jeff_l
(Jeff_L)
#1
3.4 Ablaut 111
form, and it is not uncommon for high, low, and mid-height V's to co-occur
within the stem. With inflectable verbs, on the other hand, the vocalic qualities
(especially for short V's) can normally be attributed to a melody associated
with a given stem (PerfP, Shlmpf, LoImpfP, etc.).
Η and L behave as the yin and yang of Tamashek morphology. Some verb
stems have a pure melody, either or . In a pure melody, the L or Η
links to all V's in the relevant domain, so the SVS consists of either a string of
low V's or a string of high V's. There are also some composite melodies of
the type or , though none (in T-ka) with more than two
components.
3.4.3.2 Melodic association
Melodies are normally limited to the stem. However, there are certain
morphological patterns where a melody also takes in a suffix, namely a subject
suffix for verbs or a PI suffix (specifically MaPl) for nouns.
For the composite melodies, we need explicit Melodic Association rules to
make sure that the correct attachments are made. The association rules for the
major composite melodies are summarized in (82).
(82) Melodic Association rules for Composite Melodies
a. for nominal PI
Associate L to the rightmost V, then associate Η to the
remaining V's of the stem. Outputs are «L», «HL», «HHL»,
«HHHL», «HHHHL»
b. for perfective verb
Associate L to the rightmost V, then Η to the leftmost two
remaining V's, then associate L to the remaining medial V's.
Outputs are «L», «HL», «HHL», and «HHLL». For the rare
pentasyllable verb type, I recorded «HHLLL» for the focal
dialect T-ka, but «HHHLL» for K-d.
c. for short imperfective of V-final non-augment stem
Associate Η to the stem-final V, then L to the remaining
syllables. Outputs are «LH» and «LLH».
The asymmetry between (82.a) and (82.b), for the "same" composite
melody , when there are more than three stem V's, shows once again the
futility of attempting to describe Tamashek morphophonology in simple
phonological terms.
Examples of the nominal PI are in (83).
