Avoidance of Association Line Crossing in Prosodic Structure: An Examination of Non-Local Compensatory Lengthening in Colloquial Persian

Abstract

This study examines how association line crossing in prosodic structure, as well as a bad sonority contour triggered by a glottal approximant in postconsonantal position, is avoided by non-local Compensatory Lengthening (CL) that invokes the double flop operation concerning Colloquial Persian. The study concludes that non-local CL in Colloquial Persian relies on Flop and Spread. After the deletion of a glottal consonant in the postconsonantal position that conforms to Weight-By-Position (WBP), the remaining postvocalic consonant is delinked from its mora and flops to the floating mora of the deleted glottal stop. The stem vowel would have an opportunity to spread to the adjacent mora to lengthen. This study also shows that the framework of Optimality Theory (OT) can support the double flop operation in non-local CL.