Codas are universally moraic

Abstract

Mismatches in weight criteria across weight-sensitive processes within individual languages present difficulties for theories of moraic structure, particularly regarding coda weight. Previous accounts, which stipulate that codas are variably moraic to account for the typological variation in the weight status of CVC for primary stress, make incorrect predictions for the status of CVC in other weight-sensitive phenomena, including tone, word minimality and secondary stress, among others. This article proposes a theory of Uniform Moraic Quantity coupled with a new syllable weight metric as a solution, which captures CVC's flexible weight status while maintaining the cross-linguistic moraicity of codas and avoiding the incorrect predictions that frustrate the standard variable-weight approach.