CD Mester

Course Description
Phonological Theory (B Course)
Armin Mester and Junko Ito

General Description:

While the markedness constraints of optimality-theoretic phonology are, in broad outline, familiar from other frameworks, it is the idea of faithfulness constraints governing the relation between two levels of structure (such as "input" and "output") that is most distinctive, and most controversial, about the theory.
The course will therefore place the issue of faithfulness at its center and will branch out from there to address other questions of recent interest, such as the role of contrast, parallelist vs. serialist architecture of the grammar, and the changing status of phonological explanation through representation.

There is no formal prerequisite for the course, but a basic knowledge of contemporary phonology and Optimality Theory will be assumed, as can be found in, e.g., René Kager. 1999. Optimality Theory. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press.

Course Overview and Reading List:

Week 1: Issues in faithfulness: positional faithfulness and positional markedness

Lombardi, 1999. Positional faithfulness and voicing assimilation in OT
Zoll, 1998. Positional asymmetries and licensing
De Lacy, 2001. Prosodic markedness in prominent positions

Week 2: Extended correspondence effects: anti-faithfulness, RealizeMorpheme, etc.

McCarthy, 2002. Comparative Markedness
Alderete, 2001. Dominance effects as transderivational anti-faithfulness
Kurisu, 2001. The phonology of Morpheme Realization, chapter 2 and chapter 4

Week 3: Contrast and inventories: spreading vs. correspondence

Padgett, 2001. Contrast and post-velar fronting in Russian
Gafos, 1998. Eliminating long-distance consonantal spreading
Rose and Walker, 2001. Consonantal agreement as correspondence

Requirements:

Credit will be based on a course paper: a critical presentation and discussion of one of the readings, 5 pages maximum (single-spaced). Other topics are possible as long as they relate directly to the material covered in this course, please consult with one of the instructors.

In order to make it possible to assign credit at the end of the course, we ask participants who are taking this course for credit to hand their paper in by Thursday 8/1.