Preservation and deletion in Mandarin loanword adaptation

2014 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 214-243
Author(s):  
Tae-Eun Kim
Keyword(s):  
Initial Position ◽  
Consonant Clusters ◽  
Loanword Adaptation ◽  
Close Relationship ◽  
Mandarin Speakers

This paper is about how English inputs that are not allowed in the native Mandarin phonology are adapted to Mandarin phonotactics in Mandarin loanwords. The focus of the discussion is on whether or not the elements in the inputs are preserved or deleted and what causes the phenomena. Through analyses of English consonant adaptation in Mandarin loanwords, the functions of both borrowers’ perception and the native Mandarin phonology are consistently found. The high preservation of the nasal consonants in any syllabic position clearly shows the functions, in that the salient segments are usually preserved and the acceptance of nasal codas in Mandarin phonology makes Mandarin speakers easily perceive the nasal sounds even in the coda positions. Furthermore, English /m/ and /n/ in the final positions are usually differently adapted into Mandarin loanwords. English /m/ mostly forms an independent syllable by vowel insertion while /n/ is mostly adapted into the coda nasal of the preceding syllable (e.g., English loam → Mandarin lú-mǔ, English pint → Mandarin pǐn-tuō). This tendency is due to the function of Mandarin phonology, because a nasal /n/ is allowed as a coda consonant, but /m/ is not allowed. The high deletion of English /ɹ/ in the coda or in the consonant clusters also supports the argument. The English /ɹ/, except in the initial position, is not easily perceived due to its own vowel-like quality and the fact that it is a non-Mandarin phoneme. Lastly, the higher preservation of consonants in the initial clusters than in the final clusters also shows the close relationship between perception and Mandarin phonology. Even though Mandarin does not allow consonant clusters in any position, final consonant clusters should be harder for Mandarin speakers to perceive. The reason is that in Mandarin phonology, consonants usually do not come in the final positions while all the consonants except /ŋ/ can come in the initial positions. More frequent deletion of consonants in final CCC clusters than in CC clusters can be identically explained.

Icelandic Children's Acquisition of Consonants and Consonant Clusters

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-13
Author(s):  
Thora Másdóttir ◽  
Sharynne McLeod ◽  
Kathryn Crowe
Keyword(s):  
First Language ◽  
Speech Sound ◽  
Clinical Importance ◽  
Initial Position ◽  
Consonant Clusters ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Consonant Cluster ◽  
Speech Sound Disorders ◽  
Germanic Languages ◽  
Comprehensive Study

Purpose This study investigated Icelandic-speaking children's acquisition of singleton consonants and consonant clusters. Method Participants were 437 typically developing children aged 2;6–7;11 (years;months) acquiring Icelandic as their first language. Single-word speech samples of the 47 single consonants and 45 consonant clusters were collected using Málhljóðapróf ÞM (ÞM's Test of Speech Sound Disorders). Results Percentage of consonants correct for children aged 2;6–2;11 was 73.12 ( SD = 13.33) and increased to 98.55 ( SD = 3.24) for children aged 7;0–7;11. Overall, singleton consonants were more likely to be accurate than consonant clusters. The earliest consonants to be acquired were /m, n, p, t, j, h/ in word-initial position and /f, l/ within words. The last consonants to be acquired were /x, r, r̥, s, θ, n̥/, and consonant clusters in word-initial /sv-, stl-, str-, skr-, θr-/, within-word /-ðr-, -tl-/, and word-final /-kl̥, -xt/ contexts. Within-word phonemes were more often accurate than those in word-initial position, with word-final position the least accurate. Accuracy of production was significantly related to increasing age, but not sex. Conclusions This is the first comprehensive study of consonants and consonant cluster acquisition by typically developing Icelandic-speaking children. The findings align with trends for other Germanic languages; however, there are notable language-specific differences of clinical importance.

scholarly journals Resolving the Issue of the Target of Vowel Copy in Fijian Loanwords

2016 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gakuji Kumagai
Keyword(s):  
Consonant Clusters ◽  
Vowel Quality ◽  
Minimal Projection ◽  
Loanword Adaptation ◽  
Vowel Epenthesis ◽  
Epenthetic Vowel

English loanwords into Fijian undergo vowel epenthesis, as Fijian disallows coda consonants and consonant clusters. Vowel copy is an option for determining epenthetic vowel quality in loanword adaptation (Kumagai 2016a; Schütz 1978, 2004). The target of copy epenthesis seems to be either the preceding or following vowel of the epenthetic site. However, the choice of target vowel is indeterminate, as there is no vowel copy in Fijian native phonology. This paper offers a resolution to the problem by adopting an expanded version of prosodic projection theory (Martínez-Paricio 2012, 2013), in which feet are allowed to exhibit maximal/minimal projection. I propose Foot Condition, which requires the Foot[±max/±min] to circumscribe the vowel copy domain.

scholarly journals THE SYLLABLE STRUCTURE IN EUROPEAN PORTUGUESE

1998 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-32 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Helena Mateus ◽  
Ernesto D’Andrade
Keyword(s):  
Internal Structure ◽  
Initial Position ◽  
Syllable Structure ◽  
Consonant Clusters ◽  
European Portuguese

The goal of this paper is to discuss the internal structure of the syllable in European Portuguese and to propose an algorithm for base syllabification. Due to the analysis of consonant clusters in onset position and the occurrence of epenthetic vowels, and considering the variation of the vowels in word initial position that occupy the syllable nucleus without an onset at the phonetic level, we assume that, in European Portuguese, the syllable is always constituted by an onset and a rhyme even though one of these constituents (but not both) may be empty, that is, one of then may have no phonetic realisation.

An L1 grammar-driven model of loanword adaptation

2014 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 144-187 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hyunsoon Kim
Keyword(s):  
Data Collection ◽  
Distinctive Feature ◽  
Initial Position ◽  
Syllable Structure ◽  
Acoustic Cues ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Loanword Adaptation ◽  
Lexical Representations ◽  
Acoustic Output ◽  
Adaptation Model

The present study proposes an L1 grammar-driven loanword-adaptation model with three intermediate steps — L1 perception, L1 lexical representations and L1 phonology — between L2 acoustic output and L1 output by examining how the distinctive features, syllable structure constraints and structural restrictions of one’s native language steer speakers in their search to replace foreign sounds with native sounds. Our main source of data in support of this model comes from differences between the Korean adaptations of English and French voicing contrasts on the basis of a recent survey of English and French loans in the year 2011. In word-initial position, for example, English voiceless plosives are borrowed as aspirated plosives, while French voiceless plosives are borrowed as either aspirated or fortis plosives in free variation. Considering the data examined here, we suggest that the different Korean adaptations of English and French voicing contrasts in plosives are based on Korean speakers’ perception of redundant phonetic variants in the donor languages (L2) and that this perception is conditioned by the acoustic cues to the laryngeal features [±spread glottis] and [±tense] of Korean, the host language (L1). In contrast to some current models, it shows that the distinctive feature composition of L1 segments plays an important role in loanword adaptations. We also suggest that not only L1 laryngeal features but also L1 syllable structure constraints and lexical restrictions influence L1 perception of the L2 voicing contrasts in word-final postvocalic plosives and that variation in vowel insertion after the plosives in our 2011 data collection is motivated by L1 phonology in both English and French loans. Variation in vowel insertion after English and French word-internal preconsonantal coda plosives is also affected by the native phonology in the 2011 data, no matter whether the plosives are released, as in French, or unreleased, as in English.

Similarity scaling for consonants and consonant clusters in initial position

1997 ◽  
Vol 101 (5) ◽  
pp. 3111-3111
Author(s):  
Rochelle S. Newman ◽  
James R. Sawusch ◽  
Paul A. Luce
Keyword(s):  
Initial Position ◽  
Consonant Clusters ◽  
Similarity Scaling

scholarly journals Spit or sbit? ST-type consonant clusters in the speech of Polish learners of English

2021 ◽  
Vol Volume 138 (4) ◽  
pp. 187-199
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Schwartz
Keyword(s):  
Voice Onset Time ◽  
Onset Time ◽  
Initial Position ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Consonant Clusters ◽  
Stop Consonants ◽  
Sibilant Fricatives ◽  
Speech Research ◽  
L1 English

This paper presents two small-scale acoustic phonetic studies investigating the pronunciation of sibilant-stop (ST) consonant clusters in Polish, and in the L2 speech of L1 Polish learners of English. In English, aspiration of fortis stops is not attested in the post-/s/ context. Rather, short-lag voice onset time (VOT) measures are observed in L1 English in post-/s/ stop consonants, a phonetic weakening that renders them phonetically similar in terms of VOT to lenis stops in initial position. In Polish, both voiced and voiceless stops may appear after sibilant fricatives. The acoustic results suggest that (1) L1 Polish does not weaken its stops in ST clusters, and (2) that more L1 Polish speakers exhibit some weakening in their L2 English clusters as a function of proficiency, but do not produce native-like VOTs in ST sequences. Implications of these findings for L2 speech research and the phonological status of ST clusters are discussed.

scholarly journals Sylaba w gwarze Moravy e Epërme

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 53-68
Author(s):  
Karolina Dargiel
Keyword(s):  
Initial Position ◽  
Consonant Clusters ◽  
Final Position ◽  
European Languages ◽  
Local Dialect

Syllable pattern in Morava e Epërme local dialect of AlbanianThis article summarizes the first part of a research on syllable pattern in Kosovo dialects. It attempts to answer the question, whether Kosovo dialects have one-peak syllable pattern, two-peak syllable pattern or maybe some other type. Facing many theories about the syllabic unit, that have been created until now, for our study we choose the sonority theory, which is a very comfortable model for formulating distributional rules of speech sounds.Standard Albanian language is untypical against other European languages. This is due to the fact that it tolerates two-peak homorganic consonant clusters [NO-] in word initial position (mb-, mp-, nd-, ŋg-, nʣ-, ɲɟ-). Two-peak clusters in word final position are not accepted; consonants are always separated by vowel [ә]. What we observe in Standard Albanian is rather one-peak syllable pattern, where the hierarchy of sonority in the syllable is obeyed, but the least sonorous nasal sonorants should be classified to the distributional group of obstruents. And how does it look like in other Albanian dialects?For our study we have chosen several Kosovo dialects, which seem the most relevant for the examined problems. In this article I deal with the local dialect of Morava e Epërme, where I have studied the following issues:[SO-] initial clusters (including clusters with liquids l and rr),*[-OS] final clusters,Clusters [-OSO-] with an interobstruental sonorant,Consonantal proclitics on strong morphological borders (t’, m’, n’, s’),Occurences of vowel [ә]. Does it have phoneme status in this local dialect?Can sonorants and obstruents be syllabic?Our study has proved, that [NO-] initial clusters have tendency for reduction: [mbyt], [ŋuʃt] instead of [mbyt], [ŋguʃt, whereas sporadic occurence of the two-peak initial clusters lO-, rrO- is phonetically conditioned (it means that this form occurs only after vowels [m‿ka‿ʎʃu:], [mu‿Rʣu:]).Final *[-OS] clusters in Morava e Epërme, as in the standard Albanian, are completely extinct (they are usually split by vowel [ә]: [vetәm ktu], [natәn], [θupәr]). Th same referes to the clusters [-OSO-], which usually occur with the syllabic sonorant or inserted vowel schwa [ә].Dialect of Morava e Epërme tolerates syllabic sonorants and in some contexts also syllabic obstruents.The vowel [ә] appears very often, but never in unmotivated position. Therefore we can conclude that this sound does not have the phoneme status in this dialect.Dialect of Morava e Epërme neither has the typical one-peak syllable pattern (it tolerates two-peak initial clusters), nor it has a two-peak syllable model (it does not tolerate two-peak final clusters). This local dialect can be classified, the same as standard Albanian, as a one with one-peak syllable pattern, where, however, nasal sonorants should be distributionally classified as obstruents (and not as sonorants).

Variation in loanword adaptation: A case from Mandarin Chinese

2020 ◽  
pp. 026765832096144
Author(s):  
Yangyu Chen ◽  
Yu-An Lu
Keyword(s):  
Mandarin Chinese ◽  
Forced Choice ◽  
Vowel Duration ◽  
Perceptual Similarity ◽  
Loanword Adaptation ◽  
Chinese Speakers ◽  
Adaptation Pattern ◽  
Syllable Duration ◽  
Two Factors ◽  
Mandarin Speakers

Mandarin speakers tend to adapt intervocalic nasals as either an onset of the following syllable (e.g. Bruno → bù.lŭ .n uò), as a nasal geminate (e.g. Daniel → dā n.n í.ěr), or as one of the above forms (e.g. Tiffany → dì.fú. n í or dì.fē n.n í). Huang and Lin (2013, 2016) identified two factors that may induce the nasal gemination repair: (1) when stress falls on the pre-nasal vowel and (2) when the pre-nasal vowel is a non-high lax vowel. They hypothesized that Mandarin Chinese speakers insert a nasal coda to perceptually approximate the stronger nasalization and longer syllable duration associated with the stressed syllables, and the shorter vowel duration of a lax vowel because the vowels in closed syllables are shorter in Mandarin. The results from two forced-choice identification experiments and an open-ended transcription task showed that although Mandarin speakers’ choices of different repairs were indeed biased by the different phonetic manipulations, suggesting an effect of perceptual similarity, their decisions were mainly guided by native phonotactics. The overall findings suggest that phonotactic, phonetic, as well as non-linguistic (i.e. frequency) factors interact with each other, resulting in the variable adaptation pattern.

Gestural coordination of Italian word-initial clusters: the case of ‘impure s’

Phonology ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-25 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Hermes ◽  
Doris Mücke ◽  
Martine Grice
Keyword(s):  
Structural Difference ◽  
Initial Position ◽  
Consonant Clusters ◽  
Unresolved Problem ◽  
The Status ◽  
Proper Name ◽  
Liquid Clusters ◽  
Coordination Patterns

We report on an articulatory study which uses an electromagnetic articulograph to investigate word-initial consonant clusters in Italian. In particular, we investigate clusters involving a sibilant, such as in spina ‘thorn’. The status of the sibilant in such clusters, referred to as ‘impure s’, is an unresolved problem for the syllable phonology of Italian. Coordination patterns of the gestural targets of consonantal and vocalic gestures reveal a structural difference between obstruent–liquid clusters, e.g. /pr/, and sibilant–obstruent clusters, e.g. /sp/. Whereas in /pr/, both /p/ and /r/ have distinct coordination patterns as compared to either /p/ or /r/ as a single consonant in the same (word-initial) position, this is not the case for /sp/. Here the /p/ patterns like a single consonant: /p/ in spina patterns with /p/ in Pina (proper name). Thus, although /s/ in spina constitutes a word onset, there is evidence against it being part of a syllable onset.

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