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This paper revisits Oroch vowel harmony previously analyzed in Tolskaya (2008) and propose a new analysis within the framework of modified contrastive specification (Dresher, 2009). In particular, I show that the vowel patterns in Oroch are better explained under a contrastive hierarchy [low] > [coronal] > [Retracted Tongue Root (RTR)] > [labial] than under Tolskaya’s Stratal OT approach. The proposed hierarchy not just assigns proper feature specifications to each vowel in Oroch but also provides a simple, unified solution to the transparency and opacity in Oroch vowel harmony: The transparency of /i/ to RTR harmony is due to the lack of contrastive [-RTR] specification while the opacity of /i, ʊ/ is due to its contrastive height feature specification ([-low]). In addition, the putative simple vowel /æ/ receives a better treatment as a diphthong /ia/ and its peculiar behavior resembling /i/ is ascribed to its high front vowel portion /i/.
