In the English lexicon, laryngeal alternations in the plural (e.g. "leaf" ~ "leaves") impact monosyllables more than finally stressed polysyllables. This is the opposite of what happens typologically, and would thereby run contrary to the predictions of "initial-syllable faithfulness." Despite the lexical pattern, in a wug test we found…

This article proposes and tests an experimental method to assess the psychological reality of hierarchical theories of constituent structure in particular domains. I show that a hierarchical theory of constituent structure necessarily makes the prediction that an association between constituents should be easier to learn than an association…

This article describes in detail several explicit computational methods for approaching such questions in phonology as the vowel/consonant distinction, the nature of vowel harmony systems, and syllable structure, appealing solely to distributional information. Beginning with the vowel/consonant distinction, we consider a method for its discovery…

Approaches Middle English quantity changes as the consequence of the phonologization of a syllable cut prosody and provides new evidence for the relevance of syllable cut to the diachronic phonology of English. Evidence comes from partial reconstruction of Ihe phonological system of the early Middle English dialect presented in the "Ormulum,"…

Presents several minor revisions of Halle's and Keyser's theory of meter and stress. (DD)

Mester and Ito's evidence for the phonological theory of Restricted Underspecification (RU) is refuted. Attention is focused on reduplicated forms; and it is concluded that, if there is only a rough and sporadic sound-syllable meaning association with palatization, the argument for RU is untenable. (12 references) (LB)

Attempts to show that open syllable lengthening (OSL) was part of the grammar of the West Germanic languages: Middle English, Middle Dutch, and Middle High German. Claims that all three languages endeavored to maintain and maximize the Germanic foot, and OSL contributed in different ways to do so. (Author/VWL)

A non-English portion of the universal initial-cluster hierarchy is cognitively represented in English-speaking monolingual children and adolescents. Subjects in an experiment were asked to select frequency of non-English consonant clusters, and they were able to reconstruct the phonological hierarchy. (CK)

The rate of assimilation of individual features to their target phonetic constraints varies as a function of the general target constraint itself, the segment class affected by the constraint, and the syllable involved. This rate is hypothesized as a measure of the strength or productivity of the phonological rule. (Author/DB)

In polysyllabic segments, the composition of medial clusters is a reflection of morpheme structure constraints as they apply to initial and final groups of syllables. Also, medial clusters ideally overlap, i.e., have simultaneous membership in both the preceding and following syllable segments. (DB)

Argues that there is phonological gemination in English based on distribution of vowel qualities in medial and final syllables. The analysis, cast in terms of optimality theory, has implications in several domains: (1) ambisyllabicity is not the right way to capture aspiration and flapping; (2) languages in which stress depends on vowel quality…

Abbreviated version of this paper was read under the title Nuclear Accent and Intonation Rules of English'' at the 1970 summer meeting of the Linguistic Society of America, in Columbus, Ohio, and an interim version appeared in UCLA Working Papers in Phonetics'' (1971). (VM)

Proposes a theory of stress patterns in English phonology based on the role of rhythm, or alternating weak and strong syllables, in determining stress shifts in words. (AM)