lexical/phrasal stress in alphabetisms

[Frans Plank]

yes, single words morphologically (PKW is a count noun, masculine 
gender inherited from the full form headed by Wagen, plural -s as 
with other nouns with last segment a full vowel, etc.).

But NOT single words prosodically:  pee kaa wee is *three* prosodic 
words, each stressed (with stress implemented differently in Swiss 
Geman and German German).  Larry rightly said so.  That's why I said 
we're talking about tone/intonation (Larry mentions pitch-accent). 
Record yourself and do look at pitch tracks!

Frans

>Larry,
>
>Yes, the connection to other lists such as phone numbers seems 
>plausible. On the other hand, phone numbers are just lists, whereas 
>alphabetisms are words. And the fact that in Swiss German, 
>alphabetisms are often not stressed on the last letter, seems to 
>support my conjecture (French borrowings also get initial stress in 
>Swiss German). Also, the fact that contrastive stress can be 
>lexicalized (as in German 'PKW, which is stressed on the first 
>syllable also when it does not occur next to 'LKW) seems to show 
>that we're not dealing with phrasal expressions synchronically. (Or 
>maybe there are also phrases with lexicalized contrastive stress?)
>
>Anyway, we clearly need more data from more languages, though it 
>will be hard to find languages whose alphabetisms are not influenced 
>by French or English. (Are there alphabetisms in Georgian, Armenian, 
>or the languages of south and Southeast Asia that use a non-Latin 
>script?)
>
>Martin
>
>Larry M. Hyman wrote:
>>Martin - If your conjecture re French is correct, it would 
>>presumably be PHRASAL stress. On the other hand, if each letter is 
>>a phonological word, then this just the "nuclear stress rule" of 
>>SPE, no? In other words, this is not "lexical stress". Larry
>>
>>----
>>
>>David - Sounds interesting. Wish I had data from other languages 
>>for you. It's actually not on the last syllable, but rather on the 
>>stressed syllable of the last "letter": cf. WWW (which is harder to 
>>say that World Wide Web), which has antepenultimate stress on the 
>>last W.
>>
>>I've tried to think of counterexamples, but your rule works, e.g. 
>>LSMFT ("Lucky Strike Means Fine Tobacco" ... a TV ad in the US from 
>>the 1950s), or E-G-B-D-F*, which was not originally an acronym but 
>>has been made into one ("Every good bird does fly") etc. The same 
>>works for other "lists". E.g. numbers: My zip code here at Berkeley 
>>is 9-4-7-2-0*, for instance (I'd also stress the last number of my 
>>social security number). The same happens when you mix letters and 
>>numbers: E.g. my father's amateur radio call was W-6-V-B-D (which 
>>he would repeat as "W-6-Victor-Baker-Dog"*, with phrasal stress on 
>>Dog*).  In any such "listing" of elements each one is treated as a 
>>separate prosodic word, so it would be natural to assign  English 
>>"pitch-accent" to the last prosodic word (letter, number etc.).
>>
>>Larry
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>>Dear all,
>>>>I'm interested in patterns of lexical stress in a specific type 
>>>>of acronym -- let's call them letter-by-letter acronyms -- whose 
>>>>pronunciation consists of each letter bearing its own individual 
>>>>name, eg. English US [yu:es], LFG [elefji:], etc.  (Not all 
>>>>languages have letter-by-letter acronyms, for example Hebrew does 
>>>>not.)
>>>>
>>>>In two languages that I'm familiar with, English and Papuan 
>>>>Malay, word stress is commonly or predominantly penultimate; 
>>>>however, letter-by-letter acronyms invariably place the stress on 
>>>>the last syllable, eg. [yu:ES], [elefJI:].  Is this a 
>>>>coincidence, or is there a general principle at play here?  (One 
>>>>might perhaps wish to argue that the final stress is phrasal 
>>>>rather than lexical, but in other respects these acronyms behave 
>>>>like single words.)
>>>This is a very interesting observation that had never occurred to 
>>>me. In two other languages that I'm familiar with, German and 
>>>Russian, the same holds true: Lexical stress in alphabetisms is 
>>>always on the last syllable, although other words may have stress 
>>>elsewhere (and prefer to have stress elsewhere, especially in 
>>>German). I disagree with Wolfgang Schulze's claim that stress may 
>>>also be initial in German. I cannot say 'FDP (Freie Demokratische 
>>>Partei), except contrastively (e.g. die 'SPD und die 'FDP). (But 
>>>it is true that the exact conditions for contrastive use are 
>>>unclear. These two abbreviations also contrast with respect to 
>>>their last letter, though less saliently. And one can also say, in 
>>>coordination,  'CDU und 'CSU, although these two do not contrast 
>>>in theeir first letter at all.)
>>>
>>>My guess would be that this stress pattern represents a borrowing 
>>>from French, which was a dominant language when this kind of 
>>>abbreviation became widespread.
>>>
>>>Incidentally, the term "alphabetism" is relatively 
>>>well-established for what David has in mind, and there is no need 
>>>for the ad-hoc term "letter-by-letter acronym" (see 
>>>http://urts120.uni-trier.de/glottopedia/index.php/Alphabetism).
>>>
>>>Martin
>>>
>>>P.S. On the topic of "pseudo-partitive" (a cup of tea) and "true 
>>>partitive" (a cup of the tea): Doesn't someone have a better pair 
>>>of terms for these? "Pseudo-partitives" are of course much more 
>>>common, so it's really strange to have only a "pseudo-" term for 
>>>them.
>>>
>>>--
>>>Martin Haspelmath (haspelmath at eva.mpg.de)
>>>Max-Planck-Institut fuer evolutionaere Anthropologie, Deutscher Platz 6
>>>D-04103 Leipzig     Tel. (MPI) +49-341-3550 307, (priv.) +49-341-980 1616
>>>
>>>Glottopedia - the free encyclopedia of linguistics
>>>(http://www.glottopedia.org)
>>
>>
>
>
>--
>Martin Haspelmath (haspelmath at eva.mpg.de)
>Max-Planck-Institut fuer evolutionaere Anthropologie, Deutscher Platz 6
>D-04103 Leipzig     
>Tel. (MPI) +49-341-3550 307, (priv.) +49-341-980 1616
>
>Glottopedia - the free encyclopedia of linguistics
>(http://www.glottopedia.org)
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