The diachronic development of stød and tonal accent in North Germanic
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Allison Wetterlin
Abstract
In 1982, Anatoly Liberman spiced up the century-old debate of the development of word accents in North Germanic, by proposing that stød developed first, followed by tonogenesis in Norwegian and Swedish. Liberman, however, did not address the actual mechanisms of stød – or tonogenesis. The present paper provides an analysis of how word accents developed in North Germanic following Liberman’s stød-first hypothesis. We propose that encliticisation of the definite articles and consequent glottalisation conditioned stød-genesis in monosyllables. The actual word accent opposition arose when the monosyllabic-stød and polysyllabic no-stød dichotomy was disturbed by epenthesis creating disyllables with stød. Intense language contact of speakers of stød dialects then conditioned tonogenesis in other dialects. This analysis puts the development of North Germanic word accents back in line typologically with many other languages where tonal opposition has been attested to stem from glottalisation or loss of glottal consonants.
Abstract
In 1982, Anatoly Liberman spiced up the century-old debate of the development of word accents in North Germanic, by proposing that stød developed first, followed by tonogenesis in Norwegian and Swedish. Liberman, however, did not address the actual mechanisms of stød – or tonogenesis. The present paper provides an analysis of how word accents developed in North Germanic following Liberman’s stød-first hypothesis. We propose that encliticisation of the definite articles and consequent glottalisation conditioned stød-genesis in monosyllables. The actual word accent opposition arose when the monosyllabic-stød and polysyllabic no-stød dichotomy was disturbed by epenthesis creating disyllables with stød. Intense language contact of speakers of stød dialects then conditioned tonogenesis in other dialects. This analysis puts the development of North Germanic word accents back in line typologically with many other languages where tonal opposition has been attested to stem from glottalisation or loss of glottal consonants.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction vii
-
Phonology
- A Phonological motivation behind the diatonic stress shift in Modern English 3
- Vowel reduction in verbs in King Alfred’s Pastoral Care 19
- The development of early Middle English ō 41
- The diachronic development of stød and tonal accent in North Germanic 53
- The evolution of the (alveolo)palatal lateral consonant in Spanish and Portuguese 69
-
Diachronic typology
- Evaluating prehistoric and early historic linguistic contacts 89
- Patterns in the diffusion of nomenclature systems 109
-
Morphology
- Morphological evidence for the paradigmatic status of infinitives in French and Occitan 135
- Constructional change at the interface of cognition, culture, and language use 155
-
Morphosyntax
- Stages in deflexion and the Norwegian dative 179
- Differential Object Marking in Old Japanese 195
- The grammaticalization of progressive constructions with a focus on the English progressive 213
- Hate and anger, love and desire 233
- The argument indexing of early Austronesian verbs 257
- The syntax of mood constructions in Old Japanese 281
- Medieval Sardinian 303
- Index 325
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction vii
-
Phonology
- A Phonological motivation behind the diatonic stress shift in Modern English 3
- Vowel reduction in verbs in King Alfred’s Pastoral Care 19
- The development of early Middle English ō 41
- The diachronic development of stød and tonal accent in North Germanic 53
- The evolution of the (alveolo)palatal lateral consonant in Spanish and Portuguese 69
-
Diachronic typology
- Evaluating prehistoric and early historic linguistic contacts 89
- Patterns in the diffusion of nomenclature systems 109
-
Morphology
- Morphological evidence for the paradigmatic status of infinitives in French and Occitan 135
- Constructional change at the interface of cognition, culture, and language use 155
-
Morphosyntax
- Stages in deflexion and the Norwegian dative 179
- Differential Object Marking in Old Japanese 195
- The grammaticalization of progressive constructions with a focus on the English progressive 213
- Hate and anger, love and desire 233
- The argument indexing of early Austronesian verbs 257
- The syntax of mood constructions in Old Japanese 281
- Medieval Sardinian 303
- Index 325
