Markedness and faithfulness in vowel systems

1 Vowel Systems: Reduction and Change 1.1 Introduction: Themes of the Dissertation 1.2 Vowel Reduction 1.2.1 Change in Vowel Features and Opacity 1.3 Correlates of Stress 1.4 Language Change 1.5 Goals of the Dissertation 1.6 Issues in Optimality Theory 1.6.1 What is in UG 1.6.2 Markedness Constraints 1.6.3 Faithfulness and Positional Faithfulness Constraints 1.6.4 Lexicon Optimization 1.6.5 Typological Considerations 1.7 Theoretical Achievements of the Dissertation 1.7.1 Unification of Vowel Reduction Phenomena and Typological Findings 1.7.2 Local Conjunction as a Way to Model Opacity in OT 1.7.3 The Great Vowel Shift and Models of Language Change in OT 1.8 Overview 2 Mantuan Vowel Deletion 2.1 Introduction 2.2 Data on Syllable Structure 2.3 Stress 2.4 Alternations between V ~ O in Syllables Preceding Stress 2.5 An OT Account of Mantuan Syllable and Word Structure 2.5.1 Basic Syllable Structure Constraints and Their Ranking 2.5.2 Importance of NoCoda 2.5.3 Interaction with Faithfulness: No insertion (Dep-V) and No Deletion (Max V) 2.5.4. Prevention of Apocope 2.5.5 Deletion of Consonants in Mn: Max-C 2.6 Mn Alternations Explained as Deletion of Pretonic Vowels 2.6.1 *STRU(o) drives deletion 2.6.2 Consequences for Other Derived-Alternating forms 2.6.3 Consequences for Disallowed Clusters in Alternating Forms 2.6.4 A Different Syllabification Problem 2.6.5 Summary 2.7 An Alternative with Alignment and DEP-V Driving Deletion 2.8. Epenthesis in (C)C# Environments 2.8.1 Introduction of Sonority constraint 2.8.2 Dealing with Disallowed Clusters 2.9 Assessment of Deletion and Epenthesis 2.10 Appendix to Chapter II: A Digression on Italian Syllable Structure 3 Romance Vowel Reduction Phenomena 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Vowel Reductions 3.3 Vowel Features 3.3.1 Status of Reduced Segments: An Argument from Catalan 3.4 Data 3.4.1 Western Catalan (Tensing) 3.4.2 Brazilian Portuguese (Tensing and Raising) 3.4.2.1 Brazilian Portuguese Non-Final System 3.4.2.2 Brazilian Final System 3.4.3 Eastern Catalan (Centralization- Raising) 3.5 Basic Theoretical Considerations (OT) 3.5.1 Markedness, Faithfulness, and Positional Faithfulness 3.5.2 Constraints needed for the model 3.5.2.1 Markedness 3.5.2.2 Faithfulness 3.6 Analyses 3.6.1 Western Catalan: Tensing 3.6.2 Brazilian Portuguese Unstressed Final System 3.6.3 Brazilian Portuguese Unstressed Non-Final System 3.6.4 Eastern Catalan (Centralizing) 3.7 Reduction to [ ]: English, French and European Portuguese 3.7.1 European Portuguese 3.8 Typological Considerations 3.9 Conclusions 4 Mantuan Chain Shifts 4.1 Introduction: Vowel Raising in Unstressed Environments 4.2 Mantuan Vowel System: Data 4.3 Alternations 4.4 Front Vowel Raising in Unstressed Environments 4.5 Constraints Needed for the Model 4.6 Southern Mantuan (Quistello) 4.7 Northern Mantuan (Commessaggio) 4.8 Mantuan Back Vowel Raising 4.8.1 Southern Mantuan 4.8.2 Northern Mantuan 4.9 Markedness of Mid Vowels: Typological Considerations 4.9.1 Universal Markedness 4.9.2 Vowel Spacing 4.9.3 Vowel Frequency 4.9.4 Context-conditioned variables 4.10 Conclusion 4.11 Appendix: An Acoustic Study of Northern Mantuan Stressless Vowels 4.11.1 Introduction 4.11.2 Correlates of stress 4.11.3 Method 4.11.4 Duration 4.11.5 Vowel Quality 4.11.6 Discussion Appendix I: Duration I Appendix II: Perceptual Vowel Changes as a Function of Stress Appendix III: Second Session (in carrier sentence) 5 Diachronic Chain Shifts: the Great Vowel Shift 5.1 Introduction 5.2 Historical Change in OT 5.2.1 An Example of Language Change in OT 5.3 The Great Vowel Shift (GVS) 5.4 Analysis: OT Constraints 5.4.1 Faithfulness 5.4.2 Faithfulness and Diphthongs 5.4.3 Markedness Constraints 5.5 Middle English Grammar 5.6 STAGE II: Markedness, cooccurrence constraints and the GVS 5.6.1 Front Vowels 5.6.1.1 Mantuan Front Vowel Raising: a reminder 5.6.2 Local Conjunction in the GVS 5.6.3 Back Vowels 5.6.4 Diphthongs 5.6.5 [a:] Problem 5.7 STAGE III: A later stage of the GVS 5.8 Summary of the Three Stages proposed for the GVS 5.8.1 Stage I 5.8.2 Stage II 5.8.3 Stage III 5.8.4 Two Previous Approaches to the GVS: Lass's Approach (1987) 5.8.5 Minkova and Stockwell's approach (1988, 1990) 5.8.6 A Possible Explanation 5.9 Language Change in OT Appendix I: Final Ranking at stage II Appendix II: Grammar at Stage III 6. Conclusions 6.1 Achievements Bibliography Index