Franconian tones fare better as tones than as feet: a reply to Köhnlein (2016)

Abstract

Köhnlein (2016) proposes to represent the Franconian tone contrast as a difference in foot structure, whereby Accent 1 appears in lexically marked syllabic trochees and Accent 2 in default moraic trochees, as an alternative to analyses with an underlying privative tone for Accent 2. After sketching the two approaches, we argue against three arguments Köhnlein advances in favour of the metrical analysis. We then show that one of the disadvantages incurred by the metrically derived tonal representations is the introduction of a novel and otherwise unsupported concept of a single tone that incorporates two morphologically different but phonologically identical tones. We also evaluate Köhnlein's (2018) more recent proposal to use the syllabic trochee to account for subtractive plurals in tonal dialects. Finally, we compare the predictive powers of the metrical and tonal analyses of the Arzbach dialect.