Round licensing, harmony, and bisyllabic triggers in Altaic

Natural Language & Linguistic Theory XIX. — Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2001. — P. 827–878.Within the Altaic family, restrictions on the distribution of round vowels are pervasive. In this paper, I explore the relation between three nonhigh round vowel patterns in Altaic. At the core is a study of round harmony in Classical Manchu (CMA) and Oroqen (Tungus branch of Altaic), which presents an interesting complication to the usual pattern of Tungusic harmony. These languages require round vowels in the first two syllables of a word in order to initiate round spreading, that is, the structure that initiates round harmony – thetrigger– must be minimally bisyllabic in size (Zhang 1996; Zhang and Dresher 1996). This contrasts with the more familiar condition under which a round vowel in the first syllable is sufficient alone to trigger spreading. The distinction is represented schematically in (1). In the familiar or canonicalTungusic round harmony, [Round] linked to the first syllable spreads to succeeding syllables (1a). In thebisyllabic trigger case, [Round] does not spread if it is linked only to the first syllable (1bi), but spreading occurs if it has pre-existing affiliations with both of the first two syllables (1bii).