Phonovisual Biases in Language: is the Lexicon Tied to the Visual World?

The present paper addresses the study of cross-linguistic and cross-modal iconicity within a deep learning framework. An LSTM-based Recurrent Neural Network is trained to associate the phonetic representation of a concrete word, encoded as a sequence of feature vectors, to the visual representation of its referent, expressed as an HCNN-transformed image. The processing network is then tested, without further training, in a language that does not appear in the training set and belongs to a different language family. The performance of the model is evaluated through a comparison with a randomized baseline; we show that such an imaginative network is capable of extracting language-independent generalizations in the mapping from linguistic sounds to visual features, providing empirical support for the hypothesis of a universal sound-symbolic substrate underlying all languages.

Russian Composite Words with a Borrowed Component in Business-Communication

The article presents the results of the analysis of main processes and mechanisms of forming composite words with a borrowed component in modern Russian business communication. The linguistic interpretation of the observed phenomena is carried out with due regard to the following: the presence of original, assimilated or non-assimilated borrowed component in the structure of a composite word; the change of the composite structural status in the process of its constituent(s) borrowing; the modification of the composite semantics in the process of borrowing and in the usage afterwards, and the change of graphic and phonetic representation of the composite as well as the order of its components. The results of the research showed that composites in modern Russian business communication are mostly represented by the structures with original and borrowed assimilated components. The number of composites with a borrowed nonassimilated components is also considerable. The process of foreign composite units transition into Russian requires their structural status change. The adoption of composite borrowings into Russian is accompanied by modifications of their graphic, phonetic features as well as by the order of composite constituents.

Morphologically conditioned phonological alternations

This chapter asks how affixes can affect the phonology of their stems, as in harmony/ harmonic/harmonious. Within the Parallel Architecture, phonology is an algebraic form of representation, while phonetic representation is analog in character. Their relation is negotiated by an interface that relates phonological segments and sequences to positions and trajectories in phonetic space. In these terms, the chapter explores aspiration, final devoicing, vowel shift and vowel reduction, affixes like -ity and -ious that manipulate the phonology of their bases, and affixes that can blend with their bases, for instance flattery (= flatter+ery). Again the formal machinery of sister schemas plays an important role in the account, taking over the work done in other theories by derivation (as in SPE and Lexical Phonology) and constraint ranking (as in Optimality Theory)

Interlingual Literature, Tropicalization, and Bilanguaging

US Latina/o literature is shaped by the hierarchical relationship between Spanish and English in the United States. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, writers working in various genres have explored this linguistic relationship by representing the interaction between English and Spanish in their literary works. Within a broader context of bilingual literary creation, many Latina/o writers have innovated with Spanish and English in ways that trouble the boundaries between these languages and, by extension, their relationship. In response to these literary experimentations, scholars have developed a range of perspectives to analyze writing that cannot be fully described by the term bilingual. Juan Bruce-Novoa proposes the term interlingual to analyze texts that do not treat Spanish and English as separate, independent codes but rather place the languages in a state of relation that makes a purely monolingual reading impossible. Frances Aparicio approaches this writing through the framework of tropicalization, a term that signals both dominant US cultural stereotypes about Latina/os as well as subaltern responses to those stereotypes. While Bruce-Novoa generally focuses on texts that include a high volume of both Spanish and English, Aparicio highlights the work of Latina/o writers, like Sandra Cisneros, Gary Soto, and Helena María Viramontes, who work primarily or exclusively in English. Aparicio traces the presence of Spanish in seemingly monolingual works through strategies like the use of literal translation and the phonetic representation of accent in English dialogue. She analyzes these strategies as sources of linguistic tension and literary creativity that transform the experiences of both monolingual and bilingual readers. Walter Mignolo offers a third perspective on bilingual writing, approaching it through the framework of decolonial theory. Like Bruce-Novoa, Mignolo highlights the creative use of the space between distinct languages. He argues that writers, like Gloria Anzaldúa, who operate in this liminal space participate in an active process of social transformation by denouncing and re-imagining hierarchical, colonial relationships between languages and cultures. While Bruce-Novoa, Aparicio, and Mignolo offer distinct perspectives on Latina/o writing between languages, they share a recognition of creative work that moves beyond the mere coexistence of Spanish and English to create meaning in the messy interaction between languages. In doing so, these creative and critical writers challenge their audiences to new modes of reading literature as well as of imagining linguistic, cultural, and political relationships between English and Spanish.

Teaching in the Absence of a Standard Language. A Case Study of Upper Sorbian

The teaching of Upper Sorbian (USo) is of increasing importance for the survival of this language. A challenge faced by learners is the lack of standardisation. Reliable standardisation has been conducted only in the area of orthography, which offers little indication about pronunciation. Pronunciation, however, is generally missing in all USo dictionaries, and teaching materials offer only general observations. Learners of USo mostly belong to one of two groups which require different teaching strategies: on the one hand, second-language learners aim to achieve authentic pronunciation; native speakers, on the other hand, struggle with the contrast between the standardised etymological orthography and the phonetic representation in everyday language (partly addressed in Šołćina 2014a/b).

Tongue Retraction in Arabic: An Ultrasound Study

A common analysis for Arabic emphatics and pharyngeals posits that their commonalities are due to the shared feature [RTR]. This, however, does not account for some phonological processes, and does not reflect their phonetic representation. This study provides ultrasound evidence that emphatics and pharyngeals do not exhibit a similar retraction of the tongue. Results indicate that while tongue retraction for the emphatics is characterized with simultaneous tongue dorsum and root retraction, the pharyngeals lower the tongue dorsum. Unlike the pharyngeals, the tongue root retraction of the emphatics and uvulars is always posterior to the tongue root position of the inter-speech posture. Such a consistent and significant displacement confirms that [RTR] is an active feature for the emphatics and uvulars. This is also evident from the retraction of following low vowels triggered by the emphatics and uvulars. These phonetic findings suggest that the pharyngeals and emphatics have different phonological representations.