/s/-Deletion and the Preservation of Plurality in Modern Occitan

This paper examines the weakening and deletion of /s/ in the Languedocian dialect of Modern Occitan, particularly with regards to how it may affect the system of plural marking in noun phrases. Using data from linguistic atlases, and taking the geographical distribution of variants to represent the history of a change, I reconstruct a trajectory of s-loss in Languedocian by which /s/ aspirates to [h], then vocalizes to [j] before deleting entirely. I find that, where /s/ on the definite article has vocalized to [j], the immediately-preceding vowel of the definite article has undergone concomitant raising to [e]. This raising appears to preserve the difference between singular and plural despite the plural\u27s weakening /s/. I argue that these results support Labov’s (1994:596) hypothesis that the meaning of a weakening element may be transferred to a stable, co-occurrent one

Production Planning Effects on Variable Contraction in English

This paper explores the potential role of the incremental planning of speech in interfering with the conditioning of the variable contraction of English is. Previous research has found that a variable alternation which is conditioned by the nature of the element that follows it can have this conditioning disrupted when a speaker fails to plan what that following element will be (Wagner 2011, Tanner et al. 2015). The strength of the effect of that following element on the variable alternation thus diminishes the less likely advance planning is. I extend this research, which has so far only examined following phonological elements, to look at whether this finding holds when a following element effect is localized in the syntactic domain. Taking is-contraction as my dependent variable, I first provide a detailed account of the role of following constituent category in conditioning this variable, documenting a robust effect in Mainstream American English with a hierarchy of environments very similar to what has been found in studies of the contraction and deletion of is in African American English. I then investigate an acoustic proxy for advance planning (duration of the word following is) and find that, while it does play a role in conditioning contraction, it does not interact with the following constituent effect. I connect this finding to the proposal that advance planning scope differs for different levels of grammar (Wagner et al. 2010). More broadly, I underscore that the patterning of sociolinguistic variation may be shaped, not only by the language-internal and social factors that are familiar from decades of research, but also by constraints on the language production system

Variation in English auxiliary realization: A new take on contraction

AbstractEnglish auxiliary contraction has received much attention in the linguistic literature, but our knowledge of this variable has remained limited due to the absence of a thorough corpus study. This paper examines contraction of six auxiliaries in two corpora, considering three distinct phonological shapes in which they occur and the implications for an analysis of the grammatical processes that underlie the surface alternation in form. I argue that the data best support a two-stage analysis of contraction, one under which variation in the morphology is followed by phonetic and phonological processes. Moreover, I show that this particular analysis explains a number of patterns in the data that would otherwise be accidental. In this way, I underscore the importance of approaching the study of variable phenomena with both quantitative data and formal analysis.</jats:p

A Quantitative Analysis of Diphthongization in Montreal French

In Montreal French, a process of diphthongization affects long vowels: those that are inherently long due to historical compensatory lengthening (Yaeger-Dror and Kemp, 1992), and those that are allophonically lengthened before voiced fricatives and /R/ (Dumas, 1981; Santerre and Millo, 1978). Our quantitative analysis of diphthongization in real time examines both the trajectory of this change through the community as well as individual speakers’ participation in it across their lifespans. Our study also provides acoustic measurements of the Montreal French vowel system. We tracked individuals’ vowel trajectories across a 24-year span for a panel of six speakers of diverse social classes. Matched trend samples from the 1971 and 1984 Montreal corpora, with four speakers sampled per year, provide a picture of the community as a whole. We find that four vowels show significant lowering and/or backing in the community, and that all long vowels show decreased diphthongization. Some panel speakers’ longitudinal movements mirror these changes, while other speakers are stable across their lifespans and still others show apparently anomalous movements. We discuss these results and their interpretation

English auxiliary realization and the independence of morphology and phonetics

One of the key questions in the study of language concerns the architecture of the grammar. At issue is the nature of and relationship between the systems that generate linguistic output. The present paper tests the predictions of two competing theories of grammatical architecture for a variable process of h-deletion in connected speech. A usage-based theory of grammar predicts that this phonetic lenition rule will show word-sensitivity, while a modular, feed-forward theory predicts a uniform rate of h-deletion across lexical items. Data from the Switchboard corpus supports the latter prediction

Quantitative data as a clue to auxiliary contraction processes

Quantitative data as a clue to auxiliary contraction processe

Reduplication in Itawes

This paper examines reduplication in Itawes, a language of the Philippines. In addition to providing the first overview of reduplication in this language, I examine the interactions between reduplication and three phonological processes: Vowel Laxing, Vowel Reduction, and Glottal Stop Insertion. Vowel Laxing---which laxes /i, u, e, o/ in closed syllables---and Vowel Reduction---which raises /a/ to schwa in non-primary-stressed syllables---interact with reduplication differently: Vowel Laxing shows Base–Reduplicant Identity, applying at the stem level (Inkelas and Zoll, 2005), while Vowel Reduction, applying at the word level, does not. Glottal Stop Insertion may apply at either level

Assessing the accuracy of existing forced alignment software on varieties of British English

This paper presents an analysis of the performance and usability of automatic speech processing tools on six different varieties of English spoken in the British Isles. The tools used in the present study were developed for use with Mainstream American English, but we demonstrate that their forced alignment func- tionality nonetheless performs extremely well on a range of British varieties, encompassing both careful and casual speech. Where phone boundary placement is concerned, substantial errors in alignment occur infre- quently, and although small displacements between aligner-placed and human-placed phone boundaries are found regularly, these will rarely have a significant effect on measurements of interest for the researcher. We demonstrate that gross phone boundary placement errors, when they do arise, are particularly likely to be introduced in fast speech or with varieties that are radically different from Mainstream American English (e.g. Scots). We also observe occasional problems with phonetic transcription. Overall, we advise that, although forced alignment software is highly reliable and improving continuously, human confirmation is needed to correct errors which can displace entire stretches of speech. Nevertheless, sociolinguists can be assured that the output of these tools is generally highly accurate for a wide range of varieties