From Substance to Computation: Internalization and Hierarchical Structure in Evolutionary Phonology

Abstract

In the history of phonological theory, the paradigm of computational systems has shifted in tandem with a better understanding of substantive issues such as typology, acquisition, social variation, and historical change in sound structure. The paradigm shift in the past 50 years can simply be characterized as the one from serial derivation by rules to parallel evaluation by constraints, and now Optimality Theory (OT) focusses on substantive issues by improving its phonetic groundings and has ceased groping for a better mode of computation. This is because OT is primarily a substantive theory of CON, and at least in its standard version, the computational systems of Eval and GEN are merely given assumptions. In this article, we will overview some arguments against OT in substantive respects. As an ultimate problem in substance, it cannot solve the poverty paradox, which means the paradox of the poverty of the stimulus in ontogeny and the poverty of the inheritance in phylogeny. Moreover, as a proximate problem in substance, certain gaps to be missed in syllable typology would erroneously be predicted to exist by OT. Alternatively, we will rethink the mode of computation in phonology and propose a new paradigm for phonology from the viewpoint of language evolution under a minimalist lens. Our proposal is based on Fujitas (2016a, 2017) Hypothesis on Motor Control Origin of Merge in Language Evolution, which solves the poverty paradox and thus satisfies both explanatory and evolutionary adequacy. We will demonstrate that substantive findings in OT can successfully be carried over to this scenario, in which the empirical problem concerning the typological gap is offered a reasonable explanation. We will also show that phonology has a vital role in computation and is not merely a subsidiary issue at the interface of the Sensory-Motor systems in linearization or externalization. We will take up one case for this claim: the English syllable CCVC has structural ambiguity, which means that phonology involves internalization with some mechanisms in order to create different hierarchical structures.