................26 2.2 Vennemann’s Nuclear Phonology .................................................................26 3. A new mora-sharing analysis of syllable cut.......................................................28 3.1 Requirements for a moraic representation of syllable cut..............................29 3.2 Mora-sharing and phonetic duration: Broselow et al. 1997 ...........................30 3.3 A mora-sharing analysis of syllable cut: surface representations ..................36 3.4 Mora-sharing and underlying representations................................................41 3.5 Syllable cut, mora-sharing, and schwa ..........................................................48 4. Summary ...........................................................................................................49 Chapter Four: Syllable cut in Modern Dutch.................................................................51 0. Introduction ........................................................................................................51 1. Syllable cut in Dutch: full vowels.......................................................................51 1.1 Phonetic properties .......................................................................................51 1.2 Phonological properties.................................................................................53 vii 2. Previous analyses of the Dutch vowel system.....................................................58 2.1 Early syllable cut analyses and related proposals..........................................58 2.2 Quantity-based analyses................................................................................62 2.3 Quality-based analyses..................................................................................65 3. Schwa and syllable cut in Dutch.........................................................................67