Principles of English Stress (Cambridge Studies in Linguistics, Series Number 72)

In this provocative work, Luigi Burzio argues that many common assumptions within stress theory, and phonological theory more generally, are in fact rather arbitrary. He proposes radical departures from recent tradition. In Part I he analyzes stress in the underived English lexicon, arguing that the basic accentual groups or "feet" are not monosyllabic or bisyllabic, as often assumed, but rather bisyllabic or trisyllabic. This analysis brings significant simplifications to other recent theorizing, including the elimination of standard extrametrically and all rules destressing. In Part II Professor Burzio deals with morphologically complex words, and argues that various phenomena of stress presevation, including the apparent stress "neutrality" of a class of affixes, are all predictable reflexes of a single principle of Metrical Consistency. In addition to a superior account of stress, the proposed metrical theory yields a unitary account of a wide spectrum of vowel-length alternations, in an overall conception of phonology which is modular, like that of comtemporary syntax. The book makes a major theoretical contribution to the analysis of English word stress and to phonological theory. Luigi Burzio's Principles of English Stress challenges many of the assumptions that have underpinned the generative description of English stress and more generally 'standard' metrical theory. Central to Burzio's analysis is a novel typology of metrical constituents that includes ternary feet and excludes monosyllabic feet. The analysis is essentially nonderivational in character: principles of well-formedness check for the presence of stress and weight in the output. The principles themselves are organized into a hierarchy consisting of a hardcore-controlling foot form that in cases of conflict may override principles of metrical consistency and alignment of edges. The interplay among these competing principles accounts for the cyclic effects of the standard theory. A special role is accorded phonetically null syllables that analyse hidden metrical structure to preserve a simple foot inventory and sharply curtail the standard theory's extrametricality. 1. General Introduction: Overview And Caveats -- Pt. I. The Stress Of Underived Items. 2. Null Vowels And Extrametricality. 3. The Stress Pattern Of English. 4. Stress Without Destressing And Vowel Reduction. 5. Stress And Vowel Length -- Pt. Ii. Stress And Word-formation. 6. Weak Preservation. 7. The Range Of Stress-placing Suffixes. 8. Strong Preservation. 9. The Range Of Neutral Suffixes. 10. Extensions And Refinements. Luigi Burzio. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 357-362) And Indexes.

this Controversial New Book Offers A Detailed And Thorough Analysis Of Word Stress In English.