ABSTRACT
Goddard (1970) suggested that the basic intonation pattern of Maliseet words is one of alternating high and low pitch: successive syllables are alternately assigned high and low pitch, except that certain syllables with "short vowels" (the unstressable vowels of the present work) are skipped over in assigning this contour. In addition to this principle of alternating pitch, Goddard's account requires a principle of alignment: in some words, the syllable which receives main stress is aligned with a relative high in the intonation contour, while in other words the most prominent syllable is aligned with a relative low. Finally, a principle of pitch contour formation results in the assignment of rising or falling pitch to certain syllables in short words where there are not enough syllables to map each element in a minimal permitted span of the alternating pattern onto a separate syllable with a full vowel. Given these principles, Goddard conjectured, it should be sufficient to mark the position and pitch of the main stress in a word. The rest of the contour should in general be recoverable from this information, with the possible exception of cases involving irregular treatment of "short vowels."
