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In many languages vowel insertion gives rise to opaque stress patterns. This chapter provides arguments, based on examination of loanwords in Selayarese and North Kyungsang Korean and native vocabulary in Winnebago and Iraqi Arabic, that this opacity is due either to avoidance of epenthetic material in prominent positions, or to maximization of paradigmatic contrasts.

This chapter argues that there are clear natural and unnatural histories for patterns of consonant insertion which make no reference to syllable onset or segmental markedness. It offers new ways of understanding the typology of C-epenthesis. Within the realm of natural history, glide epenthesis and laryngeal epenthesis are two distinct subtypes with different phonetic and phonological profiles. In the domain of unnatural histories, significant correlations are observed between consonants subject to coda weakening and those involved in epenthesis. This finding follows from our understanding of rule inversion as part of phonological acquisition. Finally, a mix of natural and unnatural history characterizes the analysis of Oceanic j-accretion and Ritwan l-sandhi.

This chapter examines in detail one of the key features which has been assumed to differentiate a putative Old Arabic from Neo-Arabic, the presence vs. absence of a three-valued case system, nominative, accusative genitive. The status of case is first examined in the context of Afro-Asiatic, where a system comparable to Arabic does not exist in sister branches of the phylum, then in the Semitic sub-family, where it is suggested that only Akkadian had a comparable, robust system. Case in Classical Arabic is argued to be innovative relative to proto-Semitic. The crucial arguments are that case is not found in the contemporary dialects, and more importantly, no traces of former case markers are found, inviting the conclusion that a caseless variety is the only ancestor of the dialects. Furthermore, in the early grammar of Sibawaih, the case suffixes are represented as having a great deal of free variation, indicating a system still in the making.

This chapter continues the concentration on contemporary Arabic. Arabic dialects show considerable diversity in the tolerance of short, open syllables. Some allow them, some allow only low vowels in them, some allow no short open syllables. In those dialects with a restriction on the vowels, rules of deletion and repair through epenthesis can become quite complex. This chapter proposes that rules of epenthesis can be understood relative to three parameters: the role of consonantal sonority in epenthesis; whether epenthesis occurs within verb and noun stems; and whether consonantal sequence determines epenthesis. According to these criteria, contemporary dialects can be classified according to how far they have moved away from the reconstructed pre-diasporic situation. Particular attention is paid to Nigerian Arabic, whose complex rules of epenthesis based on sonority provide important insights into the diachronic processes involved.

This chapter analyses the origins of a range of consonantal features in MUE. Starting with an overview of the consonant system and a comparison of it to the consonant systems of the input varieties and to those of Ulster Scots and Southern Irish English, the chapter specifically concentrates on a number of key phonological patterns, several of them previously ascribed to Irish influence, which reveal crucial things about the history of the dialect. Features examined include Velar Palatalisation, Pre-R Dentalisation, survival of the dental fricatives, rhoticity, realisation of /l/, epenthesis in consonant clusters, and consonant deletions. It is shown that most consonantal patterns in the dialect derive from English and, to a lesser extent, Scots, possibly with some reinforcement from Irish.

Vocalic epenthesis occurred in some ‘stop + /l/’ sequences before classical Latin, but there is no satisfactory formulation of the phenomenon or its chronology. Epenthesis occurred only in complex onsets; heterosyllabic Tl showed regressive voice assimilation. The motivation for /bl/-epenthesis cannot be recovered as it was complete before first attestation of relevant forms. Epenthesis in /pl/ showed sensitivity to the degree of preceding stress, suggesting that it was phonetically based. In contrast, /kl/-epenthesis was triggered by morphological analogy based on /bl/-epenthesis: both sequences occurred at the start of the ‘mediative’ suffixes. A further phonological analogy occurred in /kl/, removing the morphological condition to yield the structural context ‘internal onset /kl/’. The differences in the motivations for /pl/- and /kl/-epenthesis can be detected in their implementation by lexical diffusion, matching the predictions of Phillips (2001): /kl/-epenthesis was relatively slow, and affected the least frequent forms first, whereas /pl/-epenthesis was fairly fast, affecting the most frequent first.

The factors influencing the insertion of non-etymological material (epenthesis) may extend beyond phonetics and phonology to include morphological and morphosyntactic considerations. We analyse cases from a wide variety of Romance languages where more than one epenthetic segment may satisfy a phonological constraint. We show that the choice of segment may be influenced by morphology or morphosyntax. We also investigate the insertion of a meaningless syllable where there may be little or no phonological motivation for insertion, but morphology plays a role in its distribution. In all of the cases examined, the inserted material (segment or syllable) has no semantic value and so is not a morph. Many of these phenomena have been accounted for in terms of lexically listed allomorphs; however, such an approach misses generalizations about the form and presence of the epenthetic material. We conclude that the notion of epenthesis should be broadened to include morphological and morphosyntactic conditions.

This chapter focuses on the typology of distributional constraints and alternations affecting segments. The discussion is divided according to the nature of the operations and constraints involved. First, feature-level phenomena are discussed, including assimilation, dissimilation, fortition, and lenition. Then, alternations impacting the number of segments are covered, including various deletion (syncope, apocope) and insertion/epenthesis (anaptyxis, prothesis, paragoge) processes, along with compensatory lengthening of one sound triggered by the loss of another sound. Finally, shifts in the ordering of sounds (metathesis) are discussed. Perceptual and articulatory explanations for these phenomena are advanced. The theory of autosegmental phonology is introduced as a formal means to represent segment-level operations.

The chapter begins with an overview of possible syllable types in Chichewa. Possible consonant sequences and issues relating to their syllabification are taken up next. Epenthesis strategies for adapting loanwords from languages which allow a wider variety of consonant cluster types are discussed in detail. Processes of vowel deletion and syllable reduction which create syllabic nasals conclude the discussion of the syllabification of consonant sequences. Vowel sequences are also limited in Chichewa. Morphologically conditioned vowel hiatus resolution strategies are illustrated in detail.