Phonological domains in Luxembourgish and their relevance for the phonological system

Situated in the recent discussion on syllable languages and word languages, the relevance and impact of phonological domains for the phonology of Luxembourgish will be discussed. Analyzing various aspects of the phonological organization of Luxembourgish, this paper addresses the question of whether there is one main prosodic domain, i.e. either the phonological word or the syllable, that shapes the overall phonological structure of the language. The features presented here concern the distribution of schwa, syllable complexity, the behavior of unstressed syllables, the role of the trochaic foot and the impact of language contact with French. It turns out that Luxembourgish cannot be classified entirely as a syllable language or a word language. Instead, features originating from both
types seem to be mixed in an intricate way. Furthermore, frequent sandhi phenomena like the n-rule and voicing assimilation show that both phonological domains are indeed necessary to describe the structures appropriately.