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Prosody vs. Syllable Structure in Oceanic and Chamic Peter Norquest University of Arizona
This presentation investigates the interaction between prosody and syllable structure in languages from two Austronesian subfamilies, Oceanic and Chamic. The data given in these two case studies shows that when there is tension between the prosodic requirements of the language and syllable structure constraints, the latter yields to the former.
Within Oceanic, a phenomenon occurs in the two languages Rotuman and Kwara’ae, where what would otherwise be parsed as a bisyllabic foot made up of two light syllables in conservative speech is realized as a heavy, monosyllabic foot in regular discourse. Depending on the identity of the segments in the input, a variety of surface phenomena can occur, including metathesis and vowel coalescence (Figure 1).
Much attention has been paid to Rotuman in the literature (i.e., Blevins 1994 and McCarthy 2000, among others), but less to Kwara’ae (Sohn 1980, Blevins & Garrett 1998). I assert that this phenomenon is motivated by the Stress-to-Weight Principle, which requires that a stressed syllable also be heavy (bimoraic). This simplifies the internal structure of the Prosodic Word by bringing the edges of syllables and the feet that contain them into alignment. However, this prosodic requirement in turn complicates the syllable structure (by allowing closed syllables as well as a contrast in vowel length) as well as the segmental inventory (by increasing the number of surface vowels).
In Chamic, an Austronesian subgroup spoken largely on the Southwest Asian peninsula, a similar phenomenon has occurred diachronically. In this case, it is the left edge of the prosodic word which was affected, since Proto-Chamic (PC) contact with Mon-Khmer languages shifted the main stress of the prosodic word from the penultimate syllable (the default in Proto-Malayo-Chamic (PMC)) to the final syllable (Thurgood 1999). Although on the surface this appears to be an iambic footing pattern, it is more accurately described as monosyllabic trochees with unfooted pre-syllables since Proto-Chamic forms reduced to heavy monosyllables whenever the initial syllable was not preserved under specific conditions (Figure 2).
his reduction to heavy monosyllables is similar to the Oceanic data in two ways: first, it simplifies the internal structure of the Prosodic Word by aligning the edges of the syllables with the feet which contain them. Secondly, it complicates the syllable structure by (in contrast with Rotuman and Kwara’ae) allowing onset clusters as well as increasing the inventory of diphthongs since the high vowels [i] and [u] diphthongize to [Ey] and [Ťw] when carrying the main stress.
In summary, the common point between the Oceanic data and the Chamic data is the change in foot structure from a bisyllabic foot comprised of two light syllables to a monosyllabic, bimoraic foot. In each case, I argue that this results from the promotion of the Stress-to-Weight Principle (‘stressed syllables must be heavy’) over Foot Binarity (s) (‘feet must be binary at the sylllabic level’), but leaving Foot Binarity (m) (‘feet must be binary at the moraic level‘) still satisfied.
Figures
(1) Rotuman and Kwara’ae metathesis and vowel coalescence
(a) Metathesis
(pe.@ka) ® (péak) ‘to be scarce’ (mo.@fa) ® (móaf) ‘garbage’ (Rotuman)
(bŕ.bo)(u@.la) ® (báo)(bw«@l) ‘thick’ (ŕ.do)(lá.mu) ® (áond)(lú«m) ‘your pubic area’ (Kwara’ae)
(b) Coalescence
fo(rŤ@.si) ® fo(rǽs) ‘to spread out’ (ho.se) ® (hǿs) ‘oar’ (Rotuman)
(fá.?i)(tá.ni) ® (fE?)(tE:n) ‘to turn over’ (?ŕ.be)(á.ni) ® (?Q$:b)(E@:n) ‘to help’ (Kwara’ae)
(2) Proto-Chamic Reduction (and Non-Reduction) to monosyllables
(a) Reduction (b) Non-reduction
PMC ŕ PC PMC ŕ PC b«lah (bláh) ‘chop, split’ balu ba(lŤ@w) ‘widowed’ b«ra:s (brá:s) ‘rice (husked)’ bara ba(rá:) ‘shoulder’ bu?uk (şúk) ‘head hair’ dal«m da(lám) ‘in(side)’ d«r«s (drás) ‘fast; short time’ jahit ja(hi@t) ‘sew’ t«lu (klŤ@w) ‘three’ jarum ja(rúm) ‘needle’ k«ra (krá:) ‘monkey’ kali ka(lE@y) ‘dig’ paha (phá:) ‘thigh’ kura ku(rá:) ‘tortoise’ puluh (plúh) ‘ten’ pulaw pu(láw) ‘island’ tahun (thún) ‘year’ tali ta(lE@y) ‘rope; string’
References
Blevins, Juliette. 1994. “The Bimoraic Foot in Rotuman Phonology and Morphology.” Oceanic Linguistics 33, 2: 491-516. Blevins, Juliette & Andrew Garrett. 1998. “The Origins of Consonant-Vowel Metathesis.” Language 74, 3: 508-556 McCarthy, John. 2000. “The Prosody of Phase in Rotuman”. NTTL 18:1: 147-197. Sohn, Ho-Min. 1980. “Metathesis in Kwara’ae”. Lingua 52: 305-323 Thurgood, Graham. 1999. From Ancient Cham to Modern Dialects. Oceanic Linguistics Special Publication No. 28. University of Hawai’i Press. |