A Comparative Study on the Approaches of ŋ-distribution and its Analyses

Abstract

The purpose of doing this study is to identify the velar nasal distribution and to explain the phonological phenomena relating to the sequence ng either in words or suffixation from different angles which are based on a harmonic approach. For this, first we consider rule-based analyses such as boundaries (Wolfram and Johnson 1981), a sonority restriction (Roca and Johnson 1999), and lexical levels (Borowsky 1986). However, those showed some limitations of explanation as to the interrelation of g deletion and syllabification closely related to the sequence ng. As an alternative, we examined the constraints-based analyses depending on some constraints such as Max (More-Salient C) >> No Complex Coda >> Max (Less-Salient C) (Lee 1997) or parochial constraint (long([+tense])) and analogical constraint (OO(long, song; ɔ) & OO(long, song; ŋ)), etc. (Green 2001). But those explanations were complicated due to a lack of conciseness as well as either biased towards the deletion of the final consonants or the contexts of vowels occurring before the velar nasal. Therefore, in a harmonic approach, we could explain the issues (g deletion and syllabification of g) relating to the sequence ng more concisely through foot structures in level constructions than through the other analytical methods mentioned.