Optimality Theory: Phonology, Syntax, and Acquisition (review)

This book contains an introductory overview of Optimality Theory (OT) and sixteen papers discussing various aspects of OT. It is divided into four sections: prosodic representation (four papers), segmental phonology (three papers), syntax (five papers), and acquisition (four papers). There are also three indices (for subjects, languages, and names).

After the useful introduction by the editors and Paul Boersma, ‘Introduction—Optimality Theory: Phonology, syntax, and acquisition’ (1–44), the section on prosodic representation begins with Luigi Burzio’s contribution, ‘Cycles, non-derived-environment blocking and correspondence’ (47–87). Burzio argues in favor of output-to-output correspondence, a faithfulness relationship between (morphologically) related output forms which, he contends, eliminates the need for underlying representations. Bruce P. Hayes examines the thorny problem of gradient well-formedness in ‘Gradient well-formedness in Optimality Theory’ (88–120). In ‘Stem stress and peak correspondence in Dutch’ (121–50), René Kager argues in favor of an OT analysis of the interaction of stress assignment and affixation in Dutch. ‘Faithfulness and prosodic circumspection’ (151–89), by John J. MCCarthy, suggests that prosodic faithfulness constraints provide a better account of phonological developments (e.g. reduplication and infixation) than operational prosodic circumspection.

The section on segmental phonology begins with a paper by Haike Jacobs and Carlos Gussenhoven, ‘Loan phonology: Perception, salience, the lexicon, and Optimality Theory’ (193–210), which offers an OT interpretation of loan word phonology without employing the notion of ‘phonetic salience’ relied on in earlier OT analyses of the topic. In ‘Derivational residue: Hidden rules in Optimality Theory’ (211–33), Darlene LaCharité and Carole Paradis argue that GEN is a renamed rule component. In ‘Dependency theory meets OT: A proposal for a new approach to segmental phonology’ (234–76), Norval Smith discusses how a version of dependency phonology applied to segmental structure could be utilized within OT.

In the syntax section Peter Ackema and Ad Neelema, ‘Absolute ungrammaticality’ (279–301), argue that a number of constructions that are possible in some languages but impossible in others can be accounted for by reference to the null parse. Stephen R. Anderson, ‘Towards an optimal account of second-position phenomena’ (302–33), contends that the notion of ‘second position’ is linguistically real and that a number of phenomena, including clitic placement, are fundamentally related to it. Joan Bresnan, ‘Optimal syntax’ (334–85), proposes that lexical functional grammar could be used to characterize GEN and the candidate set it produces. Hans Broekhuis and Joost Dekkers, ‘The minimalist program and Optimality Theory: Derivations and evaluations’ (386–422), propose a model of syntax containing a generator and a filtering device (in some respects a merger of minimalist and OT approaches to syntax) and analyze relative clauses in English and (some dialects of) Dutch within their proposed model. Géraldine Legendre, ‘Morphological and prosodic alignment of Bulgarian clitics’ (423–62), argues in favor of a morphological rather than a syntactic interpretation of Bulgarian clitics.

The section on acquisition contains the following papers. Paul Boersma, ‘Learning a grammar in functional phonology’ (465–523), argues that distinguishing between articulatory and perceptual constraints results in a more straightforward description of the learning process and also that constraints do not have to be innate. T. Mark Ellison, ‘The universal constraint set: Convention, not fact’ (524–53), argues against the standard OT view that all constraints are innate, contending that this view is a useful convention but nothing more. Douglas Pulleyblank and William J. Turkel, ‘Learning phonology: Genetic algorithms and Yoruba tongueroot harmony’ (554–91), discuss a possible genetic algorithm that could be used within OT. Bruce Tesar, ‘On the roles of optimality and strict domination in language learning’ (592...