Coerced weight and its consequences in Bondu So verbs

Abbie Hantgan, Christopher R. Green, Leonardo Contreras Roa

Research output: Chapter in Book/Entry/PoemChapter

Abstract

Bondu So (Dogon, Mali) displays [ATR] vowel harmony that interacts with rootfinal consonants. This study provides evidence from five verb paradigms to show that the quality of a stem suffix, and its absence or presence, is determined by a combination of factors including [ATR], sonorancy, and prosody. Preliminary phonetic results show that, on average, root-final sonorants following [+ATR] vowels are longer than those following [-ATR] vowels. This differs from what is reported for other languages, as these consonants are neither inherently moraic, nor do they receive a mora due to their position alone. This finding suggests that, in Bondu So, [+ATR] licenses sonorant moraicity. We argue that these instances of coerced moraicity explain otherwise unexpected patterns of suffixation among these verb paradigms.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationThe Ghanaian Linguistics Nexus
PublisherLanguage Science Press
Pages213-241
Number of pages29
ISBN (Electronic)9783961104697
ISBN (Print)9783985540983
DOIs
StatePublished - Oct 25 2023

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • General Arts and Humanities
  • General Social Sciences

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