The prosodic representation of composite structures in Brazilian Portuguese

Abstract

In previous research, word–word compounds and stressed affix + word structures have been assigned to the same prosodic domain in Brazilian Portuguese (BP), on account of certain similarities in phonological behaviour (Silva 2010, Toneli 2014): both types of composite structures undergo vowel raising at the right edge of each element in the construction, and vowel sandhi processes between their elements. In this paper, I show that word–word compounds and stressed affix + word structures exhibit significant differences in stress patterns in BP, which supports their prosodization in two separate domains. While stressed affix + word structures are assigned secondary stress following the phonological word (PWd) stress algorithm, each element in word–word compounds behaves as an independent PWd with regard to the stress pattern that it exhibits. I thus propose that while stressed affix + word structures are recursively prosodized in the PWd domain, word–word compounds are prosodized in the composite group, the domain proposed by Vogel (2008, 2009) that immediately dominates the PWd and accounts for the prosodization of structures with compositional characteristics. The analysis reconciles two views on prosodic structure that are traditionally assumed to be mutually exclusive: the view that prosodic domains can be recursive (e.g. Inkelas 1990, Selkirk 1996) and the view that the prosodic hierarchy includes an additional domain specific to composite structures above the PWd (e.g. Vogel 2009, Vigário 2010).

Re-placing PStem in the prosodic hierarchy

“…An additional problem with PWord recursion is that it violates a markedness constraint holding of well-formed prosodic constituent structures, NORECURSIVITY (Selkirk 1995: 443). As recent work by Frota and Vigário (2013), Guzzo (2018), Vigário (2010), and Vogel (2009aVogel ( , 2009bVogel ( , 2010Vogel ( , 2012Vogel ( , 2019 forcefully argues, even though this constraint, like others in an Optimality Theoretical approach, can be optimally violated to satisfy higher-ranked prosodic well-formedness constraints, a recursive representation must still strictly satisfy well-formedness criteria holding for linguistic recursion in general. In particular, recursion should involve "embedding a constituent in a constituent of the same type" (Pinker andJackendoff 2005: 211, cited by Vogel 2012).…”

“…In the literature on PWord recursion, one finds analyses that meet at least one of these two criteria: see, e.g., Bennett (2018), Guzzo (2018), Vigário (2010), and Zec (2005). However, work like Bickel et al (2009), Frota and Vigário (2013), Guzzo (2018), Schiering et al (2010), Vigário (2010), and Vogel (2009aVogel ( , 2009b show that many analyses involving PWord recursion are not well formed according to (7), above. The same phonological processes or constraints do not apply to the outer recursion of PWord as to the inner recursion.…”

“…Before concluding this section, it is important to highlight that even though a CG-PWord distinction cannot systematically replace a PWord-PStem distinction, there is ample other evidence for a CG-PWord distinction, based mainly on the phonology of clitics and compounds. It is beyond the scope of this paper to present these arguments in detail, and the interested reader is urged to consult work like Guzzo (2018), Vigário (2010), and Vogel (2009aVogel ( , 2009b for detailed discussion. We simply note that many of the arguments given in these works for why PWord recursion cannot replace a CG-PWord distinction are analogous to those presented in Section 3.2 for why PWord recursion cannot replace a PWord-PStem distinction.…”

“…It is controversial, however, whether recursive PWord successfully accounts for cross-linguistically recurring subphrasal phonological domains in a constrained and coherent way. Bickel et al (2009), Frota and Vigário (2013), Guzzo (2018), Schiering et al (2010), Vigário (2010), and Vogel (2009aVogel ( , 2009b, in particular, have argued against PWord recursion in favor of expanding the set of subphrasal domains. At the same time, some of this work argues, rather surprisingly, against PStem as a subphrasal domain.…”

“…SeeGuzzo (2018),Vigário (2010),Vogel (2009aVogel ( , 2009b for detailed motivations for and definitions of the Composite Group (or equivalent). Note that these authors do not all use the same term for this constituent and also have somewhat varying definitions.…”