Elements on the bordersα colored approach to vowel reduction in Lunigiana dialects

Edoardo Cavirani - Meertens Institute - cavirani.edoardo@gmail.com

Carrarese, Colonnatese and Ortonovese

From proto-Romance to Lunigiana dialects“The […] unstressed vowel deletion […] is (almost) normal in the

Higher Magra Valley […], while the more you descend the valley, the more the deletion alternates with the reduction” (Luciani 1999: 82)

• Word-internal vowels have been reduced to schwa or deleted in the whole geolinguistic domain (Cavirani 2015):

SILVĀTICU(M) ‘wild m.’ > Carr./Col./Ort. [s l vat( )k] ə ˈ ə Pontr. [sar vadg]ˈ

• Word-final vowels (WFVs) display a better resistance to reduction:

• Although the MASC.SG/PL. and FEM.SG phonological exponents are identical in the whole Lunigiana, some variation can be observed in the reduction of the FEM.PL one:

Carr. [e] vs. Col. [i̯a] vs. Ort. [a]

Preceding accounts

Colors & Constraints

Lunigiana

CarraraOrtonovo

Morpho-syntactic structure

Colonnata

WFVs are morpho-syntactically complex: they can be the phonological exponent of more than one morpho-syntactic terminal

Subsegmental structure

Coloured Containment Theory (Van Oostendorp 2006) • the morphological affiliation of phonological objects must be visible

on the surface1

Constraint set (Cavirani 2015)

*V|STR| : unstressed vowels cannot license complex structures2 *CV : a morphologically transparent CV unit cannot be incorporated in the phonological representation (no CV epenthesis) EXPRESS-|X|α : elements belonging to the underlying representation of affixes (α) must be phonetically interpreted

1“Coloring […] grants the bare minimum of accessibility phonology may have to morphological structure, and […] rules out the possibility of morpheme-specific rules or constraints” (Trommer 2015: 83)2Complexity hierarchy: | Y|>>| |>>|X|>>| |X̲ X̲

Distributed Morphology (Manzini & Savoia 2005)• Vocabulary insertion targets terminal nodes• Subset Principle• Morphological operations: Fusion and Impoverishment

NUM and GEN spell-out - DM• Fusion in Carr./St.It. {PL{F}} => {PL,F}; /e/ {PL,F} • Impoverishment (if PL: F) in Ort. {PL} => ø; /a/ {F}• No morph. operation in Col. /a/ {F}; /i/ {PL}

variation both in the Vocabulary and in the morph. components

Nanosyntax (Taraldsen 2010)• Vocabulary insertion targets subtrees• Superset Principle

NUM and GEN spell-out - nS• Carr./St.It. /e/ {PL{F}} • Ort. /a/ {PL{F}}• Col. /a/ {F}; /i/ {PL{M}}

variation only in the Vocabulary; no need for morph. operations

WFVs are phonologically complex: they can constitute the phonetic interpretation of complex elemental structures (Backley 2011) …

[a] = |A| [e] = |A.I| [i] = |I|

... translating complex morpho-syntactic stuctures (viz. subtrees)

|A| {F} |I| {PL{M}}

/e/ a) {PL,F} b) {PL{F}}

donn-[e] ‘women’

/i/ a) {PL} b) {PL{M}}

lup-[i] ‘wolves’

References: Backley P. (2011). An introduction to element theory. Edinburgh University Press Cavirani E. (2015). Modeling phonologization. Utrecht: LOT publishing Manzini M.R. & L.M. Savoia (2005). I dialetti italiani e romanci. Morfosintassi generativa. Alessandria: Edizioni dell’Orso van Oostendorp M. (2006). A Theory of Morphosyntactic Colours. Ms, Meertens Instituut, Amsterdam Taraldsen T. (2010). Lexicalizing number and gender in Lunigiana. Nordlyd 36, pp. 113–127 Trommer J. (2015). Moraic Affixes and Morphological Colors in Dinka. Linguistic Inquiry 46, pp. 77-112.

MASC FEM

SG PL SG PL

Carrarese lup-ø lup-i lup-a lup-e

Colonnatese lup-ø lup-i lup-a lup-i̯a

Ortonovese lup-ø lup-i lup-a lup-a

Analysis• M.SG, M.PL and F.SG

The three dialects show the same M.SG, M.PL and F.SG structure:

lup - lupi - lupa

The variation can be found in the F.PL spell-out:

lupe - lupi̯a - lupa

• F.PL

• Grammars

•No Vocabulary difference (vs. Taraldsen 2009): the three dialects display the same VIs•No morphological operation (vs. Manzini & Savoia 2005)•The burden of the variation is taken by the phonological module

Carr.

N {PL{M}} {F}

l u p |I|α |A|α| | |C V C V

Col.

N {PL{M}} {F}

l u p |I|α |A|α| | |C V C V + C V

Ort.

N {PL{M}} {F}

l u p |I|α |A|α| | |C V C V

Carr.

Col.

Ort.

N

l u p| | |C V C V

N {PL{M}}

l u p |I|α| | |C V C V

N {F}

l u p |A|α| | |

C V C V

Carr.*CV, EXPRESS-|X|α

|*V|STR|

Col.*V|STR|, EXPRESS-|X|α

|*CV

Ort.*CV, *V|STR|

|EXPRESS-|X|α

Conclusion