phonostylistic processes

[Lise Menn]

>I would like to know when phonostylistic processes start to develop. Does
>anyone can tell me something about it?
>
>Thank you in advance.
>
>Anna

I don't know if I ever mentioned this in print anywhere, but my
dissertation subject Jacob (Menn 1979) did a very creditable imitation of
his father's emphatic negation 'no way!'  (general emphasis, extra length
on vowel) before 18 months.
	More generally, I think that this is like the question 'when do
children begin to acquire their dialect?'  They do so from the beginning of
language - they don't start with a 'neutral' or 'unmarked' form and then
develop  specific variants, but rather they start from examples and attempt
to match ones that attract them.  Frequency, match to existing phonetic
(including babble) repertoire, emotional/cognitive interest, and
suprasegmental properties all play a role in the selection of targets.
	Mastery of what different stylistic variants mean to different
hearers is, on the other hand, developed over a lifetime (there are still
times when I fail to detect sarcasm).
	Lise Menn


Beware Procrustes bearing Occam's razor.

	Lise Menn 			office phone 303-492-1609
	Professor			home fax     303-413-0017
	Department of Linguistics
	UCB 295
	University of Colorado
	Boulder, CO 80309-0295

Lise Menn's home page
http://www.colorado.edu/linguistics/faculty/lmenn/

"Shirley Says: Living with Aphasia"
http://spot.colorado.edu/~menn/Shirley4.pdf