On the Irregular Verbs in Korean

Language, Information and Computation(PACLIC 11), 1996, 469-478 On the Irregular Verbs in Korean Sechang Lee University of Southern California sechangl@aludra.usc.edu Abstract The aim of this paper is to show how an optimality-theoretic conception of phonology (McCarthy & Prince 1993, 1995; Prince & Smolensky 1993) overcomes some of the limitations of the traditional ways of treating the so-called irregular verbs' in Korean. Building on the notion of OT, I attempt to shed new light on the properties of some general phonological phenomena of Korean. In the literature on Korean, the behavior of stem-final p' and h' is usually left unanalyzed as the alternations are considered to be phonologically unmotivated. I show in this paper that the irregular alternations are not really irregular but phonologically predictable. 1. Introduction Korean verbs' are typically divided into two groups: regular and irregular. Regular verbs are invariant throughout the paradigm. Irregular verbs, on the other hand, show alternations before certain suffixes. In the literature on Korean (e.g., Choy 1959; Huh 1965; Martin 1992), the behavior of "irregular" verbs is usually left unanalyzed as the alternations are considered to be phonologically unmotivated. This paper is organized as follows. After a presentation of surface [p]/[u](or [w]) alternations of /p/-irregular verbs, I argue that the alternation in question should be explained in terms of simplification in coda position, which will be captured through the interaction of structural and faithfulness constraints (section 2). The apparently dual behavior of /h/ will receive a unified account through the interactions among the universal constraints I propose (section 3). 2. /p/-irregular verbs The /p/-regular verbs are those verbs that end in /p/. They do not show any alternations before suffixes, as shown in (1): an underlying phoneme /p/ is phonetically realized in its unchanged form when either a vowel or a consonant follows: (1) /p/-regular verbs Indicative� Connective� Stative�Nominal�Gloss a. /kop + tai� /kop + ko/� /kop + a/� /kop + m/� ' to be numb' 4� 11� 4� 4 [Icop=.t'a]2�[kop=.k' 0]� [ko.ba]�[ko.buim] b. Additional /p/-regular verbs kup- `to bend' s' ip- `to chew' 469 However, the /p/-irregular verbs show alternations, as illustrated in (2): the stems apparently end in /p/, but show an alternation of [p] N [w] before a vowel (i.e. , Indicative and Connective forms) while they have no such alternation before a consonant (i.e., Stative and Nominal forms): (2) /p/-irregular verbs Indicative� Connective� Stative� Nominal�Gloss a. /kop + tal� /kop + ko/� /kop + a/� /kop + m/� 'to be beautiful' 11 �[kop=. t'a]� [kop= k'o]� [ko. wa]� [ko. um] b. Additional /p/-irregular verbs kup- ' to roast' mip- to be hateful' The question then is how to distinguish between those two types of verbs in a natural way. From the point of view of the Site-Articulator model (Gorecka 1989) and its conception of constriction location, the alternation between [p] and [w] can be straightforwardly accounted for. I suggest two different underlying representations for the two types of verbs in question, as contrasted below: (3) a. /p/-regular verbs� b. /p/-irregular …

Content truncated to 500 words