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4 - Syllable Structure

from Part 1 - Prosody and Phonology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 May 2024

By
Alexei Kochetov
Edited by
Danko Šipka  and
Wayles Browne
Danko Šipka
Affiliation:
Arizona State University
Wayles Browne
Affiliation:
Cornell University, New York
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Summary

This chapter provides an overview of Slavic syllable structure from both synchronic and diachronic perspectives. It begins by introducing some general phonological background on the syllable and reviewing key concepts, such as syllabification and sonority. The discussion further focuses on specific aspects of Slavic syllable structure: inventories of syllable-initial and syllable-final consonants and consonant clusters, and the composition of syllable peaks (vowels and syllabic consonants). This is done by situating patterns characteristic of Slavic in the context of cross-linguistic typology of syllable structure, as well as by highlighting common historical sources and more recently developed differences among individual Slavic languages. The chapter concludes with a short review of recent experimental and corpus work on Slavic syllable structure.

Keywords

syllableonsetcodanucleusclusterssyllabification
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Slavic Linguistics , pp. 64 - 86
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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