Al-Mohanna, F. (2024). Complex weight distinctions in Harmonic Serialism. The Linguistic Review 41(4): 699-740.
Abstract
A number of the quantity-sensitive stress systems which are characterised by complex weight distinctions have often proven challenging for parallel constraint-based metrical frameworks. A number of parallel-OT accounts are proposed to explain stress systems with multi-level weight hierarchies, in which syllables with long vowels (CVV) are more prominent than closed syllables (CVC), and closed syllables are more prominent than short open syllables (CV). The majority of these accounts are either inadequate or implausible. This paper seeks to provide an alternative account of stress systems with complex weight distinctions. Gradual prosodification, as an application of Harmonic Serialism, is the proposed framework for analysis. Maintaining gradualness and harmonic improvement in prosodic structure across the different steps of the derivation is deemed to be sufficient to achieve the required effects. The realisation of the various prominence relations illustrated in those multi-level weight hierarchies is considered to be an epiphenomenon of the sequential application of independently motivated prosodification processes, such as coda consonant moraification and foot construction. The proposed gradual prosodification model is applied to the stress systems of Kashmiri and Pulaar, that have identical algorithms for primary stress assignment, in addition to the secondary stress patten attested in Pulaar.
Keywords: Harmonic Serialism; prosodification; mora assignment; footing; stress assignment; complex weight distinction
Abstract