The Spread of Prepausal Lowering in Galilean Arabic

This paper discusses the lowering of the high vowels /i,u/ to [e,o] in final syllables in Palestinian Arabic. Such a shift is actually well documented in the literature with regard to final unstressed CVC syllables. Yet whereas previous studies have not stated a clear prosodic condition on the shift, we bring evidence that in the Galilean dialects discussed the shift is clearly conditioned and occurs in the pre-pausal position only. In addition, we show that the same shift occurs in two other positions, viz. final CV and CVC_iC_i, and that it is not merely qualitative but quantitative as well, so that lowering of /i,u/ to [e,o] often involves certain lengthening, yielding [e.,o.] respectively. In the last section of this article we provide a uniform account for vowel lowering and lengthening in the three types of syllable mentioned. We show that in the pre-pausal environment an additional templatic position is added to the last vowel; and since this position cannot be realized through vowel lengthening, a lowering agent is inserted instead.