AL-Lisaniyyat
Volume 26, Numéro 1, Pages 435-449
2020-06-30

Cumulative Effect Of Markeness In Phonology

Authors : Zaidi Hiba .

Abstract

The essence of this research can be encoded as: “towards a dual marked/ unmarked thought of language surface representations”. Accordingly, this research is an attempt to offer a thorough description of a modern and highly influential theory known as the Markedness Theory, which was initiated in the Prague School of Structural Linguistics and shaped in the theories of Trubetzkoy (1939) and Jakobson (1941). As Markedness has interestingly captured different linguistic domains with rather far reaching implications in the phonological domain. So, this research seeks to reflect on its major defining principles, including universality and implicational criteria, in phonological and non-phonological terms. The importance of markedness can be captured with regards to the pivotal role it has played in addressing many issues related to second language phonology acquisition. Thus, this paper aims at providing important stretches of Markedness Theory into Eckman’s (1977) Markedness Differential Hypothesis. Likewise, it attempts to cover its major failure areas within Schmid’s (1997) Naturalness Differential Hypothesis.

Keywords

markeness ; frequency ; implication ; universality ; phonology