Perhaps the most important insight in phonological theory since the introduction of the concept of the phoneme has been the role that distinctive features play in phonological theory (Jakobson et al. 1952). Most research since Jakobson's early formulation has focused on the segmental properties of these features without reference to their hierarchical organisation. Recent research, however, has shed considerable light on this latter aspect of the phoneme as a phonological unit. In his seminal article ‘The geometry of phonological features’, for example, Clements (1985), building on earlier work of scholars such as Goldsmith (1976), argues that features are not ‘bundles’ in Bloomfield's sense, but are, in fact, organised into phonological trees with each branch corresponding to what has been called a tier. An overview of the current state of feature geometry can be found in Clements & Hume (forthcoming) and Kenstowicz (1994).

The study of the relation between syntactic structure and phonological representation has attracted the attention of many phonologists in the past few years. One important contribution to this field of study is Chen's (1987) work on Xiamen Chinese tone sandhi domains. He suggests that the syntax–phonology relation appeals to syntactic information such as category types and the edges of syntactic bracketings. This insight has been further elaborated in the general theory of the syntax—phonology relation of Selkirk (1986). In this theory, the relation between syntactic structure and prosodic structure above the foot and below the intonational phrase is defined in terms of the edges of syntactic constituents of designated types. More precisely, this theory incorporates two hypotheses. One is that there are designated category types in syntactic structure with respect to which one end (Right or Left) of the designated category is relevant in the formulation of a prosodic constituent C, which extends from one instance of the appropriate end (R/L) of the designated category to the next. This hypothesis has been called the End Parameter.

Recent work on Articulatory Phonology (Browman & Goldstein 1986, 1989, 1991, 1992a, b) raises a number of questions, specifically involving the phonetics–phonology ‘interface’. One advantage of using Articulatory Phonology (henceforth ArtP), with its basic units of abstract gestures based on articulatory movements, is its ability to link phenomena previously seen as phonological to those which are conventionally described as allophonic, or even lower-level phonetic effects, since ‘gestures are... useful primitives for characterising phonological patterns as well as for analysing the activity of the vocal tract articulators’ (Browman & Goldstein 1991: 313). If both phonetics and phonology could ultimately be cast entirely in gestural terms, the phonetics–phonology interface might effectively cease to exist, at least in terms of units of analysis.

Ever since Baudouin de Courtenay (e.g. 1917 [1990: 500]), the founder of phonology, it has been customary for every new phonological theory to make claims about the particular level(s) at which rules of versification may refer to phonological representations. Baudouin himself, for example, took rhyming to be evidence of phonemic identity. The birth of generative phonology thus led to a series of claims that rules of versification may have access to underlying representations – or to various intermediate levels of representation more shallow than the underlying but still deeper than phonemic. Starting with Zeps (1963) and for the next twenty-odd years a certain number of such arguments have been published, and it appears that their validity is widely assumed in the field, as reflected in such survey articles as O'Connor (1982: 155–156) and Hayes (1988: 228–229). Presumably it is precisely the widespread acceptance of these arguments that explains the relative lull in the debate recently (but see Malone 1982,1983, 1988a, b).

Choctaw verbs form intensives by a complex procedure of (apparent) infixation, gemination and accentuation. Verbs of all shapes have two distinct intensive forms, which Ulrich (1986) distinguishes as the y-grade (involving a geminate yy) and the g-grade (involving gemination of a stem consonant or a falling tone). Lombardi & McCarthy (1991) analyse Choctaw intensives in terms of the theory of prosodic circumscription (McCarthy & Prince 1990). Hammond (1993) gives an alternative analysis within the same theory. While insightful in certain respects, these analyses fail to account for the full range of Choctaw intensives, instead generating a single intensive for any verb. In the present paper, I propose a unified analysis of Choctaw intensives, with two, minimally different, procedures for generating the two intensives of any verb.