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<p>Dear Miren and everybody,</p>
<p>I find this problem interesting. Nowadays everybody appears to
agree that syntactic and morphological classes are essentially
distribution classes although the elements in question have
meaning. In the same spirit, the distributionalists conceived of
the phoneme in terms of the distribution of phones although these
have physical properties. And the basic phonological features like
[consonantal] and [syllabic] essentially relate to the
distribution of segments in phonotactic patterns. Questions such
as whether [ts] consists of two segments /ts/ or is one affricate
/ʦ/ are not solvable by phonetics (to the best of my knowledge),
but are resolved by analyzing the distribution of this element.
Again, it is true that distribution alone leads to unsatisfactory
classes. The complementary distribution of [h] and [ŋ] in several
languages including English is one such example. Apparently a
distribution class counts as a natural class only if it has a
phonetic motivation.</p>
<p>My impression is that a full phonological description works with
a heterogeneous set of features: It does not abide by purely
distributional phonological features, but also needs features
which are essentially phonetic and have no direct relation to the
distribution of the segments characterized by them. This may
concern, in particular, features involved in processes of
assimilation. If a consonant assimilates to an adjacent vowel, it
means they share a feature despite their appurtenance to distinct
distribution classes.</p>
<p>Net result for my initial question: Assuming that I want a rule
that assimilates a fricative to a following [u], producing [ɸ], I
will have to accept an articulatory feature like [labial] in my
phonology. Does this correspond to the state of the art in
phonology?</p>
<p>Christian<br>
</p>
-- <br>
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<p style="font-size:90%">Prof. em. Dr. Christian Lehmann<br>
Rudolfstr. 4<br>
99092 Erfurt<br>
<span style="font-variant:small-caps">Deutschland</span></p>
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