L’amuntegament tonal en castellà, català i friülà en la Teoria de l’Optimitat

Abstract

Friulian, Catalan and Spanish solve tonal crowding (i.e. a situation where three or more tones are associated with the same segmental element) differently. Friulian solves it by means of tonal truncation, which means that a phonological tone does not surface. The other two languages lengthen the segment the tones are associated with. The difference between these solutions can be explained by a different ranking of the same set of constraints. Basically, in Friulian the highest ranking constraint is DepLink μ(voc), whereas in Catalan and Spanish it is Max(T). This result represents the first step towards a unified account of the effects of tonal crowding in several languages.

Keywords

• intonational phonology
• tonal crowding
• Optimality Theory.