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Universal 1030:

Posted in Universals Archive

Universal 1030:

Original
Only the intense pole – loud stress, high pitch and length – ever has the accentual property. There is no language in which there is one and just one weakest stress or one lowest pitch (or shortest segment) in a phonological word.
Standardized
Only the intense pole – loud stress, high pitch and length – ever has the accentual property. There is no language in which there is one and just one weakest stress or one lowest pitch (or shortest segment) in a phonological word.
Keywords
stress, pitch, length, accent
Domain
prosodic phonology
Type
unconditional
Status
achronic
Quality
almost absolute
Basis
sample of almost 200 languages in Greenberg & Kaschube 1976
Source
Greenberg & Kaschube 1976: 3
Counterexamples
Chamorro (W. Malayo-Polynesian, Austronesian) has a low pitch for accent and neutral rising intonation (Chung 1983: 38, Hyman 1977: 74, referring to Topping 1969: 71 (see also Topping & Dungca 1973: 45)).

One Comment

  1. FP
    FP

    Accent = phonetic features occurring just once or at most once in the phonological word, with cumulative or demarcative function (Greenberg & Kaschube 1976).

    1. May 2020

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