Neo-Štokavian deverbal je-nominalisations contain passive participles

Abstract

An analysis is presented for the prosody of four groups of forms (infinitive, present tense, passive participle and the deverbal noun) of the most numerous theme-vowel class in Neo-Štokavian (characterised by the theme vowel i). A cyclic analysis of en-participles and je-nominalisations is proposed, showing that the latter contain the former. As noted in traditional grammars, this approach is challenged by the fact that je-nominalisations typically have the prosodic pattern of the infinitive, while the en-participle displays a neutralisation of lexical prosody. The analysis demonstrates that en-participles are indeed contained in je-nominalisations, but do not trigger a phonological cycle in them, which is why tonal contrasts survive.