Handout 10 Alternations with Kinyarwanda Rwanda ja ndika8 iBitaBo8 ja ndik iBitaBo8 umu nhu8 aRaguRa8 umuhoRo8 he she writes a book he she writes a book a person he she buys pruning knife Kinyarwanda umu nh aRaguR umuhoRo8 A person buys a pruning knife umu nhu ja ndika tSja ne8 The person writes a lot to come together Kigali kuva na8 iciga li kuva n iciga li to come together from Kigali Alternations In these forms the morpheme alternations are the following ja ndika8 ja ndik ja ndika umu nhu8 umu nh umu nhu aRaguRa8 aRaguR kuva na8 kuva n Alternations Voiced vowels e g a u alternate with voiceless vowels e g a8 u8 Distribution Voiceless vowels occur only at the end of an utterance Voiced vowels occur only elsewhere Phonemes i e a o u Rule Final devoicing V voice Utterance Alternations Otherwise the alternants differ in that one of the alternants has a nal vowel and the other doesn t We say in this case that the vowel alternates with the empty string i e nothing a a8 u u8 The alternation indicates that there is a restriction on distribution Distribution The empty string doesn t have a distribution so we can t state the distribution of vowels relative to We just state the restriction on distribution in terms of which sequence doesn t occur To determine what that restriction is we look at the distribution of the alternants The alternant with the nal vowel occurs before pause or before a consonant Distribution The alternants without a nal vowel occur before a word beginning with a vowel Generalizing what doesn t occur is a sequence of two vowels V V The asterix indicates that the sequence is disallowed Analysis Underlying representations When two sounds are in neutralization distribution the underlying representation of alternating morphemes has to have the sound with the restricted distribution Nonalternating morphemes have underlying representations with the unrestricted sound Only the restricted sound will be subject to change according to context Analysis Underlying representations The same logic extends to alternations with The restriction on distribution is on vowels they can t occur before vowels So alternating morphemes must have vowels in nal position where they can come before vowels The underlying representations of the alternating morphemes must thus be ja ndika umu nhu aRaguRa kuva na Analysis Rule The rule must then take these underlying representations and turn them into the other ones without nal vowels in the context where those occur Rule Vowel Deletion V V This rule changes a vowel to i e it deletes it Derivations Underlying representations Vowel deletion ja ndika iBitaBo ja ndik iBitaBo ja ndika Final devoicing ja ndik iBitaBo8 ja ndika8 Surface representations ja ndik iBitaBo8 ja ndika8 Yawelmani California Kenstowicz and Kisseberth 1979 77 99 mightVerb havingVerbed willVerb PresentVerb glossxatalxatmixatenxathin eat xilalxilmixilhin tangle bok albok mibok enbok hin find pa alpa i mipa enpa i hin fight logiwmilogwenlogiwhin pulverize ilkal ilikhin sing Yawelmani California The nonalternating morphemes here are the following xat xil bok al mi en hin eat tangle nd might having Verbed will present Yawelmani California The alternating morphemes are the following pa i pa ilik ilk logiw logw ght sing pulverize The alternating sounds are i Distribution of alternants All of the alternating stems have a nal CC sequence in the alternants without i The nonalternating stems do not end in CC The alternant with the i vowel occurs before a suf x beginning with C e g pa i mi The alternants without the i vowel occurs before a suf x beginning with a V e g pa al Distribution of alternating sounds What we re looking for is a generalization about a sequence that does not occur In this case what doesn t occur is a sequence of three C s C C C This is the distribution of the alternating sounds If the alternant without i occurred before a C initial suf x CCC is what you d expect to get pa mi Analysis In this case what is ruled out is the sequence without the vowel So that is the sequence that should occur in the underlying representations of the alternating morphemes pa t ilk logw The process eliminates the forbidden sequence by inserting a vowel Epenthesis V C C C high back Derivations Underlying representations pa mi pa al Epenthesis pa i mi Surface representations pa i mi pa al Yawelmani More data might dubal hudal ugnal luk lal having ed dubmu ugunmu Present Gloss dubhun hudhun ugunhun luk ulhun lead by the hand recognize drink bury New alternations New alternations mi mu hin hun ugn ugun luk l luk ul Alternating sounds might Present drink bury u i u i u When one set of sounds alternates with another as in i u the two sets must be either in complementary or neutralization distribution To discover the restriction on distribution we look at the distribution of alternants mu and hun occur after stems whose last vowel is u mi and hin occur after all other stems i u Distribution of the alternating sounds i does not occur after u C0 but does occur elsewhere u occurs after u C0 as well as elsewhere Underlying representations of the alternating morphemes mi hin Rule Vowel harmony V back cor lab V C0 high lab high u The distribution of the u alternants is exactly like that of the i o alternants The alternants with the u occur before suf xes beginning with C The alternants without u end in CC and occur before suf xes beginning with V But the u alternation occurs in the forms with the suf x alternants mu or hun The i alternation occurs with the suf x alternants mi or hin Analysis The simplest analysis is that the i that is introduced by epenthesis is subject to Vowel harmony just like any other high vowel To make this happen we just have to insure that Epenthesis applies before Vowel harmony Underlying representations of the alternating morphemes ugn luk l Derivations Underlying representation Epenthesis ugn hin pa mi ugin hin pa i mi Vowel harmony ugun hun Surface representation ugunhun pa i mi Rule ordering This analysis only works if Vowel Epenthesis applies before Vowel Harmony Vowel Epenthesis creates opportunities for Vowel Harmony to apply If Rule A creates opportunities for Rule B to apply i e Rule B couldn t apply to the underlying representation but can apply to the output of Rule A then Rule A is said to feed Rule B Rule A must be applied before rule B Reference Kenstowicz Michael and Charles Kisseberth 1979 Generative Phonology Description and Theory Academic Press San Diego