scholarly journals Metrical structure in Scottish Gaelic: tonal accent, glottalisation and overlength

Phonology ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 36 (3) ◽  
pp. 391-432 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donald Alasdair Morrison
Keyword(s):  
Optimality Theory ◽  
Intermediate Stage ◽  
Northern Europe ◽  
Metrical Structure ◽  
Scottish Gaelic ◽  
Phonological Processes ◽  
Foot Structure ◽  
Phonological Contrast ◽  
Diachronic Development ◽  
The Relationship

Scottish Gaelic displays a phonological contrast that is realised in different dialects by means of tonal accent, glottalisation or overlength. In line with existing analyses of similar oppositions in languages such as Swedish, Danish, Franconian and Estonian, I show that this contrast reflects a difference in metrical structure. Using the framework of Stratal Optimality Theory, I argue that this metrical contrast is derived, and results from faithfulness to foot structure that is built regularly at the stem level, but rendered opaque by subsequent phonological processes. Scottish Gaelic therefore represents an intermediate stage in the diachronic development of underlyingly contrastive metrical structure. This analysis successfully accounts for the complex properties of svarabhakti, a process of copy epenthesis that is intimately connected to the phonological contrast in question, and also sheds light upon the relationship between the oppositions of tonal accent, glottalisation and overlength found in various languages of northern Europe.

scholarly journals Sonority Sequencing Principle in Sabzevari Persian: A Constraint-Based Approach

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 434-465
Author(s):  
Mufleh Salem M. Alqahtani
Keyword(s):  
Optimality Theory ◽  
Syllable Structure ◽  
Consonant Clusters ◽  
Phonological Processes ◽  
Repair Strategy ◽  
Vowel Epenthesis ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Northeast Iran

AbstractThis study sheds light on the relationship between the Sonority Sequencing Principle (SSP) and syllable structure in Sabzevari, a Persian vernacular spoken in the Sabzevar area of Northeast Iran. Optimality Theory (OT), as a constraint-based approach, is utilized to scrutinize sonority violation and its repair strategies. The results suggest that obedience to the SSP is mandatory in Sabzevari, as shown through the treatment of word-final clusters in Standard Persian words which violate the SSP. These consonant clusters are avoided in Sabzevari by two phonological processes: vowel epenthesis and metathesis. Vowel epenthesis is motivated by final consonant clusters of the forms /fricative+coronal nasal/, /plosive+bilabial nasal/, /fricative+bilabial nasal/, /plosive+rhotic/, /fricative+rhotic/, and /plosive+lateral/. Metathesis, as another repair strategy for sonority sequencing violations, occurs when dealing with final consonant clusters of the forms /plosive+fricative/and / fricative+lateral/.

scholarly journals The influence of orthography in second language phonological acquisition

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-30
Author(s):  
Rachel Hayes-Harb ◽  
Shannon Barrios
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Teachers ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Systematic Research ◽  
Writing System ◽  
Phonological Acquisition ◽  
Phonological Processes ◽  
Phonological Contrast ◽  
Phoneme Perception ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract We provide an exhaustive review of studies in the relatively new domain of research on the influence of orthography on second language (L2) phonological acquisition. While language teachers have long recognized the importance of written input—in addition to spoken input—on learners’ development, until this century there was very little systematic research investigating the relationship between orthography and L2 phonological acquisition. Here, we review studies of the influence of written input on L2 phonological awareness, phoneme perception, the acquisition of phonological processes and syllable structure, and the pronunciation and recognition of words. We elaborate the variables that appear to moderate written input effects: (1) whether or not a novel phonological contrast is systematically represented by the L2 writing system (systematicity); (2) whether some or all of the L2 graphemes are familiar to learners from the L1 (familiarity); (3) for familiar graphemes, whether the native language (L1) and the L2 employ the same grapheme-phoneme correspondences (congruence); and (4) the ability of learners to perceive an auditory contrast that is systematically represented in writing (perceptibility). We conclude by calling for future research on the pedagogical implications of this body of work, which has thus far received very little attention by researchers.

Contrast and Phonological Activity in Manchu Vowel Systems

2005 ◽  
Vol 50 (1-4) ◽  
pp. 45-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. Elan Dresher ◽  
Xi Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Optimality Theory ◽  
Phonological Contrast ◽  
Redundant Feature ◽  
Vowel Systems ◽  
Feature Values ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractIn the Manchu languages, contrast plays an important role in the patterning of vowel systems. Contrastive feature values are phonologically active, triggering rules of Advanced Tongue Root (ATR) and labial harmony, whereas redundant feature values are phonologically inert. To determine which feature values are contrastive in any given segment, it is necessary to establish an ordering of features. This ordering, or contrastive hierarchy, determines the relative contrastive scope of each feature. Our analysis of the Written Manchu contrastive hierarchy is supported by synchronic and diachronic evidence from Spoken Manchu and Xibe, where a realignment of vowel contrasts results in new patterns of phonological activity. We show that our analysis is consistent with the observed typology of ATR and labial harmony systems. We argue that the concept of phonological contrast does not reduce to a phonetic function, nor is it perceptually based. The relationship between contrast and underspecification is considered, and it is shown that constraint-based theories (such as Optimality Theory) do not constitute alternatives to the theory of contrast proposed here.

scholarly journals Computationally, tone is different

Phonology ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 247-283 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam Jardine
Keyword(s):  
Optimality Theory ◽  
Phonological Processes ◽  
Segmental Phonology ◽  
Crucial Information ◽  
The Asymmetry

This paper establishes that unbounded circumambient processes, phonological processes for which crucial information in the environment may appear unboundedly far away on both sides of a target, are common in tonal phonology, but rare in segmental phonology. It then argues that this typological asymmetry is best characterised by positing that tone is more computationally complex than segmental phonology. The evidence for the asymmetry is based around attestations of unbounded tonal plateauing, but it is also shown how the ‘sour-grapes’ harmony pathology is unbounded circumambient. The paper argues that such processes are not weakly deterministic, which contrasts with previous typological work on segmental phonology. Positing that weak determinism bounds segmental phonology but not tonal phonology thus captures the typological asymmetry. It is also discussed why this explanation is superior to any offered by Optimality Theory.

scholarly journals An Optimality Analysis of the Phonological Processes in the Speech of Autistic Algerian Children: A Case Study

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 197
Author(s):  
Meymouna Bourzeg
Keyword(s):  
Autistic Child ◽  
Optimality Theory ◽  
Picture Naming ◽  
Current Paper ◽  
Autistic Children ◽  
Phonological Processes ◽  
Standard Arabic ◽  
Naming Test ◽  
Faithfulness Constraint

The current paper scrutinizes the phonological processes used by an autistic child, in Standard Arabic, via the use of a constraint-based framework of optimality theory. The data of the present study were collected through a picture-naming test. To ensure that the pictures are representative of all standard Arabic phonemes, the researcher designed a test containing 84 pictures representing three intra-word positions (initial, medial, and final). The results reveal that the autistic child grammar is characterized, mainly, with seven phonological processes: sibilant dentalization, de-emphasization, gliding, stopping, nasality spreading, final consonant deletion, and fronting. Autistic children's phonological system is stigmatized by unmarked forms. In terms of optimality theory, treating the phonological problems of autistic children requires demoting the highly ranked unmarked constraints and promoting the lowest-ranked faithfulness constraint.

The People: Ethnoracial Configurations, Old and New

2020 ◽  
pp. 79-96
Author(s):  
Leila Brännström
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Northern Europe ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
The People ◽  
Political Forces ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Political Association ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Point Of Departure

In recent years the Sweden Democrats have championed a clarification of the identity of the ‘the people’ in the Instrument of government. The reference, they argue, should be to the ethnic group of Swedes. This chapter will take this ambition to fix the subject of popular sovereignty as the point of departure for discussing some of the ways in which the contemporary anti-foreigner political forces of Northern and Western Europe imagine ‘the people’ and identify their allies and enemies within and beyond state borders. To set the stage for this exploration the chapter will start by looking at Carl Schmitt’s ideas about political friendship, and more specifically the way he imagines the relationship between ‘us’ in a political and constitutional sense and ‘the people’ in national and ethnoracial terms. The choice to begin with Schmitt is not arbitrary. His thoughts about the nature of the political association have found their way into the discourse of many radical right-wing parties of Western and Northern Europe.

World Englishes and Phonological Theory

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Uffmann
Keyword(s):  
Strong Evidence ◽  
Optimality Theory ◽  
Point Contact ◽  
Syllable Structure ◽  
World Englishes ◽  
Active Constraints ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Constraint Hierarchies ◽  
Substrate Constraint

The relationship between phonological theory and World Englishes is generally characterized by a mutual lack of interest. This chapter argues for a greater engagement of both fields with each other, looking at constraint-based theories of phonology, especially Optimality Theory (OT), as a case in point. Contact varieties of English provide strong evidence for synchronically active constraints, as it is substrate or L1 constraints that are regularly transferred to the contact variety, not rules. Additionally, contact varieties that have properties that are in some way ‘in between’ the substrate and superstrate systems provide evidence for constraint hierarchies or implicational relationships between constraints, illustrated here primarily with examples from syllable structure. Conversely, for a scholar working on the description of World Englishes, OT can offer an explanation of where the patterns found in a contact variety come from, namely from the transfer of substrate constraint rankings (and subsequent gradual constraint demotion).

Words, nonwords, and phonological processes: Some comments on Gathercole, Willis, Emslie, and Baddeley

1991 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 369-373 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maggie Snowling ◽  
Shula Chiat ◽  
Charles Hulme
Keyword(s):  
Young Children ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Vocabulary Knowledge ◽  
Nonword Repetition ◽  
Phonological Processes ◽  
The Relationship

Gathercole, Willis, Emslie, and Baddeley (1991) present a reanalysis of some of their earlier data concerned with the relationship between nonword repetition and the development of vocabulary knowledge in young children. In the present article we outline some theoretical differences between ourselves and this group in the interpretation of nonword repetition and discuss how best these differences could be resolved.

scholarly journals The Morphological Nativization of French Loanwords in the Djelfa Dialect with Special Reference to some Phonological Processes Targeting it within OT

2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Khedidja Slimani
Keyword(s):  
Special Reference ◽  
Optimality Theory ◽  
Morphological Adaptation ◽  
Phonological Processes ◽  
Source Language ◽  
French Words ◽  
Phonological System

AbstractAlgerian Arabic, in general, and the Djelfa dialect, in particular, are receptive to French words. But such borrowing is not unsystematic as they are adapted in a way compatible with the morphological and phonological system of the recipient dialect as well as preserving as much information as possible from the source language. This paper focuses on the morphological nativization of French loanwords in the Djelfa dialect with special reference to some phonological processes, viz., epenthesis, assimilation and devocalization that are used to rehabilitate the illicit syllable structures resulting from such morphological adaptation within Optimality Theory.

Modernization and Religious Concord

2014 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 235-250
Author(s):  
David Weakliem
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Religious Belief ◽  
Intermediate Stage ◽  
The United States ◽  
General Belief ◽  
Belief In God ◽  
Using Data ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractTocqueville said that Americans combined a general belief in God with a lack of interest in denominational differences. Although this outlook may be particularly prevalent in the United States, it is also visible in other Western societies, although combined with lower levels of religious belief. This paper investigates the possibility of a relationship between a belief that there is truth in many religions and modernization, using data from the Gallup International Millenium Survey. The belief that there is truth in many religions is more prevalent in more affluent nations. Moreover, this belief does not seem to be merely an intermediate stage in a move away from religion. The relationship is about equally strong among people of all religious backgrounds. The tendency for modernization to lead to “religious concord” may help to explain the relationship between modernization and democracy noticed by Lipset.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document