Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero Linguistics and English Language, University of Manchester
	Research
	Pauca sed matura. Gauss    Interests
	My main areas of research are: phonological and morphological theory; historical linguistics; Germanic (specially Old, Middle, and Present-day English); Romance (specially Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, and French). I have a particular interest in the interfaces between morphosyntax and phonology and between phonology and phonetics. In this field, my research focuses on the evidence for, and challenges to, classical modular feedforward architectures of grammar. My work on morphosyntactic conditioning in phonology highlights the advantages of cyclicity and stratification: see my page on Stratal Optimality Theory. Historical issues figure prominently in my work. I believe that proper consideration of the diachronic life-cycle of sound patterns is often crucial to solving problems of phonological description and explanation. At the same time, my work argues that a stratal-cyclic model of phonology embedded within a modular feedforward architecture of grammar can provide important insights into the life cycle of phonological processes.      Publications
	Google Scholar profile. Erdős number: 5. Henri Kauhanen, Deepthi Gopal, Tobias Galla & Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero. 2021. Geospatial distributions reflect temperatures of linguistic features. Science Advances 7(1): eabe6540. [show/hide abstract] [press coverage] [follow-up project] Quantifying the rate of change of different linguistic features is challenging because the historical evolution of languages is sparsely documented. Consequently, traditional methods rely on phylogenetic reconstruction. Here, we propose a model-based approach to the problem through the analysis of language change as a stochastic process combining vertical descent, spatial interactions, and mutations in both dimensions. A notion of linguistic temperature emerges naturally from this analysis as a dimensionless measure of the propensity of a linguistic feature to undergo change. We demonstrate how temperatures of linguistic features can be inferred from their present-day geospatial distributions, without recourse to information about their phylogenies. Thus, the evolutionary dynamics of language, operating across thousands of years, leave a measurable geospatial signature. This signature licenses inferences about the historical evolution of languages even in the absence of longitudinal data. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2020. The initiation and incrementation of sound change: community-oriented momentum-sensitive learning. In James Kirby, Lauren Hall-Lew & Patrick Honeybone (eds), Individuals, communities, and sound change. Special collection in Glossa 5(1): 121. [show/hide abstract] This article presents a theory of the initiation and incrementation mechanisms whereby individual phonetic innovations become community-wide sound changes. The theory asserts that language learners are community-oriented and momentum-sensitive: they are community-oriented in that they acquire and obey a mental representation of the collective linguistic norm of their speech community, rejecting individual idiosyncrasies; they are momentum-sensitive in that their mental representation of the community norm includes an age vector encoding linguistic differences between age groups. The theory is shown to fulfil four critical desiderata: (i) it accounts for the sporadic and localized occurrence of community-wide sound change, (ii) it incorporates Ohala’s prediction of a lawful relationship between the strength of the phonetic biases driving individual innovation and the typological frequency of the corresponding sound changes, (iii) it explains how community-wide sound change advances by intergenerational incrementation producing adolescent peaks in apparent time, and (iv) it reliably generates monotonic—including sigmoid—diachronic trajectories. Moreover, the hypotheses of community orientation and sensitivity to momentum, combined with the mechanical effects of density of contact, suffice to explain several macroscopic phenomena in the propagation of sound change, including class stratification, the curvilinear pattern in change from below, and the existence of change reversals. During propagation, linguistics variants do acquire indexical value, and so social meaning, but this produces only small-scale attitudinal effects; it is not the force that drives the intergenerational incrementation of sound change. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2018. In defence of underlying representations: Latin rhotacism, French liaison, Romanian palatalization. Probus 30(2): 171-214. [show/hide abstract] The surface realization of a linguistic expression can often be predicted from the form of paradigmatically related items that are not contained within it: in Latin, the nominative singular of a noun can often be inferred from the genitive; in French, the final consonant of a prenominal masculine adjective in liaison can typically be predicted from the feminine; in Romanian, the plural form of a noun determines whether its stem will exhibit palatalization before the derivational suffix /-ist/. Such instances of phonological paradigmatic dependence without containment have been claimed to challenge cyclic models of the morphosyntax-phonology interface. In this article, however, they are shown to be established indirectly through the acquisition of underlying representations. This approach correctly predicts that phonological paradigmatic dependencies are never systematically extended to new items if they involve suppletive allomorphy rather than regular alternation, whilst those surface phonological properties of derivatives that are under strict phonotactic control evade paradigmatic dependence on the inflectional forms of their bases. Theories relying on surface-to-surface computation fail to recover these empirical predictions because they are inherently nonmodular, positing generalizations that promiscuously mix phonological, morphosyntactic, and lexical information. Underlying representations therefore remain indispensable as a means of establishing a necessary modular demarcation between regular phonology and suppletive allomorphy. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2018. Stratal Phonology. In S.J. Hannahs & Anna R. K. Bosch (eds), The Routledge handbook of phonological theory, 100-134. Abingdon: Routledge. [show/hide abstract] The purpose of this paper is threefold: to survey current work in Stratal Phonology, to respond to recent arguments against cyclic phonological derivations, and to explore the morphological implications of the theory. Section 2 lays out the basic principles of Stratal Phonology: cyclicity and stratification. These make major empirical predictions, including Cyclic Containment, the Russian Doll Theorem, and Chung’s Generalization. The exposition highlights the fact that Stratal Phonology differs from other cyclic frameworks, such as Cophonology Theory, in positing relatively fewer cycles. Recent proposals are reviewed which look to independent facts in an effort to derive long-standing generalizations about cyclic domain structures: notably, the noncyclic status of roots and the recursiveness of stem-level domains. Section 3 addresses the contest between cyclicity and output-output correspondence, focusing on Steriade’s (1999) claim that English dual-level affixes like -able challenge Cyclic Containment. I argue that, whilst Steriade’s argument draws force from important empirical facts, containment-compliant analyses centred on lexical acquisition not only describe the phenomena accurately, but also generate correct empirical predictions that are not matched by accounts relying on output-output correspondence. Section 4 assesses Stratal Phonology by evaluating the plausibility of its implications for morphology. I show, first, that the theory can derive the relative ordering of phonological strata without recourse to the Affix Ordering Generalization, and that it can handle bracketing paradoxes without recourse to rebracketing operations. At the same time, Stratal Phonology presupposes that morphology and phonology are distinct grammatical modules, and for this reason it favours concatenativist approaches to putative instances of process morphology, in line with Generalized Nonlinear Affixation. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2016. We do not need structuralist morphemes, but we do need constituent structure. In Daniel Siddiqi & Heidi Harley (eds), Morphological metatheory, 387-429. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. [show/hide abstract] In the prethematic high~mid alternation of Spanish third-conjugation verbs, allomorph selection by phonological subcategorization in the morphology interacts with allomorph selection by phonotactic optimization in the phonology, pace Paster (2015). The cyclic locality conditions on this alternation support frameworks with stem storage (Bermúdez-Otero 2013) or spanning (Svenonius and Haugen & Siddiqi in this volume), and challenge single-terminal insertion. Embick’s (2012) alternative analysis weakens inward cyclic locality excessively. Myler’s (2015) counterproposal overgenerates and undermines the explanation of the parallel cyclic transmission of allomorphy and allosemy. Allomorphy-allosemy mismatches do occur: e.g. when English trànsp[ə]rtátion preserves the argument structure of trànspórt but not its bipedality. However, such mismatches are not generated computationally; they arise diachronically through the interplay of computation and storage (Bermúdez-Otero 2012). Theories asserting that words lack constituent structure cannot explain this fact, pace Blevins, Ackerman & Malouf (this volume). Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo & Ana R. Luís. 2016. A view of the morphome debate. In Ana R. Luís & Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero (eds), The morphome debate, 309-340. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [show/hide abstract] This paper surveys the current debate on the morphome, drawing attention to underexplored theoretical possibilities and underexploited empirical tools. We distinguish three related but separate claims made by proponents of the morphome: that there exist morphological patterns mapping arbitrary sets of exponenda onto arbitrary sets of exponents; that such patterns do not suffer from a learnability disadvantage; and that all patterns of exponence are mediated by purely morphological categories belonging to an autonomous level of linguistic representation. We review the problems caused by the lack of positive criteria for morphomicity and by disagreements over the application of negative criteria. We present arguments for a learning bias in favour of realization patterns involving natural classes, and we call for greater use of wug-tests and artificial grammar learning experiments in research on this question. Competing morphological theories turn out to be exhibit a surprising amount of empirical overlap, and their implications for the learnability of morphomic patterns are less straightforward than usually assumed. Luís, Ana R. & Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero (eds). 2016. The morphome debate. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [show/hide description] This volume surveys the current debate on the morphome, bringing together experts from different linguistic fields (morphology, phonology, semantics, typology, historical linguistics) and from different theoretical backgrounds, including both proponents and critics of autonomous morphology. The concept of the morphome is one of the most influential but contentious ideas in contemporary morphology. The term is typically used to denote a pattern of exponence lacking phonological, syntactic, or semantic motivation, and putative examples of morphomicity are frequently put forward as evidence for the existence of a purely morphological level of linguistic representation. Central to the volume is the need to attain a deeper understanding of morphomic patterns, developing stringent diagnostics of their existence, exploring the formal grammatical devices required to characterize them adequately, and assessing their implications for language acquisition and change. The extensive empirical evidence is drawn from a wide range of languages, including Archi, German, Kayardild, Latin and its descendants, Russian, Sanskrit, Selkup, Ulwa, and American Sign Language. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2015. Amphichronic explanation and the life cycle of phonological processes. In Patrick Honeybone & Joseph C. Salmons (eds), The Oxford handbook of historical phonology, 374-399. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [show/hide abstract] In amphichronic phonology, synchronic and diachronic explanation feed each other. Notably, the modular architecture of grammar predicts the possible modes of implementation of phonological change, including neogrammarian regularity, and lays down the track for the life cycle of sound patterns. In turn, an understanding of this life cycle relieves grammatical theory of the need to explain a wide range of synchronic phenomena. In the course of the life cycle, for example, it is normal for innovative phonological rules not to replace the phonetic processes from which they emerge, but to coexist with them. This type of rule scattering can create the appearance of morphologically sensitive phonetics without actually violating modularity. Similarly, the life cycle creates a tendency for older phonological processes to apply at higher levels in the grammar than younger ones. For this reason, younger generalized versions of existing phonological processes tend to apply in wider morphosyntatic domains, as do relatively new and aggressive processes of reduction in diachronic lenition trajectories. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2013. The Spanish lexicon stores stems with theme vowels, not roots with inflectional class features. Probus 25(1). 3-103. [show/hide abstract] The choice of theme vowels in Spanish nouns and adjectives can be predicted neither from the phonological shape of roots nor from syntactic features like gender. However, this state of affairs does not require the postulation of inflectional class features. The alternative is for the Spanish lexicon to store stems with their theme vowels, instead of roots annotated with declension diacritics. Default generalizations over the lexical entries of stems can be expressed by means of lexical redundancy rules. The hypothesis of stem storage is compatible with the failure of Spanish theme vowels to surface in certain environments. This is demonstrably caused by an entirely general and regular phonological process deleting unaccented stem-final vowels before suffixes beginning with another vowel. Stem storage receives further support from psycholinguistic data from recognition latencies. Additional new evidence comes from cyclic locality conditions on allomorph selection, as shown by an analysis of the well-known stress-driven alternation displayed by items like [kont-á-ɾ] ‘count.inf’ ~ [kwént-a] ‘count.3sg’. In derivatives like [N [V kont-a] ðóɾ-∅] ‘counter’, assuming that diphthongal allomorphy is a property of the root incorrectly predicts that the choice of allomorph will be determined in the first cycle: i.e. *[kwentaðóɾ]. The locality problem vanishes if /kont-a/ and /kwent-a/ are both listed in the lexicon as stem allomorphs. These data show that Stratal Optimality Theory allied to a stem-driven theory of morphology performs better than alternative approaches to allomorphic locality. Root-driven Distributed Morphology is too local: the domains for allomorph selection that it generates are too narrow. Conversely, noncyclic versions of Optimality Theory fail to predict allomorphic locality (even if they can describe its effects) because they endow allomorph selection with unrestricted access to the global environment. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo & Graeme Trousdale. 2012. Cycles and continua: on unidirectionality and gradualness in language change. In Terttu Nevalainen & Elizabeth Closs Traugott (eds), The Oxford handbook of the history of English, 691-720. New York: Oxford University Press. [show/hide abstract] The history of English exhibits numerous instances of changes that proceed along crosslinguistically recurrent pathways, notably the life cycle of phonological processes and grammaticalization clines. These pathways of change bear striking resemblances to each other: both are predominantly unidirectional, and both produce ‘layering’ effects in which old and new patterns come to coexist in the synchronic grammar. We provide English examples of key stages in the life cycle of phonological processes, including the rise of new gradient processes of phonetic implementation, their stabilization as categorical phonological rules, and the narrowing of their morphosyntactic domains. Understanding this life cycle enables us to rethink classic problems, such as the history of word-final prevocalic consonants. We also examine the grammaticalization cycles in the development of grammatical words, clitics and affixes in English, and the micro-steps involved in the creation of new grammatical constructions. As with the discussion of phonological change, we explore continua (within and between morphosyntactic categories), and directionality, and show how such rethinking is relevant for our understanding of classic problems in the history of English morphosyntax, such as the development of markers of negation, and the s-genitive. The parallels between phonological and morphosyntactic change which we address suggest new ways of thinking about the nature of grammatical change. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2012. The architecture of grammar and the division of labour in exponence. In Jochen Trommer (ed.), The morphology and phonology of exponence (Oxford Studies in Theoretical Linguistics 41), 8-83. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [show/hide abstract] Languages commonly exhibit alternations governed by complex combinations of phonological, morphological, and lexical factors. An alternation of this sort will often admit a wide variety of analyses, each apportioning different roles to lexical storage and to morphological and phonological computation. Such analytic underdetermination poses a threat to falsifiability and to learnability: hypotheses can easily evade empirical disconfirmation if potential counterexamples can be redescribed in many different ways to suit the linguist's convenience, and so theories risk losing empirical content; by the same token, it becomes hard to explain how, among a plethora of choices, learners converge upon the target grammar (§2). To avert these dangers, the theory of grammar must set limits to the space of possible interactions between phonology, morphology, and the lexicon: in particular, it must ascertain the proper division of labour between storage and computation (§3), and it must constrain the ways in which morphological operations can manipulate phonological material and in which phonological processes can refer to morphosyntactic information (§4). Concerning the question of storage vs computation, this paper pursues the hypothesis that different types of alternation reflect different modes of interaction between the lexicon and the grammar. This idea is fleshed out by means of a refined dual-route approach to exponence (§3.1, §3.5), in which the well-established distinction between explicit symbolic generalization and implicit pattern association (§3.1, §3.4) is supplemented with a novel distinction between two types of lexical listing, analytic and nonanalytic, akin to Clahsen and Neubauer's (2010: 2634) contrast between ‘combinatorial entries’ and ‘unanalysed entries’ (§3.1, §3.3.1). Assuming a stratal version of Optimality Theory (OT), I show that the peculiar syndrome of properties characteristic of stem-level morphophonology arises from the fact that stem-level forms are stored nonanalytically but stem-level processes are nonetheless explicitly represented in the grammar by means of symbolic generalizations, whose status resembles that of Jackendoff's (1975) lexical redundancy rules (§3.3.1). The model provides a highly explanatory account of internal cyclic effects in stem-level domains, which I illustrate with classic examples such as English órigin ~ oríginal ~ orìginálity (§3.3.2) and còmp[ə]nsátion vs cònd[ɛ]nsátion (§3.3.3). On the issue of the interaction between morphology and phonology, this paper argues for the adoption of a restrictive stance based on general cognitive principles of modularity and locality (§4.1). A programme is proposed consisting of four hypotheses (37): that morphology selects and concatenates morphs without ever altering their phonological content (§4.2); that phonological constraints other than those on prosodic alignment may not refer to morphosyntactic information (§4.3); that output phonological representations do not contain diacritics of morphosyntactic affiliation (§4.4); and that morphosyntactic conditioning in phonology is subject to cyclic locality (§4.4). These hypotheses provide the guiding thread for an evaluation of several mechanisms currently used to describe morphologically conditioned phonological processes, including construction-specific cophonologies (§4.2.3), indexed constraints (§4.3), and readjustment rules (§4.3). The balance of argument supports a stratal-cyclic architecture for phonology—one, however, in which neither cyclicity nor stratification are innately stipulated, but both emerge from fundamental storage and processing mechanisms (§3.3.2, §3.3.3) and from timing effects in the child's linguistic development (§4.2.3). Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2012. When a knowledge of history is a dangerous thing. In David Denison, Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero, Christopher B. McCully & Emma Moore, with the assistance of Ayumi Miura (eds), Analysing older English (Studies in English Language), 187-193. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. David Denison, Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero, Christopher B. McCully & Emma Moore, with the assistance of Ayumi Miura (eds). 2012. Analysing older English (Studies in English Language). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [show/hide description] Is historical linguistics different in principle from other linguistic research? This book addresses problems encountered in gathering and analysing data from early English, including the incomplete nature of the evidence and the dangers of misinterpretation or over-interpretation. Despite these difficulties, gaps in the data can sometimes be filled. The volume brings together a team of leading English historical linguists who have encountered such issues first-hand, to discuss and suggest solutions to a range of problems in the phonology, syntax, dialectology, and onomastics of older English. The topics extend widely over the history of English, chronologically and linguistically, and include Anglo-Saxon naming practices, the phonology of the alliterative line, computational measurement of dialect similarity, dialect levelling and enregisterment in late Modern English, stress-timing in English phonology, and the syntax of Old and early Modern English. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo & John Payne. 2011. There are no special clitics. In Alexandra Galani, Glyn Hicks & George Tsoulas (eds), Morphology and its interfaces (Linguistik Aktuell 178), 57–96. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. [show/hide abstract] The hypothesis of Clitic Idiosyncrasy holds that special clitics are neither words nor affixes, but constitute a separate type of object whose behaviour is partly governed by dedicated grammatical mechanisms. In an influential implementation of this idea, Judith L. Klavans and Stephen R. Anderson claim that special clitics are phrasal affixes, introduced by a set of postlexical morphological rules that is separate from stem- and word-level morphology. This paper criticizes the hypothesis of Clitic Idiosyncrasy and its implementation through phrasal affixation. First, we show that the identification of a distinct class of special clitics depends on a concept of ‘special syntax’ that is not well-defined: in many instances, there are syntactically autonomous units that exhibit the same behaviour as putative special clitics. Secondly, we note that the theory of phrasal affixation incorrectly predicts that special clitics will be invisible to lexical morphophonology. Thirdly, we demonstrate that, in certain crucial cases, phrasal affixation cannot place special clitics in the right positions: in Bulgarian, for example, the definiteness marker is suffixed to the head of the first syntactic phrase immediately contained within the NP. We show that this behaviour is straightforwardly handled by a theory of syntactic feature-passing within subtrees that allows phrasal features to be transferred now to heads, now to edges. This theory is independently motivated by phenomena such as the English ’s genitive and Old Georgian Suffixaufnahme. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2011. Cyclicity. In Marc van Oostendorp, Colin Ewen, Elizabeth Hume & Keren Rice (eds), The Blackwell companion to phonology, vol. 4, 2019-2048. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. [show/hide abstract] This paper addresses current debates about morphosyntactic conditioning in phonology. After proposing criteria for distinguishing between representational (prosodic) and procedural (cyclic) effects, I focus on the contest between the cycle and OO-correspondence. I adduce three instances of morphosyntactically induced phonological misapplication that challenge the basic premises of transderivational theories: Quito Spanish /s/-voicing, English linking and intrusive r, and Albanian verb stress. In all three cases, the surface bases needed for an analysis relying on OO-correspondence are unavailable for phonological or morphological reasons. The discussion shows that questions about morphosyntax-phonology interactions are intricately entangled with problems in other areas of phonology, notably including the theory of representations, the phonology-phonetics interface, and the balance between synchronic and diachronic explanation. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2007. Spanish pseudoplurals: phonological cues in the acquisition of a syntax-morphology mismatch. In Matthew Baerman, Greville Corbett, Dunstan Brown & Andrew Hippisley (eds), Deponency and morphological mismatches (Proceedings of the British Academy 145), 231-269. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [show/hide abstract] Spanish has two types of nouns with homophonous singular and plural forms ending in /s/. In pseudoplural nouns like Carl-o-s 'Charles', the number contrast is neutralized in the morphology: the syntactically singular form contains the plural marker /-s/. In athematic nouns like virus 'virus', the number contrast is neutralized in the phonology through a process of degemination. The distinction between pseudoplural and athematic nouns manifests itself only under stem-based evaluative suffixation: e.g. augmentative Carl-ot-e vs virus-ot-e. However, children are almost never exposed to these crucial forms, which have vanishingly low token frequencies; instead, learners of Spanish acquire the pseudoplural/athematic distinction on the basis of language-particular parsing preferences motivated by morphological and phonological properties of the Spanish lexicon. The emergence of the Spanish pseudoplural nouns shows that, during language acquisition, the phonological properties of words can trigger syntax-morphology mismatches. This finding has significant implications for the syntax-morphology interface. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2007. Diachronic phonology. In Paul de Lacy (ed.), The Cambridge handbook of phonology, 497-517. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.  Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2006. Morphological structure and phonological domains in Spanish denominal derivation. In Fernando Martínez-Gil & Sonia Colina (eds), Optimality-theoretic studies in Spanish phonology, 278-311. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. [show/hide abstract] In Spanish denominal derivation, the theme vowel of the base typically disappears before the derivational suffix: e.g. man-o 'hand', man-az-a 'hand.aug', *man-o-az-a. This pattern can be analysed in two ways: as driven by a morphotactic restriction, or as created by a morphophonological process of stem-final vowel deletion. James Harris and his followers have consistently assumed the former. Stratal OT, however, requires the latter, for otherwise the interaction between diphthongization and depalatalization gives rise to a stratification paradox. Independent morphological evidence provides support for stem-final vowel deletion. Stratal OT emerges from this trial as an empirically adequate, highly restrictive, and heuristically powerful model of grammar. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo & April McMahon. 2006. English phonology and morphology. In Bas Aarts & April McMahon (eds), The handbook of English linguistics, 382-410. Oxford: Blackwell. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo & Kersti Börjars. 2006. Markedness in phonology and in syntax: the problem of grounding. In Patrick Honeybone & Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero (eds), Linguistic knowledge: perspectives from phonology and from syntax. Lingua 116(5) (special issue). 710-756. [show/hide abstract] This article adopts the perspective of Optimality Theory (OT) to address the question whether phonology and syntax are equally autonomous. We show that OT enjoys the same advantages and encounters the same problems in syntax as in phonology; this suggests that markedness plays an equally important rôle in both components of language. Most markedness constraints, however, are clearly grounded: although they refer to specifically linguistic categories (self-containment), they typically display some degree of functional adaptation to the demands of performance (nonarbitrariness). In consequence, phonology and syntax should be expected to be grounded to a similar degree. Pace Hale & Reiss (2000), however, the postulation of grounded markedness constraints in the theory of grammar does not violate Ockham's Razor. In particular, we show that markedness cannot be equated with performance difficulty, and we demonstrate that infants require knowledge of markedness during language acquisition in order to transcend the limitations of inductive generalization. However, this does not necessarily imply that knowledge of markedness is innate; we argue, rather, that most markedness constraints may in fact emerge in the course of linguistic development through the child's monitoring of her own performance. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo & Patrick Honeybone. 2006. Phonology and syntax: a shifting relationship. In Patrick Honeybone & Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero (eds), Linguistic knowledge: perspectives from phonology and from syntax. Lingua 116(5) (special issue). 543-561. [show/hide abstract] This article surveys the range of patterns of interaction which have existed between phonological and syntactic research, especially in the 20th century, both in work published during this period, and in the articles collected in the Special Issue to which this piece forms an introduction. For each stage in the development of linguistic thought, we consider whether the dominant conception of language has been fostered by phonologists or syntacticians, and whether phonology and syntax have been judged to be structurally analogous. We show that linguists' views of the relationship between the two disciplines often hinge on their opinions concerning the autonomy of language, on the extent to which they perceive phonological acquisition to be subject to Plato's Problem, and even on the extent to which phonology and syntax are thought to have evolved independently or connectedly. We note that, paradoxically, linguists adopting radically diverging standpoints on these issues may nonetheless come to similar conclusions regarding the existence of putative structural analogies between phonology and syntax. Honeybone, Patrick & Ricardo Bermúdez-Otero (eds). 2006. Linguistic knowledge: perspectives from phonology and from syntax. Lingua 116(5) (special issue). 543-756. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2006. Phonological change in Optimality Theory. In Keith Brown (ed.), Encyclopedia of language and linguistics, 2nd edn, vol. 9, 497-505. Oxford: Elsevier. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2005. Review of Alliteration and sound change in early English by Donka Minkova. Diachronica 22. 438-445. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2003. The acquisition of phonological opacity. In Jennifer Spenader, Anders Eriksson & Östen Dahl (eds), Variation within Optimality Theory: Proceedings of the Stockholm Workshop on `Variation within Optimality Theory´, 25-36. Stockholm: Department of Linguistics, Stockholm University.  [The link on the title of the paper points to an expanded version stored on the Rutgers Optimality Archive] [show/hide abstract] This paper argues that Stratal OT is explanatorily superior to alternative OT treatments of phonological opacity (notably, Sympathy Theory). It shows that Stratal OT supports a learning model that accounts for the acquisition of opaque grammars with a minimum of machinery. The model is illustrated with a case study of the classic counterbleeding interaction between Diphthong Raising and Flapping in Canadian English. [For an update of my analysis of Canadian Raising, see here.] Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo & Richard M. Hogg. 2003. The actuation problem in Optimality Theory: phonologization, rule inversion, and rule loss. In D. Eric Holt (ed.), Optimality Theory and language change (Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 56), 91-119. Dordrecht: Kluwer. [show/hide abstract] This chapter outlines Optimality Theory’s contribution to research into the actuation of phonological change. We examine both phonetically driven innovation and analogical change (particularly rule inversion and rule loss). Following Ohala, we assume that the phonologization of mechanical phonetic effects is caused by parser malfunction. It is therefore suggested that, as a theory of grammar, OT will play a secondary role in accounts of phonologization. Nonetheless, OT makes a significant contribution in this area by modeling the restrictions that universal markedness principles impose upon phonological innovation. In this connection, we argue that markedness generalizations are not mere epiphenomena of performance-driven change, and we refute the claim that inverted phonological processes are synchronically arbitrary. In the area of analogy, the Optimality-Theoretic concept of input optimization affords new insights. We observe that most types of analogical change involve the restructuring of input representations at some level in the phonology. Restructuring usually occurs when, as a result of some independent development, learners cease to encounter positive cues to abandon their default state, in which input representations are identical with the corresponding outputs. We show that, whereas OT predicts this state of affairs, rule-based theories cannot account for the facts without imposing contradictory demands on acquisition theory. Our discussion of analogy is illustrated with a case-study of rule inversion and rule loss in the late West Saxon dialect of Old English. The analysis is couched in the framework of interleaved OT. It is shown that, unlike strictly parallel approaches to the phonology-morphology interface, interleaved OT preserves and develops the best insights of Lexical Phonology into the life cycle of phonological processes. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 2002. Review of Phonological knowledge: conceptual and empirical issues by Noel Burton-Roberts, Philip Carr & Gerard Docherty. Journal of Linguistics 38. 403-410. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo, David Denison, Richard M. Hogg & C. B. McCully (eds). 2000. Generative theory and corpus studies: a dialogue from 10ICEHL. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo. 1998. Prosodic optimization: the Middle English length adjustment. English Language and Linguistics 2. 169-197. [show/hide abstract] During late Old and Middle English, the distribution of short and long vowels in stressed syllables was profoundly altered. The changes involved have traditionally been understood as conspiring to optimize syllable quantity according to the position of the syllable in the word. However, Minkova's reformulation of so-called Middle English Open Syllable Lengthening (MEOSL) as a purely compensatory process appears difficult to reconcile with the traditional approach, which has recently been further compromised by suggestions that Trisyllabic Shortening was not a genuine historical sound change. In this article, Minkova's analysis is supported with new evidence of phonological conditioning behind the irregular lengthening of unapocopated disyllabic stems (e.g. raven vs heaven, body, gannet). I propose solutions to Riad's ‘data problem’ and ‘analytical problem’. Optimality Theory allows Minkova's revised statement of MEOSL to be integrated into a broader, non-teleological account of late Old and Middle English quantitative developments, including coverage of processes of lexical change such as borrowing and diffusion. Bermúdez-Otero, Ricardo & C. B. McCully. 1997. Review of Quantity adjustment: vowel lengthening and shortening in Early Middle English by Nikolaus Ritt. Journal of Linguistics 33. 620-625.      Selected manuscripts, handouts, and online comments
	2024. Nonuniformity in Stratal Phonology. Handout, 21st Old World Conference in Phonology (OCP21), Leipzig, 14 February 2024. 2022. Lexically restricted phonological alternation: the case for via-rules. Handout, 20th International Morphology Meeting, Budapest, 1 September 2022.    2019. Alternation types: computation, storage, history. Brugmann Fellow course, University of Leipzig, July 2019. [show/hide abstract] Contextual variation in the form of linguistic exponents, i.e. ‘alternation’ in the broadest sense of the term, comprises an extremely wide variety of phenomena: from probabilistic variation operating over—and affected by—continuous phonetic parameters, to strong suppletion conditioned by syntactic features. This course presents an attempt to derive a fine-grained taxonomy of alternation types in a theoretically principled manner from the interaction of three key elements:  (i) a constraint-based stratal-cyclic theory of phonological computation (Bermúdez-Otero 2018); (ii) an approach to lexical storage under which entries may be either nonanalytic or analytic, and may be linked by nonproductive schemata (Bermúdez-Otero 2012: §2.3); (iii) an account of the diachronic life cycle of phonological patterns (Bermúdez-Otero 2015). This effort leads to the conclusion that, whilst the synchronic implementation of particular alternations often involves highly complex and redundant interactions between several lexical and grammatical components, the overall typology and diachronic dynamics of alternation presents a remarkably orderly picture at the global level.. Overview    Session 1    Session 2    Session 3    Session 4    Session 5    Session 6    Session 7    [show/hide class titles] Session 1:   Foundations of Stratal Phonology Session 2:   Challenges to Stratal Phonology Session 3:   English /aɪ/-raising: new insights into an old problem Session 4:   Nonanalytic listing and the theory of the stem level Session 5:   Listed stem allomorphs and via-rules Session 6:   The life cycle of phonological processes and rule scattering Session 7:   Endogenous stratal splits and the life cycle of affixes 2018. Diagnostics of the moraic trochee from Proto-Germanic to present-day English. Handout, Workshop on the Foot in the Phonological History of English, ICEHL XX, Edinburgh, 27 August 2018. 2017. Rule inversion, rule generalization, and the life cycle. Comment on ‘Rule scattering and vowel length in Northern Romance’ by Pavel Iosad (Papers in Historical Phonology 1). 27 November 2017. 2017. Against the direct lexicalization of phonetic patterns. Comment on ‘Voice-induced vowel lengthening’ by Tobias Scheer (Papers in Historical Phonology 2). 24 November 2017. 2017. The allophony of English /aɪ/ reconsidered. Handout, PhLEGMe, Indiana University, Bloomington, 19 September 2017. 2017 (with George Bailey, Maciej Baranowski, and Danielle Turton). The phonological lexicon, usage factors, and rates of change: evidence from Manchester English. Slides, ConSOLE XXV, Leipzig, 4 January 2017. 2016. Phonology and the lexicon: a tutorial. Part I: a survey of current issues. Handout, Phonological Theory Agora Meeting 3, Tours, 14 October 2016. 2016. Comment on ‘Chomsky 1957 and the past tense’. Phonolist, 28 June 2016. 2015. The Monongahela argument. Class notes for the course LELA30441 English Phonology Past and Present, University of Manchester, 26 November 2015. [show/hide description] This set of class notes outlines an argument for the rightward adjunction of the final light syllable in pretonic ˌLLL and LˌHL sequences in English: e.g. (Wìnni)(pe((sáu)kee)) and (Mo(nòn))(ga((hé)la)). There is further discussion on Phonolist, 10-26 February 2017. 2015. The life cycle of High Vowel Deletion in Old English: from prosody to stratification and loss. Handout, 9th Studies in the History of the English Language Conference (SHEL-9), Vancouver, 5 June 2015. 2014. Philadelphia /aɪ/-raising without rule insertion. Handout, First Edinburgh Symposium on Historical Phonology, Edinburgh, 13 January 2014. 2013. The stem-level syndrome. Handout, UPenn Linguistics Department, Speaker Series, Philadelphia, 11 April 2013. 2013. An amphichronic approach to English syllabification. Handout, RUMMIT, Amherst, 6 April 2013. 2012 (with Helen Buckler). Word-level affixes trigger stem-level cycles: evidence from German dorsal fricatives. Handout, 20th Manchester Phonology Meeting, Manchester, 26 May 2012. 2011. Emergent cyclicity? Handout, 9èmes rencontres du Réseau Français de Phonologie, Tours, 1 July 2011. 2010. Morphologically conditioned phonetics? Not proven. Handout, On Linguistic Interfaces II, Belfast, 2 December 2010. 2009 (with Ana R. Luís). Cyclic domains and prosodic spans in the phonology of European Portuguese functional morphs. Handout, Old World Conference in Phonology 6, Edinburgh, 24 January 2009. 2008. A tutorial on lexical classes. Handout, Workshop on Theoretical Morphology 4, Großbothen, 20 June 2008. 2007. Marked phonemes vs marked allophones: segment evaluation in Stratal OT. Handout, Workshop on Segment Inventories, GLOW XXX, Tromsø, 11 April 2007. 2007. Word-final prevocalic consonants in English: representation vs derivation. Handout, Old World Conference in Phonology 4, Rhodes, 20 January 2007. 2006. Phonological domains and opacity effects: a new look at voicing and continuancy in Catalan. Handout, Workshop on Approaches to Phonological Opacity, GLOW XXIX, Barcelona, 5 April 2006. 2005. A-stem nouns in West Saxon: synchrony. Ms, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, February 2005. [Link to my project on Old English a-stem nouns] 2002. Cyclicity or sympathy? A case study. Handout, 10th Manchester Phonology Meeting, Manchester, 25 May 2002. 2001. Underlyingly nonmoraic consonants, faithfulness, and sympathy. Ms, University of Manchester, January 2001. 1999. Constraint interaction in language change: quantity in English and Germanic [Opacity and globality in phonological change]. PhD dissertation, University of Manchester & Universidad de Santiago de Compostela. [Main PDF file 11 MB, pages 133-134] 1998. Lexicon optimization: irregular vowel length changes in Middle English. Handout, X International Conference on English Historical Linguistics, Manchester, 22 August 1998. 1998. Harmonic evaluation of lexical items: evidence from Middle English. Handout, 6th Manchester Phonology Meeting, Manchester, 23 May 1998. 1997. Factorial typology and language change. Handout, Autumn Meeting of the Linguistics Association of Great Britain, Watford, 4-6 September 1997.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  Icon pack by Icons8