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Consonant cluster neutralisation and targeted constraints

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 November 2001

Colin Wilson
Affiliation:
University of California, Los Angeles

Abstract

In this paper, I propose an optimality-theoretic account of the generalisation that deletion processes that apply to intervocalic biconsonantal clusters canonically delete the first consonant (schematically, VC1C2V → VC2V). The approach to contextual neutralisation proposed here has two main components. First, I follow the licensing-by-cue framework (e.g. Steriade 1997) in identifying ‘weak’ elements as those without strong perceptual cues. Second, I argue that the constraints responsible for contextual neutralisation ‘target’ weak elements. This approach captures the deletion generalisation above, because the relevant targeted constraint prefers only the correct output VC2V (from which the weak consonant C1 has been removed), not the incorrect output VC1V. Intuitively, the representation containing a weak element (VC1C2V) is compelled to neutralise to a representation that is perceptually very similar (VC2V). The targeted-constraint approach is formalised by replacing the standard violation-based definition of OT optimisation with a new definition – which is equivalent except when ‘targeted’ constraints are involved – based on harmonic orderings. The approach is shown to extend to certain cases of (i) contextually determined feature neutralisation and (ii) phonological opacity.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
© 2001 Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

For very helpful comments on portions of the work presented here, I would like to thank Mark Allen, Eric Baković, Laura Benua, Luigi Burzio, Lisa Davidson, Bob Frank, Matt Goldrick, Carlos Gussenhoven, Bruce Hayes, René Kager, John McCarthy, Paul Smolensky, Donca Steriade, the participants of the GLOW Workshop and the audience at the LSA annual meeting (Chicago, January 2000). Special thanks go to René Kager and Carlos Gussenhoven for organising the conference and acting as editors of this special issue, to Luigi Burzio, whose guidance was invaluable during the writing of the paper, and to the two anonymous reviewers and the associate editor, for their insightful comments and questions.