#3748. Attachment height and prosodic phrasing in Rutooro

October 2026publication date
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Journal’s subject area:
Language and Linguistics;
Linguistics and Language;
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Abstract:
Like many languages in the family, syntactic XPs reliably correspond to phrases; however, we find a previously unattested pattern in the prosody of adnominal phrases. Head nouns are marked H when they combine with strong determiners and full relative clauses (RCs). In contrast, nouns do not bear an H tone when they combine with weak determiners, adjectives, and reduced RCs. Reduced object RCs with overt subjects are a special case: the relativized head bears an unexpected H tone, while the subject is all-Low despite the fact that it is a self-contained XP. We hypothesize that the attested, nonisomorphic phrasing arose to prevent i) ambiguity and ii) prosodic indeterminacy—when prosodic structure could be the output of more than one syntactic configuration—and was subsequently grammaticalized.
Keywords:
Phonology; Prosody; Syntax

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