Phonological Theories Session 5 Prosodic Description in Linear and Non-linear Generative Phonology Version SS 2006

Prosodic description in linear and non-linear phonology The Terms linear and non-linear were used for the segmental level of sound-structure description. The non-linear is is expressed in the different levels of the tree- structures while the linear segment string has no relation to any other level and each sound is an unstructured collection of features. Considering prosodic structuring to be a) the grouping of sound units into larger units (this can seen from the opposite side, i.e. separating groups of units from one another and be termed demarcation), b) the weighting of the units within the groups (stress or accent) c) the allocation of a communicative function to the larger units by means of melodic modulation (intonation) we can compare the SPE approach to prosody with later (AM) approaches.

Prosodic Categories in SPE The only phonologically treated prosodic category was stress (in a general sense of abstract weighting). However it was dependent for the specification of degree of stress on the morpho-syntactic demarcation structure of the sentence. - lexical formatives and grammatical morphemes (including articles, prepositions, which are considered to be clitics) are separated by a + boundary; - together, these form word units (problem: pronouns!) - word units are bounded by # (also elements of compounds) All boundaries correspond to nodes on the syntactic tree, which are also represented in the bracketed representation.

Structural basis of stress allocation Ich arbeite in der Eisenbahndirektion. S NP VP N V PP (proform)(stem) (pers./tense) prep NP Icharbeit + ein + art N der + Eisenbahndirektion (( Ich) ((arbeit(+e)) (in+(der+(((Eisen)(bahn))(direkt+ion))))))

Practice in stress allocation Draw the NP-trees, derive the bracketing and determine the stress pattern of the following words (phrases): Wettervorhersage Landesuniversitätsgesetz Donaudampfschifffahrtskapitän Mädchen handelsschule und Mädchenhandelsschule baseball bat; Kensington High Street; Tottenham Court Road

Problems with cyclical stress allocation This is the cat that killed the rat that stole the cheese. ( SPE p. 372 ) The prosodic phrasing for the sentence is: ( This is the cat) (that killed the rat) (that stole the cheese). The stress allocation for the sentence derived from the linear syntactic structure might be: ( This is) NP (the cat that killed NP (the rat that stole NP (the cheese) NP ) NP ) NP Creating rules for inserting prosodic phrase boundaries into the linear syntactic string cant work because the prosodic structure (although not unconnected to syntactic constituents) cannot be derived from the syntactic structure.

The Strict Layer Hypothesis The sort of recursive hierarchy that is seen in syntactic structures like: This is the cat that killed the rat that stole the cheese. are ruled out in prosody. A hierarchical structure has been postulated in post-linear phonology in which one or more lower order units are exhaustively contained within the bounds of the next higher unit and are co-extensive with them A second aspect of the prosodic structure is its relative indepen- dence of syntactic structure. This is not the same as saying that there is no link between them. The claim is that syntactic information can only be accessed indirectly and it is mediated by the phonological constituent structure. Any violations of the SLH and of the claim of morpho-syntactic independence can be shown to result from phonological adjustments made in the lexicon.

The SLH layers An utterance (U) can contain several intonation phrases (IPs), which can contain several phonological phrases ( s), which can contain several phonological words ( ) () U ()() IP ()()()()() ()()()()()()()()() Violation of SLH would be if ….. a was not dominated by a or was dominated by 2 s Violation types can be classified as a) non-exhaustivity, b) improper bracketing and c) recursivity. a) ()3 b)()3 c) ()2 ( )()2 ()1 ( x)()1( )(x y)()1 ( )(x)1

Some practice (or problems?) How are the following utterance divided into prosodic units (U, IP,,, F, ) according to the SLH? - When my grandmother was younger, she was quite a daredevil. - - All over the world, people are asking the reason why. - Es hat selten einen Menschen gegeben, der niemals unter seinem ge w issen gelitten hat. - Kaum hat sie die Tür zugemacht, stürmte es heftiger, als sie es jemals er lebt hatte.