Patterned Exceptions in Phonology - UCLA Department of Linguistics

sometimes [f].
Other sounds are frequently used in loanwords, such as [5], [J5], [@], [] and
The basic syllable structure is CV(C), although onset clusters are commonly
found in loanwords, and coda clusters occasionally. Most roots are disyllabic. Either
stress or length is contrastive. 9 I will not take a position on which (for two opposing
views, see e.g. Schachter & Otanes 1972 and French 1988), and both are marked in all
examples (long vowels with no marked stress are secondary-stressed).
Tagalog is rich in morphology. There are many derivational prefixes, which are
often stacked several deep. There are two inflectional (and sometimes derivational)
infixes, -in- and -um-, which are inserted between the first C and V of the stem (the result
may be a verb, noun, or adjective depending on the construction). 10 There are two
suffixes, -in and -an, which also play a variety of roles. When a vowel-final word is
suffixed, the allomorphs -hin and -han are used. There is also reduplication: the first C
and V can be copied (usually inflectional; I refer to this as REDCV), or the first two
syllables (derivational). Some examples of Tagalog affixes are shown in (5).
9 There are two types of word: those with a long, stressed penult, and those with a short penult and a
stressed ultima. There are a few loans that some speakers pronounce with antepenultimate stress and length.
In native words, a long/stressed penult must be open, but in some loans, it is closed. In derived words, there
may be length and secondary stress on the antepenult or earlier syllables.
10
In loans with complex onsets, the position of the infix varies (between the two onset consonants or
between the onset and nucleus). See Ross 1996.
13