Typology in Optimality Theory

When more choice means less freedom: a note on candidate sets and typologies

This is perhaps the kind of thing that seems obvious in hindsight, but we initially thought that our typology generation algorithm had a bug when it produced the following results: (1) Using the constraints ONSET, NOCODA, DEP-C, DEP-V, MAX to model the CV-syllable theory of Prince and Smolensky (1993:ch 6) over the 14 forms in the input set CV 3 = 3 i=1 {C, V} i (i.e., all strings of C and V up...

Optimality Of Monetary And Fiscal Policies In Iran: An Application Of The Stochastic Optimal Control Theory

Locality in metrical typology

Recent work in metrical typology within Optimality Theory has emphasised the rhythmic distribution of stress peaks by reference to clashes and lapses, compared to the more central role of foot constituency characteristic of most previous approaches. One consequence of this emphasis has been the introduction of constraints that require reference to non-adjacent objects in the representation, suc...

Linking, Optionality, and Ambiguity in Marathi

Optimality theory (OT; Prince and Smolensky 1993) has in a short time proven influential in theoretical phonology, and to a lesser degree in theoretical syntax. One of the main attractions of the theory is its strong commitment to typology. The basic hypothesis is that there is a set of universal constraints and languages differ only in how they rank the constraints. Since constraints are viola...

Recoverability Optimality Theory: Discourse Anaphora in a Bidirectional framework

In this work we explore the possibility of formalizing explanations based in the notion “deletion under recoverability”: information should be omitted in expressions if that information can be recovered without being overtly expressed – e.g., from information already encoded in the state of the discourse. This style of explanation is difficult to formalize for many reasons, among them that the ...