Influence of English donor word stress on tonal assignment in Cantonese loanwords: an acoustic account

Regular SessionThis study aims to identify the relationship between tone and stress in Cantonese loanwords borrowed from English. Tonal patterns of 23 disyllabic and trisyllabic Cantonese loanwords corresponding to English donor words of 20 different stress patterns, and the tonal patterns of 23 unassimilated Cantonese loanwords exhausting the same set of 20 stress patterns were examined. Fundamental frequency characteristics of the vowels extracted from the loanwords produced by 15 native Cantonese speakers were analysed by using Praat. The average F0s were calculated in Matlab with the algorithm of autocorrelation, and the F0s of vowels corresponding to stressed and unstressed/epenthetic vowels were compared with Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test. Acoustic results reveal that Cantonese loanword syllables corresponding to stressed syllables in the English donor words were assigned high-level tone whereas epenthetic syllables and those corresponding to unstressed syllables were usually assigned low-level or low-falling tone, and highrising tone for word-final syllables. This is consistent with previous findings proving the explicit correlation between English lexical stress and high tone, and that between English lexical non-stress and mid or low tones in Cantonese loanwords.published_or_final_versio

Tonal Adaptation of Loanwords in Mandarin: Phonology and Beyond

This study examines the tonal adaptation of English and Japanese loanwords in Mandarin, and considers data collected from different types of sources. The purpose overall is to identify the mechanisms underlying the adaptation processes by which tone is assigned, and to check if the same mechanisms are invoked regardless of donor languages and source types. Both corpus and experimental methods were utilized to survey a broad sampling of borrowings and a wide array of syllable types that target specific phonetic properties. To maximally rule out the effect of semantic tingeing, this study examined English place names that were extracted from a dictionary and from online travel blogs. And to explore how semantic association might interfere with the adaptation processes, this study also investigated a separate corpus of Japanese manga role names and brand names. Revisiting discussions in previous studies about how phonetic properties of the source form might affect tonal assignments in the adapted forms, this study also included an expanded reanalysis of adaptations elicited in an experimental setting. Observations made in the study suggest that the primary mechanisms behind tonal assignments for loanwords in Mandarin operate at a level beyond any usual phonological concerns: the adaptation processes are heavily reliant on factors that are inherent to Mandarin lexical distributions, such as tone probability and character frequency. Adapters apparently utilize their tacit knowledge about such distributional properties when assigning tones. Also crucial to the tonal assignment mechanism is the seeking of appropriate characters based on their meanings, either to avoid unintended readings of loanwords or to form desired interpretations. Such adaptation mechanisms are mainly attributable to the morpho-syllabic nature of the Chinese writing system, the language’s high productivity of compound words, and its high incidence of homophony. Also noted in the study is the influence of prescriptive conventions formulated for formally established loanwords. Research findings reported in this study highlight such non-phonological aspects of loanword adaptation, especially the role of the writing system, that have been underestimated to date in the field of loanword phonology and cross-linguistic studies of loanword typology

Tone-stress interaction: a study of English loanwords in Cantonese.

Lai Wing-sze.Thesis submitted in: August 2004.Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2005.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 233-237).Abstracts in English and Chinese.Abstract --- p.iAcknowledgements --- p.iiiChapter Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1Chapter 1.1 --- Rational and Significance --- p.1Chapter 1.2 --- Scope of analysis --- p.2Chapter 1.3 --- Organization --- p.4Chapter Chapter 2 --- Background --- p.6Chapter 2.1 --- Comparison of Cantonese and English consonants --- p.6Chapter 2.2 --- Comparison of Cantonese and English vowels --- p.8Chapter 2.3 --- Comparison of Cantonese and English syllables --- p.9Chapter 2.4 --- Comparison of Cantonese and English autosegments --- p.12Chapter Chapter 3 --- Literature Review --- p.18Chapter 3.1 --- Tone assignment in Cantonese loanwords --- p.18Chapter 3.2 --- Relationship between tone and stress --- p.27Chapter 3.3 --- Research Questions --- p.31Chapter Chapter 4 --- Methodology --- p.32Chapter 4.1 --- Data Collection and Classification --- p.32Chapter 4.2 --- Loanword Verification Task --- p.48Chapter 4.3 --- Loanword Creation Task --- p.51Chapter Chapter 5 --- Investigation of Tonal Patterns --- p.55Chapter 5.1 --- Monosyllabic Loanwords --- p.55Chapter 5.2 --- Disyllabic Loanwords --- p.59Chapter 5.3 --- Summary of Tonal Patterns in Monosyllabic and Disyllabic Loanwords --- p.81Chapter 5.4 --- Loanwords with more than two syllables --- p.81Chapter Chapter 6 --- Further Evidence on Tonal Patterns --- p.92Chapter 6.1 --- Results of Loanword Verification Task --- p.92Chapter 6.2 --- Results of Loanword Creation Task --- p.103Chapter 6.3 --- Tonal Assignment by New Generation --- p.115Chapter Chapter 7 --- Constraints and Rankings in Tone Assignment in Loanwords --- p.116Chapter 7.1 --- OT Concepts and Mechanisms --- p.116Chapter 7.2 --- Tonal Features --- p.120Chapter 7.3 --- My Proposed Account --- p.129Chapter 7.4 --- Constraints and Rankings --- p.132Chapter 7.5 --- Summary --- p.145Chapter Chapter 8 --- Conclusion and Implication --- p.147Appendices --- p.150Appendix I All collected Loanword Data --- p.150Appendix II Eliminated Loanword Data --- p.164Appendix III Kept Loanword Data --- p.168Appendix IV Initial Loanword Classification --- p.181Appendix V Loanword Questionnaire A --- p.198Appendix VI Loanword Questionnaire A Script --- p.201Appendix VII Loanword Questionnaire B --- p.203Appendix VIII More Examples of σ→ σ55 --- p.207Appendix IX More Examples of 'σσ --- p.209Appendix X More Examples of'σ[ --- p.214Appendix XI More Examples of ['σ --- p.217Appendix XII Disyllabic Loanwords with Atypical Tonal Patterns --- p.218Appendix XIII Disyllabic Loanwords with Other Tonal Influences --- p.220Appendix XIV Trisyllabic Loanwords with Atypical Tonal Patterns --- p.222Appendix XV Results of Loanword Creation Task --- p.224References --- p.23

Cantonese Loanwords : Conflicting Faithfulness in VC Rime Constraints

This paper focuses on the ways in which English loanwords are brought into line with four phonotactic constraints that restrict the possible combinations of nuclear vowels and coda consonants in Cantonese Chinese. It is found that three of the four constraints are strictly enforced in loans. Repairs change either the vowel or the coda consonant. Parallel to Mandarin, changes in vowel height features ([high], [ATR]) as opposed to changes in vowel backness are employed. Coda consonant changes obey a dorsal > coronal > labial faithfulness hierarchy that mirrors the typology of coda mergers discovered by Chen (1973) for many Chinese dialects. While changes in both the vowel and coda consonant occur, on-line adaptations favor changing the coda and preserving the vowel and suggest that the relative phonetic salience of the nuclear vowel to the coda consonant still plays a role in these adaptations.Aquest article se centra en la manera com els anglicismes del xinès cantonès conflueixen en l'adaptació a través de quatre condicions fonotàctiques que restringeixen les combinacions possibles de vocals i de consonants a la rima. Tres d'aquestes quatre condicions són estrictament inevitables. L'arranjament fa canviar la vocal del nucli o la consonant de la coda. Tal com passa en mandarí, s'utilitzen canvis en els trets d'altura de les vocals ([alt], [AA]) com a oposició als canvis en el tret de posterioritat. Els canvis en les consonants de la coda obeeixen una jerarquia de fidelitat dorsal > coronal > labial que reflecteix la tipologia de reducció o simplificació de codes descoberta per Chen (1973) per a molts dialectes xinesos. Encara que es produeixin canvis en la vocal i en la consonant de la coda, les adaptacions directes afavoreixen els canvis en la coda però no en la vocal. Això suggereix que la prominència relativa de la vocal del nucli respecte a la consonant de la coda encara juga un paper important en aquestes adaptacions

Loan Phonology

For many different reasons, speakers borrow words from other languages to fill gaps in their own lexical inventory. The past ten years have been characterized by a great interest among phonologists in the issue of how the nativization of loanwords occurs. The general feeling is that loanword nativization provides a direct window for observing how acoustic cues are categorized in terms of the distinctive features relevant to the L1 phonological system as well as for studying L1 phonological processes in action and thus to the true synchronic phonology of L1. The collection of essays presented in this volume provides an overview of the complex issues phonologists face when investigating this phenomenon and, more generally, the ways in which unfamiliar sounds and sound sequences are adapted to converge with the native language’s sound pattern. This book is of interest to theoretical phonologists as well as to linguists interested in language contact phenomena

Phonological adaptation of English loanwords into Qassimi Arabic :an optimality- theoretic account

IPhD ThesisWithin the field of loanword phonology, this study enhances our understanding of the role played by the contrastive features of the borrowing language in shaping the segmental adaptation patterns of loanwords from the source language. This has been achieved by performing a theoretical analysis of the segmental adaptation patterns of English loanwords into Qassimi Arabic, a dialect spoken in the region of Qassim in central Saudi Arabia, using an Optimality-Theoretic framework. The central argument of this study assumes that the inputs to QA are fully-specified English outputs, which serve as inputs to QA. Then, the native grammar of QA allows only the phonological features of inputs to surface that are contrastive in QA. Thus, redundant or noncontrastive phonological features in QA are eliminated from the outputs. The evidence behind the argument that the contrastive features of QA segments play a main role in the adaptation process emerges from adapting the English segments that are non-native in QA. For instance, English lax vowels /ɪ/, /ʊ/, /æ/ are adapted as their tense counterparts in QA [i], [u] and [a]. I have argued that the reason for this adaptation lies in the fact that the feature [ATR] is not a contrastive feature within the QA vowel inventory. Therefore, dispensing with the value of the input feature [-ATR] culminates in the tense vowels appearing at the surface level. To identify the contrastive features of QA phonological inventory, I rely on the Contrastive Hierarchy Theory proposed by Dresher (2009). This theory suggests that phonological features should be ordered hierarchically to obtain only the contrastive features of any phonological inventory. This is achieved by dividing any inventory into subsets of features until each segment is distinguished contrastively from all others. Therefore, the features of QA segments are built initially into a contrastive hierarchy model. Within this hierarchy, features are created and ordered according to one or more of the following motivations: Activity, Minimality and Universality. Finally, the contrastive hierarchy of QA segment inventory is converted into OT constraints. The ranking of these constraints is sufficient to account for the evaluations of the segmental adaptation patterns of loanwords from English into QA. For instance, based on the contrastive hierarchy of QA, /b/ is contrastively specified as [-sonorant, +labial, -continuant]. In the adaptation of English consonants, the English input segment /p/ is mapped consistently to [b] in the QA. In this case, the contrastive hierarchy of QA consonant inventory contains the co-occurrence constraints *[αVoice, +labial] and *[αCoronal, +labial], which filter the input features if the input is fully-specified [-sonorant, +labial, -coronal, -continuant, -voiced, …], and permits only the contrastive features [-sonorant, +labial, -continuant] to surface.Qassim University in Saudi Arabi

Vowel adaptation in English loanwords in Thai

Ph. D. Thesis. (Integrated)The use of English loanwords in everyday conversations of native Thai speakers is prevalent since many English words have been introduced to the Thai lexicon over the past 200 years. The nativisation of English loanwords into Thai has been carefully investigated in the last three decades; however, previous studies of Thai loanword phonology have primarily focused on consonants and tone assignment. Phonological adjustments made to the vowels have been less well-studied. This thesis investigates the phonological adaptation of English loanwords in Thai, focusing on adaptation patterns of monophthongs and diphthongs, and strategies employed to resolve non-native syllable structures which are ill-formed in Thai. The study examines the phonological processes that are involved in the Thai adaptation of English vowels, investigates how the best match for non-native vowels is determined and explores the role of native phonology in vowel adaptation. The loan data examined in the study were mainly drawn from standard Thai dictionaries. The analysis is conducted within the framework of Optimality Theory (OT) to explore how the grammar of the borrowing language deals with non-native segments and syllable structures which are ill-formed in the native language. The OT analysis demonstrates that English vowels which are not in accord with markedness constraints cannot surface in Thai, and their best matches are determined on the basis of acoustic closeness together with the phonological structure of the borrowing language. It also reveals that different repair strategies for imperfect syllable structures in native words and loanwords result from distinct constraint rankings for native lexical items and foreign words. The adaptation patterns identified in the loan corpus appear to show, firstly, that the phonetic characteristics of source vowels which are contrastive in the borrowing language are faithfully preserved in their adapted form, giving rise to phonological perception; secondly that a range of factors including phonetic, phonological, and non-linguistic factors are involved in determining how English vowels are realised in Thai; and thirdly that orthography plays a role if adaptation is underdetermined by other factors.Office of the Higher Education Commission in Thailan

Sinophone Southeast Asia

This volume explores the diverse linguistic landscape of Southeast Asia’s Chinese communities. Based on archival research and previously unpublished linguistic fieldwork, it unearths a wide variety of language histories, linguistic practices, and trajectories of words. The localized and often marginalized voices we bring to the spotlight are quickly disappearing in the wake of standardization and homogenization, yet they tell a story that is uniquely Southeast Asian in its rich hybridity. Our comparative scope and focus on language, analysed in tandem with history and culture, adds a refreshing dimension to the broader field of Sino-Southeast Asian Studies. . Readership: Students, scholars, (academic) libraries, community organizations, heritage organizations; linguistics, Southeast Asia Studies, East Asia Studies, Overseas Chines

Factors in on-line loanword adaptation

This thesis investigates the factors influencing the adaptation of foreign words to English, beyond traditional phonological parameters such as sonority distance. The data examined were produced in an on-line adaptation task to study purely linguistic rather than orthographic or historical influences. The adapted words contain only lesser-studied phonotactic problems rather than segmental ill-formedness. The choice of Russian as a donor and English as a borrowing language allow the study of adaptations in a setting which allows a further strategy of alteration of ill-formed consonant clusters beyond vowel epenthesis and consonant deletion, namely the substitution of segments to change one cluster into another. In contrast to previous research, English production of Russian stimuli with initial consonant clusters showed that segment change is applied frequently, comparable to the amount of vowel epenthesis. Extensive variation was observed, both in ratio of successful production, and in the choice and distribution of adaptation strategy. The factors in adaptation investigated were the sonority distance of the foreign clusters, as well as concepts which have received much recent attention within phonology, namely gradient grammaticality, similarity and frequency: English native speaker judgments were collected about the perceived grammaticality of foreign clusters and the similarity between targets and adaptations, while the frequency of possible adaptations in English was calculated from a corpus of spoken English. Results show that sonority cannot explain the variation in adaptation. Furthermore, frequency has no influence on the choice of adaptation; however, higher perceived badness results in a higher percentage of adaptations, and perceived similarity is decisive for the choice of adaptations. A comparison of similarity judgments of English and Russian listeners suggested that, in keeping with Steriade (2001), there are some cross-linguistically corresponding rankings of similarity; however, differences between languages due to phonotactics and phonetic detail were also found. In summary, the experiment results suggest that the adaptation of loanwords occurs in both in perception and production; furthermore, it is determined both by L1 specifics and cross-linguistic tendencies, an thus neither a straightforward application of L1 phonology nor completely independent of language background