The phonology of Icelandic and Faroese
This book presents a comprehensive, contrastive account of the phonological structures and characteristics of Icelandic and Faroese. It is written for Nordic linguists and theoretical phonologists interested in what the languages reveal about phonological structure and change and the relation between morphology, phonology, and phonetics.
xvi, 349 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm
9780199229314, 0199229317
694395522
Pt. I The historical and theoretical setting
1.The Two Languages And Their Historical Relation
1.1.The genetic relation: `Proto-West Nordic'
1.2.West Nordic obstruents
1.3.West Nordic sonorants
1.4.West Nordic vowels
1.5.Diphthongs and semivowels
1.6.Prosodic structure
2.The Historical Development
2.1.Quantity and prosodic structure
2.2.Overlong (superheavy) syllables and their development
2.3.The components of the quantity shift
2.4.Quality changes in the Icelandic vowel system
2.5.Faroese vowel developments
2.6.The short diphthongs
2.7.The West Nordic consonant shift
2.8.New postvocalic stops
2.9.The skerping and hiatus
2.10.Systemic arrangements and types of syllables
3.Theoretical Preliminaries To The Synchronic Analysis
3.1.Phonological levels of representation
3.2.Alphabets for phonological representation
3.2.1.Segments and distinctions
3.2.2.Phonological primes
3.2.3.Analysing diphthongization
3.3.The representation of time and precedence
3.4.Saturation and fission in West Nordic diphthongs
3.5.The modern diphthongal systems
pt. II The modern sound systems
4.The Icelandic Vowel Colours And Diphthongs
4.1.The Icelandic vowel system
4.1.1.The monophthongal units
4.1.2.The phonetic description of the vowel sounds
4.1.3.Analysing the monophthongal colours
4.1.4.The diphthongs as branching phonemic units
4.1.5.Diphthongs and hiatus
4.2.The vowels of non-initial syllables
5.Faroese Vowels And Diphthongs
5.1.An overview
5.1.1.The inventory of vowels
5.1.2.The `long' and `short' systems
5.2.The phonetic and phonological analysis of the Faroese monophthongs and diphthongs
5.2.1.The vowel qualities
5.2.2.Analysing the Faroese diphthongs
5.3.More on dialect variation and vowel systems
5.4.Hiatus phenomena in Faroese
5.4.1.Intervocalic glides
5.4.2.Raising in hiatus
5.4.3.One or two syllables
5.5.The unstressed vowels of Faroese
5.5.1.The vowel qualities
5.5.2.The syllable types
5.5.3.Dialects and morphology in unstressed vowel merger
5.5.4.The postlexical reduction and syncope
5.5.5.Coping with the variation: a folk-linguistic anecdote from Torshavn
6.Icelandic Consonants
6.1.An overview
6.2.The stops
6.2.1.Places of articulation
6.2.2.On palatals and velars
6.2.3.The fortis-lenis opposition
6.3.The fricatives
6.4.The sonorants
6.5.Summary: the classes of consonants and their element analysis
7.Faroese Consonant Segments
7.1.An overview
7.2.The fortis and lenis plosives
7.2.1.The phonological correlation
7.2.2.`Hard' and `soft' dialects in Faroese
7.3.The fricatives
7.3.1.Initial fricatives
7.3.2.Word-internal fricatives and glides
7.4.Sonorants
7.5.The element analysis of the Faroese system
pt. III Systemic relations and syllabic structure
8.Systemic Relations In Vowels
8.1.Trends towards a diasystem in Icelandic
8.1.1.The `new' diphthongs
8.1.2.A context-free merger in the Tong' system
8.1.3.The interplay of merger and diphthongization
8.1.4.The Tong/open' and `short/closed' correspondence
8.2.The Faroese vowel systems
8.2.1.The polysystemic structure
8.2.2.On prominence
8.3.The element analysis of reduction: limits on information in restricted environments
8.4.Conclusion: systemic relations in vowel systems
9.Syllable Structure And Phonotactics
9.1.Syllable structure in Icelandic
9.1.1.Motivating the syllable
9.1.2.The subsyllabic constituents
9.1.3.The Icelandic length rule
9.1.4.Half length and overlength
9.1.5.Emphatic stress on non-initial syllables
9.2.Faroese syllables
9.2.1.The length rule in Faroese
9.2.2.The template for full syllables in Faroese
9.2.3.Half length and overlength in Faroese
9.2.4.Full syllables and restricted syllables in the phonological hierarchy
9.3.The consonantal phonotactics of Icelandic
9.3.1.Initial onsets in Icelandic
9.3.2.Consonants in the Icelandic coda
9.3.3.Internal onsets in Icelandic
9.3.4.More complicated interludes in Icelandic
9.4.The consonantal phonotactics of Faroese
9.4.1.Monosegmental onsets
9.4.2.Initial clusters in Faroese
9.4.3.Faroese coda consonants
9.4.4.Internal onsets in Faroese
9.5.Gemination of glides and consonants
9.6.Conclusion: remarks on systemic structure and prominence
10.Length And Quantity In Accentuation And Phonotactics
10.1.Length and quantity in Icelandic
10.1.1.Some distinctions
10.1.2.Segmental length and syllabic structure
10.1.3.Length in postlexical accentuation
10.1.4.Representing length and quantity
Excursus: A brief comparison with Finland Swedish
10.2.The length rule on lexical and phonological levels in Icelandic
10.2.1.Length and syllabification
10.2.2.Two versions of the rule
10.3.The prosodic character of Faroese vowels
10.4.Vowel shortness and the scale of prominence
pt. IV Segments and syllables on phonological levels
11.Aspiration In Syllabic And Segmental Structure
11.1.Aspiration and the character of the fortis-lenis opposition
11.1.1.Representing the opposition
11.1.2.Phonotactic or phonetic neutralization of the fortis-lenis opposition?
11.2.Preaspiration in Icelandic
11.2.1.The phonetic character
11.2.2.The distribution of preaspiration in Icelandic
11.2.3.Phonological analysis
11.2.4.Related phenomena
11.3.Preaspiration in Faroese
11.4.Representing the difference
11.5.Preaspiration in morphophonemics
12.Allomorphy, Morphophonemics, And Phonological Levels
12.1.Introduction
12.2.Lexical and postlexical relations in paradigms
12.3.Vocalic patterns in Icelandic
12.3.1.The ablaut series
12.3.2.I-umlaut
12.3.3.U-umlaut and breaking
12.3.4.Morphology and phonotactics in vocalic alternation
12.4.Faroese vowel morphophonemics
12.4.1.Ablaut
12.4.2.Umlaut
12.5.Consonantal patterns in Icelandic morphophonemics
12.6.Consonantal patterns in Faroese
12.7.Vowel deletion in paradigms
12.8.Intersyllabic glides and fricatives in allomorphy
12.9.Morphosyntax and phonology
12.9.1.Lexical and postlexical principles
12.9.2.Clitics
12.9.3.Fossilized and non-fossilized patterns in Faroese
12.10.Conclusion
pt. V Rhythmic structure
13.Word Stress Patterns In Icelandic And Faroese
13.1.Icelandic word stress patterns
13.1.1.Native patterns
13.1.2.Foreign patterns in recent loans
13.2.Word stress patterns in Faroese
13.2.1.Native words
13.2.2.Loanwords in Faroese
13.3.The accommodation of foreign stress patterns
13.3.1.Right-strong forms in Icelandic
13.3.2.The Faroese patterns
13.4.Morphological considerations: Faroese pseudo-morphology?
14.Phrasing And Postlexical Phonology
14.1.Phonological phrasing
14.2.Systematic exceptions
14.2.1.Deaccenting of weak morphosyntactic categories
14.2.2.Deaccenting in Icelandic definite noun phrases
14.3.Pragmatically motivated exceptions
14.3.1.Emphatic rephrasing
14.3.2.Contrast, focus, and given information
14.4.The phonological consequences of phrasing
14.4.1.Cohesive laws or sandhi-rules in Icelandic
14.4.2.Sandhi in Faroese
14.4.3.Rhythmic rearrangement
14.5.Demarcative signals
14.5.1.Stress and glottal onset
14.5.2.Right hand signals in Icelandic
14.5.3.Demarcative signals in Faroese
14.6.Constituency and prominence
14.6.1.Boundaries or dependencies?
14.6.2.Domains, directionality, and prominence
15.Rhythm And Intonation
15.1.Rhythm and constituency
15.2.Icelandic intonation
15.2.1.The tonal inventory
15.2.2.Downstep and upstep
15.2.3.Functional considerations
15.3.Faroese intonation
15.4.The absence of word tones