This week’s phonology circle presentation will be by Joan Mascaró
Title: A prosodic analysis of stress-dependent harmony
Time: Mon Apr 14 5pm, 32-D831
In some harmonic systems the trigger or the target must be a stressed vowel. These systems have been analyzed as limited by a prosodic domain, the stress foot, but more recently as long-distance assimilation of the stressed vowel to an unstressed vowel (Walker 2005, 2006), grounded on the need of “weak trigger” positions to realize their feature content on prominent positions. I will examine the evidence presented in favor of a weak trigger analysis and discuss additional evidence that suggests that a prosodic account should be preferred.