Dissertation - Michael Becker

(13)*VtV tat IDENT(voice) *VtV ata. tad-1 ≻ tat-1 W Lb. at-1 ≻ ad-1 W LSince the general *VtV is no longer present in the grammar, the learner will have to listany new t-final nouns they encounter with one of the clones of *VtV. Items that get a Wfrom *VtV will be listed with *VtV tat , and items that get an L will be listed with *VtV at .As the nouns tallied in (11) are gradually learned, the resulting grammar will approach theone in (14).(14) *VtV 18 items ≫ IDENT(voice) ≫ *VtV 102 itemsIn this resulting grammar, most t-final nouns are listed with the clone of *VtV that ranksbelow IDENT(voice), meaning that their final [t] will surface unchanged in the suffixedform. Only 18 nouns are listed with the high-ranking clone of *VtV, making their [t]become a [d] intervocalically. Since both kinds of nouns are listed in the grammar, therelative size of each group is available to the speaker, and the speaker can project therelative probability of alternation onto a novel word: When offered a novel t-final barenoun, and asked to derive its suffixed form, the speaker can randomly choose one of theirlisted t-final nouns and make the novel noun behave like it. Since only 15% of the listednouns are listed above IDENT(voice), there is only a 15% chance for the novel noun toalternate. In effect, by choosing randomly from the nouns that are listed in the grammar,the speaker causes the likelihood of alternation of the novel noun to match the likelihoodof alternation in the grammar, which in turn matches the likelihood of alternation in thelexicon.15