Speaker: Hani Na’eem (MIT)
Title: The Nature of Emphasis Harmony in Jordanian Arabic
Time: Monday, May 5th, 5pm – 6:30pm
Location: 32-D831
Abstract: Most varieties of Arabic retain a set of uvularized or pharyngealized coronals (e.g. /tˤ, sˤ, ðˤ/) – called emphatics – which contrast with their non-uvularized – or plain – counterparts (e.g. /t, s, ð/). These emphatics trigger a type of back harmony, most salient on the low front /æ/ vowel, turning it into back [ɑ]. In Jordanian Arabic (JA), the extent and magnitude to which this harmony process affects its trigger’s context have seen notable disagreement, contributing to a scarcity of formal analyses that highlight the underlying mechanism behind the process. In this talk, I report on in-progress work attempting to establish/confirm/reaffirm empirical facts about the harmony pattern in JA and couching it within a theory of harmony systems attested cross-linguistically. Making provisional assumptions about the pattern – particularly regarding the transparency of certain segments – I specifically outline possible analyses within three models: (i) Generalized Alignment constraints (McCarthy, 1997), (ii) Optimal Domains (Cole and Kisseberth, 1994), and (iii) Agreement by correspondence (Rose and Walker, 2004). The aim is to discuss the validity of such analyses for the JA data and their implications for how we conceive of the harmony process, its phonetic basis and the grammatical principles governing how it applies.