Unexpected Morphophonological Outputs

This paper examines unexpected morphophonological outputs under diminutive rime change in Huojia, Jiyuan and Hongan, and explores a systemic contrastbased approach to show how preservation of phonological/phonetic contrasts serves to preserve morphophonological contrasts within the root-diminutive paradigm. The proposed anlaysis (i) shows that contrast-based constraints can provide a unified account of certain types of unexpected but systematic linguistic forms, (ii) adds to the growing body of research supporting a systemic approach to contrast preservation in phonology and morphology, and (iii) demonstrates that the notion of systemic contrast preservation can account for otherwise unexplained morphophonolgoical outputs and why contrast-based constraints should be extended to morphophonology and morphological paradigms.