Polish Nasal Assimilation: Directionality and opacity
Polish Nasal Assimilation: Directionality and opacity

Summary/Abstract: This paper investigates Polish Nasal Assimilation from the perspective of Optimality Theory (OT), as documented by words such as [sɛmp] ‘vulture’ and [bɔŋk] ‘bumblebee’. It is argued that, contrary to standard assumptions, the directionality of assimilation is not determined by positional faithfulness constraints, but rather is controlled by general faithfulness constraints that require identity to place nodes and are crucially unidirectional. This new analysis of Polish is then tested against the data exhibiting interaction of Nasal Assimilation with Coronal Palatalization and with Yer Deletion. The former interaction is transparent and thus analyzable within standard OT, whereas the latter interaction is opaque and demonstrates that standard OT fails to deliver the correct results. The final section offers a reanalysis of the opaque data in terms of a version of OT that admits derivational levels.

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