Jump to ContentJump to Main Navigation
Show Summary Details
More options …

Linguistics Vanguard

A Multimodal Journal for the Language Sciences

Editor-in-Chief: Bergs, Alexander / Cohn, Abigail C. / Good, Jeff

1 Issue per year

Online
ISSN
2199-174X
See all formats and pricing
Online
Institutional Subscription
€ [D] 419.00 / US$ 566.00 / GBP 344.00*
Individual Subscription
€ [D] 99.00 / US$ 149.00 / GBP 80.00*
*Prices in US$ apply to orders placed in the Americas only. Prices in GBP apply to orders placed in Great Britain only. Prices in € represent the retail prices valid in Germany (unless otherwise indicated). Prices are subject to change without notice. Prices do not include postage and handling if applicable. RRP: Recommended Retail Price.
More options …

The syntax-prosody interface: current theoretical approaches and outstanding questions

Emily Elfner
Published Online: 2018-03-17 | DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/lingvan-2016-0081

30,00 € / $42.00 / £23.00

Get Access to Full Text

Abstract

The syntax-prosody interface concerns the relationship between syntactic and prosodic constituent structure. This paper provides an overview of theoretical advances in research on the syntax-prosody interface. Current theoretical work is situated historically, and is framed in light of the central research questions in the field, including (a) to what extent prosodic structure can be used as a diagnostic for syntactic constituent structure, (b) the significance of recursion in prosodic theory, and (c) how mismatches between syntactic and prosodic constituent structure are modeled in different approaches to the syntax-prosody interface. The paper concludes with a discussion of the current state of the field and directions for future research.

Keywords: syntax-prosody interface; prosody; prosodic theory; recursion

References

  • Adger, David. 1997. VSO order and weak pronouns in Goidelic Celtic. Canadian Journal of Linguistics 42. 9–29.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Adger, David. 2007. Pronouns postpose at PF. Linguistic Inquiry 38. 343–349.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Agbayani, Brian & Chris Golston. 2010. Phonological movement in Classical Greek. Language 86. 133–167.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Agbayani, Brian & Chris Golston. 2016. Phonological constituents and their movement in Latin. Phonology 33. 1–42.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Agbayani, Brian, Chris Golston & Dasha Henderer. 2011. Prosodic movement. In M.B. Washburn, K. McKinney-Bock, E. Varis, A. Sawyer & B. Tomaszewicz (eds.), Proceedings of the 28th West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics, 231–239. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proceedings Project.Google Scholar

  • Agbayani, Brian, Chris Golston & Toru Ishii. 2015. Syntactic and prosodic scrambling in Japanese. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 33. 47–77.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Arnhold, Anja. 2014. Prosodic structure and focus realization in West Greenlandic. In S.-A. Jun (ed.), Prosodic typology II, 216–251. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar

  • Arnhold, Anja, Richard Compton & Emily Elfner. to appear. Prosody and wordhood in South Baffin Inuktitut. In M. Keough (ed.), Proceedings of the workshop on structure and constituency in languages of the Americas 21. Vancouver: UBC Working Papers in Linguistics (in press).Google Scholar

  • Beckman, Mary & Janet Pierrehumbert. 1986. Intonational structure in English and Japanese. Phonology 3. 255–309.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Bennett, Ryan, Emily Elfner & James McCloskey. 2015. Pronouns and prosody in Irish. In L. Breatnach, R. Ó hUiginn, D. McManus & K. Simms (eds.), XIV International Congress of Celtic Studies Maynooth 2011 Proceedings, 19–74. Dublin: Institute for Advanced Studies.Google Scholar

  • Bennett, Ryan, Emily Elfner & James McCloskey. 2016. Lightest to the right: An apparently anomalous displacement in Irish. Linguistic Inquiry 47. 169–234.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Bennett, Ryan, Emily Elfner & James McCloskey. 2017. Prosody, focus and ellipsis in Irish. Ms., Santa Cruz, CA and Toronto, ON, Canada: University of California, Santa Cruz and York University.Google Scholar

  • Chen, Matthew. 1987. The syntax of Xiamen tone sandhi. Phonology 4. 109–150.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Cheng, Lisa Lai-Shen & Laura J. Downing. 2012. Prosodic domains do not match spell-out domains. McGill Working Papers in Linguistics 22. 1–14.Google Scholar

  • Cheng, Lisa Lai-Shen & Laura J. Downing. 2016. Phasal syntax =cyclic phonology? Syntax 19. 156–191.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Chomsky, Noam. 1995. The minimalist program. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar

  • Chomsky, Noam. 2000. Minimalist inquiries: The framework. In R. Martin, D. Michaels & J. Uriagereka (eds.), Step by step: Essays on minimalist syntax in honor of Howard Lasnik, 89–156. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar

  • Chomsky, Noam. 2001. Derivation by phase. In M. Kenstowicz (ed.), Ken Hale: A life in language, 1–52. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar

  • Chung, Sandra & James McCloskey. 1987. Government, barriers and small clauses in modern Irish. Linguistic Inquiry 18. 173–237.Google Scholar

  • Clemens, Lauren & Jessica Coon. to appear. Deriving verb initial word order in Mayan. Language (in press).Google Scholar

  • Clemens, Lauren Eby. 2014. Prosodic noun incorporation and verb-initial syntax. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University.Google Scholar

  • Compton, Richard & Christine Pittman. 2010. Word-formation by phase in Inuit. Lingua 120. 2167–2192.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Cooper, William E. & Jeanne Paccia-Cooper. 1980. Syntax and speech. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar

  • Dobashi, Yoshihito. 2003. Phonological phrasing and syntactic derivation. Doctoral dissertation, Cornell University.Google Scholar

  • Dobashi, Yoshihito. 2013. Autonomy of prosody and prosodic domain formation: A derivational approach. Linguistic Analysis 38. 331–355.Google Scholar

  • Elfner, Emily. 2011. The interaction of linearization and prosody: Evidence from pronoun postposing in Irish. In A. Carnie (ed.), Formal approaches to celtic linguistics, 17–40. Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.Google Scholar

  • Elfner, Emily. 2012. Syntax-prosody interactions in Irish. Doctoral dissertation, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.Google Scholar

  • Elfner, Emily. 2015. Recursion in prosodic phrasing: Evidence from Connemara Irish. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 33. 1169–1208.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Elordieta, Gorka. 2015. Recursive phonological phrasing in Basque. Phonology 32. 49–78.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Féry, Caroline & Hubert Truckenbrodt. 2005. Sisterhood and tonal scaling. Studia Linguistica 59. 223–243.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Fox, Danny & David Pesetsky. 2005. Cyclic linearization of syntactic structure. Theoretical Linguistics 31. 1–45.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Gee, James Paul & François Grosjean. 1983. Performance structures: A psycholinguistic and linguistic appraisal. Cognitive Psychology 15. 411–458.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Ghini, Marco. 1993. Phi-formation in Italian: A new proposal. Toronto Working Papers in Linguistics 12. 41–78.Google Scholar

  • Guekguezian, Peter Ara. 2017. Templates as the interaction of recursive word structure and prosodic well-formedness. Phonology 34. 81–120.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Halpern, Aaron. 1992. Topics in the syntax and placement of clitics. Doctoral dissertation, Stanford University.Google Scholar

  • Hamlaoui, Fatima & Kriszta Szendrői. 2015. A flexible approach to the mapping of intonational phrases. Phonology 32. 79–110.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Hamlaoui, Fatima & Kriszta Szendrői. 2017. The syntax-phonology mapping of intonational phrases in complex sentences: A flexible approach. In L. Clemens & E. Elfner (eds.), Special collection: Prosody & constituent structure. Glossa. 2(1). 55.Google Scholar

  • Huijsmans, Marianne. 2015. Linearization and prosodic phrasing: The case of SENĆOTEN second-position clitics. MA Thesis, University of Victoria.Google Scholar

  • Ishihara, Shinichiro. 2007. Major phrase, focus intonation, and multiple spell-out. The Linguistic Review 24. 137–167.Google Scholar

  • Ito, Junko & Armin Mester. 1992. Weak layering and word binarity. In T. Honma, M. Okazaki, T. Tabata & S.-I. Tanaka (eds.), A new century of phonology and phonological theory. A festschrift for Professor Shosuke Haraguchi on the occasion of his sixtieth birthday, 26–65. Tokyo: Kaitakusha.Google Scholar

  • Ito, Junko & Armin Mester. 2007. Prosodic adjunction in Japanese compounds. MIT Working Papers in Linguistics 55. 97–111.Google Scholar

  • Ito, Junko & Armin Mester. 2012. Recursive prosodic phrasing in Japanese. In T. Borowsky, S. Kawahara, T. Shinya & M. Sugahara (eds.), Prosody matters. London: Equinox Press.Google Scholar

  • Ito, Junko & Armin Mester. 2013. Prosodic subcategories in Japanese. Lingua 124. 20–40.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Jun, Sun-Ah (ed.). 2005. Prosodic typology: The phonology of intonation and phrasing. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar

  • Jun, Sun-Ah (ed.). 2014. Prosodic typology II: The phonology of intonation and phrasing. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar

  • Jun, Sun-Ah & Gorka Elordieta. 1997. Intonational structure in Lekeitio Basque. In A. Botinis, G. Kouroupetroglou & G. Carayiannis (eds.), Intonation: Theory, models and applications, 193–196. Athens, Greece: ISCA.Google Scholar

  • Kaisse, Ellen M. 1985. Connected speech: The interaction of syntax and phonology. San Diego: Academic Press.Google Scholar

  • Kayne, Richard S. 1994. The antisymmetry of syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar

  • Kratzer, Angelika & Elisabeth Selkirk. 2007. Phase theory and prosodic spellout: The case of verbs. The Linguistic Review 24. 93–135.Google Scholar

  • Kubozono, Haruo. 1989. Syntactic and rhythmic effects on downstep in Japanese. Phonology 6. 39–67.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Kubozono, Haruo. 1992. Modeling syntactic effects on downstep in Japanese. In G. Docherty & D.R. Ladd (eds.), Papers in laboratory phonology, vol. II: Gesture, segment, prosody, 368–387. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar

  • Ladd, D. Robert. 1986. Intonational phrasing: The case for recursive prosodic structure. Phonology 3. 311–340.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Ladd, D. Robert. 1988. Declination ‘reset’ and the hierarchical organization of utterances. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 84. 530–544.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Ladd, D. Robert. 2008 [1996]. Intonational phonology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar

  • Lehiste, Ilse. 1973. Phonetic disambiguation of syntactic ambiguity. Glossa 7. 107–123.Google Scholar

  • López, Luis. 2009. Ranking the linear correspondence axiom. Linguistic Inquiry 40. 239–276.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • McCarthy, John J. & Alan Prince. 1995. Faithfulness and reduplicative identity. In J. Beckman, L. Walsh Dickey & S. Urbanczyk (eds.), Papers in optimality theory, 249–384. Amherst, MA: GLSA Publications.Google Scholar

  • McCawley, James D. 1968. The phonological component of a grammar of Japanese. The Hague: Mouton.Google Scholar

  • McCloskey, James. 1999. On the right edge in Irish. Syntax 2. 189–209.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Myrberg, Sara. 2013. Sisterhood in prosodic branching. Phonology 30. 73–124.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Nespor, Marina & Irene Vogel. 1986. Prosodic phonology. Dordrecht: Foris.Google Scholar

  • Newell, Heather. 2008. Aspects of the morphology and phonology of phases. Doctoral dissertation, McGill University.Google Scholar

  • Newell, Heather & Glyne Piggott. 2014. Interactions at the syntax-phonology interface: Evidence from Ojibwe. Lingua 150. 332–362.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Pak, Majorie. 2008. The postsyntactic derivation and its phonological reflexes. Doctoral dissertation, University of Pennsylvania.Google Scholar

  • Pierrehumbert, Janet. 1980. The phonology and phonetics of english intonation. Doctoral dissertation, MIT.Google Scholar

  • Pierrehumbert, Janet & Mary Beckman. 1988. Japanese tone structure. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar

  • Prince, Alan & Paul Smolensky. 2004 [1993]. Optimality Theory: Constraint Interaction in Generative Grammar. Rutgers University RuCCS Technical Report.Google Scholar

  • Richards, Norvin. 2010. Uttering trees. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar

  • Richards, Norvin. 2016. Contiguity theory. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar

  • Richards, Norvin. 2017. Deriving contiguity. Ms., MIT. https://ling.auf.net/lingbuzz/003289, Accessed January 4, 2018.Google Scholar

  • Seidl, Amanda. 2001. Minimal indirect reference: A theory of the syntax-phonology interface. London: Routledge.Google Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth. 1980. Prosodic domains in phonology: Sanskrit revisited. In M. Aronoff & M.-L. Kean (eds.), Juncture, 107–129. Saratoga, CA: Anma Libri.Google Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth. 1981 [1978]. On prosodic structure and its relation to syntactic structure. In T. Fretheim (ed.), 111–140 Nordic prosody. Trondheim: TAPIR.Google Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth. 1984. Phonology and syntax: The relation between sound and structure. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth. 1986. On derived domains in sentence phonology. Phonology Yearbook 3. 371–405.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth. 1995. The prosodic structure of function words. In J. Beckman, L. W. Dickey & S. Urbanczyk (eds.), Papers in optimality theory, 439–470. Amherst, MA: GLSA Publications.Google Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth. 2009. On clause and intonational phrase in Japanese: The syntactic grounding of prosodic constituent structure. Gengo Kenkyu 136. 35–73.Google Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth. 2011. The syntax-phonology interface. In J. Goldsmith, J. Riggle & A. Yu (eds.) The handbook of phonological theory, 2nd edn, 435–484.Google Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth & Koichi Tateishi. 1988. Constraints on minor phrase formation in Japanese. In Papers from the 24th Annual Regional Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society, 316–336. Chicago: Chicago Linguistic Society.Google Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth & Tong Shen. 1990. Prosodic domains in Shanghai Chinese. In S. Inkelas & D. Zec (eds.), The phonology-syntax connection, 313–337. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth & Koichi Tateishi. 1991. Syntax and downstep in Japanese. In C. Georgopoulos & R. Ishihara (eds.), Interdisciplinary approaches to language: Essays in honor of S.-Y. Kuroda. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar

  • Selkirk, Elisabeth & Seunghun J. Lee. 2015. Constituent structure in phonology. Phonology 31. 1–18.Google Scholar

  • Truckenbrodt, Hubert. 1995. Phonological phrases: Their relation to syntax, focus, and prominence. Doctoral dissertation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.Google Scholar

  • Truckenbrodt, Hubert. 1999. On the relation between syntactic phrases and phonological phrases. Linguistic Inquiry 30. 219–256.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Uriagereka, Juan. 1999. Multiple spell-out. In S. D. Epstein & N. Hornstein (eds.), Working minimalism. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar

  • Wagner, Michael. 2005. Prosody and recursion. Doctoral dissertation, MIT.Google Scholar

  • Wagner, Michael. 2010. Prosody and recursion in coordinate structures and beyond. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 28. 183–237.CrossrefGoogle Scholar

  • Wagner, Michael. 2015. Phonological evidence in syntax. In T. Kiss & A. Alexiadou (eds.), Syntax – theory and analysis. An international Handbook, 1154–1198. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar

  • Werle, Adam. 2009. Word, phrase, and clitic prosody in Bosnian, Serbian, and Croatian. Doctoral dissertation, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.Google Scholar

  • Windsor, Joseph W. 2017. Predicting prosodic structure by morphosyntactic category: A case study of Blackfoot. In L. Clemens & E. Elfner (eds.), Special collection: Prosody & constituent structure. Glossa. 2(1). 10.Google Scholar

About the article

Received: 2017-09-03

Accepted: 2017-12-12

Published Online: 2018-03-17

Citation Information: Linguistics Vanguard, Volume 4, Issue 1, 20160081, ISSN (Online) 2199-174X, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/lingvan-2016-0081.

Export Citation

©2018 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston.Get Permission

Comments (0)

Please log in or register to comment.
Log in