minimal pairs are not always there

[Ante Aikio]

[Patrick Ryan:]

> It suffices that pairs like /hwer/ ('where') and /wer/ ('wear') exist. But,
> I believe we must have at least *one* minimal pair for a phoneme to be
> established.

There are two mistakes here:

1.
One minimal pair, such as above, does not establish phonemes - it
establishes an opposition in a non-contrastive environment. A phoneme is
the sum of its oppisitons: what makes something a phoneme is that it is in
opposition to -all- the other phonemes. You can establish phonemes only in
the context of the whole phonological system.

To take an example: Finnish has the consonant phonemes /ptksvjlrmn/
(plus /?d/ in some dialects and idiolects, disregarded here). Now, the
following is a minimal pair:

Finn. kala 'fish' vs. pala 'piece'

But pointing this out does not establish phonemes /p/ and /k/ for Finnish.
It does not show that /k/ is a phoneme distinct from /t/, /s/, /v/ etc.
You would have to show that -all- the phonemes contrast with each other.
In order to establish /p/ as a phoneme, you'd have to point out e.g. the
following minimal pairs / series:

puu 'tree' vs. luu 'bone' vs. kuu 'moon' vs. muu 'else' vs. suu 'mouth'

palo 'burning' vs. talo 'house' vs. valo 'light' vs. salo 'woodland'
vs. jalo 'noble'

pata 'pot' vs. rata 'track' vs. nata 'snot'

You have established the Finnish phonemes only when you have shown that
every one of them is in opposition with every other. It is a different
thing to demonstrate phonemic contrast using a minimal pair and establish
a phoneme - the latter requires multiple minimal pairs (if demonstrated
through minimal pairs, see below).

2. It must be once again stressed that for many languages it is impossible
to establish all the contrasts using minimal pairs - this is precisely the
case with English /sh/ vs. /zh/, which was discussed earlier. The phonemes
contrast with each other even though there are no minimal pairs, because
their distribution cannot be accounted for with a rule. I.e., they show
contrast in non-contrastive environments (vicious vs. vision etc.).

Regards,
Ante Aikio