28.671, Review: Portuguese; Spanish; Historical Ling; Phonology; Socioling: Goodin-Mayeda (2016)

Fri Feb 3 16:51:31 UTC 2017

LINGUIST List: Vol-28-671. Fri Feb 03 2017. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 28.671, Review: Portuguese; Spanish; Historical Ling; Phonology; Socioling: Goodin-Mayeda (2016)

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Date: Fri, 03 Feb 2017 11:51:23
From: Silvina Bongiovanni [scbongio at indiana.edu]
Subject: Nasals and Nasalization in Spanish and Portuguese

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Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/27/27-2170.html

AUTHOR: C. Elizabeth  Goodin-Mayeda
TITLE: Nasals and Nasalization in Spanish and Portuguese
SUBTITLE: Perception, phonetics and phonology
SERIES TITLE: Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics 9
PUBLISHER: John Benjamins
YEAR: 2016

REVIEWER: Silvina Bongiovanni, Indiana University Bloomington

Reviews Editor: Helen Aristar-Dry

SUMMARY

Nasality, and in particular vowel nasality, have been much studied in Romance
varieties, especially French and Portuguese. The study of nasality in other
Romance varieties, like Spanish, has lagged behind. In “Nasals and
Nasalization in Spanish and Portuguese”,  Prof. C. Elizabeth Goodin-Mayeda
explores the perception of nasals and nasalization in Spanish and Portuguese.
As a research monograph, it is intended for researchers and advanced students
exploring the relationship between phonetics and phonology in co-articulation.
A second  (but equal) purpose of this book is to examine the role of the
listener’s native language. Therefore, this monograph will also be of interest
to researchers working on native and non-native speech perception.

The book includes six chapters. Since it is a research monograph, it
understandably does not include exercises and problem sets. In the following
paragraphs, I provide a brief summary of each chapter. 

In Chapter 1, “Introduction”, the author presents the subject matter. This
chapter argues for the importance of perceptual work in examining the
relationship between phonetics and phonology and offers nasalization in
Romance languages as a test case for showcasing the role of speech perception
in synchronic variation and language change. As expected, this chapter lays
out the goals of the book and presents its organization.

Chapter 2, “From citizens of the world to language specialists: Infant and
adult speech perception”, covers literature on speech perception, both for
child and adult subjects. In doing so, this chapter highlights the importance
of examining language experience and its implications for theories of native
and nonnative speech perception.

Chapter 3, “Coarticulation and nasalization”, considers the role of
co-articulation and context in speech perception. Though the focus of the book
is on speech perception, this chapter offers a comprehensive summary of the
phonetics of the velopharyngeal mechanism and the acoustic correlates (and
perceptual consequences) of nasal coupling. 

Chapter 4, “Nasals and nasalization in Spanish and Portuguese”, describes and
compares the phonemic inventories and distribution of nasal consonants and
nasal vowels in the languages of interest. It also provides a brief summary of
the historical development of this sound class in both languages. It then
discusses work on nasal consonants and nasalization, and the phonological
processes that these sounds undergo. The section on Spanish focuses on the
process nasals undergo in the syllable-coda, such as place assimilation and
neutralization. The section in Portuguese, on the other hand, concentrates on
nasalization due to stress and due to syllable structure.  

Chapter 5, “Studies in the perception of nasals and nasalization in Spanish
and Portuguese”, presents two original experiments that connect with the
issues brought up in the previous chapters: the role of language experience in
speech perception and coarticulation. The first experiment examines the
perception of place of articulation in nasals and the second, the perception
of vowel height in the presence of nasalization. In both cases, the author
presents the goals of each experiment, the research questions that guide the
investigation, the methods and procedure followed, and the results. The
chapter closes with a general discussion of the findings of both experiments
and their implications for models of speech perception and the role of
language experience.

Finally, Chapter 6, “Summary and conclusions”, summarizes the content of the
previous chapters and connects them in light of the results of the experiments
presented in Chapter 5. This chapter also identifies areas for future
research.

EVALUATION

The goal of this research monograph, stated in its introduction and conclusion
sections, is twofold. Firstly, the aim of the book is to contribute insights
into how perception can inform models of phonetics, phonology and language
change, taking nasals and nasalization in Spanish and Portuguese as case
studies. A second aim of the book is to investigate the role of listeners’
first language in the perception of nasals and nasalization. 

An important contribution of this monograph has to do with the languages under
study. First, it compares patterns of nasality in two closely related
languages. Second, and more importantly, it undertakes the study of
nasalization in Spanish, which has been understudied. Another strength of this
book is the author’s ability to synthesize clearly and concisely complex
research literature dealing with speech perception (Chapter 2),
co-articulation, and the acoustics of nasalization (Chapter 3). These two
chapters present information in a way that anticipates readers’ questions. 

The discussion of the topics at hand could be improved in a number of ways.
For example, Chapter 4 presents a comprehensive discussion of phonological
analyses of nasals in Spanish, with an emphasis on nasal consonants in the
syllable-coda. This chapter would benefit from a more developed presentation
of experimental studies that have examined language-specific processes, not
only in the syllable coda but also in the onset. An important study,
considering the experiments presented in Chapter 5, is Colantoni & Kochetov
(2012), which uses eletropalatography to compare the realization of word-final
nasals in Argentine and Cuban Spanish across three speech styles. The findings
in this study indicate that, as expected, Argentine speakers produced more
coronal, while Cuban speakers more velar, word-final nasals. However,
crucially, the study found that both speaker groups produced weakened variants
(i.e., less constricted) in the less-controlled tasks, but the degree of
weakening was higher for the Cuban speakers. Because of the methodology,
however, the authors were not able to examine the degree to which nasal
weakening was accompanied by nasalization. These results are particularly
relevant to the studies presented in Chapter 5, considering the participants
in Experiment 2, and shed experimental light on phonological processes that
have been known to lead to sound change in nasalization. 

With regard to onset nasals, research has shown that they can undergo lenition
as well, among other processes. In particular, Honoroff (2003) and Shosted &
Willoghs (2006), who investigate nasal de-occluvization, find that onset nasal
consonants exhibit phonetic tendencies towards weakening, though these are not
robust enough to claim that nasal lenition in this environment is on its way
to become phonologized. These are important findings because they show that
onset nasals also present gestural reduction, which may bear on patterns of
variation in the production of nasalization in Spanish, progressive
nasalization in this case. By not addressing the experimental literature, both
of onset and coda nasals, Chapter 4 misses important details of the nasal
system in Spanish, and contextual and dialectal variation. 

It is also important to consider how certain methodological decisions may have
influenced the data presented in Chapter 5. In Experiment 1, methodological
details crucial for replication purposes are not mentioned. For example, given
that the same speaker produced the tokens for each language, the reader may be
wondering what were the actual differences between the stimuli. An analysis of
the stimuli would be beneficial to help clarify these differences between
languages. Furthermore, information regarding the criteria to determine
methodological decisions such as how much acoustic material to remove in order
to eliminate transitions would also be useful.

With regard to Experiment 2, one key issue has to do with the use of
synthesized speech. Typical synthesis models, like the Klatt synthesizer used
in the experiments described in Chapter 5, use LPC analysis to reconstruct the
signal, which is based on the assumption of a single-resonator tube.
Nasal(ized) segments, however, can only adequately be modeled with a
dual-resonator tube. Thus, synthesizing and manipulating the nasality
parameter becomes an issue. As a result, it is not clear how the stimuli used
in the experiments presented in Chapter 5 connect to real speech. 

The limitations noted in this review should not overshadow the accomplishments
of this monograph. This book represents a much-needed and timely contribution
to the study of nasals and nasalization in Spanish and Portuguese. “Nasals and
nasalization in Spanish and Portuguese” by C. Elizabeth Goodin-Mayeda
certainly opens fruitful avenues for future research. 

REFERENCES

Colantoni, Laura & Kochetov, Alexei. 2012. Nasal variability and speech style:
An EPG study of word-final nasals in two Spanish dialects. Italian Journal of
Linguistics/Rivista di Linguistica, 24, 11-42.

Honorof, Douglas. 2003. Articulatory evidence for nasal deocclusivization in
Castilian. In María-Josep Solé, Daniel Recasens & Joaquin Romero (eds.), 15th
International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, 1759-1762, Barcelona.

Shosted, Ryan, & Willoghs, Beatriz. 2006. Nasals Unplugged: The Aerodynamics
of Nasal De-occlusivization in Spanish. In Manuel Díaz-Campos (ed.), Selected
Proceedings of the 2nd Conference on Laboratory Approaches to Spanish
Phonetics and Phonology, 14-21, Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proceedings
Project.

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Silvina Bongiovanni is a dual-PhD candidate in Linguistics and Hispanic
Linguistics at Indiana University. Her doctoral work focuses on dialectal
differences in the production of nasality in Spanish.

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