How to syllabify "obsessive": OB-SE-SIV or OB-SES-IV?

Syllabification is a controversial topic in linguistics. There isn't a 'standard' way of syllabifying words, but there's a phonological rule called Maximal Onset Principle (MOP), according to which intervocalic^[1] consonants should be syllabified as the onset^[2] of the following syllable as long as the Phonotactic constraints^[3] allow it. This would mean that VCV^[4] has to be syllabified as V.CV as long as the onset of the second syllable is permissible. There are exceptions, however.

I will mark ill-formed sequences of sounds with a preceding asterisk.

So banana should be syllabified as:

• /bə.ˈnɑː.nə/, not */bən.ˈɑːn.ə/ or */bə.nɑːn.ə/

The first /-n-/ is intervocalic, so it should be the onset of the second syllable and it is a permissible onset (there are so many words that start with /n/ such as night, name, noon etc.). The same goes for the second /-n-/.

Obsessive is syllabified as:

• /əb.sɛs.ɪv/, not */ə.bsɛs.ɪv/ or */əb.sɛ.sɪv/

Although the consonant cluster /-bs-/ is intervocalic, it's not syllabified as the onset of the next syllable because it violates the Phonotactics of English. And the reason as to why the second syllable is /sɛs/ and not */sɛ/ is that there's no English word that ends with the lax vowel /ɛ/ (except meh). The syllabification given in the dictionary is correct.

Extreme is syllabified as:

• /ɛk.ˈstriːm/ not */ɛks.triːm/ or */ɛ.kstriːm/

According to MOP, the intervocalic consonants /-kstr-/ should be syllabified as the onset of the next syllable; however, if we syllabify it as */ɛ.kstriːm/, it violates the Phonotactics of English because English cannot have an onset starting with PLOSIVE + FRICATIVE, so the /k/ becomes the coda of the first syllable, /ɛk/. /str-/ conforms to the phonotactic rules of onset clusters, so it becomes the onset of the next syllable, /striːm/.

There's another theory (or an exception to MOP) that states that stressed syllables having lax vowels such as /ʌ ɪ ʊ ɛ/ should not have an empty coda, so obsessive should be /əb.ˈsɛs.ɪv/, very should be /ˈvɛr.i/, city should be /ˈsɪt.i/ etc. Banana is pronounced with a lax vowel /æ/ in American English, in which case, it's syllabified as /bə.ˈnæn.ə/ (or /bəˈnæn.nə/, according to the ambisyllabicity theory).

Yet another theory says that the consonant following the lax vowels /ʌ ɪ ʊ ɛ/ should be ambisyllabic. 'Ambisyllabic' means that it it belongs to both the preceding and the following syllable. So according to the ambisyllabicity theory, obsessive can be syllabified as:

• /əb.sɛs.sɪv/

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Notes:

1. 'Intervocalic' means between vowels e.g. the /t/ in city, better, water etc., is between two vowels, so it's intervocalic.

2. Typically, a syllable consists of three segments; onset, nucleus, coda. The word bat /bæt/ can be analysed as: /b/ → onset, /æ/ → nucleus, /t/ → coda.

   • onset: it refers to the consonant(s) before the nucleus (usually a vowel)
   • nucleus: a vowel/diphthong or a syllabic consonant that forms the syllable peak
   • coda: consonant(s) after the nucleus

3. Phonotactic constraints are language-specific rules that determine the permissble sequences of sounds. For example, Greek allows word-initial /pn-/ as in pneumonia, but English doesn't, that's why the /p/ is dropped in pneumonia in English.

4. V → vowel, C → consonant