29.535, Review: Linguistic Theories; Morphology; Phonology: Newman (2017)

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Subject: 29.535, Review: Linguistic Theories; Morphology; Phonology: Newman (2017)

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Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2018 10:48:15
From: Christopher Green [cgreen10 at syr.edu]
Subject: Syllable Weight in African Languages

 
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Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/28/28-2589.html

EDITOR: Paul  Newman
TITLE: Syllable Weight in African Languages
SERIES TITLE: Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 338
PUBLISHER: John Benjamins
YEAR: 2017

REVIEWER: Christopher R Green, Syracuse University

INTRODUCTION

This edited volume provides a glimpse into the role played by syllable weight
in a variety of phenomena in an array of African languages that span several
(but not all) major language families and sub-families on the continent.
Syllable weight-related topics discussed in the book’s chapters include
syllabification, minimality conditions, reduplication, stress, gemination,
metrification, and tone, among a few others. In addition to the diverse stock
of languages and phenomena discussed, the volume’s contributors are also
noticeably diverse; authors of individual chapters include independent
scholars and graduate students, as well as some of the world’s most seasoned
experts on particular languages and theoretical phenomena. Newman’s
introduction sets the stage for the volume by providing an overview of the
relatively short history that studies of syllable weight occupy in the
descriptive and theoretical linguistics literature. Newman contends that it
was his very own 1972 paper, ‘Syllable Weight as a Phonological Variable’,
that introduced the term ‘syllable weight’ into use, reminding us that the
syllable had little to no “formal status” even a few years earlier in Chomsky
& Halle’s seminal 1968 ‘Sound Pattern of English’; we are also reminded that
syllables and syllable weight were fairly mainstream, however, just a few
years later, as in Hyman’s 1985 ‘A Theory of Phonological Weight’. Newman
states that the overall goal of the book is to further establish syllable
weight as an invaluable concept in phonology by illustrating that reference to
it is indispensable in the analysis of phonological phenomena in many
languages.

SUMMARY

‘Syllable Weight in African Languages’ contains twelve chapters, as well as
the aforementioned introduction by Newman, notes on contributors, and an
index. Chapter 1 is a slightly revised version of Newman’s 1972 paper
mentioned just above that is said to have established the term ‘syllable
weight.’ Newman lets us know that the differences between the current chapter
and the earlier paper are only in the removal of “extraneous” background
material and in the replacement of some examples pertaining to Hausa
pluralization with some that are clearer and “more cogent.” A major
contribution of the paper is the adoption of the terms ‘heavy’ and ‘light’ to
refer to syllables and their differentiation from the terms ‘long’ and ‘short’
(reserved for vowels) and ‘strong’ vs. ‘weak’ (referring strictly to syllable
positionality).

Chapter 2, by Matthew Gordon, gives an excellent overview of contemporary
theoretical and typological viewpoints pertaining to syllable weight. This
overview is successful in providing a frame within which to view the phenomena
to be discussed in subsequent chapters, including the fact that weight
criteria are language-specific and that languages may witness variation or
rely on “divergent” criteria in the way(s) that syllable weight figures in to
the outcomes of one weight- sensitive phenomenon to the next, even within the
same language.

 
The next three chapters discuss syllable weight phenomena in four Afro-Asiatic
languages. Chapter 3, by Lameen Souag, concerns itself with the role played by
syllable weight in syllabification in Maghrebi varieties of Arabic (Semitic).
The chapter centers upon a purported ban on light syllables in these Arabic
varieties and the resyllabifications that are necessary in response to this
ban following certain types of affixation. An important consideration is
whether or not schwa (which behaves somewhat divergently) is phonemic or
epenthetic. The chapter considers both scenarios and the role that meter and
complicating processes like metathesis play into a proper analysis of Maghrebi
Arabic syllabification.

The chapter offers sometimes confusing statements such as the fact that vowels
are apparently not permitted in light syllables; I believe that the author
intends to be motivating the fact that full vowels (as opposed to schwa) are
not permitted in light syllables. The chapter is also fairly minimal on
examples, particularly in instances where an Optimality Theoretic analysis is
alluded to, but illustrative tableaux are not provided, despite the fact that
constraints and constraint relationships are provided. A shortcoming of the
chapter is that while several analytical scenarios are entertained, there is
no evidence that the author chooses, motivates, and/or argues for one as
superior to another.

Chapter 4, by Hannah Sande and Andrew Hedding, reports on syllable weight in
Amharic (Semitic) stress and adjectival reduplication. The authors illustrate
that geminates attract stress in Amharic, which leads to exceptional
departures to the default stress pattern of the language. In addition, they
show that there is a weight distinction between syllables closed by a
singleton vs. geminate consonant in adjectival reduplication. Both phenomena
support an analysis in which Amharic closed syllables are heavy only when
closed by a geminate.

Interesting, though perhaps questionable assertions in this chapter include
that in words with more than one stressed syllable, the authors claim that
there is no evidence that any one stress is more prominent than the other.
This would seem to be unusual typologically, as languages that exhibit
multiple stresses typically have one stress that is most prominent. Also
interesting is that metrical feet are typically assigned from left-to-right,
but in some words, stress is first assigned to a geminate and subsequent foot
assignment may extend from this geminate from right-to-left, sometimes
resulting in word-initial unfooted syllables.

In Chapter 5, by François Dell and Mohamed Elmedlaoui, on syllable weight
phenomena in Tashlhiyt Berber (Berber), the authors shows that evidence for a
heavy vs. light distinction in the language’s syllables is difficult to pin
down in natural language, except in the formation of one particular type of
templatic plural. They illustrate that evidence for such a distinction is
clear, however, in the metrification of traditional songs and poetry. By
showing the importance of syllable weight in these media (i.e., in
“orthometric” syllabification), they argue that it also plays a role, by
extension, in natural language (i.e., in “grammatical” syllabification).

Last in this series of chapters on Afro-Asiatic languages is Chapter 6, by the
late Russell Schuh, which focuses on syllable weight in Hausa. Schuh, in
reference to Edward Sapir’s well-known 1933 ‘Psychological Reality of the
Phoneme’, argues that Hausa speakers demonstrate that they have unconscious
access to distinctions between heavy vs. light syllables as manifested in

 traditional poetry and song, even though such distinctions are not always
“overt.” Evidence for this assertion is provided via transcriptions of songs
in which rhythmic and durational choices are adopted that illustrate
faithfulness and/or sensitivity to underlying weight distinctions.

The next three chapters pertain to languages of the Nilo-Saharan family,
beginning with John Keegan’s survey, in Chapter 7, on evidence for syllable
weight-related phenomena in select
Sara-Bagirmi languages. Keegan draws on an array of data to show that CVV and
CVC syllables in Mbay pattern together for the purposes of tone assignment,
morpheme template shape, and resyllabification as the result of affixation,
which may involve vowel lengthening and/or epenthesis in order to bring the
resulting word in line with the language’s preferred word shapes. The author
compares the Mbay outcomes to analogous phenomena in other Sara, Sara Kaba,
and Bagirmi languages, highlighting similarities and differences between them.

Chapter 8, by Ashely McKeever, focuses specifically on reduplication and
minimality conditions in Fur. An important contribution of this particular
chapter is that it provides evidence, contrary to earlier work, that
illustrates that syllable weight does in fact play a key role in some
morphophonological processes in Fur. Syllable weight is shown to figure in to
the outcomes of both full and partial reduplication, including instances in
which reduplication is impossible when a base fails to meet a minimal size;
similar restrictions are found when a base is too large.

Last in this group is Richard Griscom and Doris Payne’s discussion of
“non-uniformity” in Southern Maa (Maasai) syllable weight in Chapter 9. The
authors present data pertaining to three phenomena (contour tones, syllable
templates, and the shape of verb roots) showing that Southern Maa sometimes
makes a binary distinction, and other times a ternary distinction, in syllable
weight, depending on the particular process being considered. More
specifically, they discuss the shape of Southern Maa syllables (i.e., whether
or not their codas are branching), their distribution (i.e., only in
word-final position or otherwise), and the precise structure of a syllable
rhyme (i.e., number of vowels vs. consonants). Taken together, their findings
point toward a binary weight distinction in Southern Maa syllable templates.
The authors also briefly discuss the typologically unusual requirement that a
minimal, monosyllabic verb root typically contains a consonant, whether in an
onset or coda, and this is preferred to vowel-only roots. This suggests that
onsets may contribute weight in that their presence helps to satisfy this
minimality condition. Finally, it is shown that there is a three-way
distinction in syllable weight concerning tone assignment; light syllables
have a single tone register and heavy syllables permit two tones, while
superheavy syllables allow sequences of three distinct tones (e.g., LHL).

The final three chapters of the volume do not form a cohesive genetic or
geographic group. Chapter 10, by Fiona McLaughlin and Caroline Wiltshire makes
a strong contribution in taking to task earlier analyses concerning the role
of syllable weight in Pulaar (Atlantic) stress assignment; some analyses argue
that Pulaar stress assignment is dependent on a four-way syllable weight
distinction. McLaughlin and Wiltshire illustrate with some convincing, though
perhaps preliminary experimental results that weight plays no role in
distinguishing between CVV and CVC syllables for their Pulaar speakers. They
do, however, move beyond stress to show that syllable weight is implicated in
processes such as reduplication, compensatory lengthening following consonant
loss, and in defining a minimal word.

 Without a doubt the weakest contribution to this volume is found in A.
Agoswin Musah’s Chapter 11 on the Gur language Kusaal. The chapter suffers
from a vague exposition stating that “weight, rather than syllable
constituency” is key in characterizing the Kusaal syllable itself. It was not
made clear how the two are to be separated from one another at the outset, as
one must be able to describe the constituents found in a given syllable before
being able to consider how a given constituent does/does not manifest weight
via its moraicity. The data displays adopt unusual use of diacritics to
separate nasality from tone, though most Unicode fonts handle such
combinations with no issue. Terminology used is also unusual, such as when the
author refers to the constituents of syllable margins as “marginal” and
“peripheral” elements. The author, in attempting to explain the possible
segments within a Kusaal syllable states that “vowels and syllabic consonants
including syllabic-like segments…are the elements typically found in the
nucleus.” It is entirely unclear to me what “syllabic-like segments” might
mean here (or elsewhere). Other questionable statements include: “the coda is
the preserve of the final consonants,” and  “the approach is to view the moras
as the specific segment,” among others. Without belaboring these shortcomings,
it is also the case that the author makes no convincing argument that syllable
weight is implicated in any particular phenomena in Kusaal, with the exception
perhaps being in the distribution of contour tones, but this is mentioned only
in passing. The remainder of the chapter simply provides example words that
are said to have one tonal contour or another, as well as words of different
syllabic shapes.

The shortcomings of the previous chapter are mitigated by the strong
contribution in Chapter 12 by Lotta Aunio concerning the role of syllable
weight in tonal phenomena in several Mara Bantu languages. Aunio illustrates
that heavy syllables in these languages attract tone and that the assignment
of inflectional Melodic High tones may be affected by the presence vs. absence
of heavy syllables. The author shows that while Melodic High tones can be
assigned to various locations in Mara Bantu verbs, they are sometimes
retracted to a preceding heavy syllable, provided that the implicated
syllables are located within a particular morphological domain of the verb.

EVALUATION

Though there are some questionable assumptions sprinkled throughout chapters
in the volume, and one noticeably weak chapter, Newman and the authors of the
individual chapters in this volume should be commended for providing such a
clear and cohesive illustration of the importance that syllable weight plays
in languages with which I would venture that many linguists are not familiar.
If pressed to find a more global shortcoming of the volume itself, I would
only say that it is skewed perhaps too heavily towards Afro-Asiatic languages
and somewhat towards Nilo-Saharan languages, while failing to include more
studies on languages from other stock, other than one each from Atlantic, Gur,
and Bantu. But, this being said, a volume must be capped somewhere, and this
leaves open the possibility for a future volume with contributions that might
fill this remaining gap. Newman most certainly succeeds in his goal of
providing further evidence for the importance of the syllable in phonological
description and theory, and we should remain grateful to him not only for
coordinating this volume, but also for his many contributions to the study of
syllables, beginning perhaps with his 1972 paper on syllable weight.


ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Christopher Green is an Assistant Professor of Linguistics at Syracuse
University in the Department of Languages, Literatures, & Linguistics. His
research covers a variety of topics related to prosodic structure and tone. He
has published on a number of African languages, including Bambara, Susu,
Somali, and Wanga.





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