SPANISH PHONOLOGY by Jones Wesley Harris B. A., University. of Georgia (1953) M, A., Louisiana State University (1962) SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF ‘THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPEY at the ‘MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF ‘TECHNOLOGY September, 1967 Stgnacure of Author»... -.. on ea oo O08 poop ORp Departebat of Modern Languages, August 21, 1967 Certified BY. eNO ee : Thesta Supervisor Accepted bY - ee ee aT Chairann, Departnental Comittee on Graduate StudentsSpanish Phonology James Wesley Harris Submitted to the Department of Modern Languages on August 21, 1967, in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. The phonological component of a transformational generative grammar of a dialect of Spanish is studied in the framework of the phonological theory whose most recent and comprehensive formulation appears in Chomsky and Halle, The Sound Pattern of English. The purpose of this study .s twofold! first, it strives for deeper in- sight into the widely studied facts of Spanish prouunciation by pre. senting a theory of these facts in the form of a generative grammar second, this study confronts the current theory of generative pho- nology for the first time with the results of sn extensive and de- tailed investigation of the sound structure of Spanish. It is shown on the one hand that, in general, the phonoiogical theory proposed by Chomsky and Halle, including recent innovations, is strongly sup- ported by the data of Spanish, and on the other hand that serious inadequacies remain. Several controversial and heretofore unresolved problems of Spanish phonology yield to insightful analysis in this theory. For example, the question of certain assimilatory phenon- ena before glides finds a natural and simple solution, and substan- tive clarification is achieved of the phonological and phonetic rep- resentations of the various r-type phones. Chapter I presents a general introduction to the investigation. Chapter II provides a close examination of rules involving the phonetic features of nasals, glides, voiced obstruents, and nonlateral liquids. Chapter III considers the wide range of phonological pro- cesses involved in the rich inflectional system of the verb. Chapter IV investigates various additional consonantal alternations, and con- cludes with an ordered list of all the rules discussed in the study. Chapter V is a historical excursus which traces the evolution of the medieval stridents in two dialects. Thesis Supervisor: Morris Halle Title: Professor of Modern LanguagesCHAPTER 1, CHAPTER I. CHAPTER III. CHAPTER IV. Table of Cont Introduction Some Consonantal Phenomena 1. Background 2. Nasal Assimilation 3. Glide/Corsonant Alternations 4. The Voiced Obstruents 5. The Nonlateral Liquids Verb Forms 1. Introductory Remarks 2. Present Indicative 3. Present Subjunctive 4. Participles and Infinitives 5. Imperfect Indicative 6. Imperfect Subjunctive 7. Preterit 8. Summary of Rules 9. Tense and Lax Vowels 10. Vowel Alternations in Third Conjugation Verbs 11, Syntactic Excursus 12. The Future 13, Further Clarifications and Summary of Rules Additional Consonantal Alternations 1, Introductory Remarks 2. Athematic Nominalizations 3. Productive Patterns 5 8 8 10 22 an 6 76 6 78 a 83 85 87 om 95 167 123 128 138