ABSTRACT
Various studies claim that prosodic structure is manifested through segment duration. Maddieson (1985) argues that closed syllable vowel shortening can be used as a cue to the syllabic constituency of a string of segments. Segment duration has also been cited as a diagnostic for moraic structures: e.g. segments that share a mora are claimed to be shorter than segments that do not (Broselow et al., 1997, Hubbard, 1994, Maddieson, 1993). This chapter investigates segment duration phenomena that are claimed to provide empirical evidence for prosodic structure in Italian:
Open syllable vowel lengthening: Main stressed vowels are claimed to lengthen in open penultimate syllables and thus provide evidence for the syllabic constituency of segments. Long vowels are claimed to occur before tautosyllabic clusters (e.g. CL), as in pá:.dre ‘father,' while short vowels are claimed to occur before heterosyllabic clusters (e.g. SC), as in pás.ta ‘pasta.' (Chierchia, 1982, 1986, D'Imperio and Rosenthall, 1999, Farnetani and Kori, 1986, Fava and Magno Caldognetto, 1976, Nespor and Vogel, 1986, Nespor, 1993, Repetti, 1989, 1991, Vogel, 1977, 1982).
Consonant duration: Consonants associated with the syllable coda are claimed to be longer than consonants associated with the syllable onset in Italian. This durational difference is argued to mark a final syllable boundary (Farnetani and Kori, 1986: 23).
Raddoppiamento-sintattico 2 (RS): Raddoppiamento-sintattico, the gemination of a word-initial consonant when preceded by a stressed vowel, is claimed to depend on the syllabification of word-initial consonant clusters. Claimed tautosyllabic consonant clusters (e.g. CL) undergo RS while 122claimed heterosyllabic clusters (e.g. SC) undergo leftward resyllabification of the word-initial consonant into the previous syllable: e.g. *cit[td] triste → cit[tát].triste ‘sad city' vs. *cit[tá] strana → cit[tás].trana ‘strange city' (Chierchia, 1982, 1986, Repetti, 1989, 1991, Vogel, 1977, 1982).
