• Speech Sciences
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.59-80
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• 1998

In this article are proposed a theory of the French syllable and a rule of French liaison within the dependency phonology framework. The treatment offered assumes that the notion of 'floating' or 'extrametrical' segment allows for a better description than competing alternatives based on truncation or insertion. This rule was based on the consequences of positing floating segments for the structure of lexical entries and underlying phonological representations. I have described the phenomenon of French liaison and shown that insights normally associated with metrical and 'autosegmental' accounts could naturally be integrated within the syllable structure.