morphological? - KOPS - Universität Konstanz

• Lexical /i/ appeared as [i] in none of the 10 words where it was preceded by an
unvoiced consonant. In this context it was always [j].
• In 15 out of the 20 words where lexical /i/ was preceded by a consonant with
the features [voiced] or [sonorant], between 100% and 7.7 % showed /i/
preserved as [i]. (The 100% case has a branching onset.)
Table 2: The [i] vs. [j] variation in the collected data
Features of preceding consonant Realization of lexical /i/ as [i] in %
neither [voiced] nor [sonorant] 0
[voiced] or [sonorant] 100 - 7.7, ø 47.2
To illustrate the results of this pilot study, we give two examples, It. ardesia ‘slate’,
and radicchio ‘radish’.
(17) ardesia
Observed realizations: [ar."dE….zi.a] (61.5 %) [ar."dE….zja] (38.5 %)
Lexical representation: /ar.dE.zi.a/
Preceding consonant: [voiced]
Gliding predicted: optional
Stress assignment: rule based: light penultima, stress on ante-penultima
(18) radicchio
Observed realizations: [ra."dik.kjo] (100 %)
Lexical representation: /ra.dik.ki.o/
Preceding consonant: neither [voiced] nor [sonorant]
Gliding predicted: obligatory
Stress assignment: rule based: light penultima, stress on ante-penultima
To conclude this section, the following can be said: The general assumption that stress
is assigned at the level of lexical representations has been combined with more
specific assumptions about how directly observable glides are lexically represented
and how they vary post-lexically. Our little empirical study has given support to the
assumption that, at the level of lexical representations, all post-consonantal glides are
vowels, which are the nuclei of light syllables. This has the consequence that many
words that have directly observable penultimate, i.e. irregular stress, have underlying
ante-penultimate, i.e. regular stress. Thus one obstacle to the ongoing quantitative
analysis of the vocabulary has been eliminated.
References:
CANEPARI, Luciano (1980). Italiano Standard e Pronunce Regionali. Padova: Cleup.
CHIERCHIA, Gennaro (1983/1986). “Length, Syllabification and the Phonological
Cycle in Italian.” In: Journal of Italian Linguistics. 8.5-34.
COLOMBO, Lucia (1992). Lexical Stress Effect and Its Interaction With Frequency in
Word Pronunciation. In Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception
and Performance Vol. 18, No. 4:987-1003
D'IMPERIO, Mariapaola and ROSENTHALL, Sam (1999). “Phonetics and phonology of
main stress in Italian.” In: Phonology 16:1-28.
LAUDANNA, Alessandro, BURANI, Cristina, CERMELE, Antonella und PARISI,
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