Lateral buccalization of [sg]

T ABLE 8-2. [+sg] as a morpheme on L-D verbs P ROCESS I NPUT 49 O UTPUT A. N ONE ʰ-kɑ̃́t͡s [kʰwɑ̃́t͡s] ‘they set soft’ ʰ-næ̌hæp [nʰæ̌hæp] ‘they run’ ʰ-sɑ́wʔ [t͡sʰɑ́wʔ] ‘they measure’ 50 B. L ATERAL BUCCALIZATION ʰ-ʔɑ́t͡ʃ [l’ɑ́t͡ʃ] ‘they.animal kick’ ʰ-héw [lʰéw] ‘they cure’ C. V OICING ʰ-pǽ [bǽ] ‘they braid’ ʰ-pǽʔæp [bǽʔæp] ‘they help him’ Typical cases of surface grammatical aspiration in Northern Pame occur on non-labial stops, affricates, nasals and fricatives, with the exception of the laryngeal fricative A. 51 However, resistant to surface aspiration are the laryngeal consonants h,ʔand the labial stop p. In the case of the laryngeals, aspiration in the input surfaces as a laryngeally complex lateral B, or in the case of the bilabial, aspiration becomes voicing C. 8.3.1 Lateral buccalization of [sg] Lateral buccalization, the assignment of [+lat, +cor] to the aspiration feature, although odd in appearance, has some phonological motivation if we consider the alternatives. The primary problem with the underlying forms in b from table 8-2 is that there is a laryngeal morpheme in the form of the feature [+sg] that in the case with stops, surfaces as aspiration on the first root consonant. Aspirated laryngeal fricatives are phonetically implausible as probably are aspirated glottal stops. Thus, the aspirated laryngeal candidate is doomed from the start. Another point to consider is the feature geometry representation of laryngeal features. This analysis follows Lombardi 1994 in assuming that the presence of laryngeal features [+sg], [+cg], [+vce] and other non-modal voice phenomena require the presence of the phonological laryngeal node, while plain voiceless segments have no laryngeal node at all. This has the advantage of being able to make a claim that segments with adjacent laryngeal nodes are marked, at least with respect to consonants; that is to say, [+sg], [+cg] and [+vce] rarely co-occur Under this assumption the concatenation of [+sg] to either h or ʔ will be a violation of OCPLar. 24 OCPLar ‘Adjacent Laryngeal nodes are prohibited’. Therefore, the grammar Northern Pame avoids violations of OCPLar by optimizing the input through a process of buccalization. Current theoretical and typological findings would lead one to believe that the default place of articulation in a buccalization process is coronal Prince and Smolensky 1993, Payne 1981. 52 Thus, we 49 Person morphology w- has been excluded for simplification. Its presence or absence has no direct consequences for the discussion at hand. 50 There is an asymmetry with the affricates t͡s, t͡sʰ and t͡s’. Rather than the plain t͡s+[+sg] surfacing as t͡sʰ, we have t͡s’ as in the forms t͡s’ú ‘they scold’ and t͡s’éʔet ‘they take.animal’. However, s+[+sg] does in fact surface as t͡sʰ as in ‘measure’. The only conceivable explanation for this pattern is that historically, Northern Pame only had contrasts between glottalized alveolar-apical affricates and aspirated alveolar fricatives, which have been preserved in this paradigm. Examples of this pattern are relatively few in number and could conceivably be completely lexicalized. 51 Roots beginning with s have a slight coronal articulation, deriving an apical-coronal affricate. 52 The violability of [cor] is expressed in OT as Lab,DorCor and has had empirical support by looking at consonant might expect to see these laryngeals surface as a coronal stop. 25 IDENT[cor] Output segments have input correspondents for the feature [cor].’ 26 Provisional Ranking OCPIDENT[cor] 27 Incorrect buccalization with a coronal stop. Input: ʰ-ʔɑ́t͡ʃ OCPLar IDENT[cor] a. ʔʰɑ́t͡ʃ b. ☹ ☞ t’ɑ́t͡ʃ However, looking at 27 we see that the winner b is incorrect. This is due to the important distributional fact that Northern Pame disallows laryngeally complex bilabial stops or alveolar stops word initially. 28 P,TLar ‘Laryngeally complex p,t are prohibited word initially’. Therefore, the language must search for an optimal candidate that is coronal, but is not a stop. 53 The lateral is the next best choice. 29 Ranking OCPLar,P,TLar IDENT[lat, cor]IDENT[cor] 30 Lateral buccalization with a glottal stop root. Input: ʰ-ʔɑ́t͡ʃ OCP P,TLar IDENT[lat, cor] IDENT[cor] a. ʔʰɑ́t͡ʃ b. t’ɑ́t͡ʃ c.☞ l’ɑ́t͡ʃ 31 Lateral buccalization with a laryngeal fricative root. Input: ʰ-héw OCP P,TLar IDENT[lat,cor] IDENT[cor] a. hʰéw b. tʰéw c.☞ lʰéw epenthesis. This research has adapted these context-free markedness constraints to a low ranking of feature faithfulness constraints in the form of IDENTITY, which specifies that the value for [cor] is violable before other place features. 53 Nasals and the flap likewise are never winners in this scenario. This analysis assumes that these features must be ranked above [lat] and therefore preserved. In tableau 30, the input has a root with an initial glottal stop, which has the plural morpheme [+sg]. Candidate a fatally violates high ranking OCPLar, and candidate b does the same to P,TLar in an attempt to change its coronal value. Only candidate c preserves both markedness constraints, but at the added featural change for lateral. The input in example 31 is compared with the faithful candidate a, but this candidate violates the OCPLar. Candidate b is an attempt to buccalize with a plain coronal stop, but is unsuccessful for language specific markedness reasons 28. Candidate c is the optimal candidate in that it preserves OCPLar, while also allowing for a surface form of the plural morpheme [+sg]. 8.3.2 Voicing of [sg]