Abstract:
Very often African languages have been claimed to have tones but no intonation
which may be understood as some organization of complex prosodic or breath
grouping, beyond the segment. However, recent studies have shown that these
languages may have complex prosodic structures. Avikam, an isolate lagoon
language of the Kwa cluster spoken in the Ivory Coast, is investigated. The
paper argues that Tone Lowering is a well established phonological rule that
is constrained both by syntactic and prosodic domains, in a quite intricate way.
This interaction points to an interface level between syntax and phonology, which
may differ from a mere postlexical component. Based on the Tone Lowering rule,
prosodic domains such as the phonological word, the phonological phrase and
the tonal foot are identified. The paper provides evidence that recursion of the
prosodic word is a common process similar to that attested in Leben and Ahoua
(1997). The paper has implications for the strong version of the Strict layer
Hypothesis (Selkirk 1978), for which some weakening may be required
