Segmental deletion is of central importance for several recent controversies in phonological theory. In this
course, we provide an overview of major developments in typology and formal modelling which seem to require
a substantial reevaluation of deletion. Thus Ettlinger (2008) shows that deletion crosslinguistically
never interacts in specific expected ways with harmony processes. The second wave of containment-based
Optimality Theory has developed approaches which predict that segments should never completely delete, thus making
deletion similar to incomplete neutralization (van Oostendorp 2008, Trommer & Zimmermann 2015). McCarthy (2008a) argues
that systematic typological asymmetries in consonantal cluster simplification follow from the assumption that deletion
is not a one-step operation, but only possible after prior deletion of place features. An empirical focus of the course
is the interaction of deletion with prosodic factors (McCarthy 2008b, Wolf to appear).
- Trainer/in: Jochen Trommer