PHRASE-FINAL VOWEL ALTERNATIONS IN CROW

Abstract

In the Siouan language Crow, only a particular set of vowel structures are observed at the end of the phonological phrase. Phrase-internally, monomoraic vowels, bimoraic vowels and bimoraic diphthongs with a non-moraic off-glide are observed in free distribution. In inputs ending in a single-vowel sequence, only bimoraic mid vowels and bimoraic diphthongs are observed phasefinally in the output. To prevent marked vowel structures from appearing phrase-finally, Crow vowels undergo processes of lengthening, neutralization and diphthongization. Vowel sequences in Crow are also restricted phonotactically. Sequences of consecutive long vowels or long vowels following short vowels are prohibited. Marked sequences undergo processes of shortening and height dissimilation in order to satisfy these sequence restrictions. In cases where vowel sequences are phrase-final, restrictions on possible vowel sequences and possible phrasefinal structures conflict. The result is that structures are observed in the output which are prohibited by phrase-final restrictions in single vowel sequences. This interaction gives insight into how phonotactic processes interact and shows that in Crow, phrase-final restrictions are violable in order to satisfy vowel sequence restrictions, which are undominated in the data. In my analysis, formulated in Optimality Theory, I model these restrictions and associated processes by introducing positional markedness constraints and ranking them with respect to faithfulness constraints. My constraints and analysis provide a model for how the phonotactic restrictions in Crow are motivated and give insight into the interaction and conflict that takes place when both sets of restrictions target the same structure.