Gemination in Qassimi Arabic: An Optimality-Theoretic Analysis

Abstract

The current study explores the distribution, phonological behavior and representation of geminates in Qassimi Arabic (QA) within the framework of Optimality Theory (OT). The study begins by showing the main properties of geminates crosslinguistically: the case where geminates work dual patterning (acting as both single segments or consonant clusters), and the cases which geminates show resistance to certain phonological processes such as lenition, deletion and epenthesis. These characteristics are then investigated in the context of QA to manifest their behavior within this dialect. To address the behavior of geminates in QA, the study adopts the Moraic Theory, arguing that geminates in QA are best analyzed as single consonants linked to a mora. The distributional patterns of geminates in QA show that initial geminates are prohibited in QA, as their initial surface leads to a violation of prosodic constraints such as the Strict Layer Hypothesis (SLH) and Prosodic Licensing, which requires that every moraic segment belongs to an immediate higher category on the prosodic hierarchy. In contrast, medial geminates are permitted to surface in QA but must be surfaced as heterosyllabic consonants (C.C), while Final geminates surface only in monosyllabic words. These distributional patterns of geminates in QA are analysed using OT constraint interaction, capturing how markedness constraints (e.g., *-GC-, *FINAL-C-μ) are ranked higher over faithfulness constraints (e.g., MAX-GEM, IDENT-GEM). The analysis of this study contributes universally to theoretical controversy on geminate distribution and representation and in particular, it adds an understanding on the bahvior of geminates in Arabic. Furthermore, the study demonstrates how prosodic theory shapes segmental realization.