[Author Login]
[Home]
ROA:401
Title:The prosodic structure of Serbo-Croatian function words: An argument for tied constraints
Authors:Carson Schutze
Comment:13 pages (from MITWPL 30, 1997, ed. Bruening, Kang & McGinnis)
Length:13
Abstract:The prosodic structure of Serbo-Croatian function words:

An argument for tied constraints

Carson T. Schütze

UCLA

The question of the proper treatment of clitics has

received considerable attention in literature on the syntax-

morphology and morphology-phonology interfaces. Selkirk (1996)

proposes an elegant theory of the prosodification of clitic

function words crosslinguistically, demonstrating that variation

in the behavior of function words both within a language (English)

and across dialects of a language (Serbo-Croatian) follows

straightforwardly from re-rankings of universal constraints in an

Optimality Theory. In this paper I argue that, in addition to

strict re-rankings of constraints, tied constraints are also

needed within such a system, in order to capture the Serbo-

Croatian facts. I discuss three empirical shortcomings of

Selkirk's analysis, all involving optionality, and show how they

can be remedied by appealing to a particular notion of what it

means for constraints to be tied in rank. To the extent that

Selkirk's basic insights are correct, this supports the conclusion

that tied constraints play an important role in OT accounts of the

ways in which dependent and independent morphemes are combined

into larger prosodic units. It adds to the growing evidence for

"crucial nonranking", whereby separate tableaux are computed for

each ordering of the relevant constraints and the output of each

is a valid possibility in the language.
Type:Paper/tech report
Area/Keywords:Prosody, Serbo-Croatian, tied constraints
Article:Version 1