ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces the syllable, a constituent that groups segments. It consider the role of the syllable and syllable membership in phonological generalizations about the distribution and realization of segments, including those that require the existence of ambisyllabic consonants. Languages vary greatly in the complexity of their syllables. Languages differ in the syllabification domain. The chapter shows that segmental duration can be accounted for by assuming that there is an independent tier of skeletal slots which constitutes an intermediate level of structure between the segments and the syllable. Syllables tend to group in words so that the sonority of the end of one syllable is greater than that of the beginning of the next, favouring a whimper-bang transition over a bang-whimper one. It also introduces two ways in which phonological representations go beyond a linear representation, that is a single string of phonological elements, which was characteristic of earlier theories.
