Positional Neutralization - Linguistics - University of California ...

derived from their structural description alone. Final syllables retain the earlier state, in
which resistance to alterations is still directly contingent on physical duration).
l. Shimakonde (Bantu, Mozambique) (Liphola 1999)
Inventory: /i, e, a, o, u/
Reduction: Optional reduction of pretonic mid vowels /e/ and /o/ to [a]. Stress is fixed
penultimate.
Resistance: Final vowels never reduce 66 .
m. Bonggi (Austronesian, NE Borneo, Banggi and Balambangan Islands)
(Boutin 1993, Kroeger 1992)
Inventory: /i, , a, , u/ underlying in native roots (Kroeger 1992: 291)
Reduction: Pretonic - Non-high vowels reduce to //
Posttonic (final syllable) - /a/ -> [] 67
Resistance: Does not apply to word-final vowels
66 A number of the systems noted here (Shimakonde, Yakan, Murut) have fixed penultimate stress and final
syllable vowels which avoid reduction, Yakan and Murut even in closed syllables (an oddity as will be
shown below). It is not outside the realm of possibility that the failure of these final syllable vowels to
reduce is due not to duration accorded them by final lengthening, but rather due to their presence in the
head foot of the word (see Alderete 1995 for discussion of faithfulness effects in prosodic heads). Zoll
(1997) presents an instance of this effect in non-final position in Guugu Yimidhirr, in which a contrast
between long and short vowels is permitted only in the head foot of the word (the initial and peninitial
syllables). In the cases at hand, the lack of any non-final posttonic syllables makes it impossible to
determine whether resistance to reduction is a property of the final alone, or posttonic syllables more
generally.
67 All instances of final syllable [] have [] in the preceding stressed syllable, indicating their derivation by
rounding spread (independently attested in other contexts).
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