[Lingtyp] Affricates vs. stop-fricative clusters

[Cat Butz]

Hello Françoise,

Interesting, so far I only knew of Polish as an example of a language 
which distinguishes affricates from their corresponding stop-fricative 
clusters. Thanks for doubling that!

(For anyone who's interested: /t͡ʃ/ is distinguished from /tʃ/ through a 
longer duration and/or allophonic trilling/flapping into a voiceless 
[tr̝] of the latter in Polish.)

Best,
---
Cat Butz (she/they)
HHU Düsseldorf
General Linguistics


Am 2023-05-24 07:41, schrieb Françoise Rose:
> Dear Christian,
> 
> “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.” This is in fact how I have proceeded for Mojeño
> Trinitario (Arawak, Bolivia) to distinguish the bi-phonemic sequence
> /ts/ from the phoneme /ʦ/. Yet this is backed up by phonetics (in
> particular the duration of the fricative part), as shown in the
> following paper.
> 
> Rose, Françoise. 2021. Mojeño Trinitario. _Journal of the
> International Phonetic Association_ (Illustration of the IPA) 1–19.
> (doi:10.1017/S0025100320000365 [1])
> 
> As for your original 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?” I would
> say yes. I use the class “labial consonant” to explain the change
> affecting a vowel following this class of consonant:
> 
> Labialization; {Labial C}{non-front V}{front V} → {Labial
> C}w{a͡e,i}
> 
> Rose, Françoise. 2019. Rhythmic syncope and opacity in Mojeño
> Trinitario. _Phonological data and analysis_ 1(2). 1–25.
> 
> Best,
> 
> Françoise
> 
> De : Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> De la part de
> Christian Lehmann
> Envoyé : mardi 23 mai 2023 15:41
> À : LINGTYP LINGTYP <LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG>
> Objet : Re: [Lingtyp] [ɸ] - [h]
> 
> Dear Miren and everybody,
> 
> 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.
> 
> 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.
> 
> 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?
> 
> Christian
> 
> --
> 
> Prof. em. Dr. Christian Lehmann
> Rudolfstr. 4
> 99092 Erfurt
> Deutschland
> 
> Tel.:
> 
> +49/361/2113417
> 
> E-Post:
> 
> christianw_lehmann at arcor.de
> 
> Web:
> 
> https://www.christianlehmann.eu
> 
> 
> 
> Links:
> ------
> [1] https://doi.org/10.1017/S0025100320000365
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