Class Notes from February 16, 2012 (on phonology and writing phonological rules) 1.) Homework Grammatical words of English [pleŋk] [preŋk] [briŋ] [bræɡ] [twi] Ungrammatical words of English *[lpeŋk] *[rpeŋk] *[rbiŋ] *[rbæɡ] *[wti] The feature we re actually interested in overall is [+sonorant] vs. [-sonorant] sounds. Onset Phonotactic Principle: In an onset, if one consonant is [+sonorant], it must come second. This problem was intended to illustrate the Sonority Sequencing Principle Some of you noticed that the onsets of ungrammatical words would have generally made good codas. This demonstrates that in codas, you want your [+sonorant] sounds to come first. Languages prefer to build syllables with the most vowel-like sounds (the most sonorous sounds) nearer the middle and the least vowel-like sounds (stops, voiceless fricatives) near the edges. Syllables structured in this way conform to the sonority profile [.-sonorant..] [...+sonorant/vowels ] [-continuant] nasals approximants vowels [l, r] [j,w] low sonority high sonority ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- constricted vocal tract unconstricted vocal tract low in acoustic energy high in acoustic energy This seems to be a very strong tendency among languages. I ve posted a link to a study that looks at Egyptian Arabic, Hindi, Mongolian, and Malayalam (unrelated languages) and finds that the preferred shape of syllables in all of these languages obeys the sonority sequencing principle. 1
2.) Phonology PHONEME: The abstract, mental representation of a sound. The form of a phone that is found in the list of words that make up your mental lexical. o Phonemes are written between / slanted brackets / ALLOPHONE: One of a set of (potentially) multiple phones used to pronounce a single phoneme. o Allophones are written between [ square brackets ] (the way we ve been writing everything up to this point). A single phoneme will correspond to one or more allophones. Your Basic Task in Phonology Problems: determine whether two phones are allophones of the same abstract phoneme, or allophones of two distinct abstract phonemes. Do you have this? Or this? /phoneme/ /phoneme/ /phoneme/ 4 1 1 [allophone] [allophone] [allophone] [allophone] How can you tell? If you can find minimal pairs for two phones (they are in complementary distribution), you know that each is an allophone of a different phoneme. If you can t find minimal pairs for two phones, you know that they are allophones of the same phoneme. 3.) Example of Allophones in English [pʰɪt] [pʰrəәpʰer] [pʰle] [spɪt] [rəәtʰɪrn] [wɪks] [tʰɪl] [kʰlɪr] [wɪk] [stɪl] [kʰɪl] [skɪl] When [p], [t], and [k] are pronounced with a release of air, we describe them as being ASPIRATED. o We can represent aspirated phones with a superscript h, e.g, [p h ], [t h ], [k h ] 2
When [p], [t], and [k] are not pronounced with a release of air, we describe them as being UNASPIRATED. o We can represent unaspirated phones by leaving off the superscript. What is the distribution of [tʰ], [pʰ], and [kʰ]? o They are all found at the beginning of an Onset What is the distribution of [t], [p], and [k]? o They are found everywhere else (in Codas, not at the beginning of Onsets) What does this tell us? These phones are in complementary distribution. There are no minimal pairs containing [p] and [p h ]. o [p] and [p h ] are two different allophones of the same phoneme, /p/ o [t] and [t h ] are two different allophones of the same phoneme, /t/ o [k] and [k h ] are two different allophones of the same phoneme, /k/ 4.) Walking through a Phonology Problem The following words are from Tagalog (Filipino). datiŋ to arrive daɾaʔiŋ will complain dami amount maɾumi dirty dumi dirt maɾami many daɾatiŋ will arrive daʔiŋ to complain manduɾukot pickpocket mandukot to go pickpocketing Step 1: Are there any minimal pairs? Step 2: Figure out the distribution of [d] and [ɾ]. Make a chart! # means word boundary, means where the phone goes [d] #_a #_u n_u [ɾ] a_a u_u a_u Generalizations: [d] occurs word-initially [d] also occurs after nasals [ɾ] occurs between vowels The sounds are in complementary distribution. There are no minimal pairs. We know they are allophones of the same phoneme. 3
Step 3: What is the phoneme? You ll select one of the phones as basic: that one will be the phoneme. The phone you select as the phoneme will have the widest distribution (we can describe its distribution as elsewhere ). It looks like [d] has a wider distribution than [ɾ]. So, we can model the relationship between phonemes and allophones as shown below: /d/ 3 [d] [ɾ] Step 4: Write a rule describing where /d/ surfaces as [ɾ]. Define the environment such that everywhere else, /d/ surfaces as [d]. /d/ [ɾ] / Vowel Vowel The phoneme /d/ becomes [ɾ] when (in the environment) of between vowels. 5.) Group Problem 1: Swampy Cree [b] and [p]: [asabap] thread [paskwaw] prairie [mibit] tooth [ospwaɡan] pipe [wabos] rabbit [pimi] lard [nabew] man [p] #_a s_w a_# The distribution of [b] is between vowels. It looks like [p] has the elsewhere distribution. Rule: /p/ [b] / Vowel Vowel (/p/ [p] / elsewhere) [k] and [g]: [kodak] another [oɡik] these [waskow] cloud [tʃiɡahiɡan] axe [niɡi] my house [tahki] often [koɡos] pig [niska] goose [b] a_o a_a i_i a_e [k] #_k s_o #_o h_i s_a [g] o_i i_a i_i o_o o_a The distribution of [g] is between vowels. It looks like [k] has the elsewhere distribution. Rule: /k/ [g] / Vowel Vowel (/k/ [k] / elsewhere) 4
[d] and [t]: [mibit] tooth [nisto] three [tahki] often [adim] dog [kodak] another [mide] heart [t] i_# #_a s_o [d] o_a a_i i_e The distribution of [d] is between vowels. It looks like [t] has the elsewhere distribution. Rule: /t/ [d] / Vowel Vowel (/t/ [t] / elsewhere) What have we learned about Swampy Cree? We have learned that there are three phonemes in the language, /p, t, k/. Each of these phonemes maps onto two different allophones: /p/ /t/ /k/ 3 3 3 [p] [b] [t] [d] [k] [g] We have also learned that the rules that change each phoneme into the form of the allophone that looks different from the phoneme (i.e., /p/ [b]) have something in common. Rule 1: /p/ [b] / Vowel Vowel Rule 2: /k/ [g] / Vowel Vowel Rule 3: /t/ [d] / Vowel Vowel It would be nice if we could make a more general statement about phonological rules in the language let s try to combine these three rules into one rule. Attempt One: /p, t, k/ [b, d, g] / Vowel Vowel (/p, t, k/ [p, t, k] / elsewhere) This is a good first pass attempt! It relates the three rules to each other, which was our goal. Attempt Two: Can we make our rule even more general? We are still listing out the phones individually. This is descriptively adequate but not very theoretically informative. We ll try instead with features: 5
Rule, final form: /-continuant, -voiced/ [+voiced] / [+vocalic] [+vocalic] How did I come up with this rule? o Between the / slanted / brackets, I listed those features that are necessary to characterize the phonemes as a set: they are all [-continuant] and [-voiced]. I could have added more features, but as long as I ve characterized all and only those phonemes which I have evidence participate in the rule, I ve done my job. o Between the [ square ] brackets, I listed only the features that change when you go from the phoneme to the allophone that doesn t look like the phoneme (i.e., from /p/ to [b]). The only feature that changes is [-voiced] goes to [+voiced]. o After the slash /, I put the environment. Since I m characterizing the phonemes and allophones in terms of features, we should do the same for the environment. All vowels are [+vocalic]. 1 1 We could have added [+tense], too: all the vowels we see in the environments are also [+tense]. 6