ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an overview of how to understand phonology as an Emergent system, building a phonological grammar without recourse to a priori phonological knowledge. It addresses some aspects of the interface with phonetics and with morphology. The chapter focuses on the sound relations, beginning from the perspective of word-learning. In networked-morph model, the lexicon shows relations among morphs and phonological statements serve three functions: to define wellformed morphs, to relate morphs in a morph set, and to select appropriate combinations of morphs in word formation. The chapter discusses each in turn briefly. It then demonstrates the function of each of the three types of phonological generalisations, using vowel behaviour in Assamese. Derivational opacity refers to the class of phenomena in which surface forms are systematically inconsistent with some general pattern. "Derivational" refers to the idea that in the course of a derivation, a later rule creates the environment for an earlier rule, but the earlier rule no longer applies.
