licensing (n.)

In GOVERNMENT-BINDING THEORY, a notion introduced in formulating conditions on REPRESENTATION: every element in a WELL-FORMED structure must be licensed in one of a small number of ways. For example, an element that assigns SEMANTIC ROLES is licensed if it has recipients in appropriate SYNTACTIC positions; a syntactically defined PREDICATE is licensed if it has a SUBJECT.

The term as used in AUTOSEGMENTAL PHONOLOGY applies to the analysis of SYLLABLE structure. Prosodic licensing is a condition that all SEGMENTS must be part of a higher-level unit (the syllable), or else they are contingently EXTRASYLLABIC. Autosegmental licensing presents the view that certain PROSODIC units are licensers, which license a set of phonological features (AUTOSEGMENTS). The syllable NODE is a primary licenser; the CODA node and certain word-FINAL MORPHEMES are secondary licensers. A given licenser can license only one occurrence of the autosegment in question. All autosegmental material must be licensed at the WORD level; elements not licensed at this level will be DELETED. The notion of licensing has also been put to use in some other NON-LINEAR models of phonology and in OPTIMALITY THEORY.