This book deals with the phenomenon of vowel harmony, a phonological process whereby all the vowels in a word are required to share a specific phonological property. Harry van der Hulst puts forward a new theory of vowel harmony, which accounts for the patterns of and exceptions to this phenomenon in the widest range of languages ever considered.

• Preface


• List of abbreviations


• Part I: A new theory of vowel harmony


• 1: Opacity and transparency in vowel harmony


• 2: The RcvP model


• 3: Harmony as licensing


• Part II: Case studies


• 4: Palatal harmony


• 5: Labial harmony


• 6: Aperture harmony


• 7: African tongue root systems: Typology


• 8: African tongue root systems: Case studies


• 9: Asian tongue root systems


• 10: Other cases of vowel harmony


• 11: Summary and further research


• References


• Language index


• Subject index

Harry van der Hulst is Professor of Linguistics and Director of Undergraduate Studies at the University of Connecticut. His particular research interests include stress, syllabic structure, segmental structure, sign language, gesture, language evolution, and phonological acquisition. His many books include The Phonological Structure of Words: An Introduction (with Colin Ewen; CUP 2001) and, as editor, Word Stress (CUP 2014) and he is Editor-in-Chief of the journal The Linguistic Review.