Do-support is a unique characteristic of English. Many languages other than English have do-periphrasis but not English-type do-support. This raises the obvious question: What is special about English? The goal of this paper is to provide an account of English do-support that explains why do-support, with its attendant properties, is found uniquely in English. I review the classical derivational approaches to do-support and argue that they do not satisfactorily capture the generalizations. I suggest an alternative, non-derivational account of contemporary do-support that makes crucial use of constructions. Finally, I propose an account of the history of do-support in English that characterizes the changes in terms of the content and scope of constructions. The rise of do-support can be understood as a consequence of the contraction and re-specialization of particular constructions in the wake of well-documented changes in the overt morphological system of the language.*

In the literature on grammaticalization, it is generally assumed that there are two categories of bound elements, clitics and affixes, and that a development from the former to the latter is an example of gram-maticalization. Frequently, this development in form is assumed to be associated with a change in function. In this paper, we argue that a simple dichotomy between clitic and affix does not do justice to the variation found between bound elements, nor to the changes they undergo over time. We also argue that changes in form are not always accompanied by a change in function. We illustrate our discussion with the history and current distribution of definiteness marking in Scandinavian.*

This article is an investigation of the acoustic properties of the so-called level stress prosody still found in some varieties of North Germanic. Level stress occurs in disyllabic words where a light root syllable has been preserved from Old North Germanic, and is described as having stress more or less evenly distributed across the two syllables. It is argued that level stress is the result of a perceptual ambiguity caused by the delayed synchronization of the accent 2 melody in level stress words, due to the shorter duration of the light root syllable. Due to this delay, both syllables may be interpreted as independent tonal and thereby stressed accent 1 domains, competing with the “normal” interpretation of the two syllables as an accent 2 domain with initial stress.*

The preference for bimoraic stressed syllables in pre-Old High German necessitated the phonological restructuring of syllables with stressed, short vowels either by early implementation of open syllable lengthening (non-shifting dialects north of the Benrath line) or by triggering an autochthonous phonological shift of +t, +p, +k after short vowels (shifting dialects). From there, the OHG dialects “progressed” though the rest of the shift in a largely parallel fashion. Asymmetry of the shift of +-p and +-k and geminate +-pp and +-kk was caused by place bias, however, especially in the Rhenish dialects where tone accents could sometimes delay or block the shift of these segments. The greater susceptibility of the more marked labial and velar affricates (-pf- and −kx-) to weakening limited their later occurrence to dialects outside the Rhineland. The reanalysis of aspirated +t- [th], +p- [ph], +k- [kh] as affricates in initial position was possible only when the corresponding geminate had already shifted, exemplifying both the effects of place bias as well as a kind of phonological reanalysis Blevins (2004) calls “choice.”

Through statistical and comparative investigations of eddic poetry, I show that Old Norse fornyrðislag meter is sharply distinguished from its West Germanic cognates by its strong preference for the trochaic cadence lift + drop in the b-verse. This unique feature is claimed to have induced the radical redistribution and reorganization of the major metrical types, types A, B, and C in fornyrðislag. Furthermore, I suggest that this favored cadence served as a basis for the fixed cadence of dróttkvætt meter by generalization and reanalysis.*

This study investigates the roles of phonetic analogy and lexical frequency in an ongoing sound change, the devoicing of fricatives in Dutch, which occurs mainly in the Netherlands and to a lesser degree in Flanders. In the experiment, Dutch and Flemish students read two variants of 98 words: the standard and a nonstandard form with the incorrect voice value of the fricative. Dutch students chose the non-standard forms with devoiced fricatives more often than Flemish students. Moreover, devoicing, though a gradual process, appeared lexically diffused, affecting first the words that are low in frequency and phonetically similar to words with voiceless fricatives.*

In morphological theory, various models have been developed with respect to the appropriate levels of abstraction for stating morphological generalizations. This paper addresses a class of seemingly marginal and/or problematic phenomena in morphology and proposes that morphological descriptions regularly refer to two distinct levels of description. One is the level of “morphosyntax,” and one is the level of “morphophonology.” Furthermore, morphology is considered to be marginal if and only if the degree of isomorphy between representations on these two levels is reduced. This basic proposal is illustrated and tested with several central phenomena of morphology found in German: synthetic compounds, conversion, empty morphs, and trun-cation. The analysis proposed here argues for the necessity of a two-level model of morphology as an approach in which both abstract morphosyntax as well as more concrete morphophonology have a place.*