Phonology circle this week will feature a presentation by Patrick Jones.
Title: “Accounting for Falling Tones in Kinande Infinitive Verbs”
Time: 5pm, 32-D831
In this talk, I will propose a novel analysis of Kinande infinitive tone that explains why (a) most infinitives receive penultimate high tones at the end of an utterance (/eri-hum-a/ → [erihúma] ‘to hit’), but some (passives, causatives, and forms with CV/VC roots) receive final falling tones (/eri-so-a/ → [eriswâ] ‘to grind’); and (b) H-toned consonant-initial roots surface with a high tone on the first vowel before the root (erítâ ‘to bury’), while H-toned vowel-initial roots surface with a falling tone on the first vowel of the root (eryôtâ ‘to bask’).The principal elements of the analysis will be:
- Phrasal Tone Assignment (PTA) results from the interaction of
- a) constraints on tonal alignment
- b) constraints against effortful pitch movements
- Lexical Tone Assignment (LTA) results from the interaction of
- a) faithfulness to underlying H and L pitch targets
- b) constraints against effortful pitch movements
- Verbal roots commonly referred to as “H-toned” are better analyzed as roots containing an underlying pitch accent that falls from H to L.
- Both PTA and LTA make crucial reference a phonologically-defined Stem (the P-Stem) that is distinct from the morphologically-defined Stem (the M-Stem). The P-stem will be shown to be independently required in order to account for reduplication facts and alternations involving the purposive suffix –irir.