In this intro course, we will focus on the typology of prosodic systems with special emphasis on systems which are traditionally described as pitch accent systems (e.g., most dialects of Bosnian/Croatian/Montenegrin/Serbian, Norwegian and Japanese). The course consists of three parts. The first part will focus on the basic concepts, representations and terminological issues in prosody. The second part will be a brief introduction to prototypical stress systems (e.g., English, Italian and Hebrew) and tonal systems (e.g., Chinese, Thai, Yoruba). In the third part we will consider data from pitch-accent systems and dive into the ongoing debate whether there is room for pitch accent systems as a third type (Hyman 2006, 2009). Many properties of pitch accent languages will be illustrated using Bosnian/Croatian/Montenegrin/Serbian examples. While the speakers/learners of this language may additionally profit from this course, no knowledge of this or any other language is required. 

Literature (beginners’ level introductions in bold):

Goldsmith, J. A., Riggle, J., & Alan, C. L. (Eds.). (2014). The Handbook of Phonological Theory. John Wiley & Sons.
            Chapters 5 and 6.

Gordon, M. K. (2016). Phonological typology (Vol. 1). Oxford University Press.
           Chapters: 6, 7, 8.

Gussenhoven, C., & Jacobs, H. (2013). Understanding phonology. Routledge.
            Chapters: 10, 14, 15, 15.

Hyman, L. M. (2006). Word-prosodic typology. Phonology, 23(2), 225-257.

Hyman, L. M. (2009). How (not) to do phonological typology: The case of pitch-accent. Language Sciences, 31(2-3), 213-238. doi: 10.1016/j.langsci.2008.12.007.

Zsiga, Elizabeth C. 2013. The Sounds of Language: An Introduction to Phonetics and Phonology.  Wiley-Blackwell.
            Chapters: 15, 16, 17.