Metaphony in Italian and Spanish dialects revisited
Kaze, Jeffery William
This item is only available for download by members of the University of Illinois community. Students, faculty, and staff at the U of I may log in with your NetID and password to view the item. If you are trying to access an Illinois-restricted dissertation or thesis, you can request a copy through your library's Inter-Library Loan office or purchase a copy directly from ProQuest.
Permalink
https://hdl.handle.net/2142/23000
Description
Title
Metaphony in Italian and Spanish dialects revisited
Author(s)
Kaze, Jeffery William
Issue Date
1989
Doctoral Committee Chair(s)
Hualde, Jose Ignacio
Department of Study
Spanish, Italian and Portuguese
Discipline
Italian
Degree Granting Institution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Degree Name
Ph.D.
Degree Level
Dissertation
Keyword(s)
Language, Linguistics
Language, Modern
Language
eng
Abstract
Metaphony is a historic phonological process by which the tonic vowel of a word assimilates a feature of a following postonic vowel. As a result, most discussions of metaphony have been within a diachronic framework. In many of the Italian dialects which demonstrate metaphony to one degree or another, the postonic vowels, which historically triggered the tonic vowel change, have neutralized or been entirely lost. This often means that metaphony has been morphologized.
Generally two kinds of metaphony are discussed for Italian dialects: (1) a napoletano type which diphthongizes lax mid vowels and raises tense mid vowels, and (2) an arpinate type which raises all mid vowels. These two types are not adequate when considering the dialects such as in the Valle Anzasca in Lombardy which demonstrate vowel fronting (for example pro 'pasture' vs. prow 'pastures').
This thesis, by considering data from some ninety Italian dialects, establishes three types of metaphony: (1) a type in which metaphony is accounted for by means of a suprasegmental (high), which becomes associated to the tonic vowel by means of spreading from a postonic vowel or through the attaching of a morpheme which is specified by it (not having any slots of its own on the CV tier), (2) a type that requires the morpheme to be specified by both (high) and (Front), and (3) a type which might be referred to as 'anti-metaphony' since the feature (low) is the key to understanding metaphony, and not (high).
These three types are then compared to Spanish types which also use the feature (high) to define metaphony and another Spanish type which uses (-ATR).
Use this login method if you
don't
have an
@illinois.edu
email address.
(Oops, I do have one)
IDEALS migrated to a new platform on June 23, 2022. If you created
your account prior to this date, you will have to reset your password
using the forgot-password link below.
