A full phonological description of the Slovak language and an investigation of recent developments in phonological theory, this study explains new theories and illustrates them by application to a large body of data.
This book has both a descriptive and a theoretical purpose. It is the first full phonological description of Slovak, a language spoken by some four-and-a-half million people in Central and Eastern Europe; and it is a study of the theories of lexical, autosegmental, and prosodic phonology, with a particular emphasis on syllable structure. In a synthesis of these two aims, the author demonstrates how the theories can be integrated in a description of a single language. Particular importance is attached to the problem of phonological representations which, it is shown, must be three-dimensional. Both the independence and the interaction of the melodic, skeletal, and syllabic tiers are investigated in detail. The theoretical linguist will find here a detailed and comprehensive description of the language, deepened by an extensive debate on current phonological theory. For the Slavist - of whatever theoretical persuasion - the book offers a discussion of the most recent theoretical developments in phonology, couched in the framework of a familiar type of linguistic material.
This book offers thorough analyses of two typologically different languages, English and Slovak, from the viewpoint of two different approaches to language: namely, structuralism, as introduced by Ferdinand de Saussure in the first half of the 20th century, and generativism, based on the ideas of Noam Chomsky’s generative grammar presented in the 1960s. Considering structuralist and generative phonology, the most important unit of phonological analysis for both is the syllable. Most of the theories within generative phonology provide a syllable model or rules for syllabification that are considered language-universal, but syllabification is not exhaustive since consonants that are part of a word but somehow violate the given syllable model or rules remain unsyllabified. On the other hand, in structuralist phonology, syllable theories fulfil the condition of universality such that all languages have syllables, and their syllabification is always exhaustive; that is, all segments in a word are syllabified. In this book, a generative understanding of the syllable is represented by the CVX syllable theory and the Syllable Structure Algorithm from Lexical Phonology, and the synthetic phonological theory was chosen to typify structuralism. As such, the book adds to current research bridging the gap between generative and structuralist linguistics.
The papers in this volume deal with subjects ranging from sound change and general phonological issues to analyses of specific problems in Polish and English, while some papers are of a crosslinguistic/contrastive nature. No single phonological paradigm has been followed, and this diversity of theoretical approaches, from natural phonology to non-linear phonology, reflects recent developments in Europe and the U.S.
On the stroke of midnight on 1 January 2013, the inhabitants of Slovakia celebrated a major milestone in their history: two decades of democratic government and personal freedom. This is so far the longest period of such rule in their history. This anniversary surpasses by a few months their only previous, generation-long, experience, namely in the First Czecho-Slovak Republic (1918-1938). The difference, of course, is that the Slovaks no longer share a state with another nation but run their own affairs. Slovakia is now an accepted and recognized member in the family of nations whose athletes, artists, and other notable personalities are acknowledged around the world. It is a member of international organization's and multilateral institutions and participates in efforts to maintain peace and enhance prosperity around the world. The third edition of Historical Dictionary of Slovakia provides a thorough update of the many accomplishments that Slovakia has achieved. This is done through a chronology, an introductory essay, and an extensive bibliography. The cross-referenced dictionary section has over 1000 entries on significant persons, places and events, political parties and institutions, literature, music and the arts. This book is an excellent resource for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about Slovakia.
Phonology: Critical Concepts, the first such anthology to appear in thirty years and the largest ever published, brings together over a hundred previously published book chapters and articles from professional journals. These have been chosen for their importance in the exploration of theoretical questions, with some preference for essays that are not easily accessible.Divided into sections, each part is preceded by a brief introduction which aims to point out the problems addressed by the various articles and show their relations to one another.-
Portuguese emerged from vulgar Latin during the course of the third century. Influential in its development were successive invasions by Germanic peoples, Visigoths, and Moors, the latter of whom were finally evicted in the thirteenth century. As a consequence of the newly-independent kingdoms imperial achievements, Portuguese is the national language of Brazil and the official language of several African countries. Maria Helena Mateus and Ernesto dAndrade present a broad description and comparative analysis of the phonetics and phonology of European and Brazilian Portuguese. They begin by introducing the history of Portuguese and its principal varieties. Chapter 2 describes the phonetic characteristics of consonants, vowels, and glides, and Chapter 3 looks at prosodic structure. Chapters 4 and 5 present the general characteristics of Portuguese nominal and verbal systems, the former considering inflectional and the latter derivational processes. Chapter 6 examines stress, main, secondary, and echo, and Chapter 7 describes phonological processes that are not related to the morphological structure of the word, including the peculiar process of nazalization. The authors deploy current theoretical models to explain the rich variety of Portuguese phonology and interrelated aspects of morphology. This is by far the most comprehensive account of the subject to have appeared in English, and the most up-to-date in any language.
In this first account of the phonology of Hungarian to appear in English, the authors place an emphasis on descriptive coverage rather than theoretical issues. It provides an interest not only for phonology specialists, but also for a wider audience.