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Tone-driven epenthesis in Wamey

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2023

Nicholas Rolle Open the ORCID record for Nicholas Rolle [Opens in a new window]  and
John T. M. Merrill
Nicholas Rolle
Affiliation:
Leibniz-Zentrum Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft, Schützenstraße 18, Berlin 10117, Germany. E-mail: rolle@leibniz-zas.de
John T. M. Merrill
Affiliation:
Program in Linguistics, Princeton University, 1-S-19 Green Hall, Princeton, New Jersey 08544, U.S.A. E-mail: j.merrill@princeton.edu
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Abstract

This paper argues that tone-driven epenthesis is possible in tonal languages. In Wamey, an epenthetic [ə] is inserted to host a high tone in two contexts: first, to host a tone which would otherwise be left floating due to a restriction on rising tones (/cv̀cⒽ/ maps to [cv̀cə́] due to a ban *[cv̌c]); and second, to host a tone which is introduced by word-level morphology but is restricted from associating across a stem boundary. These patterns cannot be attributed to syllable phonotactics, which freely allow all consonants in the coda position. We assemble the evidence for tone-driven epenthesis, focusing on the distribution of final [ə] in lexical stem structure and [ə]-alternating suffixes. A simple OT analysis derives [ə]-epenthesis, utilising common constraints (e.g. *Rise, OCP(H), etc.) together with constraints against associating tone across prosodic boundaries. In total, Wamey epenthesis exemplifies the cultivation of segmental environments for the purpose of realising pitch targets.

Keywords

toneepenthesisOptimality Theoryprosodic constituencytone–segment interactions

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Article
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Phonology , Volume 39 , Issue 1 , February 2022 , pp. 113 - 158
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Copyright © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press

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