And this is what we find. This talk examines one predicted entity in particular, the tonal foot. The aim is both to establish its existence and to ascertain its properties. Tonal feet are harder to document than metrical feet since metrical feet by definition contain only one stress per foot, while the constituency of tonal feet is not normally so neat or obvious. An approach that seems to work is to probe for tonal feet by showing how certain assumptions about their existence and constituency solve descriptive anomalies that have cropped up time and again in the study of lexical tone languages.
Tonal feet form a part of a general theory of tonal constituents.
While focusing here on tonal feet because they are to date the most obscure part of such a theory, the talk suggests what a theory of tonal constituents would look like. Based on the behavior of languages outside of Bantu, some modifications to the optimal domains theory of Cassimjee and Kisseberth 1997 are called for. Finally, the theory is shown to offer new explanations in several instances where similar surface forms exhibit consistently different tonal behavior. Because the differences in tonal behavior arise as a result of distinct representations, rather than, say, through output-output comparisons, this paper may also have implications for how opacity is treated in phonology. Le cas du mandingue.