Resilabificación incompleta y acoplamiento gestual ambisilábico en español

In the generative literature, the pattern of coronal fricative lenition found in the traditional Chinato Spanish dialect is commonly cited as a phonological argument that the resyllabification of word-final prevocalic consonants is complete, in the sense that onsets derived by resyllabification are structurally identical to canonical (word-level) onsets. However, recent acoustic studies of Northern-Central Peninsular Spanish have problematized the completeness of resyllabification with experimental evidence that /s̺/ is shorter and more voiced as a derived onset than as a canonical onset. Using a split-gesture, competitive, coupled oscillator model of the syllable in Articulatory Phonology, which divides consonants into a separate constriction and release gesture, we propose a novel representation of ambisyllabicity that predicts the phonetic behavior of derived onset /s̺/ in Northern-Central Peninsular Spanish. We then show that ambisyllabic coupling permits a simpler phonological analysis of coronal fricative lenition in Chinato Spanish as compared to alternative accounts. Our analysis makes typological predictions that are confirmed by patterns from other contemporary Spanish varieties. Lastly, we examine the consequences of ambisyllabicity for the analysis of Spanish rhotic consonants, which have also been argued to support complete resyllabification. We offer an analysis of rhotics that is entirely compatible with an ambisyllabic representation of incomplete resyllabification.En la literatura generativa, el debilitamiento de fricativas coronales en el dialecto chinato del español peninsular se cita comúnmente como un argumento fonológico a favor de la resilabificación completa de consonantes prevocálicas finales de palabra, o sea que los arranques derivados por resilabificación son idénticos estructuralmente a los arranques canónicos a nivel de palabra. Sin embargo, algunos estudios acústicos recientes han problematizado la resilabificación completa en el español peninsular centro-norteño al presentar evidencia experimental de que la /s̺/ es más corta y sonorizada como arranque derivado que como arranque canónico. Utilizamos un modelo de acoplamiento competitivo desde la Fonología Articulatoria, el cual divide a las consonantes en un gesto de constricción y de soltura, para proponer una nueva representación de la ambisilabicidad que predice el comportamiento fonético de la /s̺/ como arranque derivado en el español peninsular centro-norteño. Luego, demostramos que el acoplamiento ambisilábico permite analizar mejor el debilitamiento de fricativas coronales en el español chinato, en comparación con otras explicaciones alternativas. Confirmamos las predicciones tipológicas de nuestro análisis para otras variedades contemporáneas del español. Por último, examinamos las consecuencias de la ambisilabicidad para el análisis de las consonantes róticas del español, también citadas como otro argumento a favor de la resilabificación completa. Ofrecemos un análisis de las róticas que es totalmente compatible con una representación ambisilábica de la resilabificación incompleta

The acquisition of voicing assimilation by advanced Hungarian learners of Spanish

This study examines the effect of explicit phonological instruction on the acquisition of variable /s/ voicing in Spanish by advanced Hungarian learners. Hungarian and Spanish have very similar yet not identical voicing assimilation (VA) systems; the most important difference lies in the pre-sonorant context as sonorant consonants trigger voicing assimilation in Spanish but not in Hungarian. Data were collected in acoustic experiments from 7 native speakers of Northern Peninsular Spanish and 12 Hungarian university students, advanced learners of Spanish. The latter group was tested twice: before and after a three-month Spanish phonetics and phonology course. Our data reveals that this amount of instruction is not enough for L2 speakers to overcome their L1 VA system, which might be attributed in part to the variable, allophonic nature of the process, the similarity between the two languages’ VA systems and lack of exposure to the relevant dialect

The acquisition of voicing assimilation by advanced Hungarian learners of Spanish

This study examines the effect of explicit phonological instruction on the acquisition of variable /s/ voicing in Spanish by advanced Hungarian learners. Hungarian and Spanish have very similar yet not identical voicing assimilation (VA) systems; the most important difference lies in the pre-sonorant context as sonorant consonants trigger voicing assimilation in Spanish but not in Hungarian. Data were collected in acoustic experiments from 7 native speakers of Northern Peninsular Spanish and 12 Hungarian university students, advanced learners of Spanish. The latter group was tested twice: before and after a three-month Spanish phonetics and phonology course. Our data reveals that this amount of instruction is not enough for L2 speakers to overcome their L1 VA system, which might be attributed in part to the variable, allophonic nature of the process, the similarity between the two languages’ VA systems and lack of exposure to the relevant dialect

The Invariant in Phonology. The role of salience and predictability

This aim of this thesis is to give a phonological account of acoustic variation and reduction. It is argued that phonological representations are uneven and include information about the relative strength of the segmental and subsegmental units composing them. This unevenness implies a distinction between the invariant – the “phonetic essence” of a word, which is practically undeletable – and other units which can be dispensed with under certain circumstances. In the first chapter I compare different theoretical approaches to the problem of acoustic variation, in particular with reference to generative phonology and exemplar-based theories. In the second chapter I propose a model which combines aspects of Optimality Theory, Element Theory and usage-based linguistics. Additionally, I discuss the role of acoustic salience in the formation of the invariant. In chapter three, typological and experimental data are examined in order to establish a salience scale for consonants. In chapter four, the results of the acoustic analysis of four dialogues extracted from a corpus of spoken Italian are presented. As expected, highly salient consonants are preserved to a greater extent than less salient ones. In chapter five I attempt to identify the phonological correlates of acoustic salience and discuss other factors which may favor reduction and deletion, among which predictability. In chapter six I draw some conclusions, deal with some pending issues and suggest future directions for research

Phonetic Properties of Oral Stops in Three Languages with No Voicing Distinction

Almost all studies on the phonetics of oral stop voicing patterns focus on languages with a voicing distinction. This gives rise to some debate regarding which aspects of voicing patterns arise from inherent articulatory effects related to the production of a voicing distinction, and which aspects are intentional adjustments by speakers meant to enhance a phonological contrast. This study investigates the phonetic properties of oral stops in three No Voicing Distinction (NVD) languages; Bardi (bcj), Arapaho (arp), and Sierra Norte de Puebla Nahuatl (azz). NVD languages do not utilize the larynx to maintain a contrast between any two sounds in their phoneme inventory. NVD languages do not use the larynx to produce any contrasts, and therefore present an opportunity to determine whether laryngeal defaults will emerge in this situation. Although NVD languages do not have a voicing distinction, there are a number of commonly accepted acoustic correlates of laryngeal properties that are based on observations from languages with a voicing distinction. The acoustic properties of NVD languages can be compared with patterns seen in languages with laryngeal contrasts as well as compared across the three languages to determine what phonetic patterns are shared across NVD languages. Acoustic correlates of voicing distinctions were measured from labial, coronal, and velar oral stops in four phonological contexts: phrase-initial, intervocalic, post-nasal, and phrase-final. Five acoustic properties commonly associated with voicing distinctions were measured: total oral stop duration, rate of lenition, phonated and silent closure duration, voice onset time (VOT), and preceding vowel duration. Overall, the findings from this dissertation serve to bridge the gap between phonetic science and phonological approaches to laryngeal properties. Results add to the discussions which relate to universal defaults, underspecification, and markedness principles in phonological systems. The results from this study suggest that while there are general phonetic processes which pose constraints on laryngeal properties in NVD languages, each of the three languages differed with regard to the implementation of these constraints. These results challenge universalist and markedness proposals which predict more uniformity when there is a lack of a contrast. Alternative approaches to explaining laryngeal properties which can account for more language-specific variation are better suited to explaining the results found in this study.­­ Each of the three languages studied in this project are endangered, under threat, and under-documented. Thus, a secondary aim of this dissertation is to highlight the contribution that endangered and under-documented languages can make to linguistic theory by expanding our understanding of the full range of human language structures

La discriminación fonética de los hablantes del español costarricense

Costa Rican Spanish listeners associate intervocalic [z] with specific social attributes in a matched-guise test (Chappell, 2016) but experience difficulty when explicitly asked to produce or even comment on the variant. Given this perceptionproduction discrepancy, the present study seeks to determine how successfully listeners discriminate between allophonic differences like intervocalic [s] and [z] compared to other allophone pairs, phonemic contrasts, and identical stimuli. 106 Costa Rican listeners completed similarity rating and AX discrimination tasks in which they evaluated word pairs that were identical or differed only in one phoneme or allophone. Statistical analyses fitted to 2,862 tokens in the similarity rating task and 3,604 tokens from the AX discrimination task indicate that listeners perceive phonemic contrasts more successfully than allophonic differences, which, in turn, are perceived as more distinct than identity pairs. Interestingly, the [s] ~ [z] distinction is less successfully perceived than other allophone pairs including [n] ~ [ŋ] and [d] ~ [ð]. I contend that allophonic differences that encode linguistic information, e.g. the variable’s position within the word, or are less expected given their low frequency are heard more successfully than [s] ~ [z]. However, even the least salient phonetic variants like [s] ~ [z] can encode local social meaning and contribute to listeners’ evaluations of speakers’ social qualities.Utilizando la técnica de par oculto, un trabajo reciente muestra que los costarricenses asocian la [z] intervocálica con ciertos atributos sociales (Chappell, 2016) pero tienen dificultad cuando se les pide que produzcan o comenten sobre la variante. Con el fin de resolver esta paradoja, el presente estudio indaga sobre este desajuste entre la percepción y la producción y busca determinar cuán exitosamente los oyentes costarricenses discriminan entre diferentes alófonos como la [s] y la [z] frente a otros alófonos, contrastes fonémicos y estímulos idénticos. 106 costarricenses completaron una tarea de evaluación de similitud y una tarea de discriminación AX en las que se escucharon pares de palabras idénticas o que difirieron en un sólo alófono o fonema. Los resultados de los análisis estadísticos de 2,862 evaluaciones de la tarea de similitud y 3,604 evaluaciones de la tarea de discriminación AX indican que los oyentes evalúan los pares que contienen diferentes fonemas como significativamente más distintos quelos pares que contienen diferentes alófonos y éstos, a su vez, se evalúan comosignificativamente más distintos que los estímulos idénticos. Dentro de la categoríaalofónica, la distinción entre [s] y [z] se percibe con menos éxito que los otrospares alofónicos como [n] ~ [ŋ] y [d] ~ [ð]. Sostengo que las diferencias alofónicasque conllevan significado lingüístico sobre la posición de la palabra o que sonmenos probables dada su baja frecuencia se escuchan mejor que [s] ~ [z]. Sinembargo, incluso las variantes fonéticas menos sobresalientes pueden codificarsignificado social al nivel local e influir en las evaluaciones de los atributossociales de los hablantes que se oyen

Rhotics.New Data and Perspectives

This book provides an insight into the patterns of variation and change of rhotics in different languages and from a variety of perspectives. It sheds light on the phonetics, the phonology, the socio-linguistics and the acquisition of /r/-sounds in languages as diverse as Dutch, English, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Kuikuro, Malayalam, Romanian, Slovak, Tyrolean and Washili Shingazidja thus contributing to the discussion on the unity and uniqueness of this group of sounds

Contrast preservation and constraints on individual phonetic variation

Ferdinand de Saussure, one of the founders of modern Linguistics, described language as a system where everything holds together. Regarding the sounds of language, this has led to the current view that the phonology of a language consists of a complex system of relations between contrastive phonemes. In this dissertation, I test whether there are constraints on individual phonetic variation from a multivariate perspective due to this system of relations, and how these constraints interact with contrast preservation. Two main views of contrast preservation are considered. The first view is that contrast preservation is merely an outcome of other regular phonetic processes that affect multiple consonants simultaneously. The second view is that contrast preservation acts as a constraint on the phonetic realization of phonemes. To this end, two phonetic experiments are performed. In both experiments, multiple acoustic measures of intervocalic consonant strength are taken, and PCA is used for dimensionality reduction, resulting in measures of overall consonant strength. These measures are then analyzed with Bayesian linear mixed effects regression (using weakly informative priors and maximal random effects structures) in order to obtain distributional information about both populations and individual speakers. In the first experiment, word-medial intervocalic /s/ and /f/ are compared for Valladolid Spanish and Barcelona Catalan. Both Catalan and Spanish have the fricatives /s/ and /f/, neither has /v/ contrasting with /f/, and only Catalan has /z/ contrasting with /s/. The results show that Catalan /s/ is stronger than Spanish /s/, but there is no evidence for a difference between the two language’s /f/ strengths, with strong evidence that the magnitude of the difference between Catalan and Spanish /s/ is larger than the magnitude of the difference between Catalan and Spanish /f/. I argue that these results are consistent with a role for contrast preservation as a constraint, with Catalan having stronger /s/ than Spanish because lenition of Catalan /s/ causes phonetic overlap with a contrasting phoneme, while lenition of Spanish /s/ does not. In the second experiment, the simultaneous lenition of Spanish intervocalic /ptk/ and /bdg/ in three dialects (Cuzco, Peru; Lima, Peru; and Valladolid, Spain) is examined. Cuzco is found to have the strongest productions for both /ptk/ and /bdg/, Lima the weakest for both, and Valladolid in between for both. That is, the same hierarchy of strength applies in both cases, though the evidence for the difference between Valladolid and Lima /ptk/ is considerably weaker than the evidence for the other differences. I argue that the results are consistent with constraints on multivariate variation at the dialectal level, but that further research is required to see how constraints at the individual level relate to population differences. Examining individual variation in both experiments, I find that the degree to which an individual speaker lenites /f/ is correlated with the degree to which they lenite /s/, and that the degree to which they lenite /ptk/ is correlated with both the degree to which they lenite /bdg/ and the degree to which they lenite /sf/. These correlations represent a significant constraint on individual phonetic variation from a multivariate perspective. While a connection between individuals’ /ptk/ and /bdg/ lenitions can be explained by both the constraint and outcome views of contrast preservation, the correlation between /sf/ and /ptk/ and the correlation between /s/ and /f/ lend support to the outcome view, and Catalan having stronger /s/ than Spanish but not stronger /f/ lends support to the constraint view. I argue for a framework in which acoustic lenition in a variety of intervocalic consonants may share a common articulatory source of lenition, giving rise to constraints on individual phonetic variation that may lead to contrast preservation as an outcome, but where there may additionally be a role for contrast preservation as a constraint. I conclude by discussing the importance of further acoustic studies that use the methodologies employed here, and studies that explore the articulatory and perceptual implications of the results. In the first experiment, word-medial intervocalic /s/ and /f/ are compared for Valladolid Spanish and Barcelona Catalan. Both Catalan and Spanish have the fricatives /s/ and /f/, neither has /v/ contrasting with /f/, and only Catalan has /z/ contrasting with /s/. The results show that Catalan /s/ is stronger than Spanish /s/, but there is no evidence for a difference between the two language’s /f/ strengths, with strong evidence that the magnitude of the difference between Catalan and Spanish /s/ is larger than the magnitude of the difference between Catalan and Spanish /f/. I argue that these results are consistent with a role for contrast preservation as a constraint, with Catalan having stronger /s/ than Spanish because lenition of Catalan /s/ causes phonetic overlap with a contrasting phoneme, while lenition of Spanish /s/ does not. In the second experiment, the simultaneous lenition of Spanish intervocalic /ptk/ and /bdg/ in three dialects (Cuzco, Peru; Lima, Peru; and Valladolid, Spain) is examined. Cuzco is found to have the strongest productions for both /ptk/ and /bdg/, Lima the weakest for both, and Valladolid in between for both. That is, the same hierarchy of strength applies in both cases, though the evidence for the difference between Valladolid and Lima /ptk/ is considerably weaker than the evidence for the other differences. I argue that the results are consistent with constraints on multivariate variation at the dialectal level, but that further research is required to see how constraints at the individual level relate to population differences. Examining individual variation in both experiments, I find that the degree to which an individual speaker lenites /f/ is correlated with the degree to which they lenite /s/, and that the degree to which they lenite /ptk/ is correlated with both the degree to which they lenite /bdg/ and the degree to which they lenite /sf/. These correlations represent a significant constraint on individual phonetic variation from a multivariate perspective. While a connection between individuals’ /ptk/ and /bdg/ lenitions can be explained by both the constraint and outcome views of contrast preservation, the correlation between /sf/ and /ptk/ and the correlation between /s/ and /f/ lend support to the outcome view, and Catalan having stronger /s/ than Spanish but not stronger /f/ lends support to the constraint view. I argue for a framework in which acoustic lenition in a variety of intervocalic consonants may share a common articulatory source of lenition, giving rise to constraints on individual phonetic variation which may lead to contrast preservation as an outcome, but where there may additionally be a role for contrast preservation as a constraint. I conclude by discussing the importance of further acoustic studies which use the methodologies employed here, and studies which explore the articulatory and perceptual implications of the results