[Lingtyp] [ɸ] - [h]

Wed May 24 15:19:24 UTC 2023

Hi,

If both [ɯ] and [u] trigger the [h] to [ɸ] change, then I misunderstood and my suggestion is not relevant (I had understood that only  [u] triggered it).

Best,

Jérémy

Jérémy Pasquereau
chargé de recherche — https://jeremy-pasquereau.jimdo.com/
Laboratoire de Linguistique de Nantes (LLING) UMR 6310, CNRS & Nantes Université — https://lling.univ-nantes.fr/

Le 24 mai 2023 à 16:05, Christian Lehmann <christian.lehmann at uni-erfurt.de> a écrit :

Dear Jérémy and everybody,

you are drawing attention to the fact that, no matter whether we call the feature [labial] or [rounded], it is shared by /u/ and /o/. This calls into question the initial assumption:

No labiality or roundedness feature is responsible for [h] becoming [ɸ] before [u]/[ɯ]. What seems to count, instead, is [+high, +back]. However, [ɸ] does not share [+back] with these vowels, and shares [+high] with front vowels, too.

Your solution is that [+high, +back] increases the value of [labial] to [++ labial]. (For both [u] and [ɯ]?)

An alternative approach would be to doubt that [h] -> [ɸ] / __ [u]/[ɯ] is at all a process of assimilation. But what is it then?

Cheers,

Christian

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Am 24.05.2023 um 16:35 schrieb PASQUEREAU Jeremy:
Dear Christian,

I saw your message on LingTyp and, if I understood the issue correctly, it seems to me you may be facing a similar problem as the one I faced a few years ago when describing the phonology of Karata (Nakh-Daghestanian): there’s a phonological rule (C labialization in Karata) that occurs in the context of some rounded vowels (/u/) but not others (/o/). How to discriminate between /u/ and /o/ given that they are both [+round] (or [labial] if using privative features)? I wrote a paper<https://muse.jhu.edu/article/712106> on this where I make the proposal that in at least some languages the labial feature is scalar and therefore phonological rules can make reference to one and not other labial features. Regardless of the analytical innovation I proposed, you may find the paper useful in that it discusses the range of phonetic (articulatory, perceptual) and phonological evidence in favor of distinguishing different degrees of rounding and it also discusses other phonological phenomena that the proposal can be brought to bear on.

Best regards,

Jérémy Pasquereau
chargé de recherche — https://jeremy-pasquereau.jimdo.com/
Laboratoire de Linguistique de Nantes (LLING) UMR 6310, CNRS & Nantes Université — https://lling.univ-nantes.fr/

Le 23 mai 2023 à 14:40, Christian Lehmann <christian.lehmann at uni-erfurt.de><mailto:christian.lehmann at uni-erfurt.de> a écrit :

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<mailto:christianw_lehmann at arcor.de>
Web:    https://www.christianlehmann.eu<https://www.christianlehmann.eu/>
_______________________________________________
Lingtyp mailing list
Lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org<mailto:Lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
https://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/lingtyp

--

Prof. em. Dr. Christian Lehmann
Rudolfstr. 4
99092 Erfurt
Deutschland

Tel.:   +49/361/2113417
E-Post: christianw_lehmann at arcor.de<mailto:christianw_lehmann at arcor.de>
Web:    https://www.christianlehmann.eu<https://www.christianlehmann.eu/>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/lingtyp/attachments/20230524/5a0b5754/attachment.htm>