Introduction

The confluence of two interconnected yet independent research programs underlies this chapter. One regards the issue of language-particular phonetics, while the other concerns the emergence of Optimality Theory as the dominant paradigm in contemporary phonology. Regarding the first, research over the past twenty years has clearly shown that at least part of phonetic implementation must be viewed as falling within the purview of the linguistic grammar (see, for example, Pierrehumbert 1980; Pierrehumbert and Beckman 1988; Keating 1988; Cohn 1990; Huffman 1989). An interesting consequence of this is that language-particular phonetics raises difficult questions regarding the objects and nature of phonological inquiry. These questions pertain, for example, to whether certain phenomena are phonological or phonetic, to where and/or how the line should be drawn between phonetics and phonology (e.g., Keating 1990; Huffman 1993; Pierrehumbert 1991; Cohn 1993, 1999; Zsiga 1997; Kingston and Diehl 1994; Myers 1999; Gerfen 1999), and to whether any line should be drawn at all (Ohala 1990).

Secondly, Optimality Theory (Prince and Smolensky 1993, hereafter OT) does not constitute a theory of possible linguistic constraints per se. Rather it provides an architecture for evaluating input/output pairings in terms of a set of (partially) rank-ordered constraints. Insofar as it is a theory of how constraints interact, nothing in the architecture of the theory itself dictates the nature of the constraints invoked. In fact, given that a fundamental axiom of OT is that all constraints are violable, OT actually affords the opportunity to construct grammars from universal phonetic principles.