Synchronic stratum-specific rates of application reflect diachronic change: morphosyntactic conditioning of variation in English /l/-darkening

Abstract

Phonological processes that exhibit morphosyntactic sensitivity can pro- vide evidence of historical processes which have ascended through the grammar over time. English /l/-darkening shows such effects. Although syllable-based accounts state that light [l] occurs in onsets (e.g. light) and dark [ɫ] in codas (e.g. dull), several studies report overapplication of dark- ening to onset /l/ in certain morphosyntactically de?ined positions: e.g. word-?inally in phrases such as heal it, and stem-?inally before a suf?ix in words such as heal-ing. Although many phonological theories attempt to account for such opacity, they cannot adequately account for the potential variability in application alongside this. The present paper explores these ideas through modelling data on /l/- darkening in English taken fromHayes’s (2000) Optimality Theoretic study. It is argued that a combined Stochastic StratalOTapproach to the data is an improvementover a parallel stochastic model (e.g. Boersma&Hayes 2001) because it avoids ?ixed innate constraint rankings, which are required to prevent the prediction ofimpossible grammars. Moreover, it is shown that observations about the diachronic life cycle of phonological processes en- able us to deduce quantitative predictions about rates: the process should apply with lower frequency in smaller morphsyntatctic domains.