Serial Reduplication Is Empirically Adequate and Typologically Restrictive

Abstract

Abstract Wei and Walker (2020) and Zymet (2018) claim that derivational lookahead effects are attested in the interactions between reduplication and other phonological processes in Mbe and Logoori, respectively. On the basis of this evidence, they argue that reduplication in these languages cannot be modeled by Serial Template Satisfaction (McCarthy, Kimper, and Mullin, 2012), a theory of reduplication set in Harmonic Serialism. This paper refutes these claims, and provides serial analyses for both languages. It further identifies a novel prediction of Base-Reduplicant Correspondence Theory (McCarthy and Prince, 1994, 1995, 1999), a parallel theory of reduplication, that reduplicants may surface with marked structures unattested elsewhere in the language, and demonstrates that these patterns are not replicated in serial.