The Typology of Primitive Feet The Typology of Binary Stressed Feet

2.3.2.1. The Typology of Primitive Feet

As chapter 1 pointed out, Hayes 1991 proposes that there are only three types of binary feet: the syllabic trochee, the moraic trochee, and the iamb. Throughout this study, I assume Hayes’ typology with one important modification: feet are inherently headless. Therefore, since the term trochee implies left-headedness, I refer to symmetric feet simply as syllabic feet and moraic feet rather than syllabic trochees and moraic trochees, respectively. These two primitive foot types are represented in 90. 90 Inventory of Primitive Symmetric Feet: Syllabic Foot: õ õ Moraic Foot: μ μ In what follows I claim, contrary to Hayes 1991, that stress may be assigned to either edge of either one of these primitive symmetric foot types. In the case of the iamb, however, the Weight-to-Stress Principle Kager 1989; Prince 1990 ensures that it will always be right- stressed in those cases where it has a stress. This is because the rightmost constituent is, by definition, the heavier member of an iambic foot. Thus, while it is possible to have a stressless iambic foot e.g., McCarthy and Prince 1990 argue for such a foot in Arabic, there is only one place where a stress can link after it has been inserted into an iambic foot; this is illustrated in the next section and again in chapter 3. The foregoing discussion is explicitly limited to binary feet in that it does not necessarily apply to ternary feet. As was mentioned earlier, the existence of such feet is in dispute. A possible means of applying my proposal to derive the effect of ternarity is presented in Hagberg 1992. To summarize, I assume Hayes’ 1991 primitive typology of binary feet, with the exception that feet are inherently headless. Next, I discuss the typology of stressed feet which results from adding autosegmental stresses to primitive binary feet.

2.3.2.2. The Typology of Binary Stressed Feet

The claim that feet are inherently headless accounts for the lack of evidence for metrical heads in morphological processes, as was argued in section 2.1, but it also makes some predictions that are not made by the theory of Hayes 1991. Most notably, the inherent headlessness of feet, together with the claim that stress is an autosegment, predicts that five different combinations of binary feet with autosegmental stress are possible. These are presented in schematic form in 91, where represents a stress autosegment. 91 The Predicted Surface Typology of Binary Stressed Feet: a. Syllabic, Left-stressed: | õ õ b. Syllabic, Right-stressed: | õ õ c. Moraic, Left-stressed: | μ μ d. Moraic, Right-stressed: | μ μ e. Iambic: Preferred: Else: | | μ õμ μ μ μ In the case of an iambic foot of the form μ μ, I assume that stress always links to the rightmost member in order to conform to the direction of linking in the preferred i.e., asymmetric iambic foot. This is explained in section 2.3.3.2, where the mechanism by which stresses are assigned to iambic feet is formalized. Each of the symmetric stressed foot types in 91 is instantiated with language data in chapter 3. The two types of syllabic feet are exemplified with Warao and Mayo, which are left- stressed and right-stressed, respectively. The two types of moraic feet are exemplified with Cairene Arabic and exceptionally stressed Turkish words, which are left-stressed and right- stressed, respectively. Hixkaryana was already discussed in chapter 1 as an example of a language which utilizes the iambic stress foot. Having thus developed the autosegmental theory of stress, the next three chapters instantiate this theory and apply it to several stress systems which prove difficult to analyze under other theories of stress. First, however, this chapter concludes by presenting some additional principles which are utilized in the remaining chapters.

2.3.3. Further Principles Needed for the Proposal