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Book: Syntax-Prosody in Optimality Theory

Chapter: 5. Constraining Subcategory-Sensitive MATCH Constraints

DOI: 10.1558/equinox.41006

Blurb:

Recent work has expanded Con to include Match constraints that are sensitive to subcategories of XP and φ, e.g., Ishihara’s (2014) sp.Match(XP [+max] , φ [+max] ). Admitting subcategory-sensitive Match constraints leads to two theoretical problems: first, a proliferation of possible Match constraints, and second, the emergence of Match constraints which enforce syntax-prosody non-isomorphism, e.g., sp.Match(XP [−max] , φ [+max] ). This chapter presents the results of a SPOT investigation showing that two sets of subcategory-sensitive Match constraints drive non-isomorphism: (i) those in which only the second argument has a feature specification for its subcategory, e.g., sp.Match(XP, φ [+max] ), and (ii) those in which the first and second arguments have conflicting specifications for subcategory, e.g. sp.Match(XP [+max] , φ [−max] ). A ban on the existence of these constraints is proposed, and it is argued that this ban follows from the integration of Match constraints into the theory of Faithfulness.

Chapter Contributors

  • Nicholas Van Handel (nvanhand@ucsc.edu - nvhandel) 'PhD student, University of California, Santa Cruz'
  • Dan Brodkin (dbrodkin@equinoxpub.com - dbrodkin) 'Ph.D. student, Department of Linguistics, UC Santa Cruz'
  • Benjamin Eischens (beischens@equinoxpub.com - beischens) 'Ph.D. student, Department of Linguistics, UC Santa Cruz'