Meaningful Phonological Processes: A Consideration of Central Alaskan Yupik Eskimo Prosody

This paper proposes principles to revise the strict ‘double articulation’ of standard linguistic theory, and define a class of optional rules of postlexical phonology whose output bears meaning. The class includes prosody-modifying processes of Central Alaskan Yupik Eskimo (CAY)—which, when applied to a word or prosodic phrase, add linguistically significant expressive or other pragmatic meaning. Their postlexical rule status is suggested by their phonological form, their gradience and dependence (in some cases) on above-word prosodic phrasing, and above all by their intricate inter-ordering among the obligatory prosody rules of CAY postlexical phonology. The phonological treatment prescribed by the proposed principles is shown to handle such features naturally and easily, whereas treatments in keeping with strict double articulation do not. The proposed revision of the double articulation principle promises to preserve modularity in a way which simplifies individual grammars, and which makes testable empirical predictions about universal grammar.